Table of Contents

Introduction:................................................................................................................................................2
Gandhi leadership traits:..............................................................................................................................3
Gandhi leadership styles:.............................................................................................................................7
Follower centric leadership style:............................................................................................................7
Blake and mouton grid............................................................................................................................8
Situational leadership:...........................................................................................................................10
Servant leadership:................................................................................................................................11
Charismatic leadership:.........................................................................................................................12
Conclusion:...............................................................................................................................................14
Bibliography:.............................................................................................................................................15
Introduction:
Gandhi leadership traits:

Definite of purpose:

One of the main traits that Mahatma possessed was his ‘definite of purpose’. His vision and how
he was to achieve this, was the guiding light for the choices that he made.

His main goal was to set India free and to fight for the rights of the repressed, through the use
of NON violent means.

His total commitment to this at times caused great tribulations for him and his people, but his
principle that, non violence was the correct way to accomplish the goal of freeing India was
always at the fore front of everything he did.

Discipline:

Mahatma believed that challenging his self discipline heightened his commitment to achieving
his goals. He was a focused leader that had a “Do or Die” attitude. He ‘would free India or die in
the processes.

Mahatma would do extraordinary things to improve his discipline and his commitment.  Days of
silence, total celibacy etc.

Integrity:

Gandhi would not accept any deviation to this principle of Non Violence. He would rather go to
jail (which he did often) rather than go back on his word about non violence. His word was his
power and his weapon.

The basic root of the success of Mahatma Gandhi was his absolute integrity. Integrity leads to
credibility. People find out very soon if there is a gap between what you preach and what you
practice. The reason why many of our so called leaders today do not carry credibility is because
there is a gap between what they practice and what they preach. The first requirement for a
leader to be effective is absolute integrity. The integrity of a person is determined by his
background and the values he derives from parents, friends, and teachers and so on. Part of the
values of integrity is also derived from religion. The values cherished by the society also affect
us. Gandhi came from a background far worse than ours. He was born as the fourth child from
the fourth wife of his father who had less than grade three educations and his mother was
illiterate. Gandhi was a below-average student, was married at age 13 and had fathered a son by
age 16. He was too shy to participate in any extra-curricular activity and had not read a
newspaper until he was 18. In fact he did not show any sign of leadership up to the age of 23.
And then, slowly but steadily, he rose to become one of the greatest leaders that this world has
ever seen.

Related To People:

Gandhi made an effort to truly understand his people. He spoke from their point of view...from
what motivated them. It has been said that, when he spoke publicly to large audiences it was like
he was speaking to you individually.

He did not put himself on a pedestal and segregate himself from his people. He had great
empathy.

He did not let his ego come between him and his people. He was approachable to his people, he
connected to his masses because he loved and took a stand for them.

He opened his heart to them and was able to connect to them because he was authentic and he
was able to show them his vision and his belief because when he spoke he spoke from the heart.

Belief and Faith:

Gandhi belief was probably the most important factor in Mahatma’s success. He not only had
self belief but he had the ability to INSPIRE the Indian people to believe in themselves and their
goal of freedom, even through all the hardships that they faced.
Able To Transcend Adversaries:

The first time Mahatma got up to speak in court, when he was working as a lawyer, he could not
speak one word out loud due to fear. This caused him great humiliation. Even though he failed
miserably, those failures eventually lead to him becoming one of the best public speakers of all
time.

There were quite a number of times Gandhi failed; each time he used the failure to improve his
leadership skills and to improve himself and the task at hand.

Mahatma shows us that the even the best leaders still fail and make mistakes. He also shows that
the difference between good leaders and great leaders is that the great leaders acknowledge and
learn from their mistakes.

Spirituality:

Gandhi was able to successfully bring spirituality into his leadership style. He promoted love and
peace in times when another leader would have made a call to arms.

He did not hate anyone. He believed that his enemies were his friends. Basically he transcended
hatred by bringing belief and love to all the people he came across… even his enemy.

Gandhi’s leadership skills were the perfect example of a principle driven leadership style

Inspire and motivate others:

Gandhi without a doubt could inspire and move the masses in India, he could show the common
man that even he can make a difference and bring the British Empire to its knees. It was possible
since his leadership was based on self-reliance and non-cooperation, something everyone could
adopt and feel that they were a part of freedom struggle, synergizing the common man.
Credibility:

Gandhi had an initial credibility already establishes through his work and movements in South
Africa. People already had great honor and hopes from him due to what he could achieve in
south-Africa, his non-violent methods were also much respected within the Indian society

Further in India, Gandhi establishes the credibility by leading through example, he established
himself as a slave of the people of India, empowering the general public. He made his policy to
practice what he preached, even the small things like spinning yarn to make his own clothes. He
resorted to simple and poor living, just like millions in the country, hence people looked at
Gandhi as one of their own, and they could see their own suffering in him

Relationships:

Gandhi established a clear relationship with people by touring across India, leading all the major
movements personally and by holding various public meetings repeatedly. In this way he always
managed to be accessible t others, just a glimpse of Gandhi was enough for a common man to be
connected to this great leader.

Vision and radically different strategies:

One of the most outstanding qualities of Gandhi which makes him great transformational leader
of modern history was his long term vision, self confidence and strong principle of
righteousness.
Gandhi leadership styles:
Follower centric leadership style:

The majority of leadership theories and studies have tended to emphasize the personal
background, personality traits, perceptions, and actions of leaders. From this perspective, the
followers have been viewed as recipients or moderators of the leader's influence, and as vehicles
for the actualization of the leader’s vision, mission or goals. As an alternative to the leader-
centric perspective on leadership, Meindl offered a follower-centric approach that views both
leadership and its consequences as largely constructed by followers and hence influenced by
followers’ cognitive processes and inter-follower social influence processes. 

Leaders and followers are both essential to the organization. Unfortunately, most scholars have
focused primarily on the leader and the leader’s role in motivating followers and neglected the
significance of followers. The following model represents an attempt to put the primary
responsibility for follower citizenship behavior on the follower while still recognizing that
leadership style does manifest some influence.

Gandhi's leadership style is being termed as 'follower-centric' and one that took into account
existing conditions before determining the strategy."Gandhi advocated having leadership styles
that were dependent on the circumstances. When Gandhi was in South Africa, he launched his
protests in a suit and a tie. But when he came back to India, he thought of khadi and launched
non-violent protests on a greater scale,"

Gandhi is a fascinating figure. On the one hand, he had totally ambivalent feelings about
industrial manufacturing. But, on the other, he was a wonderful strategist, showman and leader.
He had an amazing public relations network and a very good relationship with the press then. For
instance, look at the Dandi march. If Gandhi had gone there quietly, it would just not have made
an impact. He knew he had to create an event to make an impact and so he took his followers on
a march that stirred popular imagination of the time. He had a total understanding of the human
psychology and used it along with his public relation skills.
Blake and mouton grid
Blake and Mouton’s managerial grid is one of the three major behavioral theories besides Ohio
State University studies and University of Michigan Studies (p58, Yukl, Leadership in
Organizations). It is generally believed in this theory that there are two types of concerns a leader
will have, production or people. A style of management inventory (by Telemetric International
Inc.) was developed based on Blake-Mouton’s managerial grid to assess one’s leadership style.
According to this grid, there are 5 types of leaders:

9/1- Task Management

The primary concern for task management is output. People are just commodity just like
machines. A manager’s job is to plan, direct and control the work.

1/9 - Country Club Management

The primary concern for this type of management is people the relationship. This type of
manager pays little attention to production needs.

1/1 - Impoverished Management

This type of management does not care either production or people. The major goal is to stay out
of trouble by avoiding risk and maintain minimum requirement for both production and
relationship.
9/9 - Team Management

This is best style according to Blake-Mouton’s Managerial Grid. This manager cares both
production and the people and their relationship. Production is from the integration of task and
human requirement.

5/5 - Middle of the Road - Politician Style

5/5 manager believes that production comes first but morale can’t be ignored. This manager
pushes enough to get work done, but gives enough to keep the morale.

We believe Gandhi was a 9/9 type leader. He cared not only the outcome of his efforts but also
the people. His non-violent approach in solving conflicts was a good indication that he did not
try to achieve results with all costs. He was not a task leader. He cared about people, young and
old, rich and poor. He cared about the so-called untouchables. He fought for the freedom of these
discriminated. 

He integrated the needs of people with the efforts to achieve them. He was a true leader in the
sense that he set the vision and influenced his followers. With his every goal, he had people's
needs in mind. As a great leader, he had been always among his people even to the moment of
his death.

Some has blamed him on the division of India and Pakistan as he chose not to have flights
between Hindus and Moslems although his goal was to unify India. His leadership style would
not let him to put his task for the freedom and unity of India superior to the people he cared, both
Hindus and Moslems. When facing the conflicts, Gandhi chooses fasting, a suffering on himself
rather than anyone else to end the conflicts non-violently.
Situational leadership:
The Hersey-Blanchard’s situational theory is the best leadership theory in my opinion. In this
theory, not only the task behavior, but also the follower’s behaviors are considered. Like the
Blake and Mouton’s grid, a two dimensional chart is used. Two elements - task and
leader/follower’s relation are used as the two dimensions of the chart. There are four maturity
levels of the follower:

1: unable and unwilling; 

M2: able but unwilling; 

M3: unable but willing; 

M4: able and willing.

For these situations, Hersey-Blanchard proposed four different leadership styles - Telling,
Selling, Participating and Delegating. Depending on the level of follower’s maturity and task
structures, a leader may choose any one of the four styles.

Gandhi was a change leader. He believed "You must be the change you wish to see in the
world." His leadership style through the lenses of Situational Leadership Theory would be the
participating type. His followers were willing, but unable. They wanted the freedom and justice,
but did not know how to get them. Gandhi had the vision and method to fight with the
authorities. He believed that only method would make them win was the non-violent approach.
He coached and participated with his followers.

His secondary leadership style would be selling. This style works well when the followers are
able but unwilling. There were times when his followers had doubts on his non-violent approach.
He held meetings, speeches and actions such as fasting to convince his followers about his ideas.
He set examples for his followers as a way of selling his ideas and let them know what to do.

He was considered a stubborn man. I have not seen much evidence that his was more flexible on
using other methods such as telling and delegating. He was a doer and liked to be in actions with
his followers. Therefore I would say that his leadership range would be very small and limited to
participating and selling.
Servant leadership:
According to the grandfather of Servant Leadership, Robert Greenleaf, "The servant-leader is
servant first. Becoming a servant-leader begins with the natural feeling that one wants to serve,
to serve first. Then conscious choice brings one to aspire to lead . . . . The best test is this: Do
those served grow as persons? Do they, while being served, become healthier, wiser, freer, more
autonomous, more likely themselves to become servants?"

Servant leadership has been proven to be a powerful leadership styles. It is widely applied in the
religious societies. However, the application of servant leadership is no limited to religious
societies; many modern leaders such as Jack Lowe, Jr., CEO of TD Industries and Max DePree,
former CEO of Herman Miller, Inc. also believe in and are good examples of servant leadership.

To be a servant leader, one must have some of the characters described in the Ten Characteristics
for Servant Leaders. They are Listening, Empathy, Healing, Awareness, Persuasion,
Conceptualization, Foresight, Stewardship, Commitment to the Growth of People and Building
Community.

Mahatma Gandhi is a classical example of Servant Leader. Although Mahatma Gandhi was not
born as a leader, his people transformed him to be one. He listened and experienced the needs of
Indian people for freedom and justice. He worked against all the objections from the authorities
and governments, as he knew what he did were what the people wanted. He was a true believer
of God and truth. Gandhi believed one who uses coercion is guilty of deliberate violence.
Coercion is inhuman. He searched non-violent against authorities and commitment to the people.
His vision was not set upon himself or just his surroundings. His vision was for the nations and
worlds justice and peace.  Although blamed for being stubborn, Gandhi did listen to the voice of
his people, the inner voice of calling for freedom and justice. He respected faith of his people -
my effort should never be to undermine another's faith but to make him a better follower of his
own faith.

Gandhi had proved to us that his servant leadership had more power to the government
authorities. People believed and loved him for what he did for them. Through people's loving
cares, Gandhi succeeded in his fasting to obtain what he wanted from his followers and set
examples for them.
Charismatic leadership:
Charismatic leadership is one of the new theories about leadership. It is sometimes considered as
a part of traits or behavioral theories. It is believed that certain people have charismatic qualities,
such as visionary, energetic, unconventional, and exemplary.  Charismatic leadership style can
be effective in both positive and negative (such as Hitler and Lenin).

Phenomena that can be observed in charisma include:

1) The followers trust the correctness of the leader's believes;

2) The followers feel affection to the leader and obey the leader willingly;

3) The followers feel an emotional involvement in the mission they are led to do. 

Some of the actions taken by charismatic leaders could be:

Framing Scripting: A quality of communication that causes others to accept one meaning over
another. The development of a set of directions that define the scene, specifies the actors to be
cast, outlines expected behavior, and cues when events occur and actors enter and exit.

Dialog: Aristotle defined dialog (or diction) as the verbal and non-verbal exchanges among
characters. 

Directing: Leaders are directors for performances.

Staging: Charismatic leaders stage-manage their performances. 

Performing: The charismatic leader takes the stage to enact scripted dialog and set up the frame
to construct their charismatic character.

Gandhi is a positive example of charismatic leaders. He possessed many charismatic qualities.

For each his action, he had a cause, commitment, vision, energy and courage. His method of
fighting is unique and unconventional. He had power through people. Like many other
charismatic leaders, such as Mother Teresa and Martin Luther King, Jr., Gandhi knew how to use
the method of setting stage. 
The Salt March: A 241 km walk in 24 days let by the 61 years old Gandhi. This non-violent
strategy to panic the government and gather the momentum of his people to fight for the freedom
of India.

The Charkha (spinning wheel): A method of protest to the machine made European clothing that
caused the high unemployment in India. It boosted Indian economy as well as people’s spirit.

His wisdom, his sacrifice and self-control gave him the powerful image people were looking for
and needed as their leader. He knew he had this power. He did not misuse it. Instead, he fasted to
convince his followers his belief when crises came.
Conclusion:
Bibliography: