Use action centered leadership to remind you that you have to continually balance the needs of the task, the team and the individual and that on occasions you will have to emphasize the needs of one over the other two. John Adair’s action centered leadership model contains elements of both style and contingency theory. He…
Category: Leadership
Leadership Grid – Leadership Theories Series
Use the leadership grid to confirm your preferred leadership style while recognizing that you can change your style as circumstances require. Blake and Mouton built upon basic style theory and produced their leadership grid. The grid identifies how much concern the leader has for getting the job done (task-centered) and for their staff (person-centered). They…
Basic Style Theory – Leadership Theories Series
Use basic style theory to identify your default leadership style: are you a task or person-oriented person? In the 1940s the University of Michigan suggested that leadership behavior could be described as either person or task oriented. Person oriented leaders are concerned with maintaining good relationships with staff and believe in a participative and democratic…
Trait Theory – Leadership Theories Series
Use trait theory to identify the key traits that you need to exhibit consistently if you wish to be considered a leader. The origins of trait theory are unknown but its purpose is simple. It tries to identify the innate characteristics that distinguish leaders from followers. Unfortunately, over a century of research has failed to reveal…
How to lead people, 12 leadership theories you should know and use
So why take advantage of leadership theories? The word lead means ‘to guide on a way by going in advance’ (Longman New Universal Dictionary). So its safe to say that leading involves taking someone on a journey from their current position to somewhere else. The journey can be physical as when Moses led the Israelites…