Is There a Time When Leaders Need to Lead Top Down?

Is There a Time When Leaders Need to Lead Top Down?

The title of this article is one of the most frequently asked questions about Side by Side Leadership®. I would like to use this article to answer this and some of the other most frequently asked questions about leadership.

Question: Is there a time when leaders need to lead top down?

Dennis Romig: If you are asking, is there a time when leaders need to make the final decision on certain issues for their organization, the answer is yes. Usually executives make the final decision in areas that are their responsibility for managing the organization.

Question: If it is okay for leaders to be top-down some of the time, what is the big problem with being top-down?

Dennis Romig: Making the final decision as part of a mutually understood job responsibility is not the same as an authoritarian dominating leadership style that an executive, a manager or an employee takes into every interaction. One organization perceived their executive vice president as top-down because he seemed to be delaying every decision and being the bottleneck for action in the organization. When the management team along with the Executive VP went through developing a decision-making matrix, they found that, in fact, the VP only wanted the final say in two areas. After every one understood the authority that the VP had, and their own broader authority, most decisions were made rapidly and the organization achieved progress. Making final decisions in a few key areas of responsibility is not a leadership style. The leadership style is how the leader interacts with people day-to-day and the extent the leader shares talking time, decision-making, information and help.

Question: Why can't leaders be authoritative when they want to, based upon the situation, and participative when they think that style is appropriate? Why have a style of leadership that most of the time is two-way and participative?

Dennis Romig: Situation-specific type leadership is popular with leaders. The value is that it opens up the thinking for leaders who tend to be authoritative and top-down all of the time so that they act participative at least a little bit. It is surprising, though, that control group research did not indicate increased productivity of leaders doing situation-specific leadership styles. If it makes so much sense why does it not improve performance in the same way that has been so carefully documented for side by side leadership? One answer I think is that the top-down style is emotionally addictive to a leader and is hard to stop once the leader starts dancing that way in a group or individual interaction. I have noticed in my own leadership behavior with my team at Performance Resources, Inc. that after I have made a decision in a team meeting that is part of my responsibility no matter what the next agenda item is, I am more micromanaging and directive in that area as well. There seems to be an emotional spill-over effect of authoritarian decision-making in one decision to micro-management in adjacent discussions and decisions.

Question: What about leadership in the military? Shouldn't that be top-down?

Dennis Romig: Side by Side Leadership is not about military leadership. It was researched and tested in modern business organizations and a few non-profit organizations. Side by Side Leadership is how to increase the performance of an organization 20-30% by engaging the hearts and minds of everyone associated with the organization-its employees, its customers, its suppliers, its government regulators, and its partners. Two-way, participative leadership turns on people's hearts and minds at work toward achieving shared visionary goals. There may indeed be an application of Side by Side Leadership in the military, but that application has not been researched at this time.