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Leadership Style6

Laissez-Faire Leadership

Choosing the Right Style for the Situation

In business, a leadership style called
"transformational leadership" is often the most effective approach to
use. Transformational leaders have integrity, they inspire people with a shared
vision of the future, they set clear goals and motivate people towards them,
they manage delivery, and they communicate well with their teams. (You can find
out more about transformational leadership at the end of this article.)

However, leadership
is not "one size fits all" thing; often, you must adapt your style to
fit a situation or a specific group. This is why it's useful to gain a thorough
understanding of other leadership styles; after all, the more approaches you're
familiar with, the more tools you'll be able to use to lead effectively.

Let's take a deeper
look at Laissez-Faire Leadership style.

Laissez-Faire Leadership

This French phrase
means "leave it be," and it describes leaders who allow their people
to work on their own. This type of leadership can also occur naturally, when
managers don't have sufficient control over their work and their people.

Laissez-faire leaders
may give their teams complete freedom to do their work and set their own
deadlines. They provide team support with resources and advice, if needed, but
otherwise don't get involved.

This leadership style
can be effective if the leader monitors performance and gives feedback to team
members regularly. It is most likely to be effective when individual team
members are experienced, skilled, self-starters.

The main benefit of
laissez-faire leadership is that giving team members so much autonomy can lead
to high job satisfaction and increased productivity.

The downside is that
it can be damaging if team members don't manage their time well or if they
don't have the knowledge, skills, or motivation to do their work effectively

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