Reflective Diary Individual - Assignment Solution

Charismatic leadership:

St. Paul used the word charisma to define the divine presence that is evident in forms like prophecy and curing. Then in the last decade of the nineteenth-century, it was used by Rudolf Sohm that encouraged people to transform in charismatic Catholics from Christianity. Max Weber, a German sociologist used charismatics in his theory of power and validity in the early 20th century. His theory had three terms; first was traditional that he connected with the system of empires. The second term he used was bureaucratic which was connected to politics and democracy, the last was charismatic through which he explained that the world needed extraordinary and revolutionary leaders in times of emergency. Weber believed that this type of leader can entice the support of the society, consequently, he also believed that the support of these leaders needed a chain of miracles which was impossible. He also added that it is unlikely that there can be a stable rule although he discussed how to sustain this leadership which was in the form of a clan or institutional charismatics (Eatwell, 2006).

These types of leaders emphasize more on the future and their objectives that are normally visionary that stresses the various positive results that will happen if their aims are accomplished (Mumford, 2006). Charismatic leaders are visionary and always pinpoint the positive characteristics of long term goals (Conger & Kanungo, 1987 as cited in Griffith, Connelley, Theil & Johnson, 2015) whereas presently conveying appropriate characteristics of the current events (Strange & Mumford, 2002). Mumford (2006) also explained the charismatic traits of a leader, however, according to him this type of leadership emphasizes more on the understanding of the leader that focuses on the relations between the leaders and their supporters or the positive impacts of a charismatic leader (as cited in Griffith et al. 2015).

There are many attributes of a charismatic leader but the main trait that makes them successful is their capability to attract the workers and draw the devotion of the workers towards them. This type of leader can attract and persuade supporters through their exceptional communication skills. The leader motivates his supporters through vision-based goals that may impress the supporters and see these goals as the main objective and encourage others to follow this leader. Many researchers report that supporters adopt these goals promoted by the leader due to the emotional attachment with the leader (e.g. House, Spangler, & Woycke, 1991; Howell, 1988). Consequently, only a positive side of the charismatic leadership has been discussed and not the negative side (as cited in Samani & Singh, 2013)

Narcissism is one of the consequences of the charismatic leader. According to Strange & Mumford (2002), they listed the behaviours of a charismatic leader that included narcissism; this type of leader is an attention seeker and wants to have control over others. In their research, they investigated narcissism as a variable and found out that along with visionary traits the leader becomes influential and wants to dominate the intrapersonal outcomes. This, in turn, will result in the dehumanizing of the colleagues and an increase in the selfishness of the leader.

A charismatic leader, in my opinion, can influence a lot of people for their cause and can have many loyal supporters that will follow them anywhere they lead them to. Charismatic leadership can come in handy in organizational setup but if the leader has the attribute of narcissism in them then they work for their selves and not for the betterment of their employees. Many researchers as mentioned above haven’t discussed thoroughly the negative impacts of the charismatic leader however, few of them have discussed it like Stranger & Mumford (2002). Leaders need to adapt this psychological theory if he wants to benefit the firm or his country in the future if the leader is a visionary.