Polydimensional Leadership

Democratic versus Autocratic Dimension

While democracy in its political terms, means involvement of the citizens in both determining the delegates, then sharing with them through elected individuals in decision making process, the democracy in its organizational terms is essentially limited to participation in decision making and operational autonomy. While direct reports of an executive can participate in his own evaluation under 360 degree appraisal systems, it remains unpractical to let the reports elect who shall manage them. Such a level of democracy is susceptible to develop unaffordable anarchical situations if applied in business enterprises. The political leaders are only committed to their voters, while the business executive should be committed to both his team as well as the best interest of shareholders. In simple words, it is damn easy to get the votes of your direct reports if you will commit yourself to give them the highest salary increases, the best vacation schedules, the best fringe benefits, and ask them hardly for a marginal achievement. But is this what business management is all about?

On these determinants, we claim democracy to be fruitful whenever the intended decision is related to business operations. Though, when it comes to moderating the relation between the firm and its manpower, it remains the very coral job of every executive to play the role of a fair judge, not the role of a senator. We shall elaborate the point of senator versus judge styles when we come to converse people versus task orientation horizons.

The Pathway to Democracy Lounge

Analysis, trust, empowerment and monitoring are the four words composing your pathway to democratic leaders lounge. Your abilities to understand people, is your key when it comes to analyzing your team members to find who will be your assignees. This analysis might includes any attribute of the person subject to analysis, but you should never lose three attributes to know about him;

1. His own logical mindsets guiding his own approach to a business case or a problem
2. Integrity of decision making, and to what extent can he put aside personal contentions when he takes a decision.
3. His willingness to empower others subsequently. You can not create democratic environment through a one-stepped delegation process.

Upon fruition of this analysis, you will come up with a list of intended leaders to whom you shall empower a certain degree of business management capacity. One simple thing you need to acclimate yourself with before empowering them, to learn how to Trust others. Trusting your analysis, and accordingly trusting them, and their capability to perform satisfactorily afar from your tight patronage. Here, you need to remind your well nourished ego, resulting from years of experience doing what you are doing today, about some simple facts of life

1. Someday in the past, you were not capable to do what you are easily doing today. They need time to learn it, and you need to tolerate imperfections. Perfection is a theoretical assumption that have never existed by the end of the day.
2. If you kept doing what you are doing today, all by yourself, you can never grow the business and never grow yourself. You have no other option but to empower.
3. It should not be done your very own way to be right. It can be done a hundred different ways and sill be faultless.
4. Democracy is letting people do, not letting them talk, then you do it your own way

Upon fruition of this analysis, you will come up with a list of intended leaders to whom you shall empower a certain degree of business management capacity. One simple thing you need to acclimate yourself with before empowering them, to learn how to Trust others. Trusting your analysis, and accordingly trusting them, and their capability to perform satisfactorily afar from your tight patronage. Here, you need to remind your well nourished ego, resulting from years of experience doing what you are doing today, about some simple facts of life;

Motherly vs. Gestapo Monitoring

Does it sound nonconforming to link autocracy and democracy to the monitoring process? It might be in theory, while in everyday life in business operations, you shall see one of two trends when it comes to monitoring. First, and unfortunately more common within the areas of the world wherein democracy is least implanted, and wherein policeman style dominates in business ambience, is the Gestapo Monitoring style. You are surely having a Gestapo monitoring in your firm when you have one or more of the following phenomena floating on the surface everyday;

1. Operational monitoring is questing for mistakes more than striving for success models.
2. Individuals linked with monitoring function, perceive the figure head or the senior management in general to be more interested to hear about mistakes more than achievements.
3. Senior management is widely spoken within the organization to be reactive to mistakes more than constructive for excellence.
4. Individuals capitalize more on discovering errors of others more than achieving themselves, as a tool to magnify their role and enhance their status.
5. Reports are designed occasionally to reveal previously known problem.

On the other shore, you can find the second model of monitoring, that is the Motherly Monitoring. While a Gestapo agent will be observing his suspect, trying to find out a mistake, therefore he is getting a praise, a mother keeps an eye on her child, observing the development of his milestones, protecting him from hazardous acts and deeds, and being happy when he becomes less and less needy to her patronage. You can be rest assured about having this kind of healthy monitoring when you have the direct opposites to the above mentioned phenomena. Monitoring reports are done regularly to reveal attainments as well as defects hands by hand. Task force members are caring more about self-accomplishments other than others faults.It is crucial to remember a very important actuality of life. While a Gestapo style pushed leaders away from the spying organization, the motherly style breeds leaders. You follow the chitchats of losers, and you will find yourself alone with them one day.Based on the feedback accumulated from monitoring process, your very first analysis will be affirmed or challenged on one or more of its aspect. Here, many leaders get entrapped, falling in love with their own assessment and decisions regarding next line leaders. You need to remember one point, if you backed-up a loser, sooner or later it will spill over yourself. Courageously saying “I was wrong in my clue about this gentleman” will decrease the impacts of your decision. Moreover, it will make you wiser next time, to avoid having to apologize for your assessment.

Tyrant, Roman and Athenian Leaders

First of all, we need to understand that the degree and scope of leadership that is ideal to all firms in all developmental stages and under all conditions does not exist. By degree of delegation, we mean the level of empowerment granted to delegates. Be it financial level, procedural level, operational level, or any other. The appropriate degree of delegation could be figured out through assessment of different variables; delegates willingness and capabilities, organization size and structure, nature of operation and business dynamics to be all regarded. While by scope of delegation, we meant the number of persons empowered to certain function or functions and the nature of operational coordination among them. Here, some caution is usually required. Unlike degree of delegation, it is very mischievous to exceed the appropriate scope that fits with your operation.

The Tyrant leader is the well known Mr. Know-it-all and do-it-all. He tends usually towards centralization of decision making and has a great affinity to concentrate power around him. Usually this form of a leader is a security seeker. By definition he shall keep both degree and scope of delegation to the level that is highly required. Excepting in a very small organization, and very tiny operational transactions, this sort of a leader shall be short-lived one. His results will always fall short to expectations and calculations, as he creates from himself a constraint against the firm.

The Roman Leader (named after the Roman Republic, wherein the first constitution based on power dispersion emerged), while we can not claim it to be the best of all and for all. Yet, we can claim it to be the safest and most tried-out one. It capitalizes on elective scope of delegation, to selective individuals in a flowing manner from up downward. Avoiding the chaotic hazards of wide power dispersion through the organization. To these selective elements, a Roman styled leader will delegate extensively and increasingly as they develop by time.

The Athenian Leader (named after the Athenian democracy wherein every citizen was allowed to share in all and every decision making process in a sense), he is the type of a leader who consults all, involves all and delegates all. He tends to disperse power as far as possible and as wide as he can within the organization. This sort of a leader can be a perfect fit in small-scaled businesses, specifically in terms of headcount, like consultancy businesses for instance, wherein the task force is mainly composed of experts and high calibers. Nevertheless, in a medium-sized to large organization, such a leader might reach a limit wherein everyone is doing everything and produces nothingness.

Copyrights© 2007. Eyad A. Harfoush