Dr. Manmohan Singh's leadership style and democratic management approaches

Leadership Style of Dr. Manmohan Singh

Leadership Styles

Manmohan Singh's Leadership Style

In this era of rapid change, incremental focus is being placed on the management function within any social, political and/or business entity. In this order of ideas, the specialized literature presents the reader with a multitude of information on leadership styles. While some managers opt for a specific style, others use a combination of more than one style. The aim of this paper is to assess the leadership style implemented by Dr. Manmohan Singh. In order to achieve this desiderate however, it is first necessary to briefly present some leadership styles as revealed by the specialized literature. This process is required so to get basis for benchmarking the actions and decisions of Dr. Manmohan Singh. The paper will come to an end with a section on concluding remarks.

Leadership Styles

The Skagit Watershed Council (2008) identifies three types of leadership styles:

authoritarian (autocratic)

participative (democratic) and delegative (free reign).

The authoritarian leadership style occurs when all of the decisions are taken by the manager and they are implemented top-down. The role and say of the employees is barely existent, with their single task being that of executing the commands received from management. This style is only advisable to be used on rare occasions and it stands chances of success when three simultaneous conditions are met -- the leader is pressed by time and needs to quickly resolve a problem, the leader possess all the necessary and correct information required to solve the problem, and third, he has full trust in the employees, who are responsible and motivated. The autocratic leadership style if often confused with a behavior in which the leader is aggressive towards the staff members, yet this is not the true scenario, as a good leader should never be abusive of his subalterns, regardless of the implemented managerial style.

The second leadership style is one in which decisions of what to do and how to do it are made based on communications and information collected from the staff members. The final decision still falls in the hands of the manager, but the employees do have a say and their opinion matters. This leadership style may be mistakenly interpreted as a sign of weakness, but it is in fact a move that will show the employees that they are valued. It is then only natural to understand why some organizational leaders present the participative management style as a non-financial incentive which stimulates employees to increase their levels of on the job satisfaction and as such also increase their levels of performance. Aside employee satisfaction, the benefit also relies in an ability to make better informed decisions. In this order of ideas, it can be concluded that the participative style is a sign of strength. In terms of the moments when it is appropriate to implement it, this generally occurs when the manager does not possess all the information and the missing data is possessed by the employees.

The final leadership style, the free reign, occurs when the manager has a minimal role in the decision making process, delegating the large majority of the responsibilities to the staff members. Nonetheless, despite the fact that the employees decide what to be done and how to do this, the leader is still responsible for the decisions made and their final outcome. The free reign style is best to be implemented whenever the manager has too many tasks on his hands and possesses skilled and trusty employees to which he can delegate the respective chores. Restrictions do exists and it is advisable for a careful supervision in situations of delegative style (The Skagit Watershed Council).

4. Conclusions

Today's world is fiercer than ever in several aspects mostly materialized when it comes to the demands and expectations. In order to cope with the emergent requirements, leaders diversify their approach of the subordinates. Yet, three distinct styles can be identified in the autocratic style, the democratic style and the last, the delegative style. Through the first style, the manager is the party to make all of the decisions, without an analysis of the feedback from employees. Through the second style, decisions are generally made based on both managerial and employee feedback, with the final decisions still falling on the hands of the leader. Finally, the free reign style sees that the manager allows the staff members to make most of the decisions, with his responsibility revolving around the final outcome.

All the achievements of Dr. Manmohan Singh point out to the fact that he has managed to successfully implement all leadership styles when the situations arose and required a specific approach. Otherwise put, it becomes obvious that when he possessed all the information and a decision had to be taken rapidly, he implemented an autocratic leadership style. Then, when he needed additional data, he listened to those around him and based his decisions on what others had to say. Finally, whenever he was facing tough situations and could not resolve all problems on his own, and most importantly, when he was surrounded by capable and trustworthy staff members, Dr. Manmohan Singh implemented the free reign style by delegating responsibilities to his subalterns.

References:

2008, Leadership Styles, The Skagit Watershed Council, http://www.skagitwatershed.org/~donclark/leader/leadstl.html last accessed on July 15, 2009

2009, Manmohan Singh Reminds the World Not to Forget Africa in the Race for Development, Thaindian News, http://www.thaindian.com/newsportal/world-news/manmohan-singh-reminds-the-world-not-to-forget-africa-in-the-race-for-development_100218458.html last accessed on July 15, 2009

2009, Dr. Manmohan Singh -- The New Prime Minister of India, Indian Elections, http://www.indian-elections.com/dr-manmohan-singh.html last accessed on July 15, 2009

2009, Profile: Manmohan Singh, BBC News, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/3725357.stm last accessed on July 15, 2009

2009, Yes, Prime Minister: Dr. Manmohan Singh, India Marks, http://www.indiamarks.com/guide/Yes-Prime-Minister-Dr.-Manmohan-Singh/664 last accessed on July 15, 2009

Website of Dr. Manmohan Singh, http://www.manmohansingh.org / last accessed on July 15, 2009

Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh, Embassy of India, http://www.indianembassy.org/press_release/2005/July/PM.htm last acc3ssed on July 15, 2009