Question

how can we develo our own leadership style? how can we apply it to work (whether an organization or your own business), as well as our personal lives (the family and/or to the self)?

Answer 1

Leadership styles:

The leadership styles are 8. They are given below

1. Democratic Leadership
2. Autocratic Leadership
3. Laissez-Faire Leadership
4. Strategic Leadership
5. Transformational Leadership
6. Transactional Leadership
7. Coach-Style Leadership
8. Bureaucratic Leadership

The explanation each type is given below:

1. Democratic Leadership :

• Democratic leadership is exactly what it sounds like -- the leader makes decisions based on the input of each team member. Although he or she makes the final call, each employee has an equal say on a project's direction.
• Democratic leadership is one of the most effective leadership styles because it allows lower-level employees to exercise authority they'll need to use wisely in future positions they might hold. It also resembles how decisions can be made in company board meetings.

2. Autocratic Leadership :

• It is rarely effective ,Autocratic leadership is the inverse of democratic leadership. In this leadership style, the leader makes decisions without taking input from anyone who reports to them. Employees are neither considered nor consulted prior to a direction, and are expected to adhere to the decision at a time and pace stipulated by the leader.

3. Laissez-Faire Leadership :

• Sometimes Effective
• If you remember your high-school French, you'll accurately assume that laissez-faire leadership is the least intrusive form of leadership. The French term "laissez faire" literally translates to "let them do," and leaders who embrace it afford nearly all authority to their employees

4. Strategic Leadership :

• Commonly Effective
• Strategic leaders sit at the intersection between a company's main operations and its growth opportunities. He or she accepts the burden of executive interests while ensuring that current working conditions remain stable for everyone else.

5. Transformational Leadership :

• Sometimes Effective
• Transformational leadership is always "transforming" and improving upon the company's conventions. Employees might have a basic set of tasks and goals that they complete every week or month, but the leader is constantly pushing them outside of their comfort zone.

6. Transactional Leadership :

• Sometimes Effective
• Transactional leaders are fairly common today. These managers reward their employees for precisely the work they do. A marketing team that receives a scheduled bonus for helping generate a certain number of leads by the end of the quarter is a common example of transactional leadership.

7. Coach-Style Leadership :

• Commonly Effective
• Similarly to a sports team's coach, this leader focuses on identifying and nurturing the individual strengths of each member on his or her team. They also focus on strategies that will enable their team work better together. This style offers strong similarities to strategic and democratic leadership, but puts more emphasis on the growth and success of individual employees.

8. Bureaucratic Leadership :

• Rarely Effective
• Bureaucratic leaders go by the books. This style of leadership might listen and consider the input of employees -- unlike autocratic leadership -- but the leader tends to reject an employee's input if it conflicts with company policy or past practices.

I can develop leadership style as follows :

Practice discipline :

• A good leader needs discipline. Developing discipline in your professional (and personal) life is a must in order to be an effective leader, and to inspire others to be disciplined as well. People will judge your capacity to lead by the amount of discipline you display at work.

Take on more projects

• A great way to develop your leadership skills is to take on more responsibility. You don't have to take on more than you can handle, but you do need to do more than simply what's covered in your job description if you want to grow. Stepping out of your comfort zone is the only way you will learn anything new, and doing so will get you noticed by executives as someone who takes initiative.

Learn to follow :

• A true leader has no problem yielding control to another person when appropriate. You should not feel threatened when someone disagrees with you, questions your thinking, or puts forth ideas of their own. Keep an open mind and give merit where merit is due. It won't always be easy, but if you learn to value and respect others on your team, they'll be more likely to step up to the plate for you.

Develop situational awareness:

• A mark of a good leader is someone who can see the bigger picture, and anticipate problems before they occur. This is a valuable skill to have when handling complex projects with tight deadlines. The ability to foresee and provide suggestions for avoiding potential problems is invaluable for a leader. This ability also helps you recognize opportunities that others overlook, which will certainly earn you recognition.  

Inspire others :

• Being a leader means you are part of a team, and as a leader you should be able to motivate and inspire those you work with to collaborate as best they can. When a team member needs encouragement or guidance, offer it. Sometimes, all a person needs is someone to listen and be sympathetic.

Keep learning :

• The best path to becoming a good leader is to always keep learning new things. It keeps your mind sharp, and your skills fresh. It primes you for new challenges that may come your way, which is always a good thing in a leader.

Empower your teammates :

• No one is the best at everything, and the sooner you realize that, the sooner you can learn to be a good leader. Delegating tasks to others not only frees you up for things you do well, it also empowers other people on your team.

SELF AWARENESS IS ALSO IMPORTANT

Self-Awareness

• Human beings are complex and diverse. To become more self-aware, we should develop an understanding of ourselves in many areas. Key areas for self-awareness include our personality traits, personal values, habits, emotions, and the psychological needs that drive our behaviors.

  Personality :

• We don't normally change our personalities, values and needs based on what we learn about ourselves. But, an understanding of our personalities can help us find situations in which we will thrive, and help us avoid situations in which we will experience too much stress. For instance, if you are a highly introverted person, you are likely to experience more stress in a sales position than a highly extroverted person would. So, if you are highly introverted, you should either learn skills to cope with the demands of a sales position that requires extravert-type behavior patterns, or you should find a position that is more compatible with your personality. Awareness of your personality helps you analyze such a decision.
• Roy Disney and Stanley Gold would say that Michael Eisner's personality is too controlling. He has buffered himself from threats to his tenure as CEO by co-opting the board of directors and by micro-managing the executives he should be developing and empowering. As a result, his performance as CEO has suffered.

Values :

• It's important that we each know and focus on our personal values. For instance, if your first priority is "being there for your children" or "your relationship with God," it's very easy to lose sight of those priorities on a day-to-day, moment-by-moment basis. During the workday, so many problems and opportunities arise that our lists of "things to do" can easily exceed the time we have to do them. Since few (if any) of those things pertain to what we value most, it's easy to spend too much time on lower priority activities. When we focus on our values, we are more likely to accomplish what we consider most important.

Habits :

• Our habits are the behaviors that we repeat routinely and often automatically. Although we would like to possess the habits that help us interact effectively with and manage others, we can probably all identify at least one of our habits that decreases our effectiveness. For example, if you are a manager who never consults your staff before making decisions, that habit may interfere with your ability to build your staff members' commitment to the decisions and their decision-making skills as well.

Needs:

• Maslow and other scholars have identified a variety of psychological needs that drive our behaviors such as needs for esteem, affection, belongingness, achievement, self-actualization, power and control. One of the advantages of knowing which needs exert the strongest influence on our own behaviors is the ability to understand how they affect our interpersonal relationships.
• For instance, most of us have probably known people who have a high need for status. They're attracted to high status occupations, and they seek high status positions within their organizations. Such people also want the things that symbolize their status. They insist that they be shown respect, and they want privileges and perks that people of lower status can't have. Sometimes these people fight for things that others see as inconsequential--like a bigger office. Needs cause motivation; and when needs aren't satisfied, they can cause frustration, conflict and stress.

Emotions :

• Emotional self-awareness has become a hot topic of discussion recently because it's one of the five facets of emotional intelligence. Understanding your own feelings, what causes them, and how they impact your thoughts and actions is emotional self-awareness. If you were once excited about your job but not excited now, can you get excited again? To answer that question, it helps to understand the internal processes associated with getting excited.
• That sounds simpler than it is. Here's an analogy: I think I know how my car starts--I put gas in the tank, put the key in the ignition, and turn the key. But, my mechanic knows a lot more about what's involved in getting my car started than I do--he knows what happens under the hood. My mechanic is able to start my car on the occasions when I'm not because he understands the internal processes. Similarly, a person with high emotional self-awareness understands the internal process associated with emotional experiences and, therefore, has greater control over them.