Leadership Styles in Business

Businesses are all around us. While an airline company may be different from a retail store, they have similar structures and hierarchies and leadership styles among leaders. They all follow similar frameworks that make business work. Two concepts that are found across all businesses are different levels hierarchy and leadership styles that are crucial in determining a business success and effectiveness.
A hierarchy is the relationship between the boss and workers, while the leadership style is how the leader chooses to control hierarchical structures. The leader (or the boss) may treat his employees differently depending on the leadership styles they use.
One leadership style is the hierarchical style where the leader is the boss and all other employees have to take the orders given. This style is commonly used by presidents or monarchs. Putin would be an example of a hierarchical leadership style. He complete authority and excepted to make tough decisions on his form for the benefit and interests of his nation. Chinese president Xi-Jing Pin is yet another example of an autocratic leader. The people at the lower branch of the government are not expected to contradict him and disobey his commands.


The other leadership style is the democratic. Basically, leaders work in collaboration with their employees to reach a common goal. There is no hierarchy in this case. Other workers are like peers or colleagues. This style of leadership is best suited when there is trust between the leader and other workers and a sense of respect and camaraderie.
This choice of leadership leads to better productivity have worker are more likely to get positive reinforcement for their work and increase trust and confidence. The autocratic style of leadership would not seek positive reinforcement as the leader is not feared, not befriended. The democratic style, however, can be dangerous as it postulates that all opinions and all ideas are equal, which is, of course, not true. This is one powerful argument that autocratic regimes have against democracies: since all opinions and ideas aren't created equal, it would be insane to make everyone count equally. This is also why most democracies tend to be oligarchies where power and opinions are controlled by the media. The people in power knew very well how dangerous it would be to give total power to the people and have created a system to preserve some ideas over others.


Overall, different leadership styles have different outcomes, and not all systems are purely democratic or autocratic. Autocratic systems need the trust of the people at the bottom if they don't want to be overthrown. Democratic systems need to be rigged, disrupted, and controlled by oligarchs to prevent all opinions from being worth the same. Business that use autocratic systems need to make sure employee are happy while busy with their job so as not to build resentment. Employees should follow the rules as the leader has the experience and vision necessary to lead the company. If we take the image of a boat, the autocratic leader knows where the boat is going and how to get to the right destination. Employees should follow the directions, not question the leader. The boat would be in big trouble if those who know nothing about sailing start giving direction.
The democratic leadership can lead to better productivity only when the employees are just as effective as the CEO. Cooperation builds trust, which leads to better team efficiency. As long as respect and trust are kept between the CEO and the employees, the democratic business model and leadership style are more efficient than the autocratic style.
When should one style be used then over another?
Preferring one leadership style and eventually one work environment over another depends on many factors, one of them being employees' experience and psychology. Experienced employees who like to take responsability over their work would prefer a more democratic environment, while those who lack experience should yield control to the leader who can maintain team efficiency as the sole commander in chief. As such, it would be hard for employees with considerable experience to work under a leader with less experience. When the employees feel they should become the leader, they keep must keep low profile if they want to work under autocratic leadership.
As I have previously outlined countries work the same way as businesses. Adopting one leadership over another will have different consequences on the overall management structure. Neither the democratic nor the autocratic style is perfect but the democratic leadership style works best as long as people keep in mind that not all opinions are worth the same and all opinions are competent to have a valuable opinion.

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