Why Democratic Leadership Brings Better Strategic Results

An Overview Of Democratic Leadership

Over 90% of the organizations struggle to convince their people to adopt new strategic initiatives.

The traditional way of creating a strategic plan and then announcing it to the organization's employees just doesn't work anymore.

Management needs to take more bottom-up initiatives and consider a more democratic leadership style if it wants its strategy to gain some traction.

Including people in the strategy discussions goes a long way to grounding your strategy in reality and leading to increased engagement as your people adopt it.

What Is Democratic Leadership?

Democratic leadership is the style of leadership that invites multiple people to participate in the decision-making process than just the leaders. That's why it's also called “participative leadership.”

Organizations that adopt it have very advanced internal communication processes. However, it's still a leadership style with an active hierarchy.

Autocratic vs Democratic Leadership: Understanding Different Leadership Styles

These two leadership styles have many inherent differences manifesting in various ways. Here are the three categories that their most important differences reveal themselves:

• The communication processes
• The organizational structure and internal team dynamics
• The company culture

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Democratic leadership demonstrates increased efficiency in internal communication. Unlike autocratic leadership style where informational channels display intense friction in moving, sorting and searching for information, democratic style creates highways of informational flow that encourage sharing.

It's impossible to make informed decisions in democratic style if there isn't a free flow of ideas inside the organization. On the other hand, autocratic leadership style focuses on converging most of the information to a few key decision-makers.

Democratic leadership demonstrates fluidity in structure and team dynamics. Organizations that adopt a more democratic leadership style have less vertical hierarchical levels and they tend to spread responsibilities horizontally.

Involving more people in the decision-making process requires a delegation not only of tasks and activities but of authority as well, empowering group members. That is not the case with autocratic leaders who tend to accumulate responsibilities and hold the majority of their team's authority when making decisions.

These leaders delegate activities, but in the organization's eyes, they are solely accountable for their team's success.

Democratic leadership develops a growth company culture. Where the focus is on execution. This is represented in the way the organization treats mistakes and obstacles. For democratic leaders, mistakes are lessons, not failures.

They tend to create an environment where team members feel safe to express their ideas and creative solutions. This encourages experimentation and favors innovation. Autocratic leadership style focuses on comprehensive planning and avoiding mistakes.

Adhering to processes and rules is highly valued and execution closely follows the initial plan.

No style of leadership is better than the other

Each one has its appropriate use case. In terms of popularity, though, strict, top-down leadership styles have reigned supreme until recently, being the go-to style to govern an organization. However, more bottom-up initiatives and horizontal leadership styles are popularized among certain industries, especially in private businesses.

The truth is all organizations should experiment with different leadership styles and initiatives that lean towards either side of the spectrum.

Primary Characteristics Of Democratic Leadership

This leadership style has three defining primary characteristics.

Free flow of ideas and information

A team makes informed decisions when the right information reaches the right person at the right time. Effective leadership requires this.

In participative leadership, that means sharing information with everyone inside the team. This requires channels where the free flow of information is rapid and multi-directional.

The team can't make a collective decision if every person holds only certain pieces of the puzzle. Thus, installing efficient communication channels becomes a priority for effective leaders.

For example, you might adopt the daily habit of sharing findings or weekly updates through structured team meetings, perhaps including brainstorming sessions.

The goal is to have dedicated channels to certain information to avoid cluttering and overloading.

Employee engagement and empowerment

This is the key characteristic that makes democratic leadership so effective. It rely heavily on empowering employees.

In an autocracy, employees are encouraged to share information upwards and wait for the stamp of approval to act on it. Democratic leadership reverses this model. Leaders delegate authority to their people and encourage group members to make decisions within defined limits.

Instead of waiting for approval, the individual is expected to make responsible choices and is reviewed based on their decision-making abilities as well as their choices' results. This contributes to driving higher job satisfaction.

When leadership communicates clearly that it trusts its people to make the right decision, team members feeling empowered is a common result. This contributes to employee engagement.

Communicating more than just the strategy's content

Leadership communicates the context as well, ensuring alignment with the company's vision.

People don't get only the conclusions of the strategy discussions but also a deeper understanding of the journey that took them there. They feel included and gain a sense of ownership because their opinions matter. As a result, strategy gains more traction when implemented.

Tools like slides and sheets are unable to provide that context. Use a Strategy-Led Performance Platform like Cascade to expose your plan to your people.

When Is Democratic Leadership Effective?

Below are the three major indicators that your organization needs a democratic leadership style.

When innovation and creativity are priorities

Creativity requires a certain degree of freedom. Encouraging creative solutions is key.

In industries where innovative solutions are essential to a company's bottom line, strict structure and lack of empowerment hinder creativity. Take Pixar, for example.

The company wouldn't be able to constantly innovate with every new movie if all of the creative decisions were taken by only a few people. On the contrary, every movie is the product of collaborative innovation between both the creative team and the technology one, often involving a software development team. This type of leadership fosters such environments.

When speed is more important than “getting it right”

Great execution rarely is the product of a perfect plan.

It always stems from experimentation. If there are too many uncertain conditions in the market, spending more time planning is never the answer for effective leadership.

The answer is swift execution. Going out there and testing ideas. Instead of trying to piece together a perfect plan, you discover the best path by trial and error, often gathering input along the way for problem solving.

Startups know this. That's why they move so fast and try so many different ideas, fostering a range of ideas. There is no value in spending too much time planning and looking for the right answer. Startups simply lack the resources to stay still.

Large corporations, on the other hand, have the luxury of standing still and observing the market. But - and this is a huge “but” - they tend to grow complacent, believing they're too big and too successful to fail. So they resist internal change.

Instead of instilling a higher degree of freedom inside their organizations, they remain rigid and unable to react to market disruptions. The democratic approach could help here.

Democratic leadership takes feedback from the front line and corrects course at lightspeed. This agility is crucial for organization's success.

When process optimization is a priority

There comes a time in every organization's life when improving current processes yields higher returns than introducing new policies. This might involve quality control improvements.

At this point, front-line employees are encouraged to utilize their expertise, bring their ideas and creative solutions forth and incrementally improve production. Democratic leadership takes advantage of its people's expertise and improves efficiency, potentially helping to boost productivity.

Although continuous process improvement is in every company's plan, autocratic leadership style is much more resistant to change and takes much more time to apply incremental improvements.

For example, democratic leadership in nursing benefits departments like quality assurance, where people spot weaknesses in the front line and raise their concerns, encouraging participation.

However, there is the danger here of spreading too thin. If every request from the bottom is granted and the focus is to optimize processes individually for every team and department, the company stops operating as a unit. Achieving team consensus becomes harder.

It maximizes the efficiency of its parts separately instead of treating them as moving parts of a bigger machine, ensuring everyone is on the same page.

Thus, confining its potential and giving up on acquiring a significant competitive advantage.

Disadvantages Of Democratic Leadership: When It's Ineffective

When group members lack expertise

Not every source provides valuable information. Not all group members possess the necessary knowledge.

The marketing department can't offer insightful feedback to manufacturing because it lacks the expertise and the necessary context. The same dynamics could occur in a team, though on a much smaller scale, involving different team members.

In many cases, a team leader's experience and expertise might tower over those of their team members.

As such, involving team members in the decision-making process won't add any value besides providing context to the final conclusion. Team members will simply have nothing to offer at that point, despite democratic values encouraging input from everyone's opinion.

Guidance and providing concise instructions gain greater importance than involving people in strategy discussions or team collaboration.

When predictability is the top priority

Think of emergencies. Where decision making needs to happen fast.

When there is no time for brainstorming sessions. When moving forward in a predictable way matters above all. In those cases, authority is concentrated on the leader and every decision goes through them. The leader has the final say. That doesn't mean that communication stagnates. Good conflict resolution skills may still be needed.

On the contrary, information sharing takes a central role. It becomes much more efficient and focused. Filtering information strengthens and only the most essential things are communicated, aiming at creating a completely decluttered situation, often requiring a strong project manager.

However, these situations rarely last long and for a good reason. These are highly intensive situations and require a massive energy expenditure from everyone involved.

In addition, the heavy information filtering hinders long-term progress since many opportunities involving diverse perspectives are dismissed due to the situation's urgency.

Examples Of Democratic Leadership In Action

While purely democratic organizations are rare, elements of this leadership style are prevalent in many successful settings.

For instance, Google has historically fostered bottom-up innovation, valuing employee input significantly in its decision making process.

The collaborative company culture at Pixar, essential for their creative output, relies heavily on peer feedback, brainstorming sessions, and shared leadership across teams during film production.

Furthermore, many software development teams embrace democratic principles through agile methodologies like scrum, featuring self-organizing teams and collaborative planning.

Beyond specific company structures, many effective leaders act consultatively, actively seeking diverse opinions and gathering input from their team members before making a final decision, embodying a core aspect of the democratic approach.

These examples illustrate the potential benefits in various contexts. However, successfully adopting this style requires deliberate effort and specific leadership practices to cultivate the right environment.

Implementing Democratic Leadership Effectively

Moving toward a democratic approach takes real, ongoing effort from leaders.

Here are some key ways to build this kind of environment:

Actively encourage participation

Don't just wait for input; actively ask for it. Use tools like focused brainstorming sessions, easy ways to submit suggestions, regular team meetings for problem solving, and one-on-one chats where the leader encourages group members to share openly.

Foster open communication

Build safe and open ways for honest feedback, both good and bad. Make sure information travels easily – not just down, but also up and between team members. This helps the free flow of ideas needed for smart decision making.

Delegate meaningfully

Truly empowering employees means trusting them with real tasks and the power to make decisions within clear limits. Set clear boundaries, but avoid micromanaging. This helps build employee engagement.

Value diverse perspectives

Create a space where different viewpoints aren't just accepted, but are actively welcomed. Make an effort to hear multiple perspectives, including those that disagree, to challenge assumptions and avoid groupthink. Considering a range of ideas leads to stronger results.

Develop conflict resolution skills

When you have many diverse opinions, disagreements are bound to happen. Help your team (and yourself) learn good ways to handle conflict constructively. Aim for team consensus when you can, or at least clear understanding. Good conflict resolution is key for healthy team collaboration.

Be decisive when necessary

Remember, democratic leadership doesn’t mean avoiding responsibility. The leader still needs to make the final decision or set a clear path when the group can't agree, when time is short, or when their expertise is crucial. It's important to clearly explain why a decision was made, helping keep everyone on the same page.

Lead by example

In the end, how the leader acts sets the real tone. Show democratic values in your everyday actions: listen well, admit when you're wrong, be open to feedback, and give credit to others freely. These actions shape the company culture much more than rules do, showing that everyone's opinion really does matter.

Embracing The Democratic Advantage

Choosing the right leadership style comes down to the specific situation, your team, and what your organization needs to achieve. Democratic leadership, while not always the easiest or best fit, offers real benefits when used thoughtfully.

Although there is a time and place that democratic leadership doesn't benefit a team, implementing more bottom-up initiatives using the democratic style of leadership loosens internal structure making the organization more adaptive. This management style fosters adaptability compared to authoritarian leadership or other leadership styles that are more rigid.

Tapping into the team's collective knowledge and insight is powerful.

The democratic process can encourage creativity. By using these principles, organizations can become more resilient, innovative, and build stronger employee engagement for lasting success.

In Cascade, you expose your strategic plan to your people, encouraging them to challenge it and spark meaningful conversations around it, leveraging multiple perspectives. Try Cascade Strategy-Led Performance Platform for free or book a chat with our experts.