When it comes to providing leadership in your organization, do you find yourself coming back to the idea that “people come first”? If so, you probably employ the Affiliative Leadership style as your default style of leadership. For you, success is not solely defined by the attainment of goals, but rather through the ability to ensure that team members emotional needs are met. Happiness and harmony are closely held values to you, and through your efforts you inspire fierce loyalty.

An affiliative leader is a caring nurturer who is tuned in closely to the emotions of the people around them. They care about performance and team members’ abilities to achieve goals and objectives, but they are much more interested in how people are feeling in the workplace.

In most cases, affiliative leaders inspire teamwork, feelings of togetherness and an overall sense of harmony. Among the various leadership styles, affiliative leadership is the most conducive to improved communication in the workplace, which means that it is a particularly effective style to employ during times of high stress or when team members are not getting along well. Affiliative leaders cultivate strong feelings of trust and togetherness, which can lead to improved innovation and creativity. Affiliative leaders also excel at improving flexibility in the office or work space – they value freedom and trust that their people will employ methods that ensure success.

Perhaps most importantly, affiliative leaders know the value of ongoing positive feedback. The modern workplace isn’t always conducive to “job well done” spontaneous and in the moment feedback, and some employees only get a chance to learn what their leaders think of them during their annual performance reviews. But with affiliative leaders in charge, employees always understand their value and importance to the team.

This all sounds wonderful doesn’t it? Particularly if this style resonates with your leadership values. But you have to remember that no single leadership if used 100% of the time is effective. Affiliative leaders focus on the positive so much that they often overlook situations where below average or poor performance needs to be addressed. They also have a tendency to create environments in which there’s a sense that mediocrity is tolerated or acceptable. What’s more, affiliative leaders may often struggle with delivering constructive feedback related to areas of opportunity for their employees and feel uncomfortable in addressing performance issues.

That being said, if you’re an affiliative leader, you possess a style that can be effective in virtually any common workplace scenario. It’s up to you to learn how to leverage it!

Affiliative Leaders – A Look at the Upside

Some of the positive characteristics of Affiliative leaders include:

• A strong sense of togetherness and equality
• Openness to innovation and creativity
• An ability to cultivate an atmosphere of trust
• A capacity for giving much-needed positive feedback
• The ability to inspire open, positive communication
• An innate sense of harmony

Affiliative Leadership – What Does it Look Like in the Workplace?

Here’s an example of how an affiliative leader can effectively inspire organizational success:

Annie, a motivated and self-aware affiliative leader was requested to lead a group of salespeople at her software company. The previous department head didn’t care about the employees personally, and often used tactics designed to pit people against each other in the name of building competition. But those tactics didn’t work, and the employees became fierce rivals instead of trusting team members focused on a common set of goals and values. The previous leader was fond of berating team members and using people as examples of bad behavior and ineffective techniques. Additionally, this leader took all the credit for the team’s accomplishments, even though they were attained in spite of his/her leadership.

Thanks to Annie’s ability to lead using the affiliative style, she was able to heal the wounds that the former leader inflicted. She shifted the focus of the team from getting results to getting along, and this inspired much more positivity and trust among its members. She also implemented a system through which positive feedback could be given in a way that inspired the team to perform at a higher level. Annie’s door was always open, and she was always attuned to the emotional needs of her people.

As a result, Annie’s team of salespeople began to feel good about their jobs again, with many of them going above and beyond for the sake of each other and the company as a whole!

Leveraging Your Affiliative Style – What Can You Do?

If you see yourself as an affiliative leader like Annie, you’ve probably noticed that your style works extremely well in some instances, but not so well in others. The key to leveraging your style is developing your self-awareness. Take notice of times when you’re feeling good about your style and its effectiveness – what is the state of the team and its members? Chances are, it’s during times when positivity and emotional connectedness is needed.

But also pay attention to those times when you feel like your style is not connecting – it’s likely that during these times, you’re dealing with an already secure team that simply needs to improve its performance. That is the pivotal moment when you realize a different style of leading is required.

Affiliative Leadership Strategies for Success

Here are some of the things you can do:

1. Recognize when your team members’ emotional needs are being met – when there is trust and togetherness present within your organization, your default style will do little to help matters.
2. Be aware of times when harmony is achieved at the expense of good work – don’t let mediocrity take over.
3. Understand that sometimes, employees just need a clear directive from you – while they will appreciate your caring, nurturing approach, they may need to simply be told what to do at times.

Learning about the various styles of leadership is critical. Affiliative leaders are beloved within their organizations, but they’re only at their best when they know how to take on different leadership attributes, as needed.

Calling All Affiliative Leaders!

Are you an affiliative leader? We’d love to hear your thoughts! What do you think about this style and how it’s valued in your organization? Have you run into problems with mediocrity or a lack of performance? What other leadership styles have you employed to deliver results? Let us know what you think!

Our series on leadership styles continues next time with a look at Coaching Leadership. Stay tuned!