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Presence and Fit: Charismatic and Situational Leaders
Principles of Management · Chapter 9: Leadership Styles and Sources of InfluenceSection 9.7 · lesson 51 of 11712 min · free with a free account
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In this lesson
Why charisma lives in followers' eyes, and why adapting takes a repertoire.
- Describe charisma and the attributions it rests on
- Explain the risks of charismatic leadership
- Explain succession and routinization
- Describe the situational orientation and its demands
Transcript
Everything said in the video, section by section (1,538 words). Read along, or search it.
Leadership Styles and Sources of Influence
Presence and Fit: Charismatic and Situational Leaders
Some leaders seem to carry a room with them. We call that charisma. This section asks where charisma really comes from, and the answer is surprising. Largely, it comes from the followers. We'll look at the behaviors linked to charisma, and the conditions under which it's attributed. We'll connect it to transformational leadership, and state its risks in full. Then we'll take up the problem every charismatic organization eventually faces. What happens when the leader leaves? In the second half, we turn to situational leadership, the idea that good leaders adapt their style. And we'll see why knowing you should adapt isn't the same as being able to. Both halves share a theme. Leadership depends on the situation, and on the people reading it.
Defined by Attribution
Charisma Is in the Eye of the Follower
Charismatic leadership is defined by the attributions followers make. Followers perceive extraordinary qualities in the leader. Those qualities may or may not be objectively present, at least to the degree perceived. That definition moves charisma to an unexpected place. It sits in the relationship between leader and follower, not simply in a fixed property of the leader alone. And that changes how charisma should be understood. It's partly a matter of what a leader does, or is. But it's just as much a matter of what followers are prepared to perceive in her. And that readiness comes from the followers' own situation, and their own needs. Hold on to that idea. It explains almost everything else in this section.
The Behaviors
5 Behaviors Linked to Charisma
Five behaviors are commonly associated with leaders to whom charisma is attributed. The first is articulating a compelling vision. It gives followers a vivid, motivating account of a desired future. The second is a willingness to take personal risk for that vision. That signals genuine commitment, beyond words. The third is sensitivity, both to follower needs and to the environment. It lets the leader read circumstances accurately, and respond to them. The fourth is unconventional behavior, which sets the leader apart from an ordinary, expected pattern of conduct. And the fifth is confident expression. It conveys certainty in a way followers find reassuring, especially under the conditions we'll turn to next. Notice that these are behaviors. Charisma itself is still the followers' attribution.
When It Emerges
Crisis Makes Charisma
So when do followers attribute charisma? The conditions are largely situational. They aren't simply a function of the leader's own qualities. Crisis, uncertainty, and a felt need for direction work together. They create the moment when followers are most ready to see something extraordinary. Charisma is attributed far more readily in unstable conditions than in stable ones. Here's the striking part. Take the same leader, saying and doing much the same things. She's considerably more likely to be seen as charismatic during a genuine organizational crisis than during a calm, settled period. This connects directly to Weber's charismatic authority, from Subchapter three point two. Weber named crisis and instability as the conditions under which charismatic authority historically emerges, and is accepted. So when a leader looks extraordinary, it's worth asking how much of that is the moment.
Related Frameworks
Charisma and Transformational Leadership
Charismatic leadership relates closely to transformational leadership, from Subchapter nine point two. The overlap sits in one component, idealized influence. Idealized influence and charisma both concern a leader whose personal qualities inspire genuine emulation, and devotion. But the two frameworks are related without being identical. Transformational leadership has four components. Alongside idealized influence, they include intellectual stimulation and individualized consideration. That gives transformational leadership a broader scope. Charisma has a narrower focus. It's about the attributed, extraordinary personal quality itself. So a transformational leader may be charismatic. But transformational leadership asks for more than charisma alone.
The Risks, Stated Fully
4 Risks of Charismatic Leadership
Charismatic leadership's risks deserve a full statement, not a passing mention. There are four. The first is dependence on the leader. Much of what held the organization together traveled through followers' relationship with her specifically. So once she leaves, the organization is genuinely fragile. The second is suppression of dissent. Disagreeing with a leader seen as extraordinary carries a real social cost. That discourages exactly the challenge a decision might sometimes need. The third is the possibility of charisma serving destructive ends. The construct is value-neutral, just like transformational leadership's components. It describes a pattern of attribution and influence. It doesn't guarantee that the influence serves a good end. The fourth is a documented gap between attributed quality and actual decision quality. A leader perceived as extraordinary isn't, by that perception alone, making better decisions than a less charismatic one.
After the Founder
Succession and Routinization
That first risk, dependence, leads to a distinctive succession problem. Much of the organization's cohesion and direction ran through followers' relationship with one specific leader. So replacing that leader is genuinely harder than replacing one whose authority rested on role, process, or institutional structure. A successor inherits the position. But she doesn't automatically inherit the attributed, extraordinary quality that made the original leader's influence work. The answer is routinization. Routinization is the process by which a charismatically led effort converts into stable, durable structure, so it can survive its founder's departure. It comes from Subchapter three point two, where Weber's charismatic authority moves into more durable rational-legal, or traditional, forms. An organization that never routinizes stays structurally dependent on one person, indefinitely. One that succeeds converts personal, attributed authority into structure that can outlast the person who generated it.
Figure 9.7.1
Charisma Falls as Stability Rises
Figure nine point seven point one puts these ideas on one picture, for a fictional firm, Harborline Manufacturing. The shape is illustrative. There are no measured values here. Along the bottom runs organizational stability. Up the side runs the charisma followers attribute to the leader. On the left, in crisis and uncertainty, attributed charisma is at its highest. As stability increases, the curve falls away. By the time conditions are stable and routine, charisma's attribution has naturally declined. The dashed arrow is routinization. It's the deliberate transition that converts what charisma provided during the unstable period into durable structure. That structure has to function once conditions have stabilized, and the charisma has faded. The key word is deliberate. The curve falls on its own. The structure doesn't build itself.
The Situational Orientation
Adapt the Style to the Situation
Now the second half of the section, the situational orientation. It's the general proposition that effective leaders adapt their style to circumstance. They don't apply one fixed approach, regardless of the situation in front of them. Four variables determine what a situation actually calls for. The first is the task itself. The second is the follower capability available. The third is the time pressure the decision is under. And the fourth is the stakes involved. Different combinations of these four call for genuinely different responses. This chapter has already covered several of those responses on their own terms. The autocratic approach from Subchapter nine point six fits certain combinations. The participative approach from Subchapter nine point five fits others.
The Repertoire Problem
Knowing Isn't Doing
The situational orientation raises a specific practical difficulty, called the repertoire problem. A leader with one genuinely good style, and no second option, can't actually adapt. That's true however well she understands, in the abstract, that different situations call for different approaches. Knowing that a situation needs a different style is one capability. Actually delivering that style competently is another. Take a leader whose only well-developed mode is participative consultation. She may recognize, intellectually, that a given crisis calls for autocratic direction. And she may still lack the practiced capability to execute it well when the moment arrives. So adaptability isn't just a matter of judgment. It's built by practicing more than one style before you need it.
Adaptability vs. Inconsistency
A Shift Followers Can Understand
The orientation raises one more practical difficulty. How do you tell adaptability from mere inconsistency? Adaptability is a deliberate, situationally grounded shift in style. It's made for a reason a follower could understand and accept, if they asked. Inconsistency is an unpredictable shift, with no discernible situational logic behind it. Followers experience the two very differently. Inconsistency doesn't feel like responsive leadership. It feels like unreliability. The transition problem from Subchapter nine point six applies directly here. Adaptability that's never explained risks being experienced as inconsistency. That's true however sound the situational logic underneath it actually was. One boundary to note. This section treats situational leadership only as a general orientation. The formal model, with its own named styles and follower readiness levels, is the Hersey and Blanchard model. Chapter ten develops it in full.
Case Vignette
A Founder's Departure Nobody Planned For
Here's a composite case, constructed for instruction. Lucian was the founding division head at Harborline Manufacturing. He led his division through its earliest, most uncertain years, with a compelling vision and a strong personal presence. Team members described him in almost reverential terms, and under him the division thrived. But in practice, most of its coordination and shared purpose ran through Lucian's own relationships with individual staff. Very little ran through any formally documented process. After a decade, Lucian left. His successor was competent, and well regarded in her own right. Within months, coordination that had seemed effortless began visibly breaking down. Staff who had relied on their relationships with Lucian had no equivalent structure to fall back on. This wasn't a failure of the successor's competence. The division had never been routinized. Lucian's charismatic leadership was never converted into durable, person-independent structure. Next, Subchapter nine point eight turns to the opposite premise, bureaucratic leadership by rule and procedure.
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