Leadership has become an interesting topic in the age of technology because we have different tools to use that help keep people accountable, without you having to do so. Everyone uses fancy words like C-Suite to describe a very human part of a company’s success.
For me, I see leadership as a type of accountability for my own behavior. When I’m working as part of a team, like I am with my current business partners, and there’s five of us, leadership becomes an act of kindness and love. It becomes the standard of your partnership’s dignity. Let me explain.
Leadership style is how one gives direction, puts plans into action, and inspires a group. It’s based on their expertise, current awareness level and emotional intelligence.
Each leadership style comes with its pros and cons. You will benefit most by evaluating the kind of business you have and choosing the partner’s leadership style that best suits a current goal. We have five styles of leadership within our company because I have five partners with excellent leadership styles. I would like to share with you what I’ve learned from my partners’ leadership styles and how it has benefited our company.
This is so important to understand because, partner-built businesses have a 94% success rate and solopreneurs have a 6% success rate. That means your company has a better chance of succeeding with partners then without.
However, partnership isn’t an easy task and it requires everyone’s participation. Leadership inside partnership requires that you’re willing to discern when it’s time to put your ego in your back pocket. It has to do with your willingness to look at how you think differently than your partners do.
As a leader, it’s important that you value the difference between how you think and how they think, because that’s where the magic is.
For me, I have been excited to learn the leadership skill sets of all my partners. We have a robust and dynamic, proactive, solution-oriented, board of talent. Because I have the unique privilege of leading such a talented group of people, I would like to share with you some of the secrets I’ve learned about how they lead with dignity. These five types of leadership styles represent the things I’ve learned from my amazing partners. Do you have anyone on your team like this?
Democratic leadership:
Democratic leadership, also known as ‘participative’, means involving everyone in the business in decision making. The leader allows their employees to contribute and have a say in the input of the company, but the final say is made by the leader. This style boosts the members’ morale through discussions, debates, and exchange of ideas. The level of participation should be managed to avoid anyone being overpowered.
Democracy, however, can reduce efficiency if a lot of time is spent before coming to a final decision. There must be boundaries around trying to make sure everyone’s happy because that never works. Our company has a high batting average of consensus leadership. However, there is the occasional four yeses and one no. When we have a think tank situation, the democratic leader is at their best.
Authoritarian leadership:
The leader in this case takes full control over the employees and makes decisions on their own without being influenced by others. People are obliged to do what the leader has decided is right for the organization because their expertise in that wheelhouse is so strong. This leadership style is efficient because time is valued.
Decisions are made quickly, when someone has strong expertise in the area, we are working in. Work gets done on time with more precision. The con is, if the leader is a jerk, people despise being treated in such ways. However, if it’s done with dignity, it works great.
In our partnership what is the most rewarding is that everybody keeps in mind, we are deciding what is best for the organization, and not just for ourselves. When all the team thinks like this, giving control to someone who has the company’s best interest at heart, feels safe. However, this is not easy to do when things are stressful.
What we have discovered is, if somebody has an expertise in the area requiring leadership, bending to their leadership and expertise benefits everyone. When you give this kind of command to your partnership, a lot gets done, because the person whose wheelhouse it is, can pave the way to success much faster than trying to figure it out as though it’s new.
We don’t have discussions about who’s in charge, we let the person with the expertise step into the driver seat and steer the project forward. This is so important to understand because if you’re driving the vehicle, you need to be able to let your ego move aside, and, allow another person to drive the vehicle when it’s appropriate, reasonable, and the next best step.
If there are five partners, all five of them must know when to step out of the driver seat and let another partner with that expertise, drive. This can be the best thing for success when there is uncertainty, technological disruption, or an advance that explodes your company’s growth. This is delegating and positioning your talent. It’s not just about putting the right people on the bus, but, putting the right person behind the wheel of the bus to steer the bus through certain terrain.
Laissez-faire leadership:
The leadership style of laissez-faire is characterized by allocation of work to members of an organization with little or no supervision. It should be used when partners have a lot of experience, are well trained, and who will work at their best, knowing that they are trusted. The name Laissez Faire leadership sounds like it’s relaxed and laid-back, but the truth is, it’s about trusting the partnership to the point where you do not have unnecessary stress or sleepless nights wondering who wasn’t going to hold up their end of the deal.
Now, I am one who firmly believes that what you focus on grows. If you focus on what people aren’t doing and how crappy they are at something, they will become more of what you are focusing on. In turn, if you focus on their talent and you focus on their skill sets, they will achieve greatness, especially when you trust them, and you focus your attention on their successes.
If you choose your partners well, they will want to do their best and be part of a team that is the best. They will want to excel along with everybody else who wants to excel. This type of leadership is about rooting the type of culture and mindset you want into your business and leadership team. It’s a type of culture that benefits everyone as they learn to work together, growing a deep trust for each other. This will explode your growth and project satisfaction.
Transactional leadership:
People that use this style believe in rewarding positive output and punishing mistakes done by members. Every member sets an attainable goal that they agree to follow, then their leader assesses their results. The upside to this is that allocation of tasks is specific to everyone and its downside is that partners can do little about job satisfaction.
When used correctly the power of this leadership style will work, but used incorrectly, it can create toxic work environments. When this style is used well, meaning, you put your “Aces in their places,” there is project satisfaction, and great productivity.
Having a team of five partners means productivity is not easy to measure without progress reports and key identifiers, such as milestones and needle movers, in place. If you have a new company and you are within the first year of business, getting the systems in place is always the hardest part of the business. As technology grows, you may have to pivot to a new software or technological tool and create a new system.
This is when you benefit from transactional leadership because it helps measure progress. This is when transactional leadership works well. New systems require attention, precision, and follow up. It’s not always comfortable, but the person who is good at transactional leadership is organized and has an eye for detail.
Transactional leadership requires that you have a good assessment of everybody’s leadership style and skill set. You must know who would be the ace in the place, especially during the time of pivot or disruption. In this style of leadership, there’s usually a big learning curve to adapt to and transactional leaders make great project managers.
Transformational leadership:
When it’s your job to inspire, foster affirmative behavior, mentor, and motivate members of an organization, you have become a transformational leader. This is the person who manages the mindset and well-being of the company. It fosters a strong culture with high productivity and team involvement that benefits the entire company.
The leader sets the tone of the company’s mindset by modeling it for them and using it to help the team achieve their goals. It doesn’t matter what business you own, there are always stressors. You can either go through those stressors with a good attitude or a crappy one. I will tell you, a good attitude has higher productivity than a crappy one.
Transformational leadership is taking a team of people to the next level, wherever that may be. Each partner has a specific level that they are working on that is their next level of achievement. The role of the transformational leader is to make the working environment a place where transformation and change are handled with kindness, intelligence, and discernment.
All people, all companies, all leaders go through transformation. Change is the natural aspect of the growth or shrinking of a business. Handling change is an art, and if you can create a culture of change and transformation as an accepted part of the business, just like sales are, then transformation becomes an exciting thing to manage.
A true leader benefits the most when they have mindfulness and awareness.
When you have 5 people that are going to decide how your day is going to go, it benefits you most to know what their talents are and to deeply know them as people. If someone has partnered with you to get a business off the ground, it’s more than dating or getting married. It’s about coming together to make a difference in the world by creating something that serves a community.
A partner has entrusted you to help build and serve a community with them. When I understand the amount of trust someone has shared with me by being willing to partner with me, it’s one of the greatest gifts you can receive from anyone. Partners are giving the deepest trust they can give when they ask you to join them. You can cheat in a marriage and it can survive, but when you cheat in business, it usually dies. Partnership in business is a personal development program with an income package to go with it.
Partnership in business is saying something about you. Somebody believes in you. Somebody trusts you with their livelihood and credibility. I understand what an honor it is to have someone, know me, like me, and trust me so much that they would be willing to share a business with me. It’s one thing to have a business idea. It’s another to get it off the ground. Partnership is how big ideas change the world.
If your partners are willing to embrace these types of leadership skills, your chances of success will grow tenfold. A lot of teams began arguing and fighting because they do not have respect for someone else’s leadership style. They are unwilling to see anyone’s leadership style except their own. This is the demise of many a company.
When you understand how important each leadership style is, you can embrace it and use it to the best of your ability. There are some instances when a Democratic Leadership style is needed and when a Transactional leadership style is needed.
If you want to succeed with your team, then the best thing you can do is get to know them. Watch them in action. They will show you the strength of their leadership style and you will be able to identify it.
You will be able to harness the talent of your team in a way that creates miracles instead of mayhem. This means to have mindfulness and awareness, of the greatness that exists in your partnership, before you look at any tiny mistakes. This is so important to understand because mistakes happen whether you have a good team or no team. Since mistakes are part of success, then focus on the greatness of your team and not their itty-bitty mistakes.
My partnership prides itself on being a smart, proactive, team. We thrive using these styles of leadership and our mottos are:
“Whatever starts here improves lives”
“No burden is too heavy, if everyone lifts”
“We make a positive difference in the world”
“We achieve success together”
“We have fun”
Whatever your leadership style and business venture is, may the wind be at your back.
Vickie Helm is a bestselling author, business and asset strategist, and the CEO of Smart Group Firm. She has improved the success of more than a thousand companies and the lives of thousands of individuals throughout her career. You can learn more about Vickie at https://thesmartlifeclub.com or https://vickiehelm.com.
