LITERATURE RIVIEW

RAFIA ZAHEER
SEC B
Bs-ias-146-f-17
SUBMITTED TO DR AMANI MUAZZAM
 1

INTRODUCTION

The key root of success and failure of every organization is leadership style. A leader guides

others to do a particular task and impressed his subordinates. Leadership style is a key root of

giving guidelines to people. An effective leader works hard to achieve the desired goal. There

are four leadership styles such as the democratic leadership style, autocratic leadership style,

transformational leadership style, strategic leadership style. All there styles have different pros

and corns. Leadership styles affect the performance of organization and the organization culture

is control by leadership styles. This study focuses on democratic leadership styles and their

relations with other styles. Democratic leadership style is more appreciated and liked by

employees. In democratic leadership styles, the employees shared their ideas without judgment.

It works well in complexive situation. Democratic leadership theory is done in the 1930s and

1940s. (Ojokuku R, 2012)According to the Ngambi et al (2010) and Ngambi (2011) leadership is

the process of influencing other's commitment towards realizing their full potential in achieving

a value-added, shared vision, with passion and integrity. Leadership only focuses on the growth

of followers and their needs. (Ojokuku R, 2012)According to Michael (2011) leadership has a

direct cause and effect relationship upon the organization and its success. Leaders evaluate the

values and culture and also motivate the employees. The leader influences the members in that

way the employees cooperate with each other for achieving the specific goal of an organization.

The relationship between employee and leader is the standard of employee performance. The

leadership syle is effected by the leader. “leadership is an inspiration that someone gets from

others which provides a direction towards the achievement of a specific goal” (Zhang, 2015) In

this leadership style followers are allowed to take decisions on their own, and they have full

support from their leaders. The whole performance depends on the subordinate's abilities. Some
 2

studies found that such type of leadership may increase the performance of the employees and

also job satisfaction which leads to the better performance of the organization. For high-

performance, employees should be self -motivated so that they can't lose the real motivation to

do things timely and efficiently.

SIGNIFICANCE:

Democratic leadership style encourages honesty, encourages creativity, improves job

satisfaction, increases team knowledge and it also creates a strong vision for the future.

OBJECTIVE:

The objective is the impact of a democratic leadership style on employee performance.

This style plays an important role in an organization. Democratic leadership is reliable in that

situation where group members are professional to share their knowledge.

Literature Review

There are different leadership styles such as democratic leadership style, autocratic

leadership, transformational leadership and strategic leadership (Yahaya & Ebrahim, 2016). All

these leadership styles have different characteristics with a mixture of pros and cons. Therefore,

different styles of leadership impact the performance and personality of employees in a different

way. In sum, Democratic leaders work without power differences with employees to support

their job tasks (Yahaya & Ebrahim, 2016). According to Weschler (2015), “leadership is an

inspiration that someone gets from others which provides a direction towards the achievement of

a specific goal” (Zhang et al., 2015). Northouse (2013) defined leadership as a tool to motivate a

group of people to complete the selected goal. Yukl (2018) explained leadership as an influence

creating process in a company through different connections, and this influence can be created
 3

purposefully to inspire the group (Sultan, Al Shobaki, Abu-Naser, & El Talla, 2018). According

to Gharibvand (2015), in leadership some qualities must be present in a leader that the way of his

talking, his accent, the way he conveyance others to follow him, the way he communicates, his

ability to encourage his assistants and the way to give the direction of his team to complete the

tasks in a proper and efficient way (Rasool, Arfeen, Mothi, & Aslam, 2015). Sharma (2011)

provided the definition of leadership “ a method in which a person affects and helps others to

achieve the explicit goals clearly and consistently.

White (2012) stated that democratic leaders enthusiastically take part in decision making

and negotiations, which boosted the final results. According to Kaczmarski (2004), a democratic

leader has some qualities as a charismatic personality, inspiring, educated, have good listening

skills, ability to motivate others, regarding, capable enough to react according to the

circumstances. Mullins (2009) announced that democratic leadership is people-oriented, and it

increases the communication within a group as well as in external groups.

Khan (2015) said that democratic leadership exists where managers have given high

control over decision making that he can take decisions without any pressure (Khan et al., 2015).

This leadership promotes teamwork and increase the ability to think wide and unlimited. All the

members are encouraged to give suggestions, and this thing motivates the employees to

contribute actively in the session. Equal participation by all the members make the decision-

making process easy for the leader, but the ultimate decision depends on the leader.

Melling (2010) stated that autocratic leadership is a style where a leader considers

himself the main part of every activity in the organization and thinks that all the things that came

from him will definitely end with him. According to Iqbal (2016), autocratic leaders have the

authority to tell others what to do. Nwankwo (2015) narrated that autocratic style is a leadership
 4

style where the leader has the full power of making decisions (Nwokocha & Iheriohanma, 2015).

In this leadership, all the staff is not encouraged to participate in the discussion, and they are not

allowed to give any suggestions. Sometimes if they give suggestions still, these suggestions are

not considered important enough. This leadership involves rapid decision making regardless of

the end results. The decision is taken by the leader in which the suggestions by the employees are

hardly involved. Leaders have high control over the followers and force them to obey the orders

without defining the reasons.

Deluga (2009) stated that Laissez-faire leadership style is a discontent and useless style

which has no fruitful results. Leaders with this style waste their efforts because they are no more

inspirational and have no influence on others. Hartog & Van Muijen (2017) explain that in

laissez-fair leadership leaders have no authority of decision making, and they don't take part in

any negotiations and group discussions (Fiaz, Su, & Saqib, 2017). They are also not involved in

the evaluation of employees and are not able to enjoy the benefits. Jones (2009) defined laissez-

fair leadership as a sluggish style of leadership in which a leader is not willingly fulfilled his

duties and did things in a bad manner.

In this leadership style followers are allowed to take decisions on their own, and they

have full support from their leaders. The whole performance depends on the subordinate's

abilities. Some studies found that such type of leadership may increase the performance of the

employees and also job satisfaction which leads to the better performance of the organization.

For high-performance, employees should be self -motivated so that they can't lose the real

motivation to do things timely and efficiently.

Van Eeden (2014) dictated that laisses-fair leaders avoid taking any responsibility, and

they never provide any direction related to goal achievement (Nanjundeswaraswamy & Swamy,
 5

2014). Gastil (2010) defined that autocratic leaders have a strong trust that a good group

discussion can make a good decision, so, they promote collective participation. They also

enforce people to obey them and hold them tightly so that they can implement the things as they

want. On the other hand, the laissez-fair leadership style has low participation, and they leave the

things as it is that assistants will handle things that's why it is not a productive leadership style,

and they are not welcomed in any decision making the process.

Situational leadership was first discovered by Hershey and Blanchard (2008). The

purpose of this leadership was to define the leadership styles and their links with the people. It

also defined what kind of maturity level is required to connect the different groups. Graeff

(2010) explained that instead of adapting himself in one leadership style leaders should try other

leadership styles as well. It would give them a new experience, and they would be able to learn

how to behave in a specific situation (Ojokuku, Odetayo, & Sajuyigbe, 2012). When they would

practice different leadership styles, then they would be capable enough to comprehend that

according to the task, what style suited them best.

Grid was recognized by Robert Blake and Jane Mouton (2015). This grid was majorly

divided into two categories: people-oriented, which means this grid was concerned with people

or employees, which focuses on the benefits of people. This explains the intensity to which a

leader is sensitive towards his employees related to their needs and fields in which they required

any training to achieve the desired goals. While on the other hand, the second category task-

oriented related to the work (Iqbal, Anwar, & Haider, 2015). It was entirely bounded with the

tasks. In this category, the leader has to focus on manufacturing and through this have an eye on

the output of the company and the effectiveness. From all these, he has to measure that the goals

have achieved or not.

Leadership has an important impact on job performance and the company's overall

performance. Good leadership has a positive impact and give advantages to the company. If a

leader provides the right direction to the followers for doing a task or achieving a goal, then it

provides a motivation to the subordinates. It creates a trust for the leader, which also helps him to

carry out the other activities in a quite fairly manner. Bad leadership demotivates followers and

have a bad impact on a company's reputation. It discourages the subordinates never to be

controlled by others. It also affected their job satisfaction in which they are not able to focus on

the tasks, and the things go in the wrong way, which ultimately affects performance. Three

leadership styles have their own pros and cons. Democratic, autocratic and laisses-fair leadership

styles are the main popular styles adopted by the leaders. In these three types, every leadership

has some positive and negative effects on job performance. By adopting these leadership styles

leaders can guide followers in a better way (Cunningham, Salomone, & Wielgus, 2015). These

styles help leaders how to behave in critical situations to keep things working and in the right

direction. Leaders are special people who direct us towards the right path.

Employees are placing them in an uncomfortable situation in stretch

assignment challenges in order to learn and grow. In other words, the individual has to put

himself in a stretch zone rather than a comfort zone (Glen, 2016). Developed interpersonal skills

these skills included some social rules to interconnect and to make relationships with other

people. interpersonal skills are an umbrella term that includes verbal and non- verbal

communication, consultations, problem-solving, self-confident, decision making and listening

skills. It is important to interact with others to develop all these skills. For this purpose, Work in

a team will be playing the role of a leader. I will try my best to prepare my all tasks and speech at

my home to avoid confusion during meetings and to be confident. I will listen to other team
 7

members in an effective way and will permit them to speak freely and to participate in the

decision making process. it is necessary to observe positive as well as negative characteristics in

people so that they are encouraged to improve their negative traits by putting some efforts and by

developing effective skills (DuBrin & Geerinck, 2015). I will join the cross-cultural teams of my

organization so that the practice of communication skills would be done effectively. For this

purpose, I will be focusing on practice empathy and will show a keen interest in other’s interests

and will help them to achieve their goals.

Change is like a risk or uncertainty in which individuals are not cleared about results such as

change can cause failure as well as success. I personally believe that my personality is adaptable

and can accept change easily but still I am afraid of change because of high-risk levels. The

whole company really wants some change.For this purpose, develop a sense of importance

around the need for change. It will help you to touch the existing motivation to get things

moving. Therefore, it is said that individuals should prepare before accepting and implementing

change such as they must analyze potential threats that can occur during the change process. all

possible opportunities should also be examined and efforts must be put to achieve those

opportunities. Start honest discussions and convincing reasons to get people talking and thinking.

Outside stakeholders and industry people help you to strengthen your argument. For this

purpose, it is essential to have a higher emotional intelligence level and work rationally. There

are four major elements in emotional intelligence such as empathy, effective and skilled

relationship, self-management and awareness. It is necessary to have all these elements while

working on change because they help in understanding and implementing changing aspects. In

the first place, the individual should accept negative emotions and try to avoid it then utilize

emotional skills to tackle all issues associated with change.

Reference

Cunningham, J., Salomone, J., & Wielgus, N. (2015). Project Management Leadership Style: A
Team Member Perspective. International Journal of Global Business, 8(2).
DuBrin, A. J., & Geerinck, T. (2015). Human relations: Interpersonal, job-oriented skills:
Pearson.
Fiaz, M., Su, Q., & Saqib, A. (2017). Leadership styles and employees' motivation: Perspective
from an emerging economy. The Journal of Developing Areas, 51(4), 143-156.
Glen. (2016). Using Stretch Assignments to Develop Leadership Talent. from
https://www.sigmaassessmentsystems.com/stretch-assignments/
Iqbal, N., Anwar, S., & Haider, N. (2015). Effect of leadership style on employee performance.
Arabian Journal of Business and Management Review, 5(5), 1-6.
Khan, M. S., Khan, I., Qureshi, Q. A., Ismail, H. M., Rauf, H., Latif, A., & Tahir, M. (2015). The
styles of leadership: A critical review. Public Policy and Administration Research, 5(3),
87-92.
Nanjundeswaraswamy, T., & Swamy, D. (2014). Leadership styles. Advances in management,
7(2), 57.
Nwokocha, I., & Iheriohanma, E. (2015). Nexus between leadership styles, employee retention,
and performance in organizations in Nigeria. European Scientific Journal, 11(13).
Ojokuku, R., Odetayo, T., & Sajuyigbe, A. (2012). Impact of leadership style on organizational
performance: a case study of Nigerian banks. American Journal of Business and
Management, 1(4), 202-207.
Rasool, H. F., Arfeen, I. U., Mothi, W., & Aslam, U. (2015). Leadership styles and their impact
on employee's performance in the health sector of Pakistan. City University Research
Journal, 5(1), 97-109.
Sultan, Y. S. A., Al Shobaki, M. J., Abu-Naser, S. S., & El Talla, S. A. (2018). Effect of the
Dominant Pattern of Leadership on the Nature of the Work of Administrative Staff at Al-
Aqsa University.
Yahaya, R., & Ebrahim, F. (2016). Leadership styles and organizational commitment: a literature
review. Journal of Management Development, 35(2), 190-216.
Zhang, J., Ahammad, M. F., Tarba, S., Cooper, C. L., Glaister, K. W., & Wang, J. (2015). The
effect of leadership style on talent retention during merger and acquisition integration:
Evidence from China. The International Journal of Human Resource Management,
26(7), 1021-1050.