Bill Gates as Leader - Biography

Introduction

Bill Gates was born on October 28, 1955, in Seattle, Washington. At the tender age of 13 years, he began his lifelong passion for computer programming. Gates love for computers, along with his best friend Paul Allen, established Microsoft in 1975 while both were scholars at Harvard University. Gates's dreams of becoming a successful programmer in the world forced him to drop out of college to focus on his innovation. Gates's decision paid off as he had enough time to establish a program known as MS-DOS (Umoh, 2017). He licensed the operating system to IBM and used it to become the launching dimension for the entire organization. It's through his smart business moves and effective leadership that has pioneered Microsoft to feature on the Fortune list of organizations continuously. The growth of Microsoft has made Bill Gates the wealthiest person globally for at least 14 years in a row. As a philanthropist, together with his wife Melinda Gates decided to form the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation as a platform to give back to the community (Fortune, 2017). Nonetheless, the growth of his Microsoft organization is attributed to his transformative style of leadership as well as situational style of leadership when the need arises.

Leadership Evaluation

Transformational Theory

Transformational leadership theory is an approach that explains how leaders can create positive and valuable changes in their followers. The theory argues that leaders such as Bill Gates concentrate on gaining compliances by giving and withholding bonuses and benefits. According to Toback (2016), transformative leaders focus on "transforming" others to support their colleagues as they work towards a collaborative objective. Subsequently, employees respond by showing loyalty, admiration, respect, and trust to their leaders. Similarly, they are more willing to cooperate and work harder to please their leader.

Henceforth, a transformational leadership approach involves a process that which an individual influences others to accomplish objectives to attain organizational objectives. Consequently, it transformative leadership style; one has to carry out a business process consistently and continuously to be successful. This is possible by applying skills, knowledge, and effective leadership styles that will be in line with the industry dynamics and maturity levels. Bill and Melinda Gates utilize transformational leadership to manage their organizations. Their approach is a team-orientated work strategy in which organization success is attributed to all employees. According to Rampton (2015), leaders need to have a vision of the things that can be achieved. Consequently, they need to formulate strategies to communicate to all employees to realize the concept of the organization. Bill and Melinda Gates motivate their employees and negotiate for support and resources that will guide them in achieving desired organizational objectives.

Bill Gates concentrated on the transformational style of leadership since it came naturally to him (Bel, 2010). He would occasionally adapt to different leadership styles when needed, but for the significant part, he used transformational leadership to control the Microsoft organization. Among the qualities of a transformational leadership style includes.

Motivation is ordinarily inspirational and individualizes, with a clear and precise communication coming from the leader to indicate a particular path towards an end outcome

Encouragement and support are provided at the personal level rather than concentrating this resource on team-based perspectives.

A desire to encourage and enhance individual creativity in oneself and to all followers

Organizational Performance and Transactional Leadership

Max Weber initially introduced the transformational leadership model in 1947. As earlier stated, it is a kind of leadership that concentrates on the supervision and performance of employees in a corporation. In appreciation, employers emphasize bonuses and rewards between management and employees (Beaumont, 2008). The model focuses on financial awards and promotions that workers are given for excellent performance in a workplace setting.

This leadership style enables organizations such as the Microsoft foundation to obtain objectives based on the effectiveness and efficiency of the workers (Uhl-Bien, Schermerhorn, & Osborn, 2014). Bill Gates, as a transactional leader, has made frequent visits to his product team to evaluate if the unit is heading in the right direction to achieve organizational objectives. The transformational leadership style favors Bill Gates as a businessman. Microsoft foundation is a large organization that constitutes employees of different language, race, and culture and need to be directed to understand the organizational objectives. (Buffett and Gates go back to school, 2006).

The leadership style is understandable across a corporation, and workers effectively follow employer direction to manage a task successfully. Consequently, transactional leadership is helpful in crises when every employee understands their responsibility and can complete them under pressure.

Nonetheless, Bill Gates is attributed to possessing a special leadership style that is characterized by a mixture of different leadership styles with the primary aim of achieving the objectives of the Microsoft organization (Nicols, 2007). With that said, people believe that Gates's leadership style is situational since he makes decisions when the need arises. However, his changing leadership style is not only favorable to his organization but to the employees that work for him as well. For instance, Gates used both transformational and transactional leadership methods to motivate workers through rewards for good performances.

Consequently, Gates changes to the authoritative leadership style when developing strategies and policies that bring desirable change in the firm. At other times, he would utilize the participative leadership style since he involved his employees in making some of the organization's decisions (Uhl-Bien, Schermerhorn, & Osborn, 2014). Gates's flexibility and visionary nature enabled him to bring competent professional managers that would steer the organization to heightened success.

Moreover, he utilizes the altruistic leadership aspects through his aims to enhance the wellness of his followers. As a result, he can establish trust, loyalty, and satisfaction amongst his employees (Limsila & Ogunlana, 2008). Henceforth, his alternating leadership styles have a positive impact on all employees since it guides them to collaborative efforts to attain organizational objectives. Bill Gates's transformative leadership characteristics include being an:

Influential Leader

Bill Gates can be depicted in different dimensions- computer tycoon, philanthropist, a predictor of technology, or astute. However, apart from his title as the world's richest man, he is an influential leader that has transformed the world as a whole (Chaleff, 2009). Early in his career, Gates inherited the intelligence, determination, and, competitive attitude that guided him to become a successful businessman. Under his leadership, the Microsoft foundation revolutionized the IT industry and became a substantial trendsetter in the modern world. Upon the creation of Microsoft in 1975- 2006, Gates had the primary responsibility of the organization's product strategy (Fortune, 2017). He is always keen on improvising strategies that would broaden the organization's range of products, and whenever they become dominant, he would aggressively defend them.

Powerful and Strict

Gates has always presented himself as a sturdy and rigid leader to his subordinates and rivals. Through hard work and perseverance, he has successfully transformed Microsoft into a stable monopoly. In the aim of maintaining the organization's status, Gates focused on creating barriers to the market new entrants. Subsequently, he strictly dominated the company's production to ensure that quality products were manufactured. On the other side, he believed that client satisfaction was paramount, and the production of quality products would lead to retaining clients as well as recruiting new customers. His powerful and strict nature has made Microsoft a recognized and profitable organization.

Additionally, at the initial stages of the Microsoft organization, he concentrated much on its growth compared to the well-being, comfort, and retention of the employees. For instance, when Gates realized that Paul Allen was in poor health condition, he sidelined him from the company until he fully recovered (Uhl-Bien, Schermerhorn, & Osborn, 2014).

Similarly, he would ridicule or act abrasively on employees that tried to change his managerial styles. Gates once stated in his practice that he did not hire bozos that would tell him how to run his business. Henceforth, he would be actively being involved in selecting hard-working and dedicated individuals at Microsoft foundation's initial development stages. Gates's task-orientated behavior is displayed in his reliable personality characteristics which include:

Focus

An experience on something is much different from having knowledge or wisdom. Experience means that one has witnessed the highs and lows of a situation and has understood ways to maneuver in the case of the latter. Bill Gates concentrated on soft wares since he has a good understanding of them. He tried to improvise them to use to the whole world. Therefore, he has been working tirelessly to dominate the Microsoft industry as he made execution his main priority by sticking with the skills that he has mentioned to be his strongest attribute.

Caring

Bill Gates has depicted the element of care as part of his transformative leadership. He is contributed billions of dollars to charity foundations. He has donated over $ 28 billion to his foundation to give away at least $ 90 billion in time (Goleman, 2014). Additionally, in 2010, Gates made a promise to give out a significant part of his wealth to help the poor through the Bill and Melinda Gates platform. Gates caring and passionate attitude is as well notable in the workplace as he makes sure that all employees have equal chances of finding success if they are motivated to get it.

Creativity

Gates has always embraced the art of creativity. Through his transformative leadership style, he emphasizes empowering and encouraging people. He believes that individual perspectives act as a platform to create new opportunities to explore creative ideas. Henceforth, it is thought that although some people have followed him due to his charismatic nature, he ascertains that many individuals have followed him as they believe he had the abilities to teach them to be effective and successful leaders.

Bill Gates, in his transformative style, takes practical strategies to establish goals. He visualizes concepts in a broader dimension. Henceforth, instead of formulating an unapproachable vision, he utilizes a step-based approach that will make progress towards his vision. He ascertains that life is similar to a staircase in which one has to take one step at a time.

Discussion of a Different Leadership Style to Bill Gates Transformational Leadership

Nonetheless, great leaders are emotionally intelligent. Emotional intelligence is the ability to appreciate and respect people's emotions. Henceforth, leaders that possess a high degree of emotional intelligence are quick to understand how their staff is feeling, how to control their emotions, and in what circumstances will the emotions affect colleagues in an organization. For instance, when Paul Allen (Microsoft Cofounder) becomes sick, rather than Bill Gates sidelining him from the organization, he would have emotionally supported him as a colleagu...