A workplace with democratic leaders allows employees and staff members to participate in each and every decision taken in the workplace. Leaders lead as a team, they always give room for expression to employees and encourage them to have a say in decision-making. Democratic leadership, which is also commonly known as participative leadership, is about letting multiple people participate in the decision-making process. This type of leadership can be seen in a wide range of contexts, from businesses to schools to governments. Leaders that lead in that particular leadership style are bound to bring a lot of success to the workplace and bring myriad benefits to an organisation. Lisa Nyonyozi, a leadership coach based in Kigali, explains that involving subordinates in decision making helps them acquire knowledge and problem-solving skills, which can be beneficial to an organisation since one person can have the ability to make a decision for the whole organisation. “Employees in a workplace have different skills, experience, and ideas, as a leader, it is wise to work hand in hand with them. They have the capacity to bring out ideas that can grow the company or organisation, but if you don’t listen to them you can never know what potential they have, allowing them to participate in every decision-making also creates trust and engagement,” she says. Nyonyozi adds that democratic leadership in a workplace invites higher levels of commitment. “Democratic leadership can foster positive and healthy company cultures, when employees are given the chance to share their ideas, to solve problems, and to make decisions, it encourages them to be more involved and committed, it creates a culture in a workplace that allows people to feel that they are heard and considered,” she states. Creating a workplace where people communicate, ideas flow, and discussions are had, creates stronger team relationships, Steve Kalisa, a research analyst says. “When a workplace is under a democratic leadership, communication and discussion becomes a norm, your team gets to have daily conversations that regard the company’s development and conversations that impact their work life, a stronger relationship is going to be created in the workplace, plus employees will not view their boss as a person to fear but as a co-worker to share ideas that benefit the company with,” he says. For many companies with weak leaders, building a clear vision for the future is hard, but according to Kalisa, leaders that leads in a democratic way are able to build a clear vision for the future and work towards it. “To succeed, a democratic leader needs to define and articulate a vision for the future that team members can align with, instead of rejecting your idea, shooting it down, or criticizing, team members are more likely to scrutinize and offer constructive feedback to how they learn to think positive on every decision and how to build it in a better way,” he adds. Experts emphasize that many of the advantages tap directly into the characteristics of democratic leadership, which is built on the assumption that involving team members in the process of arriving at decisions is a healthy way for an organisation to operate.
