Wal-mart Organization Culture and Leadership Styles Essay Example

various leadership styles that are used by the organization leaders in order to lead and direct the employees in an organization. Democratic leadership style is among them and it is characterized by the leader involving the employees in decision making by creating avenues or platforms through which the employees air their views in relation to a particular decision the company intends to undertake (Pride, Hughes & Kapoor, 2010). Democratic leadership style also known as participative is considered to be very effective in boosting the employee’s morale, encouraging team work, reducing the resistance to change and encouraging the employees to be more innovative. Wal-mart adopts the democratic leadership style in order to be able to encourage the employees to be more than the rank-and-file workers. Wal –mart adopts the supportive leadership style which helps in increasing the employee’s confidence and reducing the stress that is related to work (Williams, 2009).

In addition, the adoption of the participative leadership style has also helped in improving the relationship between the management and the employees and this has helped in promoting trust between the groups of leaders. In Wal-mart the junior leaders who are mostly at the lower part of the organization hierarchy are given some power to make certain decisions that relate to a particular supercenters they work in order to be able to customize the shopping experience so as to make it match the needs of the customers. Due to adoption of an effective leadership style which reduces the associates stress, the productivity of the employees has increased as well as customer satisfaction and this is evidenced by the company’s outstanding performance.

Analysis of how Culture Affects Leadership Style

Culture

is learned and transmitted socially by the members and it provides rules for behaviors within an organization. Organization culture is considered to be complex and it influences the employee’s attitude as well as behaviors. An organization culture is normally influences the leadership styles. The supportive as well as participative leadership styles are characterized by influencing the employee’s effectiveness positively in an organization. This implies that the organizations such as Wal-mart which have adopted participative leadership styles influence their employee’s productivity and this contribute to the overall improvement of the organization performance. In addition, the workers who are under the democratic leadership style do not experience the tension or stress that is related to the job and this further help in increasing work productivity.

The companies that have the employees who are hardworking, work as a team, cooperate and are innovativeness are the ones that have adopted democratic leadership style (Ruckda?schel, 2014). This case is evidenced by the Wal-mart Company where the management has adopted the democratic leadership style. The company has been in a position to promote teamwork, and improve the employee’s productivity by reducing the stress that is caused by the adoption of such as autocratic leadership styles in which require the employees to always follow orders from their seniors and they are rarely consulted or involved in decision making. The workers under the autocratic leadership styles are usually less motivated and this reduces their productivity (Ruckda?schel, 2014).

The leaders can only create an organization culture that promotes cooperation among the employees or team work if they have adopted autocratic leadership style (Multicultural Marketing Conference et al., 2015). Such organizations are mostly characterized by the organization

culture in which employee productivity is low and who are less motivated. By adopting a democratic leadership style, Wal-mart has managed to create a culture which enables the associates be highly motivated, more productive and which encourage team work.

References

• Ruckda?schel, S. (2014). Leadership of networks and performance: A qualitative and quantitative analysis.
• Multicultural Marketing Conference, In Chebat, J.-C., In Oumlil, A. B., & Academy of Marketing Science. (2015). Proceedings of the 1998 Multicultural Marketing Conference: Montreal, Quebec, Canada, September 17-20, 1998.
• Williams, C. (2009). Management. Mason, OH: South-Western Cengage Learning.
  Pride, W. M., Hughes, R. J., & Kapoor, J. R. (2010). Business. Australia: South- Western/Cengage Learning.
• Working at Walmart. http://corporate.walmart.com/our-story/working-at-walmart
  Lombardordo, J. (2015, August 15). Walmart: Organizational Structure & Organizational Culture. http://panmore.com/walmart-organizational-structure-organizational-culture