In 1939, Kurt Lewin led a group of psychologists to identify different styles of leadership. They named three major leadership styles: authoritarian, democratic, and laissez-faire. Laissez-faire leadership, also known as delegative leadership is a hands-off leadership style. This style allows followers to make decisions for themselves without the interference of the leader. With this type of hands-off leadership, researchers have found that it leads to the lowest level of productivity because followers don’t feel like there is anything pushing them to get their work done. Laissez-faire leadership is characterized by: very little guidance from leaders; complete freedom for followers to make decisions; leaders provide the tools and resources needed; and group members are expected to solve problems on their own. These leaders believe that the followers excel best when they are left alone to tackle their responsibilities and problems in their own way.
When studying laissez-faire leadership, Kurt Lewin and his group of psychologists, did a study on the three different types of leadership. During the study the children were led in arts and crafts projects. The students in this group were the least productive of all three groups. The children made more demands on the leader, showed little cooperation, and were unable to work by themselves.
Although this leadership style is not very effective for a majority of people, if the employees, or group members, are highly motivated and capable of working on their own it seems to be the best style. While it is “hands-off”, the leaders are still open for employees to ask questions or get feedback.Laissez-faire leaderships seems to be most effective for high level management. Those in high level positions should already prove to be self starters and not need their leader to tell them what to do. It would be effective for this specific type of person because laissez-faire leadership minimizes the leader's involvement in decision-making, allowing people to make their own decisions, although they may still be responsible for the outcome.
Overall, I would not personally prefer to work for someone with this type of leadership because although it may work for me and others, it would not benefit the company as a whole. Each person responds differently to different styles so if a style is best suited for let’s say 7.5% of all people are upper level managers, the other 92.5% would not respond well to these leaders.
http://psychology.about.com/od/leadership/a/leadstyles.htm
http://psychology.about.com/od/leadership/f/laissez-faire-leadership.htm
http://changingminds.org/disciplines/leadership/styles/lewin_style.htm
