Leadership Styles Define Project Managers

No man will make a great leader who wants to do it all himself, or to get all the credit for doing it. —Andrew Carnegie.

Leadership styles define great project managers and also not so good ones. We all know that in Management there are no black and white rules, but there are some common styles of leadership that we can recognize because we have seen them repeatedly during our years of first-hand experience. In the following, we summarize the four most common:

Autocratic

Project Managers with this leadership style solicit little or no feedback from their team and make most of the decisions solely by themselves.

Consultative Autocratic

Project Managers with this leadership style solicit feedback or advice from their team but make the decisions solely by themselves.

Group Consensus

Project Managers with this leadership style table or open the subject to their team for discussion and simultaneously allow or encourage their team to make relevant decisions. This style is also called Democratic.

Laissez-Faire

Project Managers with this leadership style have poor management skills. They have minimal communication with their team and delegate authority to it to make decisions. It is virtual abdication of management.

Probably the Leadership Style that gives the most lasting result is Consultive Autocratic. However leaders must be flexible in their management approach. Although the Consultive Autocratic style is the best long term strategy, there may be situations or circumstances where in the short term another style may fit better.

What leadership styles do you use?