The significance of leadership at the workplace cannot be denied as it not only just helps in framing an effective group but it also helps in binding them together and for making continuous efforts for accomplishing desired goals on behalf of the organization. Leadership is an integral part of the organization. The leader and his approach not only help the team to walk on the showed path but also showcases the opportunities to the whole team through which walking on the same path for every team member can generate positive outcomes. Therefore, leadership is an important concept for every organization in terms of accomplishment of the tasks in an effective manner. There are a number of leadership approaches available in the business context and every approach has its own significance which is used in different situations for addressing the unique set of challenges (Bhasin, 2017).
In this essay, two leadership approaches will be discussed, contrasted and compared to determine the effectiveness and significance of leadership approaches in the workplace. Leaders should be capable enough to analyse the significance of leadership approaches along with determining the perfect time to implement the appropriate leadership approach as per the requirement of the situation. The major advantages of leadership approach for the organization are that deals effectively with the situation along with generating positive outcomes, helps in reaching to the set mission and vision. Leadership creates a positive impact on organizational success and growth. Thus, roles of leaders have been given priority in order to manage the organizational tasks along with managing the human resources to perform those tasks in an expected manner.
Figure 1: Difference between charismatic and transformational leader
Leadership refers to the ability of an individual in terms of leading and convincing a group of people to believe in the leader’s vision. Another crucial duty of a leader is to position the right person in the right position for accomplishing the tasks and to gain positive outcomes.
However, leaders also need to face criticism from his own subordinates sometimes but as the primary element for an effective leader is being positive in all sorts of situations which transforms the negative situations at the workplace into positive and effective ones. Effective leadership is considered as the lynchpin for a successful organization and in the context to the leadership approaches, it has been observed that it is the duty of leaders to motivate, guide and direct the employees towards the appropriate direction so that their efforts could be moulded in order to attain desired goals and objectives. Coordination, teamwork and workforce diversity are some of the major requirements for every organization in order to move towards sustainable growth and overall development. With regards to this, leaders are held accountable for guiding and directing the employees to develop and maintain an effective workplace environment where all employees could feel safe, secure and satisfied (McCleskey, 2014).
Above discussed elements are some of the necessary aspects of all leadership theories and in this scenario, transformational and charismatic leadership approaches hold true as their applicability in the modern workplaces is more effective than other leadership styles. The leaders who have adopted any of these leadership theories or both of them have lead towards growth and development. According to the modern business environment and requirement, transformational and charismatic leadership approaches are considered as the most effective approaches as these approaches not only helps the leaders to attain goals but these approaches also act effectively in dealing with the challenges of modern business environment (Banks, et. al., 2016).
According to transformational leadership approach, leader works along with his teammates in order to determine the requirement of change and the place where change is required in order to create a vision to guide the change by inspiration, as well as by executing the change by walking along with the teammates in order to originate adequate techniques to gain positive outcomes. On the other side, charismatic leadership is considered as the perfect approach to motivate employees along with giving them adequate support for boosting up their morale in order to encourage them for performing the assigning duties in an appropriate manner. In this leadership style, followers treat their leaders as the role model as the qualities of a leader inspires the subordinates (Tepper, et. al., 2018). For building up trust amongst the employees with regards to the qualities and decisions taken by the leader, it is necessary for the leader to showcase the effectiveness. Thus, it is said that a leader should always be confident in his work and the approaches followed by him to tackle the situations. Thus, it could be said that both transformational and charismatic leadership approaches have their own significance and leaders implement each of the approaches as per the situation (ST. Thomas University, 2018).
Apart from this, the transformational leadership approach is considered as the advanced version of the charismatic approach because both are interrelated at some point. It has been evaluated that in charismatic leadership approach, leaders were focused on customer satisfaction but the transformational leaders focus on both sides i.e. satisfaction of customers as well as their employees. Ultimately, transformational leadership is considered very effective in many contexts. For example, if an entrepreneur wants to take his start-up to a large extent, it is necessary to implement transformational leadership approach because, for a start-up, it is necessary to appoint the employees along with retaining them for a longer period of time. It is said by few business experts that transformational leaders have the ability to inspire.
On the other hand, charismatic leaders are known for generating positive and higher outcomes rather in comparison to other types of leaders. The major difference analysed between these two approaches is that charismatic leadership approach only focuses on enhancing organizational performance whereas the transformational leadership approach focuses on increasing productivity for employees by them appropriate training and development sessions for fulfilment of organizational goals and for enhancing customer satisfaction, adopting new and unique measures to fulfil employees’ demands to enhance their satisfaction along with retaining them for longer period of time in order to move towards suitable growth and overall development.
For example, one of the most effective leaders of this era is Jeff Bezos, CEO, and founder of Amazon Inc. It is the largest internet retailer and it operates in more than 188 countries across the globe. In his initial times, Jeff Bezos was acting as an autocratic leader due to which he faces huge criticism from his employees and colleagues and some of his decisions were also went against the company’s goals which resulted as the huge losses for the organization (Breevaart, et. al., 2014). After realising the fact that the adopted leadership approach is affecting business’ performance, Jeff Bezos quickly transformed his approach and adopted transformational leadership approach in order to reach towards the desired goals of the organization resulted in gaining trust and loyalty from the employees. Today, Amazon stands on the 7th position as the largest companies in the UK. (Engelen, et. al., 2015). As a transformational leader, Jeff is also known as the charismatic leader as well because when he deals with his employees, he uses transformational leadership approach and while dealing with the customers, he implemented charismatic leadership approach in order to gain positive outcomes (Ellyatt, 2018).
Thus, both the approaches are known for creating a fascinating vision for the future and through this, transformational leaders easily create their positive and impressive persona across their surroundings. Jeff Bezos links the company’s long term goals and the personal values of the employees in order to generate interest amongst them to move towards the vision of the organization. With this regard, Jeff Bezos has an adequate set of vision and mission which encourages his subordinates to generate new and innovative ways to perform the assigned tasks (Hoch, et. al., 2018). By this manner, Amazon is continuously moving towards sustainable growth and overall development. Apart from this, Jeff Bezos’ innovative approach has helped both his subordinates and the organization to continuously rise up in the market along with gaining the competitive advantage over existing companies. Jeff Bezos’ leadership style is a mixture of both transformational and charismatic leadership approach and it has helped the organization to sustain in the dynamic and competitive business environment, retaining key and talented employees with the organization along with introducing new products and services to enhance customer satisfaction.
In the last few decades, the growth rate of Amazon has been increased at a very fast pace and the major reason behind the organizational success is the adaptation of the customer-centric approach (Hartung, 2013). Jeff Bezos thinks that the primary factor for sustaining in the competitive business environment is fulfilling customers’ demands along with retaining their interest in the organization by giving them huge choices with regards to their demands and wants. This thinking style is influenced by both transformational as well as charismatic leadership styles and with regards to this, all employees along with him always seek for innovation through which new products and services could be offered to the consumers with the objective of retaining their interest in the organization along with enhancing the customer base (Schmitt, Den Hartog & Belschak, 2016).
Both the approaches are considered as effective leadership approaches and both are regularly practiced in the modern business environment in order to deal with different business scenarios. These leadership approaches are concerned as the technique of encouraging some standard set of behaviours through appropriate communication methods along with persuasion and force of personality. Charismatic leaders and the transformational leaders are known for their convincing ability which is used for getting the things done by others in the required manner.
Apart from this, charismatic leaders offer all sort of resources and training to its teammates in order to motivate them for creating new ways for accomplishing the tasks and the charismatic leadership approach only focuses on improving organizational performance, thus, employees are left dissatisfied which leads to increase labour turnover whereas, transformational leaders provide training measures to its employees in order to boost up their efficiency for the objective of enhancing both organizational as well as employees’ productivity along with focusing on increasing customer satisfaction. Charismatic leaders are found good communicators with effective influencing verbal skills through which they set up a positive and reliable image amongst its teammates.
Apart from this, charismatic leaders are also known for their distinct ability to dissect and decipher any sort of inefficiency within the workplace. These elements make a charismatic leader effective and reliable and it results in the generation of critical thinking which is mainly used for generating various ways to deal with a situation and this also creates differences between charismatic leadership approach and transformational and other leadership approaches (Teamwork Definition, 2017). Thus, it could be said that both the leadership approaches have their own significance and both could be implemented at modern workplaces but while comparing both the approaches, transformational leadership is more effective as it helps in satisfaction of both customers as well as employees (Mittal & Dhar, 2015). There are the number of similarities between transformational and charismatic leadership approach as a transformational leader is also considered as the charismatic leader because roots of transformational leaders are somewhere connected with the charismatic leader.
This could also be verified with the live example of Jeff Bezos as his style of leadership is a mixture of both transformational as well as charismatic leadership approach. The motive of the transformational leader is to transform the whole organization in all aspects in order to attain desired goals while charismatic leaders could be satisfied with the status quo (Shamir, Arthur & House, 2018). In the real world of business, very few leaders are found with both transformational as well as charismatic leadership approaches. Steve Jobs, a well-known leader of a behemoth brand i.e. Apple Inc. was also an effective leader and his style of leadership could also be considered as the mixture of both transformational as well as a charismatic leadership style. He had demonstrated an ability to inspire his employees and with regards to this, he had been able to take his employees along with himself and the organization up in the dynamic and competitive business environment.
Later on, the organization has made its name to be counted in the top ten most valuable companies across the world. This achievement proves the effectiveness of Steve Jobs and as the result; he has been able to mark its position on the top in the list of most effective leaders across the globe. There is another example of an effective leader i.e. Jeff Bezos and his leadership style could also be taken as the mixture of both transformational and charismatic leadership style. He could be taken as an effective charismatic leader as he is enthusiastic and self-confident. This has made him the person with an attractive personality and by his actions; he influences people around him to walk on the directed path (Oreg & Berson, 2015). Charismatic leaders have been identified with five basic characteristics such as they have the vision, ability to express that vision, willingness to take risks to attain vision, a sense of knowledge towards both environmental as well as target audience’s needs and unique behaviour which makes them unique from ordinary people. These elements create difference amongst the charismatic and transformational leaders. This helps the leaders to develop their reliable and positive image in the organization and the employees, thus, attainment of desired goals and objectives for the organization becomes an easy task. Following are two common elements of Jeff Bezos’ and Steve Jobs’ leadership style which proves that they both are transformational as well as a charismatic leader:
Idealised influence: This is considered as the basic capacity of the leader which proves him both positive and moral role model for its followers. Everyone cannot be a leader as they do not have substantial qualities of being an effective leader. Steve Jobs is another big example of an effective leader with effective leadership approaches to lead and guide its subordinates in order to enhance their skills along with the objective of making appropriate utilisation of the available resources in order to attain desired goals (Sacavém, et. al., 2017).
Inspirational motivation: Big leaders such as Steve Jobs, Jeff Bezos, etc. always believes motivation is the primary factor for inspiring subordinates as well as junior level employees so that desired goals could be accomplished. Steve Jobs was efficient enough to guide their employees along with this; he was capable enough to manage to retain them with the organization for a longer period of time. This resulted in Apple to become the leading manufacturer of smartphones in the global market. In the same manner, Jeff Bezos who is also known as the most effective leader of this era has utilised his strengths to the optimum level through which his dream has come true of selling everything over the internet. Jeff Bezos has a unique capability of analysing the quality of an employee and this shows the effectiveness of a true leader. On the basis of employees’ efficiency and knowledge, tasks are assigned in the organization in order to reach towards the desired vision of being the earth’s most customer-centric company. Apart from this, there is another great skill which plays a key role in making a leader effective enough to develop positive relations with his employees and teammates i.e. communication skills. The primary reason for the rapid growth and development of Amazon is the interpersonal skills of Jeff Bezos. He always believes that employees are a crucial part of the organization and as it is necessary also for the objective of encouraging them towards the attainment of organizational desired goals (Menges, et. al., 2015).
References:
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