Mark Zuckerberg's Leadership Style: An Analysis of Facebook's CEO

This report examines the leadership style of Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook, analyzing his application of various leadership approaches including autocratic, democratic, laissez-faire, and transformational leadership. It highlights how Zuckerberg blends these styles to manage Facebook, discussing his decision-making processes, employee interactions, and the impact of his leadership on the company culture. The report also explores his digital leadership characteristics, emphasizing his visionary approach, customer orientation, and ability to adapt to the digital age. It references sources that support the analysis of his leadership qualities, risk-taking behaviors, and business acumen. The conclusion emphasizes Zuckerberg's inspirational role and the success he has achieved through a performance-based approach and a free work culture.

Leadership Style of
Mark Zuckerberg,
CEO of Facebook
Name of the Student:
Name of the University
Author Note:

Birth of Facebook
• Launched on 4th February, 2004.
• Started with students of Harvard
college and slowly became
popular worldwide.
• Currently has 2.37 billion active
Brief
Overvie
w:
Faceboo
k

Increase in
employee
numbers
in
Facebook
since
2004. Illustration 1: Employees in Facebook
Source: Statista (2020)

Mark
Zuckerbe
rg
Mark Zuckerberg has shown a mixture of
different leadership styles:
 Autocratic leadership
 Democratic leadership
 Laissez-Faire leadership
 Transformational leadership (Quesnell 2018)
A mixture of
leadership
styles

Examples of
leadership
for
Zuckerberg
 Known for making executive decisions.
 Believes that he takes decisions for
company benefit.
 Board is not always involved (George and
Migdal 2018).
 Gives him the opportunity to fight hard
times with hard decisions.
Autocratic
leadership

Examples of
leadership
for
Zuckerberg
 He takes continuous feedback from colleagues
and workers.
 He used the feedbacks for making the user
experience better (Zuckerberg and King Jr.
2018).
 maintaining their vision of ensuring better
connection through the world.
Democratic
Leadership

Examples of
leadership
for
Zuckerberg
 Provides a free work environment.
 Workers are allowed make changes in
Facebook layout.
 He trusts and relies on his employees.
 Treats employees as colleagues.
Laissez-faire
leadership

Examples of
leadership
for
Zuckerberg
 Rejects hierarchies and barriers.
 Promotes innovation and critical thinking (Eisner
2016).
 Clear vision for the company.
 Employee empowerment and perks motivates
the employees
 Great communicator and involved in operations.
Transformatio
nal leadership

Mark
Zuckerber
g
 Digital age requires different
characteristics of leaders.
 Continuous learning and expectation
delivery over spotlight moments.
 Being able to predict how people think
rather how they act makes the difference.
A true Digital
Leader

Leaders
hip
Qualitie
s
Hard
worki
ng Clear
Value
s
Emoti
onal
Intelli
gence
Abilit
y to
Inspir
ePassi
onate
Thirst
for
Learni
ng
Stron
g
Com
muni
catio
n
Work
Life
Balan
ce
Illustration 2: Leadership qualities of
Zuckerberg

Digital
Leadership
of Mark
Zuckerberg
 Digital leaders need to be a digital visionary.
 They must be customer oriented and obsessed
with complete satisfaction to the customers
(Breuer and Szillat 2019).
 They must have the ability for fast decision
making and risk taking.
 An inherent sense of business acumen is also
needed.

Digital
Leadership
Characterist
ics of Mark
Zuckerberg
Visionary
 Innovative mind
strength
 Dreams the future
 Conceives
revolutionary ideas
 Technological skills
 Trust on self and
instinct.

Digital
Leadership
Characterist
ics of Mark
Zuckerberg
 Ensures all-
encompassing
customer
satisfaction
 Sees through the
eyes of the
customers
 Aligns customer
needs and
company objectives
Customer
oriented

Digital
Leadership
Characterist
ics of Mark
Zuckerberg
Fast decisions
and risk taking
 Bold decision
making
 High speed thinking
 Management of
strategic,
operational
reputational risks
 Proactive in cyber
threats, encryption
and data security.

Digital
Leadership
Characterist
ics of Mark
Zuckerberg
Business acumen
 Fundamental
understanding of
business.
 Able to manage and
align, customer,
employee and
company needs.
 Sustainable
leadership and long
term goals.

Conclusion
 Mark Zuckerberg is an inspiration to many
and has created milestones that people
rarely dream about.
 Though he is not as charismatic a leader
as other inspirational leader, he is able to
lead more than forty thousand people
successfully.
 People in the company enjoys the free
work culture and lack of bureaucracy.
 Performance based approach has created
a positive work culture.
 His risk taking behavior and confidence to
his own self is exemplary.

References
 About Facebook. (2020). Company Info | About Facebook. [online] Available at:
https://about.fb.com/company-info/ [Accessed 5 Feb. 2020].
 Bateh, D., 2019. Leadership from Millennials to Generation Z
Transformed. Journal of Advanced Management Science Vol, 7(1).
 Breuer, S. and Szillat, P., 2019. Leadership And Digitalization: Contemporary
Approaches Towards Leading In The Modern Day Workplace.
 Eisner, S., 2016. The" In-Factor": Signature Traits Of Innovation’s
Leaders. Journal of Applied Business Research (JABR), 32(1), pp.185-200.
 George, W.W. and Migdal, A., 2018. Facebook Confronts a Crisis of Trust.
 Hoffmann, A.L., Proferes, N. and Zimmer, M., 2018. “Making the world more
open and connected”: Mark Zuckerberg and the discursive construction of
Facebook and its users. New Media & Society, 20(1), pp.199-218.
 Quesnell, A., 2018. Facebook: Mark Zuckerberg.
 Statista. (2020). Facebook: number of employees 2018 | Statista. [online]
Available at: https://www.statista.com/statistics/273563/number-of-facebook-
employees/ [Accessed 5 Feb. 2020].
 Tanniru, M.R., 2018. Digital Leadership. In Management of Information
Systems. IntechOpen.
 Toussaint, J.S. and Ehrlich, S.P., 2017. Five changes great leaders make to
develop an improvement culture. NEJM Catalyst, 3(4).
 Zeike, S., Bradbury, K., Lindert, L. and Pfaff, H., 2019. Digital leadership skills
and associations with psychological well-being. International journal of
environmental research and public health, 16(14), p.2628.
 Zuckerberg, M. and King Jr, M.L., 2018. An Exercise in Leadership: Being the
Change that You Wish to See. Powerful Relationships in Leadership: A
Collection of Modern Leadership Insights, p.57.