Many people think authoritative leaders are bossy, micromanaging, or lacking empathy. However, good authoritative leaders create visionary goals and strive to motivate and encourage their team members to achieve great things.
An authoritative leader is hands-on and actively guides their team. The relationship between an authoritative leader and a team member is similar to that between a mentor and a mentee. First, the leaders inspire their team members by creating a vision and a plan, then they help motivate everyone by giving direction, guidance, and feedback. The team learns from the leader, and the leader motivates the team to reach the goal.
Even though they spearhead the efforts, good authoritative leaders are still willing to admit their mistakes and see success as a team effort.
Authoritative leadership is often confused with authoritarian leadership, so it is important to know the difference. Authoritative leaders encourage their team members to follow them, while authoritarian leaders command their followers to do what they say. Authoritative leaders view success as a team effort, while authoritarian leaders see themselves as the key to success. Finally, while authoritative leadership can be applied in different situations, authoritarian leadership only tends to work well in situations that are truly an emergency and require instant, decisive action.
Authoritative leadership can increase productivity, encourage high-quality work, and help teams operate more efficiently. Authoritative leaders can plan ahead and make quick decisions, which helps their teams to act quickly while still paying attention to detail. Good authoritative leaders have high emotional intelligence and seek to build trust with their teams. They can engage with others' concerns and emotions and use their understanding of their team to remove obstacles to its success.
Despite all these positives, authoritative leadership isn’t the right fit for every situation. Team members who prefer a more hands-off leader may find this leadership style confining and frustrating. It also doesn’t work well in situations where team members are experts or peers with more expertise than the leader. Often, this happens when a new leader gets the responsibility for leading a highly experienced team.
However, authoritative leadership shines in situations that need structure and clarity. These could be times of leadership change when a team is not meeting its goals or an organization that doesn’t have a clear vision. An authoritative leadership style is very useful in urgent situations or when a quick turnaround is important. It works well where team members need clear direction and instruction.
Some ways to use an authoritative leadership style include:
Identify your organization’s strengths and weaknesses, and note what needs to change.
Make sure you have frequent, two-way communication with your team members. Understanding your team member’s strengths, weaknesses, and skill sets will help you understand how each team member can contribute to the goal.
Be able to explain the reasons behind the actions you take. Team members may want to know how your plan will help them and the organization.
Chew On This:
Could any aspects of your role benefit from a more authoritative leadership style?