Scribd
Upload
56 views

Bureaucratic Leadership: Example of Bureaucratic Leader

The document discusses three leadership styles: bureaucratic, charismatic, and visionary. Bureaucratic leadership focuses on strict adherence to rules and hierarchy. An example is Harold Geenen who grew ITT through clear structures and accountability. Charismatic leadership relies on inspiring people through passion and personality, like Jack Welch who transformed GE. Visionary leadership articulates a path to the future through expertise and persuasion to mobilize employees.

Uploaded by

Siddarth
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
56 views

Bureaucratic Leadership: Example of Bureaucratic Leader

The document discusses three leadership styles: bureaucratic, charismatic, and visionary. Bureaucratic leadership focuses on strict adherence to rules and hierarchy. An example is Harold Geenen who grew ITT through clear structures and accountability. Charismatic leadership relies on inspiring people through passion and personality, like Jack Welch who transformed GE. Visionary leadership articulates a path to the future through expertise and persuasion to mobilize employees.

Uploaded by

Siddarth
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 4

Bureaucratic Leadership

People don't always grin when they hear the word bureaucracy. While bureaucratic leadership has a
negative reputation, it is indeed one of the oldest forms of leadership in the world.

The efficient, rule-based leadership framework has shown to be a reliable method of governing and
organising communities.

The crux of the word bureaucracy as defined in Cambridge dictionary is It is a system that can be
used to manage either a country, company or organization which has lot of people/employees to
ensure the rules are followed properly.

There are four core elements associated with Bureaucratic leadership style:

First and foremost, there are strong rules and guidelines which enables strict and rather systematic
way on the subordinates

Secondly, there is complete clarity because of the hierarchy present like who is your immediate
leader and whose orders to follow

Thirdly, the power vests with the leader and the people below him should obey him no matter what.

Fourth, Rewards and recognitions are given to the subordinates who have the strong ability to abide
by the rule’s setup by the leader

The following are some of the most important elements of a bureaucratic leadership style:

 There is little to no scope of flexibility and innovation in a bureaucratic leadership


 There is a well-defined structure where the roles and responsibilities of all individuals are
well defined too
 Since Bureaucratic leader’s work is repetitive in nature, they need to be hardworking and
have standard operating procedures for all the tasks
 Leaders should be strong and confident of their abilities and should be task oriented
 There is well-defined terms and policies which every person should abide
 Rights and responsibilities increase as one goes up the hierarchical structure present in a
bureaucratic leadership style

Example of Bureaucratic leader

From the world of business, Harold Geenen is among the few


figures who is considered to have bureaucratic leadership style. He
was the Chief Operating Officer (CEO) of International Telephone
and Telegraph Corporation (ITT). He was the key behind the
company’s growth to a multination conglomerate. Most of the
success he achieved was due to his bureaucratic style of
management.

Geneen is frequently credited with assisting in the development of


international firms and the establishment of the framework needed
to bring medium-sized businesses onto the global arena. His
concept of forming a parent company that owns subsidiaries in various industries has become a
popular model for today's mega-corporations.

His bureaucratic leadership style was pretty evident from the way he structured his organization. ITT
used to follow a clear hierarchy with structures accountability of each of the subsidiary organization
to the primary organization. All the departments within the organization used to follow a
hierarchical structure. There was bit of levy of the decisions allowed to take within the smaller team
but the objectives as whole were setup at macro level.

Harold Geneen was himself a very passionate student of the styles of leadership and even spend a
considerable amount of time writing on the topic. He also once said Leadership cannot always be
shown in words rather it is shown in the individual’s attitude and action. This reflects his
bureaucratic leadership style where he wanted to keep the organization as well as the performance
at the centre.

We can say that bureaucratic style of leadership has help Harold Geenen immensely to grow ITT
from a small company to an MNC.

Charismatic Leadership
The main goal of charismatic leadership is to influence and inspire people. Charismatic leadership is
more about the personality of the leader than any other leadership style since it is very closely linked
to the leader's persona and charisma. In a charismatic leader, his personal morals and passion are
frequently linked. The charismatic leader also plays on his or her followers' emotions, who recognize
and appreciate their leader's principles and enthusiasm.

The following are some of the characteristics of charismatic leadership:

 Confidence in oneself is one of the characteristics that is inevitable for charismatic


leadership.
 Leaders with charismatic leadership should possess high levels of excitement and energy.
 One of the key skills for a charismatic leader is communication along with good articulation
of his/her thoughts.
 A leader should be very expressive to be considered a charismatic leader.

Example of Charismatic Leadership Style

Jack Welch who was born in 1935 was considered one of the
most charismatic leaders in the business world. Jack joined
General Electric as a chemical engineer in the year 1960. Within
a short span of time, he rose the corporate ladder and became
the youngest CEO in the history of General Electric in the year
1981. Jack was born in Peabody, Massachusetts. During his
childhood, he played a lot of sports and used the lessons learned
in it in his life.
Jack was known to be confident and a great communicator of his thoughts. He was dubbed as the
greatest leader of his era several times. This title shows the impact that he has had. He was known in
the corporate world as someone who primarily focussed on building good relationships with his
customers as well as his employees.

At General Electric, Jack probably spent more than half of his time putting the right people in the
right places and then helping them succeed. Most global CEOs would delegate hiring choices to
others, but he'd get engaged.

Under Jack Welch’s charismatic leadership style General Electric grew multi-folds. He may not be the
ideal leader for the 21st century but his leadership style during his era was simply outstanding.

Visionary Leadership

The hallmark of a visionary leader is his or her ability to mobilize people towards a
goal. This leadership style is defined by persuasion, charisma, and a high emotional
IQ. Leaders who practice this management style can articulate a vision for the future,
and the path others must take to reach it. For this reason, visionary leadership’s
positive impact on organizational culture often surpasses that of other management
styles.

The visionary approach is most effective when the leader is an authoritative expert in
his or her field of work, and a fresh vision for the future is needed. They leverage this
expertise to gain the respect and credibility necessary to “rally” employees to follow
their ideas and plans to fulfill them. Visionary leadership is less effective when
employees are underdeveloped, or require more guidance.

The following are some of the important characteristics a visionary leader possess

References

https://www.cleverism.com/bureaucratic-leadership-guide/

https://plopdo.com/2019/01/09/what-are-characteristics-of-bureaucratic-leadership/

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/bureaucracy

https://www.businessmanager.in/charismatic-leadership.php

https://hbr.org/2020/03/jack-welchs-approach-to-leadership

You might also like