Value of Participative Leadership During

¶ … Value of Participative Leadership During Organizational Change

Participative or democratic leadership strives to involve other organizational actors in the decision-making process, as an aid to the main decision-making authority. This can be a particularly effective leadership style when dealing with organizational change. There is often initial resistance in adapting to the new standard operating procedures within an organization. However, one of the core assumptions of participative leadership is that involving subordinates in the decision-making improves their understanding of why such changes are necessary. This style of leadership strives to undercut organizational resistance through soliciting input. By involving others in the change process, people feel as though they have a commitment and a stake in the organization's new course for the future.

Democratic leadership is especially effective when decision acceptance is the most crucial aspect of the prospective change. Democratic leadership techniques are also effective when the problems that the change may cause are indeterminate in nature because the leader lacks information about the changes' full future implications. Instead of trouble-shooting on his or her own, the input of others can guide the leader in identifying what areas of the organization the changes may prove most difficult and why resistance may occur. ("Vroom and Yetton's Normative Model," 2006, Changing minds)

Persons deciding together often make better decisions than one person alone, as different and perhaps overlooked aspects of organizational change may be evident to certain members of the organization but not evident to members in a different area of the hierarchy. When problems ensue, as they inevitably will during an organizational change, people tend to be more committed overcome such difficulties where they have been involved in the relevant decision-making from the beginning, rather than been subject to the change process as mere passive actors. People tend to be less competitive and more collaborative when they are working on a goal in which they feel they have a common interest, namely in making change as painless as possible. When people make decisions together their commitment to the change is greater and this increases their commitment to the initial decision. ("Participative Leadership 2006, Changing minds)

Some of the weaknesses of the democratic approach to leadership are that occasionally a strong organizational vision may be required to offset resistance to a potentially radical idea. This is especially true of new, sweeping changes that go contrary to conventional wisdom. It can be problematic when there is a wide range of opinions and there is no clear way of reaching an equitable final decision, other than having a single, strong and decisive actor to make a decision. ("Lewin's Leadership Styles," 2006, Changing Minds) This is why democracy may not be the most appropriate style to adopt during the initial phases of organizational change. Persons within the organization can sometimes unite against the goals rather than share in them. Democratic leadership is not a free-for-all and an abnegation of the central authority's responsibility for being the final decision maker.