Charismatic Leadership : A Charismatic Leader

“Although charismatics appear to be independent thinkers, they often rely on other high-profile executives in the company when making decisions. Addressing this tendency will help increase your chances for success” (Williams & Miller, 10).

Charisma is just a trait and means to have a vibrant persona. The difference between a charismatic leader and a normal leader is that a charismatic leader is more charming and is usually more persuasive than a regular leader.

Their research focused on leader and follower relationships within a strategic planning framework. Charismatic leaders are unlikely to emerge without a compelling need for organizational change. The leader conducts a SWOT assessment through which they identify performance gaps. They identify their vision of the desired future state and develop a plan to reach it. Working from a relationship based on trust and previous pertinent experience, the leader convinces the followers of the disadvantages of the current state, the advantages of the desired state and the efficacy of the plan to reach it. Personal commitment, confidence in themselves and the followers, articulating that the identified risk(s) are real, but acceptable, and passion for the effort motivate the followers towards the goal. Messaging and repetition becomes critical. Since strategic goals generally look three to five years into the future, building and maintaining the leader follower relationship is paramount to reaching the desired state (Sage Chp 7). Although not specifically stated, it seems intuitive given the type of leadership activities required and the length of time during which the leader and follower would interact that leaders could not maintain a lie throughout, especially at the surface. Anything other than authenticity and transparency would eventually be

One of the single most important traits to possess in order to be an effective leader is charisma. Jeff Skilling exuding charisma and was able to convince the media, shareholders, employees, and everyone in between that he was acting in their interest and running a company with integrity and honesty. Skilling’s charisma can be seen in many instances during his career at Enron, but one of his more striking instances of charismatic leadership was how he was able to influence all of the workers at Portland General Electric to convert their 401k’s into company stock (Gibney, 2005). Though this may sound like a relatively commonplace act, it took massive amounts of charisma to gain the trust and confidence of an entire company’s employees.

Charismatic leadership is a passionate, self-confident leader whose character and actions affect people to behave in certain ways. High self-monitors might be more effective leaders because they can easily adjust their behavior to a different situation versus a charismatic or self-confident leader that behave in an assured way.

The charismatic leadership style depend on the attraction and persuasion of the leader. Charismatic leaders are driven by their beliefs and promise to their cause. In this theory of Charismatic leadership, they say that charismatic leaders act in a different way they have a special charismatic effect on their followers. They are dominant, having a strong way to influence other people to be self- confident, and have a strong sense of one’s own moral values.

The Target CEO has is a charismatic leader that has accomplished great things. I agree with the article as it lays out where Target was prior to him taking the reigns as the CEO to where they are now. He has been able to make great strides in a short amount of time meaning he has been able to get his team on board with his vision early. The article shows that a charismatic leader can make changes that not only improve the companies bottom-line but improves the service to the customer as well. Charisma is more about the people being led than the leader as he or she has the attributes that people find easy to follow. The charismatic leader influence also goes outside the company itself to its stakeholders and other companies as well. It is

Charismatic leaders are able to inspire emotion and passion in their followers by being optimistic and enthusiastic. Without passionate and emotional employees, an organization will be crippled and unable to face

Antonakis, J., Fenley, M., & Liechti, S. (2011). Can Charisma Be Taught? Tests of Two Interventions. Academy Of Management Learning & Education, 10(3), 374-396. Antonakis et al starts off research by posing a question. “Can leadership, and in particular charisma, be taught? The authors set out to prove in fact that training can training managers a specific set of charismatic leadership tactics not only improves their charisma, but their effectiveness as leaders. Charismatic leadership is defined as by Antonakis et al as being a sub element of transformational leadership. In the first study researchers assigned 34 middle managers from a Swiss company into two groups randomly. One group received training in charisma and the others received no training. The group receiving training were trained in principles on charismatic leadership. In the second study focused on 41 MBA students enrolled in a leadership course at a Swiss public university monitor charismatic leadership. The students were videotaped giving a 4 minute speech addressing problems within the company while also giving a plan of action to staff. After, speech was done, each participant received training in charismatic leadership and was asked to deliver the same speech 6 weeks later by videotape. Results reveal that improvement and effectiveness as a leader were made in both research groups. This study concluded that feedback is important to the growth and development of leaders and must be provided to

Transformational leadership are classified into four components which are pointed out by Bass (1990, p. 28), ‘charisma, idealized influence, inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation and individualized consideration’. Apart from these basic roles, charisma leadership, a collection of personal characteristics, has its own role of literature since it has similarity with transformational leadership and they are contribution to each other (Bertocci, 2009, p. 43; Judge & Piccolo, 2004, p. 755). Leaders’ behaviour reflects them being role models for their followers. Followers respect, admire and trust their leaders who have charismatic effect on their followers to an extremely high grade are willing to take risks

Bryman, A., 1993, ‘Charismatic leadership in business organisations: some neglected issues’, Leadership Quarterly, vol. 4, no. 3, pp. 289-304.

Many great leaders have one thing in common and that is charisma. Charismatic leaders are those that have the capability to inspire and encourage people to do more than they would normally do, despite obstacles and personal sacrifice. (Daft, R.L, pg. 364) Charisma is what provokes energy and commitment out of its followers. These leaders possess the power to motivate their followers to do almost anything. They create an atmosphere of change and express an ideal vision of a better future. The most common characteristics of the charismatic leader involve maturity, communication, humility, and inspiration. These unique qualities impact their followers and conduct themselves in such a way that allows for remarkable results. Then

“Leadership is more ability than job. Moreover, it is all about determination, ability to solve problems, set direction for followers, gather them for common purpose and motivating people to achieve tasks. Furthermore, it is a charisma and the ability to reacting at the right time for a particular competitive situation” (L.Mullins, 2010, P372).

Charisma theory is described as a “gift”, or a unique superiority of an individual character. This is set by an advantage of which the individual is set apart from the common man and treated as a gem with supremacies (Charismatic vs. Transformational, 2011). Whereas the transformational theory is defined as leaders who enthuse followers to use their own egocentricities to benefit the organization (Charismatic vs. Transformational, 2011). These leaders also possess a gift of having a great impact on their followers (Charismatic vs. Transformational, 2011). Theories are apprehended around the world and almost every aspect of life possesses a theory behind them, whether there is action or unfolding someone’s personality. There are two leadership theories that will be conveyed, Charismatic Leadership and Transformational Leadership. Behind each theory is a founder that explains these concepts, James MacGregor Burns the founder of Transformational leadership (Conger, n.d.) and Karl Emil Maximilian "Max" Weber the founder of Charismatic leadership ("Transformational," n.d.). Over the course of time, movies have been made, demonstrating these theories, for example an old classic “The Lion King” ("Leadership Movies," 2008). This movie coveys both MacGregor Burns and Karl Emil Maximilian "Max" Weber’s theories.

Researchers have proposed several characteristics of leaders described as ‘charismatic’. The widely accepted characteristics of charismatic leaders are (Bryman et al., 2011, p. 90-91):