Effectiveness of the Leadership Styles at Wal-Mart - Coursework Example

Paternalistic and Democratic are flexible style of leadership and they are being used by Wal-Mart since many years. Wal-Mart takes care of its employees by practicing the paternalistic style of leadership. Wal-Mart tries to supply concern for their employees and in return they gain trust and loyalty of the staff. Through democratic leadership Wal-Mart gives the decision making power to the employees, which promotes the interest of the employees towards the betterment of the organization. However Wal-Mart does not seem keen to practice laissez-faire leadership style, as it wants to restricts the decision making power of the employees.

The transactional leadership style is however used by Wal-Mart at times when the find the emotional level of the employees low (5 Different Leadership Styles That All Work!, 2011). The most common and effective leadership style that is being used by Unilever is the transactional style of leadership, which is based on providing materialistic and psychological rewards to the employees on their good performance and also to keep them motivated. This style of leadership is being used through the entire organization.

The leaders analyze the cause of the poor performance of the employees and then take corrective actions. The end result of this leadership style have been effective for Unilever, as it helps them reach goal setting, maturity, increase productivity and efficiency of operations. Other leadership styles such as transformational and laissez-faire have not been quite successful at Unilever. However paternalistic and democratic leadership styles have been effective for gaining the trust of the employees and keeping them devoted towards the organization.