In simple terms, leaders cause followers to do stuff – stuff that the followers might not otherwise do if it were not for the leadership intervention that they’ve just experienced.

Leaders influence followers to act. Leadership is often promoted as a one-on-many phenomenon with the leader espousing policy or plans. We believe however that it is best thought of, and best done, one-to-one. It’s best thought of as dyadic and done leader to follower. We advise leaders to focus on the dyadic model of leadership.

Leadership interventions

Leadership is identified by the existence of interventions by the leader on the follower.

There’s no rulebook for what those interventions should be, and different interventions can have the same result. We counsel that it’s for the manager to determine the interventions that they consider appropriate for the context they and their volunteer are in. There are however typologies of interventions, and we describe how managers should build their own compendia. Typologies then aggregate as approaches.

Leadership approaches are proposed by academics following many years of analysis and there are many good books on the subject. One or other approach is a useful starting point in a manager’s leadership journey with a particular follower group. They are a point from which new interventions can be developed and existing interventions evaluated.

Leadership acts on follower motivation

Theoretically, leadership acts on a follower’s motivation.

Motivation is the in-person cognitive process that gets the follower going, directs their energy toward a particular project, dictates how much energy they put into a particular activity and for how long, and stops them and makes them change activities. Again: leadership acts on motivation. Understanding and acknowledging the process of motivation is essential for success as a leader.

Leadership is a series of continuous momentary actions.

An intervention is a sequence of events by the leader: it’s determined necessary, developed, done, and evaluated. If the result is what was wanted, no further action is needed at that point and the intervention can stop. If the result is not as required, the leader must run the sequence again, developing a new intervention. If the result is then as required, the leader can stop, rejoice, and wait. The wait will be short for the context will soon change and the sequence will need to be re-run to develop and run a new intervention in search of a new result.

And just because one type of intervention worked yesterday doesn’t mean it will work again today. Often, tried and tested interventions will begin to routinely fail, and leaders will need to develop new leadership ideas. We likened this to natural evolution. Leadership learning from others, and through original thought, is forever.

Leadership approaches and styles

There's a difference between approaches and styles. Approaches are the typologies, like the professional approach used when managing volunteers whom the leader regards as their peers. Leadership styles are like moods - adopted and changed to suit the moment. Managers should not confuse the two. There are four common approaches: professional leadership, procedural leadership, transformational leadership, and transactional leadership. There's a fifth, the contingent approach that's a blend of those and others. Likewise, there are several styles: directive, non-directive and laissez-faire. There are many more of both and managers should research to find the approach and styles that best fit their context.

There's the issue of whether leaders are born or bred: whether managers can be natural leaders, or whether they must be trained. Simply, leaders can have the right personal characteristics to be a leader. And they can, given those right characteristics, go on to learn the trade. It takes both personal characteristics and training.

Sadly, leadership is not well understood. This lack of understanding leads some commentators to believe that approach and style are somehow baked into the leader, leading to the question, ‘what’s your leadership style’. This parallels the myth that there is such a thing as a ‘natural leader’. Approaches and styles are leadership choices, not a characteristic of the leader themselves. In addition, some commentators suggest that leadership is all about behaviour – ‘behave in a certain way and they’ll follow’. This is an over-simplification.

Leader behaviour

In seeking a dyadic relationship with every follower, the leader must engage with them. That’s not to say that they need be each follower’s friend, but they can’t turn the relationship on and off to suit their mood. Leaders must sustain follower relationships always – whenever they meet, whenever they talk, even going out of their way to bump into followers they’ve not seen for a while.

Leaders must be prepared to act for followers. Some call this servant leadership, but it’s the leader holding up their part of the exchange. Acting for and supporting followers makes the follower indebted to the leader. That builds exchange capital that can be relied on later by the leader. And leadership needs trust. Followers must be able to trust that the leader will do what they say; that they will keep implied and expressed promises.

It's useful too if followers have positive impressions of the leader – even to admire them. Admiration demands certain behaviour. To be admired, leaders must be authentic – true to the cause. Deviation from the cause damages leader reputation and that admiration. Leaders must not embody the saying, ‘do as I say, not as I do’. Leaders must also tell the truth. A leader who lies becomes established as someone who is out for themselves and will say whatever is needed for their personal benefit rather than for that of their followers.

Sometimes bad things will happen as a result of leader decisions. Perhaps followers will suffer. The leader must always express humility and contrition, accepting when they’re wrong. Leaders can’t always be right, but they can always say sorry and correct their mistakes.

And, if leaders don’t know; if they are not technically competent; they must seek out others who do and defer to them, facilitating high quality decisions rather than making their own poor ones.

Leadership takes energy

Managers who want to lead must put energy in to make it happen. Managers who want to lead should think hard about the behaviour they consider appropriate for their chosen approach(es) and style(s). Their behaviour will be under scrutiny always and it takes the right behaviour to retain those all-important followers. Leadership behaviour, and the leader’s personal awareness of their behaviour, is continuous – there can never be any let-up.

By way of overall summary, we argue that leadership is a never-ending machine in which the leader sets goals, selects leadership interventions, acts, monitors success and failure, and repeats – forever.