Lewin Lippitt & White Leadership Style

Lewin, Lippitt, & White as cited in Hamid and Ismail (2015), conducted a research on organization and leadership styles such as democratic, autocratic, and laissez-faire. Leadership style refers to a leader’s manner of behavior in a work situation. Accordingly, leadership style can be influenced by one’s personality which means it deals mainly with the manner of the leader on how he/she carry his/her functions or authority and power and the decision-making process. Leaders tend to choose a leadership style that is most comfortable to them and which allow the subordinates to participate in the decision making process, and is also dependent on the values and the personality of the leaders. The research conducted found the authoritarian, also

These leadership styles were defined as the manner and approach of providing directions, implementing plans, and motivating people. Leaders are hands-off and allow group members to make decisions. A free rein leader does not lead, but leaves the group entirely to itself such a leaders allows maximum freedom to subordinates. Freedoms are freely determined by group goals, techniques, and working methods. This leadership style promotes team work and on good interpersonal relations. The leader does not interfere with the events, thus the subordinates do what they want. There is autonomy among the members of the organization, thus they have complete freedom to make decisions. Thus, this type of leadership was ineffective when measured in hierarchal organizations (Edward & Gill, 2012). According to researches, laissez-faire leaders do not influence their subordinates and do not demonstrate abilities to lead, but rather demonstrate a lack of leadership (Northuose .2011). The study of Hamid and Ismail (2015) support the assumption that democratic leadership style is more effective than laissez-faire leadership style. In summary, these three leadership styles can be applied depending on the personality and experiences of the leader which may affect decision making

Looking into the theoretical review, there is no universal accepted definition of integrity, as there too many definitions of integrity, little theory and too few vigorous empirical studies. However, in this particular study, integrity of leaders is anchored on moral or ethical behaviors of leaders. When we speak of ethical or moral, it encompasses actions which are in accordance with socially accepted behavior (Pillay, 2014). Ethical appropriateness with regard to leaders-behavior is often evaluated in terms of abstract and highly idealistic concepts about individuals perception of how leaders should behave ( Maesschalck, as cited in Pillay, 2014). In dealing with conflict situations, ethical behavior should be behind the choices that we make. It necessitates critical analysis and deliberation that leads to choosing one option over the other. There may be other approaches to making ethical decisions; however, our choices shape us as being good or bad, and whether an action that was taken will harm someone or something (Van Aswegen & Engelbreecht, as cited in Pillay,