Military Officers Leadership Styles: Their Quality, Perception and Behavior

Abstract

Generally speaking, military organization requires high standard of task performance. But relationship to subordinates is equally important, too. In the military, 'Situation' and tasks to be performed are changing according to one's rank. So it is natural that officers in higher rank are used to exhibit more matured and balanced leadership behavior than those in lower rank. Based on this idea, we may suggest an ideal military leadership style. This article extracted a proposed ideal leadership model by applying military leadership characteristics and the leadership theories. Then a group of military officers' leadership style was studied to find out differences from the proposed model. Author picked the examining group from the active duty marine officers and supplied them with 3 types of questionnaires. Questionnaire A (QA) is to examine the individual quality of leadership, questionnaire B (QB) is to identify each perception to leadership style and questionnaire C (QC) is to find out each actual exhibition of leadership behavior. It is interesting that the group having 'A' quality prefers 'B' leadership style perception and exhibits 'C' behavior. By and large, the group needs to improve both dimensions of leadership behavior; task and relationship. Also maturing pattern in leadership shows irregular forms. Ranks from Captains to Lieutenant Colonels show some deficiencies from the normal pattern of maturity. The study result does not represent all military officers but may provide a useful tool to analyze the pattern of military officers leadership style not only as a group but also as an individual.