Art Friedman

Art Friedman was a small business owner who used his effective leadership abilities to expand his business from a single store to a franchise that has grown to over 120 stores nationwide (Friedman's Appliance Center, 2015). Art used various leadership, motivational and reinforcement theories within his business, which in turn, led to his phenomenal success. Art Friedman’s business technique appointed all employees to act as bosses, determining their own wages and working hours. For Friedman’s Appliances, this technique worked, “it still works and it will always work” (Lussier & Achua, 2013, p. 106) but, would this method work for every business?

Mr. Friedman used the leadership style provided by the University of Iowa called the democratic leadership style. A democratic or participative leader sees both the followers and the leaders as equals therefore the leader urges input pertaining to a task from the group as a whole (Texas A&M University, 2013). This is a positive leadership style since this style allows employees to feel as though they are needed, appreciated and valued. Employees who feel as though they have a purpose within an organization will place the highest of standards on their output and quality of work.

Friedman realized the importance of motivation and used a combination of two forms of motivational theories: the acquired needs theory and balancing work-life needs. The acquired needs theory states, “that people are motivated by their need for achievement, power and affiliation” (Lussier & Achua, 2013, p. 88). Mr. Friedman gave his employees all three of these aspects by giving them power to run the business as a “boss”, which also gave them affiliation within the business hence leading to the achievement of