Contemporary Leadership Style: How relevant are they in today’s world?

Introduction

The world is governed by leaders, it has always been the case. Leaders are individuals who have always guided their group during tough times. They are the ones who have turned losses into profits, wrecked ships into completely new ones. Leadership is not only a concept, it’s a necessity. Every profession has leaders in it and they have helped time and time out to enthral the world showing why are they important. Leadership can be shown in many ways. It’s not important to be that you are only a leader if you are in a higher position in some business, In troubled times, any person who steps up to speak to their team or group and show them direction, give them motivation to give 100% in their efforts is a leader in definition. In this study, the different types of leadership will be discussed.

Contemporary Leadership Styles

As already mentioned, leadership has many styles in modern times. There is the traditional leadership, where it has been made to understand that all power stays with the leader. This often instils fear, negativity and hatred in employees or team members since any wrong move may lead to a huge problem career wise. What follows later is that these leaders are often oiled by employees which results them in being favourites and it also leads to politics among colleagues. The traditional leadership bring negativity with it which doesn’t help with the performance of the whole group. Different styles of leadership have been developed and they have been quite useful in situations. Traditional leadership have often been described as masculine since its inclinations towards power and pressure. Contemporary leadership has bit of both and the main difference is that it brings about a sense of togetherness which was missing earlier. In here, no doubt the power stays with the leader but the leader doesn’t instil fear or negativity but introduces motivation and a knack to give efforts to achieve results. The goals set are long term and it is much more successful in the long term. The work culture improves significantly and instead of oiling bosses the employees are much more interested in performing well to earn fruitful results (Molchanov, 2016). Contemporary Leadership brings values and the environment is driven by continuous gathering of knowledge and new born ideas out of creative minds. Traditional leadership is limited with rules and regulations which often restricts positivity whereas contemporary leadership excels in it. It doesn’t have strict regulations, only the basic ones which the employees would generally follow. Contemporary leadership breaths positivity and growth in its roots. It looks after its employees as its own which brings about the togetherness in any organisation. Its not only what the leader instils, it is also what a leader himself is. An unconventional leader has many skills that he/she has honed with experience. Good communication skills, trying to hear the problems of employees and trying to solve a few of them (Rosenbach, 2018). One of the main traits of any kind of leadership is his honesty and transparency. It is because it sets an example for the employees to follow.

The example of Apple

The leadership style could be seen as complicated as he was primarily involved in taking up challenges be confident about them. He was dynamic, charismatic and his sheer will power made him a role model among his employees (Apple, 2019). The actions of Steve Jobs helped the company to create new designs and helped build strong organisational culture. Today Apple is the most valued company in the whole world by capitalization of the market.

Figure: Sales Chart of Apple

(Source: Apple, 2019)

Discussion

This study talks about how the Contemporary Leadership has come into action in today’s world and how it is useful in dealing during troubled situations. It shows how it has been able to overcome the flaws that were previously there with traditional leadership. Contemporary leadership brings the whole group together and the chemistry between the employees grow and it can be seen that the problems in the work environment starts to seize down.

Conclusion

Contemporary leadership has proved itself that with its values it can install a strong motivating workforce wherever it has been enforced. In today’s competitive and harsh world, contemporary leaders are saviours who show trust in their group to do a little better. This automatically brings a sense of responsibility among employees to prove their leaders right.   This type of leadership holds a high place in the bright future to come.

References

Apple, 2019. Available at https://www.apple.com/in/

Molchanov, M.A., 2016. The Ashgate research companion to political leadership. Routledge.

Rosenbach, W.E., 2018. Contemporary issues in leadership. Routledge.