What makes an effective group leader? In your essay, define leadership and provide an overview of leadership behaviours and styles in your discussion of leader effectiveness. Support your answer with relevant research
An effective leader sets clear direction, establishes goals, empowers his or her team towards achievement and leads by example. Leadership balances strong, forcefulness with compromise to achieve successful outcomes.
There are many characteristics and styles of leaders, ranging from forceful to compromising. Effective leaders require a balance of qualities to successfully achieve outcomes. Effective leaders include government heads, military leaders, corporate chiefs and ambassadors for civil rights, all must be forceful enough to get the job done however compromising enough to listen to other people’s opinions and ideas while maintaining focus on their primary objectives. This essay will argue this, using successful outcomes as a measurement.
All leaders will naturally have or develop a quality that makes people listen to them through tone of voice, physical characteristics or confidence. These characteristics are obvious through popularity, strength or domination.
(Cathcart, R & Samovar 1998) Believes the three main leadership styles aside from natural attributes are laissez fair, democratic and autocratic. The style laissez fair is a leader appointed by name only, these leaders are labelled by name only and are uninvolved providing little guidance or support for fellow group members
(Hoover 2002). The democratic leader regards equality to fellow group members and considers the views of others. Nelson Mandela is an effective democratic South African activist, who was elected the first black presid ...