"Motivation is the art of getting people to do what you want them to do because they want to do it." --Dwight D. Eisenhower
Leadership StylesFrom Mahatma Gandhi to Ratan Tata, and Medha Patkar to Lalu Prasad Yadav, there are as many leadership styles as there are leaders. Fortunately, business people and psychologists have developed useful, shorthand ways of describing the main leadership styles that can help aspiring leaders to understand and adapt their own styles and leadership impact.
Eisenhower was a WWII General, known to be one of the greatest assets the Allies had. The Allies had to first beat Germany, to contain Japan until this task was finished, and then force Japan into surrendering. During these tough and crucial times, it was Eisenhower’s diplomacy and tact that held the Allies together and brought the victory.
And,it was tough and crucial times that the Kolkata Knight Riders – owned by Shah Rukh Khan - and the Bangalore Royal Challengers – owned by Vijay Mallya, went through when both their team failed to qualify for the semis. So how did the two deal with the situation?
Mallya reacted by blaming his captain Dravid and sacking Charu Sharma, his manager, for selecting a team of their – not his – choice. For good measure, he also blamed the media.
On the other hand Shah Rukh declared to the press that he was undaunted by his team’s lack of success, and that the failures of this year would be the pillars of success for his IPL team next year. Two distinct contrasts in leadership styles and behaviour.
Leadership StylesFrom Mahatma Gandhi to Ratan Tata, and Medha Patkar to Lalu Prasad Yadav, there are as many leadership styles as there are leaders. Fortunately, business people and psychologists have developed useful, shorthand ways of describing the main leadership styles that can help aspiring leaders to understand and adapt their own styles and leadership impact.
In his book Primal Leadership, Goleman introduces six leadership styles:
1. Visionary Leadership
2. Coaching style
3. Affiliative Leadership
4. Democratic Leadership
5. Pacesetting Leadership
6. Commanding Leadership
2. Coaching style
3. Affiliative Leadership
4. Democratic Leadership
5. Pacesetting Leadership
6. Commanding Leadership
According to Daniel Goleman, good leaders are effective because they create resonance. They are tuned in to other people’s feelings and move them in a positive emotional direction. They speak authentically about their own values, direction and priorities and resonate with the emotions of their people. Under the guidance of an effective leader, people feel a mutual comfort level. Studies have shown that resonance comes easily to people with a high degree of emotional intelligence.
Based on the Goleman model, Mallya would appear to have a combination of a Pacesetting and Commanding styles of leadership. People with this style have a strong urge to achieve, are low on empathy and collaboration, impatient, numbers driven and tend to micromanage. These traits may have helped Mallya in his corporate battles such as the long drawn out one with Kishore Chhabria, for management control of Shaw Wallace. Have they let him down in the management of his IPL team? If Emotional intelligence is about using ones emotions intelligently, could more intelligent management of his emotions arising out of his leadership style attributes - impatience and lack of empathy – have helped him lead his team better during such crucial and sensitive times? Would that have also reinforced his image as a chilled out King of Good Times?
On the other hand, Shah Rukh’s response to his team’s failure was to pep up the spirit of his team by sending each of them an SMS saying, “the beauty of failure is that it brings people together…. So, let’s stick this out together…” [emphasis mine]
So what is Shah Rukh’s leadership style? He would appear to have a combination of the traits of a Visionary, Coaching, Affiliative and Democratic leader who inspires, is empathetic, and moves his people towards shared dreams. When failure strikes – unlike Mallya - he does not blame them, he uses ‘we’ [we are in this together] unlike ‘you’ [you are to blame] in his communication. As he says in his SMS, “….right now, all of us have become part of a failed script… A bad IPL script…. Let’s try and keep our characters worthy of still looking back at this story and remembering it as a special story becos we all worked very hard at this….” Could this explain, to an extent, the grand way the KKR team rode out of the IPL? As the Indian Express reported, “Sourav Ganguly finally decided to stamp his class with a match-turning 86-run knock that turned out to be the most sensational of comeback efforts in the tournament so far.”
Or, Do We Require Change of Our Thinking?
Are we seeing an evolution in the nature of the game of cricket as we know it? The IPL has all the elements of big league football - dugouts, cheerleaders, big money et al. Why, they even share the same name – Premier league. So is Mallya’s behaviour in keeping with that of a typical football team owner? Remember how the Chelsea football team owner, Roman Abramovich, sacked the manager of his team just days after their recent defeat to Man U? With a role model such as this, is Mallya’s behaviour justified?
Again, as Harsha Bhogle observes in The Indian Express , the corporatisation of cricket and profitability, image and return on investment become key criteria, can Mallya’s behaviour be seen as demanding accountability from his ‘employees’? After all, having shelled out a bomb for each of them, he would be perfectly within his rights to demand results of them!
What do you think?
