What is a Leadership Style

A leadership style is more than a personal preference. It is the pattern a leader produces consistently, across many situations, in how she handles people and work. Style is not random; it is shaped by who the leader is, what she has seen others do, what her organisation rewards, and what the situation demands. Knowing where one’s own style comes from is the first step to choosing it deliberately instead of just defaulting to it.

The working definition

Newstrom and Davis, writing in 1993, defined leadership style as the pattern of how a leader behaves:

A leadership style is a leader’s style of providing direction, implementing plans, and motivating people. It includes patterns of explicit and implicit actions performed by the leader.

The definition has two important parts.

1. Pattern, not single act. Style shows up across many actions, not in any one decision. A leader who consults the staff once is not “democratic”. A leader who consistently consults is.
2. Explicit and implicit. Some style elements are deliberate (how she runs meetings). Others are unconscious (how she handles disagreement, how she greets people, how she ends conversations). The implicit ones are often the most visible to staff.

A staff member who has worked under a principal for six months can usually describe her style without effort. The principal herself may not be able to. The implicit elements are visible to others before they are visible to oneself.

Hay McBer on what style includes

The consulting firm Hay McBer, writing in 1999, listed five specific places where a leader’s style shows up:

1. Listening. How the leader takes in information from others.
2. Setting goals and standards. What kind of targets she sets, and at what level.
3. Developing action plans. How detailed her plans are, and who participates.
4. Directing others. How she tells people what to do.
5. Giving feedback. When, how often, in what tone, in what setting.

A leader can audit her style by asking how she handles each of these five. Two leaders described the same way in a job ad (both “experienced and decisive”) can have very different styles when their actual practice on these five dimensions is examined.

What shapes a leader’s style

The handout names four sources of a leader’s style:

Leadership styles are based on (a) Individual’s own characteristics (values, principles, personality), (b) Styles that the individual has seen and experienced others doing, (c) The values promoted by the individual’s organisation as being the right way to manage things, (d) The specific management situation and the people the individual deals with most.

The leader’s own characteristics

Personality, values, upbringing, and natural temperament shape style. A naturally cautious person tends towards careful, consultative style. A naturally decisive person tends towards faster, more directive style. These tendencies can be modified by training but they do not disappear.

A leader who knows her own characteristics can use them as a starting point and develop the modes she is naturally weaker at. A leader who is unaware of her own characteristics keeps defaulting to her natural style without realising it.

Styles seen and experienced

People model what they have seen. A teacher who worked under a strong consultative principal early in her career often becomes a consultative principal herself. A teacher who worked under a harsh autocratic principal often either copies that style or deliberately rejects it.

The implication is that early career experiences matter for leadership development. A school that wants strong future leaders should give emerging staff exposure to a variety of leadership styles.

Organisational values

The school’s culture rewards or punishes specific styles. A school that values fast decisions rewards directive leaders. A school that values consensus rewards consultative ones. A leader who tries to operate against her school’s grain finds the work harder.

This is one reason changing schools can change a leader. The same person, in a school with different values, ends up developing differently.

The specific situation

A leader who deals mostly with experienced senior teachers develops one style. A leader who deals mostly with new and inexperienced teachers develops another. The people one leads daily shape the style one develops.

In a school where the principal works with both senior and junior teachers, she must develop both modes. A single style does not fit both.

Style is partly chosen

A new leader’s style is mostly her defaults. An experienced leader’s style is increasingly her choices. The shift is what professional growth in leadership looks like.

Three concrete moves a leader can make to take more control of her own style.

1. Audit your style. Ask staff. Watch a recording of a meeting you ran. Compare your perception with theirs. The gap is the implicit style you have not been seeing.
2. Identify the situation. Which style does this situation actually need? The answer often differs from your default.
3. Practise the gap. If your default does not fit the situation, deliberately practise the style that does. The first attempts will feel awkward; this is normal.

A leader who does these three things consistently over a year is developing range. A leader who keeps doing what feels natural keeps using one style.

Why style matters for schools

Schools are intensely social environments. A principal’s style ripples through:

1. Teachers’ classroom style. Teachers often copy the principal’s pattern. A consultative principal tends to produce consultative teachers; a directive principal produces directive teachers.
2. The staffroom climate. A warm style produces warmth; a cold style produces caution.
3. Student culture. Children pick up on the school’s tone. A school led by an autocratic principal often produces compliant but quiet students.
4. Parent perception. Parents notice style quickly. They feel comfortable, or they do not, often within a single meeting.

A principal who is choosing her style deliberately, with these ripple effects in mind, is doing important work. A principal who treats style as a personal matter is missing how much it shapes the whole building.

Flashcard

What four factors shape a leader's style?

Tap to reveal

Answer

The leader, what she has seen, the organisation, and the situation.

1. The leader’s own characteristics. Personality, values, upbringing, temperament.
2. Styles seen and experienced. Models from earlier in her career.
3. Organisational values. What the school rewards and punishes.
4. The specific situation. The people and challenges she deals with.

An experienced leader becomes increasingly able to choose her style deliberately rather than defaulting to it. The shift from default to choice is what leadership development actually produces.