Leadership and Management Theories in Dangote Cement Group

This research paper discusses the various leadership and management theories implemented in the Dangote Cement Group. It provides an overview of the company and its expansion plans. The paper evaluates the appropriateness of the current leadership traits and proposes a theory more suitable to the organizational context. It also explores the different management theories and their impact on the organization.

Running Head: LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT THEORIES
Leadership and Management Theories
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT THEORIES
Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................2
Discussion........................................................................................................................................4
Overview of the Company.......................................................................................................4
The theories of Leadership in Management............................................................................7
Leadership in The Dangote Cement Group...........................................................................10
Leadership qualities required for business expansion...........................................................12
Why participative leadership is important.............................................................................14
Implementing participative leadership in Dangote Cement..................................................17
A collaboration between employees and the management: -................................................19
Evaluating the probable outcomes.........................................................................................20
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................21
Reference.......................................................................................................................................22

2LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT THEORIES
Introduction
According to some of the scholars, leadership is all about creating and establishing a way
for the people to contribute in making the objectives come to reality. An ideal leader drives the
followers towards action and supports them to realize their capabilities so that they can
accomplish their goals. It is quite often that in the larger companies, leaders are appointed to
motivate the employees and raise them as the upholders of the company, while in the smaller
companies, the managers play the role themselves (Anderson and Sun 2017). A clear
understanding of the leadership theories can help an organization to develop leadership skills in
their leaders usually via trainings or recognize the potential leader during the hiring session.
Through the past decades the leadership theories have been the center of attraction for various
studies. The theories are mainly categorized by the aspect of leadership it intends to define the
most such as the Great Man Theory, Contingency Theory, Trait Theory, Transactional Theory,
Behavioral Theory and the Transformational Theories. Around the mid -19th century, the Great
Man Theory evolved. The Great Man Theory suggests that the leadership traits are intrinsic.
It further says that the Great leaders are born and not made. It considers those leaders as
great who are destined to be great leaders. The Trait theory on the other hand states that, people
either acquire or are born with certain traits or qualities that will transform them into great
leaders in future (Patel et al. 2014). The behavioral theory asks to focus on the behaviors of the
leaders which effects the behaviors of the followers too. In short, it claims opposing the Great
Man theory that leaders are made and not born. The contingency theory on the other hand
supports the trait theory and argues that the leadership is based on the situations and there is no
single way of leading in every situation. The transactional theory is better known as the exchange

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leadership theory because through it, a transaction occurs between the followers and the leader. It
supports a mutual beneficial relationship.
The transformational leadership theories state that establishing relationship with other
people increases the percentage of faith and responsibility. In this type of leadership, the leaders
inspire the followers with the charismatic nature and activities. This leadership style enables the
followers to have a deep sense of belongingness with the organization. The present report will
focus on the critical evaluation of the development of leadership and management in the Dangote
Group. The Dangote group is an international conglomerate based in Nigeria. The group was
founded by Aliko Dangote in 1981 and the company has grown up to having 30,000 people
associated with it causing it to generate an excess of US$ 4.1 billion by the year 2017. The
company principally deals in products like Cement, Sugar, Flour, Salt, Steel, Oil and Gas. The
company has recently decided to innovate and expand to the Asian countries as well as in the
European subcontinents. The new CEO Joseph Makoju of the Dangote Cement which is a part of
the Dangote Group is focusing and investing on the expansion policies for better outcomes. The
present report will analyze and evaluate the leadership that is currently being practiced in the
company putting it in a particular framework. The report will further describe the
appropriateness of the leadership traits and propose a theory more suitable to the organizational
context.

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Discussion
Overview of the Company
The Dangote Group is a private Conglomerate founded in the year 1981 holding the
hands of Aliko Dangote. It is considered to be the largest conglomerate specifically in West
Africa and one of the largest companies in the entire continent of Africa. The company began as
a trading body which used to import sugar, rice, cement fish and other useful commodity goods
to be distributed in the Nigerian market. The group expanded since the 1990s to the production
of cements to be distributed across the countries of Africa. The group owns almost 18
subsidiaries which operate in ten countries around Africa (Dangotecement.com 2018). The
Dangote Cement is one of the most effective subsidiary among all the other subsidiaries. It is
listed in the Nigerian Stock Exchange too that has occupied 205 of the total capitalization of the
Stock Exchange. The headquarter of the Dangote Group is situated in Lagos, Nigeria. The
Dangote Cement was founded in the year 1992 and actively engaged in the manufacturing,
preparing, importing, packaging and distributing the cement and other related products across the
countries of Africa.

5LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT THEORIES
The Dangote Cement already has three plants and looks forward for establishing plants in
other 13 African countries along with countries in other continents. The company is recently
investing millions of dollars on building the manufacturing plants and terminals. It also has a
plan to expand in Nepal. According to Businesslive.co (2018), the richest man of Africa known
as Aliko Dangote, the owner of the Dangote Group is planning to accumulate $500 million for
expansion. The new CEO of the Dangote Cement, Mr. Joseph Makoju is apparently the most
initiative leader in terms of expanding the business and has already earmarked almost $350
million for the capital projects in the year 2018. It has been foreseen by the CEO that this
expansion would open new ways of opportunities for the company so that it can increase the
brand familiarity in other countries and receive the competitive edge over the market rival in the
contemporary rivals.

6LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT THEORIES
Image 1 – organizational structure of Dangote Cement
Source – Dangote .com 2018

7LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT THEORIES
The theories of Leadership in Management
There are more than dozens of existing leadership theories and each one has a close
relationship with the business management. However, there are five leadership theories which
are considered as the most concrete theories including the transactional, transformational,
contingency, trait based and situational (Sumitha and Padmaja 2017). It has been found that the
leadership styles affect people in many ways and the leadership skills are important for the
business organizations. The leadership theories and how they affect the employees in an
organization, both positively and negatively can craft the message on how to motivate and
inspire the team.
The Trait Theory
The trait theory believes that people do inherit certain qualities or traits which make them
suitable to leadership in a better way. According to the trait theories, a particular behavioral
characteristic is identified that is shared by the leaders. Taken for example, there are traits such
as extroversion, courage self-confidence is on the list which can be positively linked with great
leaders (Neary 2016). However, it is also true that there are people who never seek for the
position of leadership but occupy such qualities. In contrast, there are also leaders who do not
possess such qualities still are effectively leading enterprises.
The contingency Theory
The Contingency theories on the other hand concentrate on the specific variables related
to particular environment which might determine which kind of leadership would be perfect for a

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specific situation. Scholars suggest that effective leadership is not about certain qualities inherent
in the leader, rather it is about maintaining a right balance between the needs, behaviors and the
context. A true leader can easily assess the needs of the followers, take hold of the ad verse
situation and mold their behaviors accordingly. The attainment of success depends on the
qualities of the followers, the aspects of the situation and the leadership style of the leader.
The Situational Theory
According to the situational theories, the leaders select the appropriate course of action
founded on the type of situation. There are different styles of leadership which are most suitable
for the decision making in certain scenarios. Taken for example, in a situation where there is no
time for prolonged decision making and the leader is the most knowledgeable person, the
autocratic leadership is the most suitable here. On the other hand, when the group members will
be found to be more skilled experts, the most appropriate style would be the democratic style.
The Transactional Theory
The transactional theory believes in maintaining the operations in the organization in a
normal flow. The transactional leadership is also referred to as “keeping the ship afloat”. The
transactional leaders make use of the array of incentives in order to motivate the employees
along with a disciplinary power. The term “transactional “refers to the fact that this type of
leadership essentially inspires the subordinates or the followers by setting rewards for their
performances (Mesu, Sanders and Riemsdijk 2015). The leaders who follow the transactional
leadership usually look ahead strategically in order to guide the organization towards market
leadership. It rather focuses on the smooth conduction of business operations without any
hindrance.

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The Transformational Theory
The transformational leadership theory supports going beyond the management of day –
to day operations and designs innovative strategies for the upliftment of the company. The
leaders who follow this leadership theory take the performance and success of the organization to
a different level. The work process of the transformational leaders starts with setting particular
business goals, team building collaboration with the motivated employees at various levels of the
organization. The subordinates in the organization are motivated by incentives and other
opportunities for personal and professional growth of the employees.
The Autocratic Leadership
The autocratic leadership is also known as the authoritarian leadership. These type of
leaders provide a clear description of what is to be done, when it should be done and how it is to
be done. In this kind of management style, a single person has all the control of the organization
and takes nominal inputs from other members of the group. The autocratic leaders usually make
choices based on their own knowledge and beliefs and rarely involve others for their advice or
suggestions.
The Participative Leadership
The participative leadership is better known as the democratic leadership. It is a method
that involves all the team members in order to identify the important goals along with the
developing strategies and way to achieve the business objectives. In terms of this, the
participative leadership style can be referred to as a style that depends primarily on functioning
as a group. The members of the team are assigned to a particular task and specific goals are set

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for them. This is a type of leadership which can be useful in business settings, volunteer setting
and also at home.
The Delegative Leadership
The delegative leadership or the Laissez-faire leadership is a different type of leadership
in which the leaders takes his hands out of the business decision making and allows the group
members to take important decisions. The scholars have found out that it is generally that kind of
leadership which results in degraded productivity in the business and the organization
consequently lags behind. However, this kind of leadership has its own benefits and drawbacks
too. There are certain situations where this kind of leadership works suitably.
Image 2- Comparison between types of leadership
Source – (Mesu, Sanders and Riemsdijk 2015)

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The Management Theories
The management theories are a specific set of rules that are supposed to guide the
managers to control and organize a firm. These theories assist the employees in relating between
the business goals and implementing effective ways of achieving those goals. Among these
theories the administrative management theories, the behavioral theories and the bureaucratic
theories are the most important.
The Administrative Management Theories
The administrative theory of Henri Fayol who is considered as the father of management
generated few principles related to management. These are equity, division of work, discipline,
authority and responsibility, esprit de corps, initiative, stability of Tenure, Subordination of
Individual Interest to General Interest, centralization, unity of command, scalar chain,
remuneration and unity of direction.
The Bureaucratic Theory of Management
Max Weber made a difference between power and authority. He believed that power
demands obedience by applying force that compels the individuals to follow the rules. Weber
delineates three types of power in the organizational context. These are the Charismatic Power,
the Traditional Power and the Bureaucratic Power or Legal Power. Some of the features of
Bureaucracy are division of labor, management by rules, formal relations, importance of legal
power, formal hierarchical structure, and technical expertise based on selection.
The Behavioral Theory of Management

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The famous management scholar Elton Mayo claimed that the multiplied productivity is
the result of the psychological stimulus. When the employees are involved, singled out and made
feel important, it reflects on their productivity. Hence, the way the employees are being treated
leaves huge impact on their personality and performance.
Leadership in The Dangote Cement Group
The current leadership style in the Dangote Cement Group is the Autocratic Leadership
style hat is equivalent to the dictatorship or authoritarian approach. The employees of the
organization follow the orders of their leaders and without questioning about the rationale of
such instruction do their duty. This leadership style is primarily based on Douglas McGregor’s
Theory X which views the employees as lazy and work disliking and accepts the concept that
they try to avoid work whenever they get chances. Hence, this theory has advocated a
comprehensive control on the employees and a close supervision which is supported by a
hierarchical structure along with a narrow span of control.
Advantages
The autocratic leadership style in the company establishes a chain of command with high
involvement of the leader in all departments of operations. It has led to a formation of spoken
and hub type of organizational structure which is useful in many ways, such as:
 The operations are don quickly since decisions are made quickly.
 The logistics and communication are improved
 In the external environment, there is better response to change

13LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT THEORIES
 A more coordinating approach regarding the fulfillment of organizational goals are put
forth
 The problems are anticipated in advance and there is a better realization of the
consequences of the action on various departments
It is a kind of short –term or quick-fix approach to the management. The ability in the leader
of the Dangote Cement group to decide faster has led to multiplied productivity and success of
the organization worldwide. It has been found that this kind of leadership survives the most since
it is naturally associated with most of the leaders.
 It has worked as an ideal method for the company to develop fast and it has also
advocated an ideal method to promote high performance of the employees. It is also said
to have the ability to get the operations done without slacking. In the Dangote Cement
company which is under the autocratic leadership, there are less number of
administrat8ve levels which have to be kept informed regarding each of the management
decisions. It is because the leader is in the charge of all operations. Only the leader is
responsible for weighing the pros and the cons of any activity.
 Since there are multiple levels of departments in the organization, a command from
higher levels of management helps the employees to work in a straightforward way. The
confusion n the communication is eliminated by the autocratic leadership because the
command goes straight from the leader to the subordinates.
 The productivity of the Dangote Cement has been improved a lot since the leader is able
to move the information around the entire organization as fast as possible. The
productivity does not get delayed by the quick moves. The employees do not get the
chance to stop their projects as they receive communications and decisions from their

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leaders on time. The work environment of the organization Dangote Cement has been
positively impacted due to this kind of leadership.
 The employee stress is also reduced by such leadership style because there is a greater
mass of employees who like to work in a work environment where there is a particular
goal fixed for them and they are expected to work according to that. In the Dangote
Cement company even the creative employees also support the autocratic style of their
leader. They consider that their leader is like the captain of a ship and every decision
from the leader is their responsibility to support.
Image 3- Autocratic Leadership

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Source -(Kuron et al. 2015)
Management qualities required for business expansion
Since the Dangote Cement company has decided to expand the business in other
countries beyond Nigeria and get the global customers too, these are few of the characteristics
the leader of the company must follow for desired outcomes. With the growth of the business,
the leadership style and the working style might need to change. It is said that the true leaders
help themselves and make others follow him in doing the right deeds. The leaders set the
directions, establish an inspiring vision and create something innovative. There are certain skills
required of a leader to lead the employees in helping the business expansion.
 The leader has to be realistic, attract8ve and convincing and equally depictive so that he
can show the subordinates what the business is going through and where it needs to go. A
clear vision shared among the employees having involved them in the discussion s and
decision making would be helpful. In this manner, the employees would know how they
need to work or adjust according to the change in the organization.
 The communication is considered to be the key element in the business management. The
flow of information between the employees and the leaders have to be transparent and
strong. The communication, both internally with the member of the organization and
externally with the stakeholders will be useful to know if there are other suggestions or
opinions from the other sides that might open new ways for the organization. The
communicative skill of the leader has to be strong.
 The leader need to have the capability to motivate and inspire the employees of the
organization. When an organization decides to adopt some change in their operations, it
is likely that the employees would not be completely ready to accept the change or might

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struggle to adjust with the change. Since the Dangote Cement group is on the verge of
expanding the business, there are high chances that so many operational or functional
changes would come along and the employees would find it difficult to suddenly switch
to something other at once. Here, the leader has to go down to the level of the employees,
know and understand their difficulties and motivate them to accept the change along with
resolving the matter as much as possible.
As stated earlier in this report, Dangote Cement is now considering a mammoth
expansion across the Asian and European countries. Dangote Cement in the leadership of Joseph
Makoju is constantly looking to expand in the different parts of world. However, the vision
might face some barriers surprisingly from the leadership style of its current CEO. Joseph
Makoju is an autocratic leader (Anderson and Sun 2017). An autocratic leadership style does
exist in some parts of world like China (Yang, Kitchen and Bacouel-Jentjens 2017). However, it
may not be an ideal preference of a CEO for many contemporary professionals. Millennials in
particular are getting diverted from traditional leadership being practiced in organizations. The
reason for this deviation is perhaps the motivation, which the contemporary professionals look in
everything they are associated to.
These are active professionals. They are no longer the passive people. Millennials in
particular want to get involved in the process rather than observing it from a distance (Kuron et
al. 2015). This brief information of a contemporary workplace indicates that autocratic leaders
are not acceptable universally. Considering this as a fact, the leadership style at Dangote Cement
needs a transformation into another but a most feasible leadership style. With regards to this, the
“Participative Leadership” style appears to be the most suitable. Participative leadership

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encourages an input from all, which is almost opposite to an autocratic leadership that
encourages a very minimal input of the others.
Why participative leadership is important
There are a lot of advantages of having participative leadership in organizations.
Nevertheless, these benefits should definitely contribute to the long-term vision of this company.
In this section a few of these benefits would be discussed to identify how these will benefit
Dangote Cement. Participative leadership can positively affect the morale at the workplace. A
positive morale at the workplace is essential to enhance employee engagement in the company.
Employee engagement has become an integral part of contemporary organizations. It is now one
of the areas of concern for contemporary managers. An increased input in the form of training
and development, rewards and recognition, fun session, and a lot more is now practiced to
enhance employee participation in organizational process (Huang et al. 2016). It is increasingly
becoming a fact that employee engagement is an integral part of organizations. Until and unless
there is a connectivity between an employee and the organization, there would be limited or less
motivation to work. This is one of the reasons why a positive morale is essential to
organizational practice. Hence, participative leadership style being proposed to Dangote Cement
can be a good choice to adapt to.
An improved team environment is another benefit of a participative leadership.
Participative leadership is the most suitable for a team-oriented workplace. In a team-oriented
workplace, the response to participative leadership is higher. Such leaders encourage employees
to come up together and add valuable suggestions to a decision. Employees under such leaders
receive ample of opportunity to participate in the decision-making process. When such thing
happens employees develop the attitude that they are valuable to organization. Additionally, they

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are encouraged to participate in the decision-making process. It gives rise to a participative work
environment. In such environment when they collaborate during a project, their behaviors and
activities reflect a participative culture (Mesu, Sanders and Riemsdijk 2015). With regard to
Dangote Cement, a positive work environment is important because the company is now in
constant expansion to different markets. The company would never want a high employee
turnover during this period. An increasingly growing employee turnover can affect the employee
strength needed to accomplish the vision. They would rather look to improve the employee
retention rate.
Innovation is often common with a culture of a participative leadership. In such
environment, employees are build up in trust that their ideas will not be thrown into the debris
but would be considered on a serious note. Their ideas would actually be implemented if found
to be effective and feasible to organizational practice. Adding to this, some companies even go to
an extent that they reward the person to come up with the best ideas. Employees those who are
entrepreneurial-minded can work and wish to work in a participative culture. In this culture, they
make an appropriate use of their creativity and innovation skills without going for a risk by
applying these in a business. In regards to Dangote Cement, it is important that the company
encourages and retains people who are rich in creative minds. They rather find some ways to
help their employees explore their hidden creativity. This could probably be done through
development programs being held on a routine basis, and by recruiting fresh and creative talents
(Imran and Tanveer 2015).

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Image 4- Participative leadership
Source – (Neary 2016)
Brainstorming is another good thing that could be encouraged in organizations with
participative leadership approach. Brainstorming is increasingly becoming a part of
organizational practice. Brainstorming means putting efforts to generate a range of creative ideas
to solve a problem. With this definition, it can be said that brainstorming is key to the success of
a business. In the era of the fourth industrial revolution, technologies have become factor of
competency. It has created competition between companies for bringing in the best and
innovative technology. Brainstorming is a way to promote and enhance employee engagement
by asking for their feedbacks and creative ideas (Yang, Kitchen and Bacouel-Jentjens 2017).
Employee engagement is essential to keep employees motivated to their work. Brainstorming
promotes the teamwork, which is itself a good thing for many reasons like the cultural
integration. Brainstorming sessions are good ways to generate creative ideas. This is also how an

20LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT THEORIES
innovative idea is created. Brainstorming sessions can actually be used promote innovation in
organizations (Michinov et al. 2015).
In context to Dangote Cement, brainstorming sessions should be encouraged in the
company. This will help to bring in innovative ideas and solutions to a range of problems. Such
creative ideas will help to keep the expansion process going on. This will also help to resolve the
problems while being into the expansion process. Ever since the inception of the new CEO
Joseph Makoju, Dangote Cement is in constant expansion related talks. In addition, it must also
have the work environment that is exciting and engaging to employees. Moreover, a majority of
employees should have reasons to stay here in this company for a longer period of time. The
work environment that is required to promote and facilitate brainstorming sessions need a
managerial intervention in the form of participative leadership style (Michinov et al. 2015). A
participative work environment would encourage employees to explore their creative thoughts.
And since their thoughts will be given a value, they will feel connected and engaged to the
process. It is needleless to say that the work environment apart from basic employment needs to
employees is an emerging trend. Millennials in particular are more in favor of such workplace
(Kuron et al. 2015).
To summarize, what all have been understood from the advantages of a participative
leadership, it appears as if that participative leadership in contrast to the existing autocratic
leadership in Dangote Cement is essential to its future business.
Implementing participative leadership in Dangote Cement
It is being advised and also being found from the benefits of participative leadership style
that the current CEO at Dangote Cement should adapt to participative leadership approach. It is
needed to accommodate the changes required in the leadership practice to support the huge

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global expansion of Dangote Cement. It is also a fact that true leaders should exhibit a variety of
leadership styles under diverse circumstances. Indeed, one leadership approach cannot be called
a universal approach. Considering the strategy to expand to the Asian and European countries, it
is now important for the CEO of Dangote Cement to promote a participative leadership.
However, an implementation of the suggested leadership approach might face some barriers
from within the organization. Hence, it is of primary importance to identify whether participative
leadership approach is feasible with Dangote Cement. The feasibility checks and other important
factors concerning its implementation is being discussed below (Ghaffari et al. 2017):
Financial Feasibility: - An organization wide implementation of participative leadership
will require a financial commitment from the management specifically from the stakeholders. A
leader of participative approach encourages employees to participate in different organizational
processes like decision-making, problem-solving, brainstorming to generate creative ideas, and
others. However, without any motivation towards a participative work environment it is difficult
to facilitate and encourage employee participation into organizational processes. For example,
employees will feel encouraged to provide their valuable feedbacks to the management if they
are assured of that their feedbacks will be given a serious concern (Kuron et al. 2015). They will
be motivated to such acts at large. In a similar way, monetary and non-monetary benefits are also
regarded as one of the highest values to employees. If they are provided with these benefits apart
from their basic pay, many of them will start appreciating their employer. And if they also get a
cooperative work environment, they will certainly rate it high. Nonetheless, work flexibility is a
rising concern among contemporary employees especially among the “Millennials” (Kuron et al.
2015).

22LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT THEORIES
Human Resource Feasibility: - This is perhaps one of the most vital parts of this
proposal to implement participative leadership style in Dangote Cement. There is a need to have
people who all can contribute to the vision of the new CEO of Dangote Cement. This will be
served by existing people who are both skilled and are a positive learner of innovation. For this
to happen, it is important that employee turnover remains steady or follows a declining trend. If
this could happen this will ensure the retention of employees who are skilled and have gained
sufficient experience in working with Dangote Cement. In otherwise case, situation could be
worse as well. There would be the need to roll out a fresh recruitment process to attract and
select skilled professionals. A retention of these newly selected professionals will still remain a
challenge. With regard to employee retention, it is important that the level of job satisfaction is
high. Employees may have varied range of choices for job satisfaction; however, a majority of
them will agree to a few things. These are (Sumitha and Padmaja 2017):
 Work pressure should be justifiable
 Employees should have prospects for career growth
 Work-life balance is one of the essentials
 Motivations in the form of monetary and non-monetary benefits should exist
 A fair and transparent appraisal at the end of each year should also be a part of
employment
These all pieces of information just suggest that there is a need for a change along with the HRM
practices. This will prevent Dangote Cement from losing its quality performers as this may badly
affect the global expansion of the company.

23LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT THEORIES
A collaboration between employees and the management: -
This is one of the essentials of implementing participative leadership style in Dangote
Cement. Indeed, a collaboration is needed, so that, a participative environment is applied
universally. An interaction between the management and employees must be increased. Frequent
meetings on different agendas should be held. In such meetings, employees must be allowed to
share their honest feedbacks. They should feel free to exchange their views of management.
Managers can utilize these meetings to prepare a database noting down the common issues being
faced by employees. Additionally, critical cases must be given a double chance such as through
one-on-one discussion (Imran and Tanveer 2015). These feedbacks should be applied to practice
if being found feasible to the company. In this way, management will give values to employee’s
feedbacks. Moreover, this will strengthen the relationship of trust between managers and
employees. This is what is hardly found in several number of companies across the globe. By
doing just simpler things, management can develop a good collaboration with employees.
In context to Dangote Cement, the work pressure is expected to be high during the entire
journey of expansion. The expansion will create additional work pressure on the management,
financial, and the human resource team (Ghaffari et al. 2017). The management during all these
period will need to be excessively involved in identifying new management strategies, and
interacting with employees to seek their feedbacks. The finance team will have additional work
to take care especially during the year end time. The human resource team in a same way will be
looking to introduce new activities to enhance employee engagement. Moreover, fresh
recruitment process will also increase (Huang et al. 2016). Employees especially the experienced
ones will be asked to perform extra works. Considering all these pieces of additional work

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pressure, it can be said that a trusted collaboration between employees, and the entire
management team is of utmost needs to Dangote Cement.
Evaluating the probable outcomes
Since, participative leadership is dependent heavily on input from employees, and other
stakeholders, a range of benefits can be obtained with it. This can be used to produce new ideas
or introduce different and new methods for solving problems (Businesslive.co 2018).
An international expansion can face several barriers of expansion. These barriers can be
fought with participative leadership. For example, local competition is one of the most common
barriers to a successful expansion in the international markets (Neary 2016). To compete with
local competitors, it is primarily important to identify the purchasing behavior of local people to
be able to offer relevant products at best offers. Normally, secondary data of competing
companies are available on the internet resources but still it is more valuable to be adaptable with
the local culture. An online survey can help in this regard. In addition, taking the help from local
consultants, and recruiting from local resource will also help at large (Patel et al. 2014). Local
professionals will be more comfortable with local culture at workplace. Local culture will also
help to retain these professionals. Hence, the very important local culture can be created in many
ways such as by implementing the feedbacks of local professionals regarding the organizational
practices. Indeed, participative work environment will generate the much-needed feedbacks of
employees. It is because they will feel free to share things, which they want to be implemented in
the organizational settings (Anderson and Sun 2017). It is, therefore, evident that participative
leadership can actually provide solidity to the workforce at the global level.
In context to operations in Asian and European markets, innovation will hold the key to
perform and sustain. There should be enough reasons to prefer a foreign company over the

25LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT THEORIES
locals. Innovation can create such reasons. It is to be noted that innovation excel best with the
workforce who are expertise in creative thoughts. Hence, this also supports a fact that
participative leadership is one of the future needs to Dangote Cement.
Conclusion
To conclude, this can be said that the CEO of Dangote Cement, Joseph Makoju, should
adapt to participative leadership. This will help the company to excel in innovation, which is
now key to operate at the global level. However, the CEO must have solutions to counter act the
barriers to implementing participative leadership. Joseph Makoju should focus on areas, which
have been highlighted in this report as potential barriers to creating participative leadership.
Participative work environment can potentially help Dangote Cement to expand successfully and
sustain business in Asian and European markets.

26LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT THEORIES
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