What leadership style do you follow?

To be a successful leader, one has to have a mix of leadership styles. My comments on various leadership styles

Coercive Style Demands immediate compliance
Style in Phrase “Do what I tell you.”
I believe that this style can be one of the least successful in most situations. The “Do what I tell you” can be very successful in a turn-around situation or when working with problem employees. But often, the coercive leadership style strongly affects the company's climate by inhibiting the organization’s flexibility and dampening employees' motivation. Be careful out there!

Authoritative Style Mobilizes people towards a vision
Style in Phrase “Come with me.”

I believe that this style is often the most successful. This type of leader states the overall goal but gives people the freedom to choose their own means of achieving it. Since employees under this type of leader understand the importance of their job and reasoning behind, this style works especially well in most business situations, but it works particularly well when a business is adrift. This style will fail when the leader is working with a team more experienced than he or she is. Du'oh!

Affiliative Style Creates harmony and builds emotional bonds
Style in Phrase “People come first.”

I believe that this style is particularly successful for building team harmony or increasing morale and has a noticeably positive effect on communication. In addition, it gives employees the freedom to do their job in the way they feel is most effective. But remember you cant always be people, people!

Democratic Style Forges consensus through participation
Style in Phrase “What do you think?”

I believe this style's impact on a company's climate is not as high but definitely not negative. By giving employees a voice in decisions, democratic leaders build organizational flexibility, responsibility and help generate fresh ideas.Sometimes the price is endless meetings and confused employees who feel they have no leader.

Pacesetting Style Sets high standards for performance
Style in Phrase “Do as I do, now.”

I believe that pacesetting should be used sparingly just like the coercive style. This leader sets high performance standards and exemplifies them too. A very structured approach, pacesetting tends to destroy company climate by evaporating flexibility, responsibility. This style has a very positive impact on employees who are self-motivated, highly competent but other employees tend to feel overwhelmed by leader's demands.

Coaching Style Develops people for the future
Style in Phrase “Try this.”

The least used of all, this style focuses more on personal development than on immediate work-related tasks. It works well when employees are already aware of their weaknesses and want to improve, but not when they are resistant to changing their ways.

I think there is no one style which works in all cases. A leader becomes great when he is flexible enough to switch between different styles as conditions demand. I do strongly believe that good, efficient, emotionally intelligent leaders do use multiple styles and if a leader rely only one style and also not delegate, chances are more that an organization might fail to accomplish its own goals.