Leadership and Management Styles

Can leadership be taught? Or are the only real leaders born leaders?

“Traditionally, the model for leadership in business has been the army. Managers and army officers give orders and their subordinates carry them out. Managers, like army officers, may be sent on leadership courses to develop their leadership skills, their ability to lead. But they still need a basic flair.”

What makes a great leader?

“The greatest leaders have charisma, an attractive quality that makes other people admire them and want to follow them. A leader may be described as a visionary, someone with the power to see clearly how things are going to be in the future. People often say leaders have drive, dynamism and energy.”

How have management styles changed in the last few years?

“Before, leaders were distant and remote, not easy to get to know or communicate with. Today, managers are more open and approachable: you can talk to them easily. There is more management by consensus, where decisions are not imposed from above in a top-down approach, but arrived at by asking employees to contribute in a process of consultation.”

Do you think this trend will continue?

“Yes. There are more women managers now, who are often more able to build consensus than traditional military-style authoritarian male managers.”

What exactly is empowerment?

“Encouraging employees to use their own initiative, to take decisions on their own without asking managers first, is empowerment. Decision-making becomes more decentralized and less bureaucratic, less dependent on managers and systems. This is often necessary where the number of management levels is reduced.

To empower employees, managers need the ability to delegate, to give other people responsibility for work rather than doing it all themselves. Of course, with empowerment and delegation, the problem is keeping control of your operations: a key issue of modern management.”

Task 3. Answer the questions:

1. What has traditionally been the model for leadership in business?

2. What do managers need for leadership?

3. How may a leader be described?

4. What were leaders before?

5. How are decisions taken nowadays?

6. What is one of the points of female management?

7. When is the empowerment especially necessary?

Task 4. Match the sentence beginnings (1-7) with the correct endings (a-f).

1. We are looking for a new CEO, someone with strong leadership

2. Richard has real managerial flair

3. In the police, leaders are held responsible

4. She is an extraordinary leader

5. Thatcher had drive, energy and vision,

6. He was born leader. When everyone else was discussing

a) but many thought it was the wrong vision.

b) and has won the respect of colleagues and employees.

c) for the action of their subordinates.

d) skills and experience with financial institutions.

e) what to do, he knew exactly what to do.

f) who will bring dynamism and energy to the job.

Task 5. Complete the following text with the correct words given below: open, top-down, authoritarian, consultation, subordinates, decentralized, approachable, imposed, bureaucratic, remote.

“My name is Laura Garcia and I train people in modern management techniques. Old style managers were …. They took all the decisions and told their … what to do without talking to them. They were often very … from their employees. They … their decisions from above and their whole approach was … and …. A modern manager has to be more … and …. Decision-making needs to be …. So everyone should be involved in the process of ….”

Task 6. Match the following words from the text with their definitions from the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary of Current English:

1) subordinates	a) a leader who can see what the future will be
2) charisma	b) to make smaller in size, number, degree, price, etc.
3) flair	c) people working below managers and army officers
4) visionary	d) to give hope, courage or confidence; support
5) to empower	e) to lay or place a tax, duty, etc.
6) to contribute	f) attractive quality that good leaders have
7) consensus	g) talent
8) to reduce	h) to give power or authority to act
9) to encourage	i) general agreement (of opinion, etc); collective opinion
10) to impose	j) to give ideas, suggestions

Task 7. Put the adjectives in brackets into the comparative or superlative form adding any necessary words. See Appendix 5.

1. At Associated Box Company (ABC), employees call their managers ‘sir’. At ’Superior Box Corporation (SBC) employees are … (deferential) as everyone uses first names.

2. Managers have long meetings with employees at SBC when at ABC employees are never consulted in decision-making, so SBC is … (informal) in the way people talk to each other.

3. Managers are … (approachable) at Superior Box Corporation as they share the same canteen with employees.

4. Our Chief Executive Officer is … (intelligent) person in the corporation.

5. Tom is … (responsible) employee in our company.

6. Siemens is … (large) electronics company in Europe.

7. Bill Gates is one of … (wealthy) men in the world.

Appendix 1:

SIMPLE TENSES (Active Voice)

	Present Simple	Past Simple	Future Simple
FORM	Affirmative	V (V + (e)s) she plans we plan	V + (e)d V2 she planned we wrote	Shall/will + V she will plan we will plan
Negative	she does not (doesn't) plan we do not plan	she did not plan we didn’t write	she will not / won't plan we will not / won't plan
Interrogative	Do we plan? Does she plan?	Did we write? Did she plan?	Shall we plan? Will she plan?
USAGE	-repeated or usual actions -facts or generalizations	-action(s) in the past, -a past habitual action, -past facts or generalizations	-a voluntary future action -a promise -a prediction
EXAMPLE	Marketing “drives” many of the day-to-day decisions made by operating management.	Marketing “drove” many of the day-to-day decisions made by operating management.	Marketing will “drive” many of the day-to-day decisions made by operating management.

Appendix 2:

PROGRESSIVE TENSES (Active Voice)

	Present Progressive	Past Progressive	Future Progressive
FORM	Affirmative	am is + Ving are He is planning	was were + Ving He was planning	will be + Ving He will be planning
Negative	He is not planning	He was not planning	He will not / won't be planning
Interrogative	Is he planning?	Was he planning?	Will he be planning?
USAGE	· an action in progress "at this very moment" or around it. · near future, particularly plans	· an interrupted action in the past · two past events in parallel	· an interrupted action in the future · two parallel actions in the future
EXAMPLE	They are having a meeting about the catalogue.	We were discussing our expansion plans when he came.	I can’t see you on the 12th because I will be attending a training course.

Appendix 3:

PERFECT TENSES (Active Voice)

	Present Perfect	Past Perfect	Future Perfect
FORM	Affirmative	have has + V(e)d V3 He has written	had + V(e)d V3 He had written	will have + V(e)d V3 He will have written
Negative	He has not written	He had not / hadn't written	He will not / won't have written
Interrogative	Has he written?	Had he written?	Will he have written?
USAGE	· unspecified time before now · duration before now	· a completed action or duration before something in the past	· a completed action or duration before something in the future
EXAMPLE	They have already discussed this problem.	He had completed his experiment by the time his chief came.	I will have taken part in many conferences by 2020.

Appendix 4:

PASSIVE VOICE

	Simple	Progressive	Perfect
Present	am is + V3 are	am being is being + V3 are being	have been + V3 has been
Past	was + V3 were	was being + V3 were being	had been + V3
Future	will be + V3		will have been + V3

Appendix 5:

COMPARISON

	Adjective	Comparative	Superlative
one-syllable adjectives	fast long	faster longer	the fastest the longest
-y, -ly, -w adjectives	busy	busier	the busiest
adjectives with two or more syllables	interesting	moreinteresting	the most interesting
irregular forms	good bad much(many) little far	better worse more less farther/ further	the best the worst the most the least the farthest/ the furthest

Appendix 6:

THE GERUND

	Indefinite	Perfect
Active	writing	having written
Passive	being written	having been written
Functions: 1) subject2) direct object3) prepositionalobject4) predicative5) adverbial modifier6) attribute	Reading economic articles is useful. Do you mind my reading this report? I am fond of reading. He started reading this report. After reading he closed the book. This reading hall is large.