Managing a Team – Part 2: Management Styles and Flexing

Mon 26 Feb 2018

We all remember good managers. When they move companies often the team will move with them so why are they so good what do they do?

In this series of two blog posts we are looking at look at your management style. In particular:

The Qualities of a Good Manager – what do we know?
Management Styles – a model for your style of management
Flexing – planning the styles you use according to the situation

In this post we’ll look at management styles and flexing.

Management Styles

George Litwin and Robert Stringer of Harvard Business School researched how leaders lead. Based on their findings we see six basic styles of management.

Management Styles

Coercive	Just do what I tell you to.
Authoritative	Let me tell you where we're going as a team.
Affiliative	People first task second.
Democratic	Let's decide together.
Pace Setting	If you can't do it right I'll do it myself.
Coaching	What did you learn what would you do differently what can we improve on.

Coercives demand immediate compliance they are driven to achieve like taking the initiative and typically want to control not only the situation but themselves as well. Coercion works best in crisis we’re strong directive leadership quick decision-making and control is required. This style is often a good way to kickstart a turnaround. Be careful not to stay in this style once the turnaround starts happening. It can be the only way to manage problem employees.

Authoritative is all about mobilising people towards a vision. They see the bigger picture and can communicate it clearly. This style is characterised by self-confidence and empathy; an engagement with the objective as well as the people and the journey. A good style to adopt when you want to be a change catalyst. A new vision is required and clear direction needed. It does of course rely to some extent on the competence and motivation of the people who will deliver. The affiliative style is all about creating harmony and building emotional bonds. The people come first as without them nothing will get done. Characterised by empathy relationship building and generally good communication this works best when a team is in conflict. Affiliative is a good healer and motivator under stress as opposed to crisis when perhaps coercive would be better.

Democrats seek consensus through participation. They want to collaborate, show team leadership and good communication. A good style when you need to build buy-in. It also means you get input from valuable team members, so if you are not the expert in the subject and they are go democratic. However, remember that the Democratic decision may not always be the best for the team.

Pace-Setters are in at 7 a.m. and still there at 7 p.m. They set high standards, are very conscientious, and driven to achieve. This style is one that takes the initiative and literally sets the pace. If you can’t keep up you probably shouldn’t be here. The style gets quick results as long as you have a highly motivated and competent team.

Coaches focus on developing people for the future. The long term is the target, and so investment emotionally is required upfront. The style is characterised by a lot of empathy self-awareness and the ability to facilitate and coach others. Coaching is a very powerful driver in improving team performance and developing long-term strengths. It does however take more time.

Flexing

Leadership and management are situational it depends what’s happening. The key to effective management is identifying the style you need for a given situation. This we term “flexing”.

If you’ve just implemented a round of redundancies and people are nervous and fearful of change then you probably need to be more affiliative. However a very competent team of high performers who always want new challenges may want you to pace set or be more authoritative. “Tell us where you want to end up and then leave us to do it”. If you’re pushing through change that needs strong buy-in then starting democratic will help do that. A coaching approach will smooth the way, but eventually you may need to be coercive to drive it through.

Here is an exercise in exploring application of the six styles.

From this list, consider consider what is your strongest style.
Where your strongest style is the most appropriate to use, how will you maximise the effectiveness of it?
Where your strongest style is the least appropriate to use, how will you flex?

This rapid learning module gives you an introduction to how you can flex your management style to lead your team more effectively.

Use the three sections we’ve explored to continually plan and review your management approach.

Qualities of a good manager, your own definition and the general points most agree on.
Management styles the six style model which gives you your preferred and least preferred styles.
Flexing. Styles are situational not a one-size-fits-all so analyse the demands of your work and select the appropriate style for the scenario you are dealing with.

I hope this series of posts has been useful. Obviously, there is a lot more to the subject, perhaps this will whet your appetite to work with Sun and Moon!