SITUATIONAL LEADERSHIP, ORGANIZATION AS SYSTEMS, LIFECYCLE OF Essay

SITUATIONAL LEADERSHIP, ORGANIZATION AS SYSTEMS, LIFECYCLE OF LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT - Essay Example Situational leadership is an innovative leadership style that would be analyzed in relation to Richard Lesser who is the present CEO of BCG. Paul Hersey had developed the situational leadership theory and was initially known as Life Cycle theory of leadership. The most important concept behind this theory is that there is no such leadership style which can be considered to be perfect or adopted by an individual. A leadership style can be stated as effective if it is task relevant. Those leaders are successful who are able to adapt leadership style to degree of maturity of their team. This quality is well observed in Richard Lesser who is the CEO of Boston Consulting Group. Figure1 represents various components of situational leadership. The different leadership styles are categorized into four segments such as telling, selling, participating and delegating. S1 represents telling and in this form there is one way communication as the leader guides the team on what is to be done. S2 is selling which encompasses socio-emotional support and this form of two way communication enables team members to be fully indulged into the process. S3 represents participating behavior that highlights shared decision making and the focus is shifted from task oriented approach to relationship oriented approach. S4 is delegating behavior in which the entire responsibility is on the team members and the leader gets involved only in decision making process and monitoring overall progress. The type of leadership style would be totally depending on the maturity level and competencies of the team members. Richard Lesser has greatly exercised all the different styles that has been outlined in Figure 1. The newly appointed consultants of the g roup are in direct guidance of Richard Lesser. He believes to educate all the new joiners properly so that they can work in collaboration with experienced candidates of the