How to Coach Yourself and Others Essential Knowledge For Coaching | Page 510

Discussion
In Lewin et al's experiments, he discovered that the most effective style
was Democratic. Excessive autocratic styles led to revolution, whilst
under a Laissez-faire approach, people were not coherent in their work
and did not put in the energy that they did when being actively led.
These experiments were actually done with groups of children, but
were early in the modern era and were consequently highly influential.

Likert's leadership styles
Description
Rensis Likert identified four main styles of leadership, in particular
around decision-making and the degree to which people are involved in
the decision.
Exploitive authoritative
In this style, the leader has a low concern for people and uses such
methods as threats and other fear-based methods to achieve
conformance. Communication is almost entirely downwards and the
psychologically distant concerns of people are ignored.
Benevolent authoritative
When the leader adds concern for people to an authoritative position, a
'benevolent dictatorship' is formed. The leader now uses rewards to
encourage appropriate performance and listens more to concerns lower
down the organization, although what they hear is often rose-tinted,
being limited to what their subordinates think that the boss wants to
hear. Although there may be some delegation of decisions, almost all
major decisions are still made centrally.
Consultative
The upward flow of information here is still cautious and rose-tinted to
some degree, although the leader is making genuine efforts to listen

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