In last week’s blog post we gave an overview on the consensus-style leadership style and key characteristics of these leaders. Consensus-style leaders typically want all of their employees to feel valued and happy, and are often found acting as mediators or peacekeepers within the organization to keep the peace. This week we’ll be looking at the specific pros and cons of this leadership style to get a better idea of the potential issues associated with this approach.

Advantages and Disadvantages

Consensus-style leaders offer some significant benefits. They:

• Attempt to understand people’s perspectives and needs to ensure they’re affirmed and pleased.
• Avoid becoming angry to prevent discouragement or upset.
• Solicit each person’s input and ideas to avoid feelings of exclusion or disillusionment.
• Mediate disagreements to help the team find unity and safety.
• Give of themselves, often setting aside personal preferences for the common good.
• Make themselves available for discussion or assistance.
• Help each person contribute to team success without favoritism.
• Influence through diplomacy to avoid offending people.
• Shrug off personal credit to recognize others.
• Avoid blaming others and focus on solutions.

As healthy as this work environment may seem, consensus-minded leadership has several potential drawbacks:

• Leaders tend to hold back their opinions to avoid disunity, which diminishes their authority and ability to lead firmly.
• They avoid conflicts they fear may be too difficult to handle, which permits underlying trouble to brew and makes unity tougher to maintain in the long run.
• They take less initiative when outcomes may not sit well with everyone. Passive leaders often miss opportunities for improvement or success.
• They struggle with decisions when they fail to achieve consensus. People may then be reluctant to trust them, especially in tough times.
• Their indecisiveness limits progress, thwarting people’s efforts to complete assigned tasks. This causes frustration and disengagement.
• They keep the peace by giving answers they believe people want – but not necessarily need – to hear. This misinformation causes errors in direction, judgment, and outcomes.
• They skirt around constructive feedback instead of clearly explaining how employee performance must improve. Substandard work or attitudes go unaddressed, and a lack of corrective actions may threaten the organization’s well being.
• They fail to offer directives when the team incorrectly prioritizes tasks. They discredit their own expertise in a misguided attempt to empower their people, which may compromise goals and progress.
• They disfavor change, especially if it may disrupt the comforting status quo. Organizations may fall behind.
• They ignore their personal needs as they tend to everyone else, thereby inviting fatigue, anger, resentment or burnout.

At this point you should be starting to get a sense of the troubles that consensus-style leadership can cause. While there are many benefits to this style of leadership, it also brings with it a unique set of issues that can eventually undermine the corporation as a whole. As always, I would love to hear from you. I can be reached here or on LinkedIn.

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