Assessment o f leadership styles in organisations

This research article discusses leadership style as the actions of a manager when he seeks to influence employee behaviour and makes decisions that are goal-oriented or employee-related and able to reconcile goal-seeking and employee focus. The selected researched leadership styles are: transactional, transformational and servant. Transactional management is perceived as a leadership style that focuses more on technical problem-solving, and less on employees. The transformational style is considered more complex than transactional, and is not limited to employee encouragement through awards or punishments. The servant leadership style offers more meaningful leadership, to ensure sustainable outcomes for people, organisations and societies. The aim of the article: to distinguish theoretically leadership style criteria, to evaluate leadership style using the developed assessment tool. The object of the research: the evaluation of the leadership style in an organisation. Research methods: based on the insights of researchers, and applying methods of analysis and the synthesis of scientific literature, to present the importance and concepts of leadership styles, to identify their features as evaluation criteria, to describe leadership styles. Based on primary empirical data collected through a survey by two qualitative researchers (directly accompanying manager and staff), a comparison of leadership styles in organisations is assessed. This paper explores different criteria of leadership style: the decision-making method; providing instructions (tasks); responsibility sharing; the attitude towards initiative; the attitude towards employees; the attitude towards one’s own knowledge; communication with employees; the character of relations with employees; the attitude towards discipline; the attitude towards values; providing a vision for employees. These criteria were chosen to assess leadership styles in organisations. The qualitative research conducted allows us to conclude that the leaders of organisations 1 and 2 evaluate their leadership style as a combination of servant, transformational and transactional leadership styles. Their employees argue that the opposite is true, because their managers combine transactional, transformational and servant leadership styles. The leader of organisation 5 indicates that his combination of leadership styles is the same as that of the leaders of organisations 1 and 2. His employees say the same, only indicating that their manager combines transformational, servant and transactional leadership styles. The leader of organisation 4 refers to the leadership style as a transactional and transformational leadership style combined with the servant style. His staff refer to a different combination of leadership styles, consisting of servant, transactional and transformative leadership styles. Only the evaluation opinions of the head of organisation 3 and his staff agreed that the manager uses a combination of transactional, transformational and servant leadership styles. It can be concluded that the criteria chosen are suitable for assessing leadership styles in organisations. The criteria selected showed differences and overlaps between respondents, heads of organisations, and the employees directly under them. It provides opportunities to evaluate leadership styles and combinations of them in organisations. By using these criteria properly and purposefully, managers can ensure successful leadership, and the achievement of the organisation’s goals. Organisations use combinations of different leadership styles. A comparison of the statements made by managers and employees under them reveals the same combinations of leadership styles, only in different proportions