Leadership Journal 3: Analysis of Leadership Styles and Feedback

This leadership journal reflects on the author's understanding of different leadership styles, including transformational, contingency, charismatic, and situational leadership. The journal details the author's learning journey, discussing the evolution of their leadership definition and insights gaine...Read More

Running Head: LEADERSHIP JOURNAL 3
Leadership- Journal 3
Name of Student:
Name of University:
Author’s Note.

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Introduction
The entire journey of this course has been wonderful for me. In the first two journals I
have discussed about four key style of leadership. These are transformational leadership,
contingency leadership, charismatic leadership & situational leadership. I have always
believed that leader must be able to see or visualize the end state before taking any
managerial decision. I have shared the results of my previous journals with my friend and
asked his opinion. The objective of this paper is to discuss the opinion and comments in
detail. One thing is for sure that I have learned as a part of the feedback process and feedback
system.
Analysis
My definition of leader was that the word ‘leader’ is not confined just to people with
immense power and support at their disposal; but means anyone who inspires and mentors his
companions or colleagues towards a common goal. Thus, the chieftain of a tribe or the
headman of a group of colliers is as much a leader as was Winston Churchill or Mahatma
Gandhi. My friend liked the way I have defined the leadership. He agreed that leadership
could be of a small group or of a large nation. The important thing is that leaders should be
able to take the group forward. My friend suggested that leaders should have a good
relationship with their followers so that leaders can get the work done from the team
members.
The comments and the reactions from my friend suggested that transformational
leadership comes naturally to leaders. It is indeed critical that leaders must learn about the
transformational leadership and various ways of transforming (Breevaart & Bakker, 2014).
However, there are some leaders to whom transformational leadership comes as a natural

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practice. The important thing for leaders is that they must continuously improve their
leadership skills so that they can learn about the contemporary leadership skills.
One of the key things that I have learned from the reactions and comments of my
friend is that charismatic leadership helps leaders to develop a strong positioning about them.
It would be correct to say that leaders are also a brand in itself. Like any other brands, leaders
must also improve their brand positioning and brand value (Derue & Nahrgang, 2011). The
charismatic leaders ensure that they can impress other from their charisma. I strong believe
that charismatic leadership also comes naturally to people (Furnham, 2005). Leaders can
develop and learn various intricacies of leadership. However, they would find it difficult to
learn about the charismatic leadership (Breevaart et al., 2014). My friend also commented
about contingency leadership style. In general, this particular leadership style includes the
prediction of the individual’s behavioural outcome in the future for any particular situation.
The contingency leadership style shows the competency of the leaders under this style, in
balancing the thought process for present as well as future situations (Odhiambo & Hii,
2012).
The last or the fourth leadership style that I discussed was situational leadership style.
My friend suggested that situational style of leadership that has gain importance and
applicability in the current world. My friend suggested that situational leadership style helps
organizational leaders to take the best decision about their organizations (Zehir et al., 2014).
The advantages with situational style of leadership are that it is very dynamic in nature and
with this style of leadership leaders can take the decision without wasting any time. However,
it is important that the decision making should help organizations in long term (Sethuraman
& Suresh, 2014). In an organizatioanl setting, people come across various difficult situations
and therefore situational leadership style is a powerful asset for leaders (Yukl, 2013).

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Conclusion
To conclude the argument, it can be said that the area of leadership is dynamic in
nature and it is important that leaders should work to continuously improve their leadership
skills because in business context, organization would face new and complex business
problems every day.

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References:
Breevaart, K., Bakker, A., Hetland, J., Demerouti, E., Olsen, O. K., & Espevik, R. (2014).
Daily transactional and transformational leadership and daily employee
engagement. Journal of occupational and organizational psychology, 87(1), 138-157.
Derue, D. S., Nahrgang, J. D., Wellman, N. E. D., & Humphrey, S. E. (2011). Trait and
behavioral theories of leadership: An integration and meta‐analytic test of their
relative validity. Personnel psychology, 64(1), 7-52.
Furnham, A. (2005). The psychology of behaviour at work: The individual in the
organization. Psychology Press.
McCleskey, J. A. (2014). Situational, transformational, and transactional leadership and
leadership development. Journal of Business Studies Quarterly, 5(4), 117.
Northouse, P. G. (2015). Leadership: Theory and practice. Sage publications.
Odhiambo, G., &Hii, A. (2012) .Key stakeholders' perceptions of effective school
leadership. Educational Management Administration & Leadership, 40(2), 232-247.
Sethuraman, K., & Suresh, J. (2014). Effective leadership styles. International Business
Research, 7(9), 165.
Yukl, G. (2013). Leadership in Organizations (8th edition). London: Pearson Education
Zehir, C., Müceldili, B., Altindağ, E., Şehitoğlu, Y., & Zehir, S. (2014). Charismatic
leadership and organizational citizenship behavior: The mediating role of ethical
climate. Social Behavior and Personality: an international journal, 42(8), 1365-1375.