Jeff Bezos: Leadership & Amazon's Success

This assignment examines the leadership qualities of Jeff Bezos and their influence on Amazon's achievements. It delves into his transformational leadership style, emphasizing employee development alongside company growth. The analysis considers Bezos's calculated decision-making, risk-taking, problem-solving skills, and his position as a top leader and wealthiest individual due to these attributes.

Leadership in
Organizations

Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
TASK...............................................................................................................................................1
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................4
REFERNCES...................................................................................................................................5

INTRODUCTION
Jeff Bezos is known to be an entrepreneur who has changed the way world use to read
books. He is the one who established the biggest online library from where people could get right
set of books, both in digital as well as in hardcopy. He always dreamt of having a library that can
cater to the needs of people as per their needs and requirements. Whenever they are asked as
what motivates them most, it is always stated to be the need of achieving more and better in their
life. According to the people who have worked with Jeff Bezos, most of them mentioned that he
is very concerned with the goals achievement rate as well as the culture that is prevalent within
organisation (Stone, B., 2013). Today, Amazon is stated to be one of the largest E-retailing firm
which is providing everything to its consumers. It all begin with selling or renting books offline
which later on came online and became a brand name in itself. In this Essay it will be stated as
how Jeff Bezos used different types of leadership styles as to attain what he has today. He has
seen many up’s and down’s in which he showed different type of leadership qualities.
TASK
Leading an organisation, which has a size of Amazon is not easy and not everyone can do it.
There is a requirement of leadership qualities that has to be there as to make sure that a person is
able to show his followers as what he is trying to achieve. This is what Jeff Bezos is capable of
doing. He showed the world exactly what they could not see and do (Jeff Bezos Reveals His No.
1 Leadership Secret, 2017). The concept of Amazon is different and changed the way world use
to shop. Behind this success was Bezos wisdom of doing things that forced people to change and
adapt the Amazonian way of shopping. He is the richest guy in the world though Bill Gates is
still ahead of him but he is the one who surpassed him in last 20 years. There are various theories
related to leading people and first they are the one which have to be understood as to get more
clarity regarding Bezos qualities. The types of leadership theories are stated below:
Trait Theory is stated to be the one which states that a person has all the traits and
qualities of leaders in them. These attributes are there in an individual from their birth and they
can increase them with time and experience (Cohn and Moran, 2011). A Person has some of
innate qualities which makes them an able leader. Basically, this theory puts special focus on
identifying traits that a person has acquired from his birth. It is one of the most common and
popular concept of late 1900 which was based on identification of qualities that are required by
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individuals. To be specific this theory does not state everything about Jeff Bezos, except the fact
that he has certain trait which are mentioned in it.
Behavioural theory came after the trait concept. It was based on the aspect that a leader
has the ability to develop or learn various skills and qualities of leadership. As well as the
behaviour of a leader can be modified making him an individual who can respond to a specific
stimulus in a desired manner. This theory ignores traits and looks at the things which have been
done by leaders (Puccio, Mance and Murdock, 2010). It also analyses the responses that are
given by a leader to a certain situation as to correlate with condition. The practical application of
this theory the impact of leader behaviour upon the performance as well as different behaviours
that would be right in various conditions.
Situational Theory is a concept that has been stated to analyse the response given out by leader in
a certain situation. It is very effective approach as it allows a per in changing his approach
towards an issue and sort them out in a desired manner. This theory of leadership stated that
anyone can be a leader according to the requirement of situation and the person capabilities (The
Mind-Boggling Ascent of Amazon and Jeff Bezos, 2017). This type of leadership is usually
successful in solving small issues or a short term problem. But for long term growth and
development the leader has to approach various issues and problems in a desired manner.
Transformational theory: This is a type of leadership style where a leader works with
subordinates as to find out variances and requirement for changes. He creates a vision from
which he guides other via inspiring them and executing all the tandems with various committed
group members. This type of leadership is focused on boosting motivation, morale as well as the
performance of followers in a way that they are able to attain higher level of objectives in an
easier manner (Izogo and Ozo, 2015). He uses various methods for identifying the sense of
identity in followers, self to a project as well as to the and self to a project as well as to the
collective identify. He inspires people as a role model and tries to improve their weakness and
enhance their performance. This is the theory which is relevant and applicable for Jeff Bezos. He
is a type of leader who is concerned with motivation as well as development of employees who
are working for Amazon.
Transactional theory of leadership is also known as managerial leadership. He is the one
who focuses on supervision, organisation as well as better performance for organisation.
transactional leadership style is stated to be the one that is concerned with compliance by
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followers via rewarding as well as punishing them. these type of leader does not look fo4r
changes and focuses on getting the job done. This is a type of leadership which is highly
effective in a situation where crisis or emergency is going on.
Out of these theories, Transformational as well as behavioural theories are perfect for
Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos. He is focused on training and developing the skills and capabilities of
employees who are employed by the company. He considers this as a task of organisation to
provide opportunity to people so that they can grow with the rise of company. this will bring
more commitment and automatically boost motivation level of people (Murphy and Narkiewicz,
2010). Jeff as a person believe that if a firm has individuals who are capable and willing to learn
more than nothing can stop them from growing and this is why he wants to make Amazon to be
the one example where employee growth and development is taken as a priority task. He is a
dreamer who aims to achieve the vision of being the top retailer in the world. This is also the
reason that he encourages employees to explore their ideas and ensure that they are not left
behind. Jeff Bezos has also stated that everything will be done as per the ethics and values. He is
one of the taxpayers in the country who is paying off each and every buck as to make sure that
Amazon image of being a market leader is maintained. There is various concept that leaders need
to follow and try to avoid.
Disturbed leadership is a concept that has to be avoided by leaders, just like Jeff did in his
life span. A leader has to make sure that they are able to understand issues that concerns their
colleagues and boost their capabilities to a higher level (Wrestling Big Ideas in a Bruising
Workplace, 2017). It is stated that he should not be authoritative and needs to listen to problems
of people as to solve them and boost their motivation level.
Ethical leadership is stated to be a perspective which needs to be followed in order to make
things more effective and efficient. Today, Jeff is one of the top taxpayers and this shows that he
is interest in keeping up with laws and legislation (What Makes Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos Such a
Visionary Leader, 2017). The leaders from present time can learn that issues can be dealt with
fair play instead of forcing way in.
Critical leadership perspective states that a leader has to critically analyse various issues
and problems as to make sure that solution is attained which will solve the problem in a more
effective manner (Why Jeff Bezos Should Care More for Amazon’s Employees, 2017). Jeff is
known for his critical analysis of issues which allows him in sorting them out in a very
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appropriate as well as efficient way. basically this is where most of the leaders make mistake as
they miscalculate their moves and takes wrong decision which impact organisation effectiveness
in long term.
CONCLUSION
Concerning Jeff leadership style, he is more of a democratic leader who listens to people
issues and problems as well as opinions. This allows him in connecting with market and ensures
that all the task is completed in a set period of time. He follows Transformational leadership
style which focuses on development of people as well as company at the same time. basically,
issues need to be cleared on time which is only possible when leaders are making their moves
after calculating them properly. At present, Jeff is one of the top leaders who are also the richest
because of their ability to take risk and dose off problems effectively.
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REFERNCES
Books and Journals
Stone, B., 2013. The everything store: Jeff Bezos and the age of Amazon. Random House.
Cohn, J. and Moran, J., 2011. Why Are We Bad at Picking Good Leaders? A Better Way to
Evaluate Leadership Potential. John Wiley & Sons.
Puccio, G. J., Mance, M. and Murdock, M. C., 2010. Creative leadership: Skills that drive
change. Sage Publications.
Izogo, E. E. and Ozo, J.U., 2015. CRITICAL EVALUATION OF HOW WELL PLACED
AMAZON IS TO SUSTAIN ITS HISTORICAL IN ONLINE RETAILING. British
Journal of Marketing Studies. 3(6). pp.31-42.
Murphy, R. and Narkiewicz, V., 2010. Electronic commerce and the value proposition. The
Journal of Human Resource and Adult Learning. 6(1). p.99.
Online
Wrestling Big Ideas in a Bruising Workplace, 2017. [Online]. Available
through<https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/16/technology/inside-amazon-wrestling-
big-ideas-in-a-bruising-workplace.html?
action=click&pgtype=Homepage&region=CColumn&module=MostViewed&version=
Full&src=mv&WT.nav=MostViewed>.
Why Jeff Bezos Should Care More for Amazon’s Employees, 2017. [Online]. Available
through<https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/22/business/dealbook/why-jeff-bezos-
should-care-more-for-amazons-employees.html>.
What Makes Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos Such a Visionary Leader, 2017. [Online]. Available
through<http://fortune.com/2017/04/14/data-sheet-be-like-jeff-bezos/>.
Jeff Bezos Reveals His No. 1 Leadership Secret, 2017. [Online]. Available
through<https://www.forbes.com/forbes/2012/0423/ceo-compensation-12-amazon-
technology-jeff-bezos-gets-it.html#70990c665227>.
The Mind-Boggling Ascent of Amazon and Jeff Bezos, 2017. [Online]. Available
through<https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/28/your-money/amazon-jeff-bezos.html>.
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