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There are several approaches to providing leadership in an organization, including that which puts people first. A manager whose default approach is to put people and harmony first employs an affiliative leadership style. Achieving goals doesn’t solely define success and ensuring team satisfaction plays an extremely crucial part. The affiliative style focuses on taking care of employee happiness and maintaining a harmonious workplace and work culture to inspire loyalty within the team.
We’ll discuss the affiliative leadership style definition and some affiliative leadership examples to highlight why managers may consider emphasizing harmony when it comes to managing and leading teams.
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Affiliative Leadership Meaning
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Characteristics Of Affiliative Leadership Style
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Advantages Of Affiliative Leadership Style
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Disadvantages Of Affiliative Leadership Style
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Affiliative Leadership Examples
Affiliative Leadership Meaning
Affiliative leadership is a style of leadership that focuses completely on people and relationships. It relates to the act of forming social and emotional bonds with each member of a team. Adopting a people-first approach can help in creating and sustaining a peaceful workplace environment. An affiliative leader is caring and nurturing and is tuned in to the emotions of their team members. Affiliative leadership inspires togetherness, teamwork and a sense of happiness and harmony.
Affiliative leaders value ongoing positive feedback. Gone are the days when employees used to get feedback during annual performance reviews and there was a little formal and informal exchange between employee and manager. Affiliative leadership’s definition tells us that modern leadership is all about taking charge and letting employees always know their importance and value to the team.
Characteristics Of Affiliative Leadership Style
Let’s discuss the characteristics of affiliative style of leadership:
- An affiliate leader’s top priority is people. They value both individuals and teams and respect their emotions and needs. Bonding with team members and having a strong sense of loyalty ensures opportunities for impeccable performance
- Affiliative leaders have strong moral values and vehemently discourage unethical behavior. Affiliative leadership style examples show that a focus on morality is the reason why affiliative leaders exhibit empathy towards team members, which other leadership styles often lack
- Affiliative leaders use positive and regular communication as tools to keep team morale high and increase the chances of achieving goals
- Affiliative leadership style examples have shown how a high level of communication and trust and avoiding rigid rules and policies bring greater flexibility for handling changing situations
The cornerstones of affiliative leadership are a strong moral compass and a strong focus on people.
Advantages Of Affiliative Leadership Style
These are the advantages associated with affiliative leadership style:
- Instead of dwelling on shortcomings, affiliative leaders offer constructive feedback to uplift team performance and morale.
- A harmonious work culture aids in swiftly resolving interpersonal conflict.
- Employees build a sense of loyalty, as their leaders care about their emotional and physical well-being.
- Flexibility and autonomy offer a lot of breathing space to employees thus helping them experience less stress or manage it better.
- Empathetic and compassionate yet strong leadership helps employees morally and emotionally recover from business crises.
The advantages of affiliative leadership can be attributed to tightly knit teams with a strong sense of loyalty towards their leaders and organizations.
Disadvantages Of Affiliative Leadership Style
Here are the disadvantages associated with the affiliative leadership style:
- Always being positive with feedback to avoid conflict makes managers overlook poor performance. This can become contagious and affect team performance, as the rest of the team may expect lower standards to be acceptable.
- Issues remain unresolved when constructive criticism isn’t used as a tool for betterment. This coupled with a sole focus on a team’s harmony and well-being can negatively impact an organization in achieving its goals.
- Being too empathetic can urge an employee to develop an unhealthy dependence on their leader. This can affect the development of their emotional fortitude and intelligence.
Leaders have to realize that prioritizing employees over organization can cost the business. They must avoid such situations by identifying shortcomings and maintaining balance.
Affiliative Leadership Examples
Let’s finish by looking at these examples of affiliative leadership:
- A globally famous example of an affiliative leadership style is the Dalai Lama. His teachings, compassion and dedication inspire his followers and disciples to follow him on his path of happiness and harmony, no matter what the conditions are
- Warren Buffet is one of the most famous affiliative leaders in the world. He focuses on the well-being of his team of finance professionals and trusts them to creatively carry out strategies to produce returns
Affiliative leadership is one of the many approaches to effective team management. Managers must analyze their goals, knowledge, experiences and personality to assess how they can lead their teams better.
Affiliative leaders and other ambitious professionals who want to balance action with awareness and utilize opportunities for growth and learning should sign up for Harappa’s Leading Self program. With this online leadership course, you can utilize frameworks and performance equations to reduce interferences. Use the Iceberg model to identify and overcome limiting beliefs, while the Ladder of Learning will teach you the four steps of skills and competence. The Balcony and Dance Floor Model will help you balance actions and awareness in critical moments. Our faculty will train you to become a professional who has the vision and competence to drive innovation.
