A Systematic Review on Leadership Styles in Small and Medium Enterprises

Abstract

Earlier notions of leadership opined that leadership can be found in one's genes that determine how an individual behaves and reacts to his/her surrounding (Bass, 1985). That is, a leader can still be detected in a group of people although nobody may be appointed to lead at the outset. In the past, an individual became a leader through inheritance of a rank or the throne in a country or in an institution. However, the temperament or characteristic of an individual determine whether one can lead or not. A leader acts as a conflict contributor, a resolver or peacemaker, and a punisher (King et al., 2009). Besides being dominant over the rest of the group members, a leader needs to influence the followers too with his/her leadership style. The leadership style of a leader depends on the attitude of him/her to influencing followers in the organisation. The modern era indicates that an uncertainty or complex situations are not uncommon. In a context of a small and medium enterprises (SMEs), turbulences arising in an enterprise require an effective leader to sustain a strong sense of opportunity for all followers. Such participation allows followers to share opinions, make better decisions and control the resources. In fact, followers and the leader cannot be separated. Likewise, leadership runs in tandem with development. Development occurs as leadership pushes it (Banyai, 2009). Hence, without proper leadership to lead the followers, it would be rather difficult to reach the mutual goals of the enterprise (Poskas & Messer, 2015). Also, a good leadership through guidance and effective communication enables followers to improve themselves. Hence, to conduct a relevant systematic review, the current paper is guided by the following main research question: how are leadership styles practiced among leaders in the context of small and medium enterprises? The focus of this paper is on the leaders of small and medium enterprises where followers are working together towards achieving the mutual goals of the enterprise. Keywords: leader; leadership style; PRISMA; small and medium enterprises; systematic literature review