Charismatic Leadership
Charisma is a certain quality of an individual personality, by virtue of which he is set apart from ordinary men. Charismatic Leader gathers followers, through dint of personality and charm. Understand the meaning and concept of Charismatic Leadership and the qualities of a charismatic leader. Gain an understanding of the advantages and disadvantages of using charismatic leadership. Finally, explore the difference between charismatic and transformational leadership.
What is the definition of Charismatic Leadership?
“Charisma is a certain quality of an individual personality, by virtue of which he is set apart from ordinary men, and treated as endowed with supernatural, superhuman, or at least specifically, exceptional powers or qualities." “Charismatic Leadership is "resting on devotion to the exceptional sanctity, heroism or exemplary character of an individual person, and of the normative patterns or order revealed or ordained by him".
– Max Weber
Qualities of a Charismatic Leader:
The Charismatic Leader gathers followers, through dint of personality and charm, rather than any form of external power or authority. Some prominent qualities of a charismatic leader are as follows:
- Vision.
- Speech.
- High Principles.
- Emotional Sensitivity.
- Personality.
- Charisma.
Every leadership style has its advantages and disadvantages when compared to other leadership styles. Let’s understand the advantages and disadvantages of charismatic leadership.
Advantages Of Charismatic Leadership:
- Ability to affect change.
- Energetic and driving leader.
- Sensitivity to people's emotions.
- Supportive environment.
- Vision and Articulation.
Disadvantages of Charismatic Leadership:
- Over-Reliance on Leader.
- Lack of Clarity.
- Failure of Vision.
- Misarticulating Goals.
- Poor Management.
- Autonomy.
- Broken Trust.
Now let us compare the charismatic leadership style, with the transformational leadership style.
Charismatic Vs. Transformational Leader:
A charismatic leader influences the followers with the dint of his personality and charm whereas a Transformational Leader inspires change, through his vision & passion to get things done.
Charismatic Leader is the “head of the show” whereas Transformational Leader is open to followers’ input and participation.
In the case of charismatic leadership, Vision fulfillment happens by stimulating followers to the leader’s vision and in contrast, under transformational leadership, Vision fulfillment is inclusive of both follower and leader's vision.
Charismatic leaders are most likely to emerge in crisis situations whereas it has been generally observed that transformational leaders, can emerge at different levels of the organization. From a style standpoint, charismatic leadership behavior is aimed at leader driven goals and, the focus is to promote feelings of obedience and dependency in followers. In the case of transformational leadership, the behavior is aimed at encouraging teamwork and commitment to the shared goals.
Related Links
You May Also Like
-
What are the functions which a leader does to establish as a leader? What are the activities undertaken by them to become great leaders, rather revolutionary leaders? The most important tasks done by a leader in all situations are defining the vision, mission, and goals, leading the team, administrative functions, motivating followers, decision making and conflict resolution, and continuous development.
-
Laissez-faire is a style of leadership that affords the group members a great deal of independence. Tasks are delegated to the group members and they are responsible to see the project through to fruition. Research has shown that this style of leadership leads to the lowest levels of productivity. This article explains this style and covers the implications of having a hands-off approach and the situations where this style could be effective.
-
Appreciative leaders encourage contributions from those around them and facilitate the discussion to mutually solve problems. Understand the concept of Appreciative Leadership and learn about tools to create and ask powerful questions - that lead to new discoveries and possibilities. Instead of focusing on what’s wrong in the workplace, learn about, and build upon what works. Learn in this article the art to apply appreciative inquiry to specific situations and challenges at your workplace.
-
Participative leadership is one of the most effective styles and creates higher productivity, better contributions from group members, and increased group morale. The democratic leadership style consists of the leader sharing the decision-making abilities with group members by promoting the interests of the group members. Learn more about this leadership style and situations when it is effective.
-
Have you ever resonated that there seem to be as many different ways to lead people as there have been great leaders? When we recall the success of Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, Abraham Lincoln, Napoleon Bonaparte to Steve Jobs and Jack Welch, we also notice that they all used different approaches that were suitable to their specific situations and circumstances. Over the last century, researchers and psychologists have developed simple ways to describe the “Styles of leadership” and in this section, we will explore these commonly known leadership styles.
-
Understanding of how individuals of different cultures interact with each other is very important. Not all individuals can adapt to the leadership styles expected in a different culture whether that culture is organizational or national. In a fast-paced business environment, developing a richer understanding and sensitivity to other cultures is a skill that leaders must possess. Learn to be effective in a cross-cultural setting.
-
There are four major factors in leadership called Leader, Follower, Communication, and Situation. The success of the leader is dependent on how the leader is effectively able to communicate and motivate followers to perform desired tasks using the appropriate leadership style best suited for the given situation. Interdependencies and dynamics of these four factors of leadership must be considered by a leader to be effective.
-
A good leadership style is something that every effective leader must have in order to succeed, but identifying what that entails or does not entails might be difficult to understand. Most of the research on leadership focuses on the exemplary, best practices, and positive attributes of effective and successful leaders. This article talks about a new approach to learn leadership using lessons from bad leadership. That is the lessons to be learned by examining leaders who have not effectively exercised their power, authority, or influence.
-
Frederick Winslow Taylor started the “Scientific Management Movement”, and attempted to study the work process scientifically. Scientific management, also called Taylorism, was a theory of management that analyzed and synthesized workflows. It is a system for increasing the efficiency of manpower to its maximum potential and streamlining production to improve efficiency. This article explores this theory in more detail.
-
We define Lean as the systematic elimination of waste through a continual effort to decrease inefficiency; the lean leader strives to create a more efficient organization. Lean leadership is a philosophy. It is a consistent way of thinking and being in your role as a leader. The focus of this approach is on raising new leaders and help their team embrace a culture of continuous improvement. Learn what we mean by lean leadership style and its principles.
