Leadership is the effective towards a certain goal. It is the social influence and support for accomplishment. In the book, "The essential guide to group communication" by O'Hair and Wiemann, states that leadership can be defined as interpersonal influence, directed towards the communication process. O'Hair and Wiemann list four different types of leadership which consists of authoritarian, consultative, participative and laissez-faire. An authoritarian leader is strict, controlling and leads without any consideration from the other members of the group. Authoritarian leaders states his or her opinions, but does not make them open for discussion in a group effort. Consultative leaders is a bit more considerate because a consultative leader lets the group members participate, then makes a final decision after considering the members idea and opinions. Participative leader is most considerate. A participative leader works in a group and supports them to accomplish the task. A laissez-faire leader makes very little effort. I think I am a Participative leader. Although I work well independently, in group work, I like to hear and involve everyone's input.
Blankcanvas
I think that a leader should have attributes in all four of these categories. I think that because you can never know what kind of group you will encounter. You might have members in your group with different mentalities and some of them might not even catch on as other would. A leader without a doubt in my opinion should be an authoritarian and also have some characteristics of participative. I say this because I believe a natural born leader will act like one. I also state that a leader should be somewhat participative, because a leader will never know everything. When participating in a group a leader should be vocal and very credible for what he/she has done in order for the group to acknowledge that this is their leader. A leader who assumes everything and goes about his/her way is not a good leader just a demanding one. A leader who lets the group speak their mind and give their input and then comes to a conclusion based off of his/her analyzation of the groups entire is definitely a good leader. This is just my opinion but great work at explaining all four characteristics of a leader.
ReplyDelete