Exploring Participatory and Transformational Leadership Styles

UNIT 4 CST FINAL PROJECT Participatory and Transformational Leadership
Introduction
Throughout this class, we learned that leadership can be defined in many ways by different authors. The definitions depend on many things and different variables. One way of we can attempt to define is through characteristics of the leader, the followers, and the situation (Yukl, 2013). Yukl, 2013 defines leadership as being “the process of influencing others to understand and agree about what needs to be done and how to do it, and the process of facilitating individual and collective efforts to accomplish shared objectives” (Yukl, 2013 p.7). The character of the leader influences situations and followers in different ways. The characteristics of the followers also call for a different type of leadership style

The team jointly identifies plans, procedures, goals, vision, and develops strategies to achieve the leader’s objectives. The leader, leads by acting as a sort of facilitator: a guiding hand. Of course the leader does task delegation and team formation. But in general, a participatory leader involves as many stakeholders as possible when making decisions. This is important because most organizations make decisions with little input from the regular employees: decisions are top down and hierarchical (Hogan & Hogan, 1994). In developing my personal style of leadership, I prefer a more down-up or grass-roots grown decision making. I think the people at the bottom of any organization and the ones at the front counter understand what needs to be done or solved in any organization. Making organizational culture change must include the regular subordinate staff to realize the future vision of the organization. Participatory leadership aspires to involve a wide participation in decision making (Yukl,