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Executive Summary

The report has reviewed different studies by different researchers, journals, books, and websites on leadership styles and characteristics. The leadership styles discussed includes transformational, authentic leadership, democratic leadership, shared leadership, the task-oriented approach, trait theory, transactional leadership and Heifetz’s leadership model. The report has also discussed ways that the study findings apply and benefit leaders in the criminal and justice profession. Findings indicate that leadership styles vary from one region to another because of the differences in the laws and agencies that have the responsibility to serve justice. In addition, criminal justice leaders need to be innovative in their duties to earn the trust and confidence of the followers. Likewise, many organizations and departments in criminal and justice system are increasingly acknowledging and embracing the benefits of a more transformative and inclusive approach while most common police leadership styles include; authoritative police leadership, transactional police leadership and transformative leadership. The findings as well indicate that application of these styles is based on the situation. These leadership styles have also accrued benefits to the criminal justice system manifested by individuals such as William Bratton who served as a chief of Police in Los Angeles, Boston and New York City who embodies these leadership traits enabling him to be recognized and appreciated for his good leadership skills and Governor Jerry Brown who also became the Governor of California in 2013.

The last section concludes with what leaders need to do to benefit including being flexible and innovative, ensure that their character in the criminal justice is above reproach and they need to embrace Heifetz leadership model, transformational and authentic leadership styles as these styles of leadership allow for creativity and adaptation to situations.

Leadership Styles and Characteristics in Criminal Justice System

Leadership remains pivotal in effective management and governance of the criminal justice system.  This analysis report incorporates studies on leadership styles and characteristics from empirical studies, journals, and dissertations and explains how findings from these studies apply to successful leaders in the criminal justice in general.

Criminal Justice System

Criminal justice systems do vary from one jurisdiction to another depending on the state, city, tribal government, federal government or military installation in charge because these jurisdictions have different agencies, laws, and ways and processes of managing their criminal justice processes (Kleinfeld, 2017). The criminal justice system consists of agencies and processes set up by the government to control and impose penalties on the violators and has various components including law enforcement, prosecution, defense attorney, courts and correctional facilities (Kleinfeld, 2017). 

Leadership Styles and Characteristics

According to Alshamsi (2016), leadership styles vary across countries. In the Abu Dhabi police, the leadership aspect of police and law enforcement is important and is taken with seriousness.  Alshamsi (2016) defines leadership as to intuitively decide what is to be done, and then inspire others to do the same. A leader acts as a pioneer and a pace setter who must always exemplify the values of the organization. Various leadership styles exist with various characteristics as described in the paragraphs that follow.

One of the leadership styles is transformational. According to Alshamsi (2016), a leader who exhibits components such as good interpersonal skills, vision, influence, risk taking, exemplary, pioneer dedicated and empathetic is a transformational leader. Other characteristics of transformational leaders include good communication skills, good judgment, competence or knowledge, confidence, good interpersonal skills, inspiration, proactive, visionary, and willing to listen and entertain new idea, adaptability and has organizational consciousness.

The second leadership style is authentic leadership. Leaders that exhibit this leadership style display high level of information sharing amongst leaders and team members before any decision is made or a decision is concluded (AlShamsi, 2016). The leader is transparent and ethical with the ability to bring out the best out of others as opposed to being self-seeking. 

The third leadership style is democratic leadership where leaders accord democratic ideologies such as inclusiveness, equality, egalitarian principles and free will (AlShamsi, 2016). Leaders are relational minded and, therefore, harness the teams potential in spearheading the organization forward. The leaders allow the followers to share their experiences in reaching amicable solutions to the problems at hand. The  major challenge is that this process may take quite some time to  reach consensus because of the freedom given to followers to partake in the decision making process.

Another leadership style is shared leadership style where there is a dyadic relationship among individuals aiming and developing a sharpening relationship to achieve the group or the entity goals (AlShamsi, 2016). This leadership is best in developing good and healthy relationship towards achievement of the goals set through empowering employees to take responsibility at both the strategic and operational level. This style requires openness and respect to work effectively.

In the task-oriented approach, a leader has the ability to manage tasks in an entity. Task oriented leaders are competent in assigning tasks and roles and responsibilities and are self-driven to complete tasks and to solve problems within the time set (AlShamsi, 2016).  The leader makes unpopular decisions and is ready to take the responsibility of the results. The leader is also more of a goal getter, and a problem solver. Such a leader sees follower as task drivers and not as relational friends.  Such leaders are also good at leading an organization during chaos or to spearhead project management (AlShamsi, 2016). They may not work well in situations where employees require morale and where the level of satisfaction is low. Such leaders also exhibit attributes of autocratic leaders, a style that thrives in highly structured and bureaucratic settings.

Yet another style is the trait theory, which focuses on the personal traits of the leaders as opposed to the tasks to be accomplished (AlShamsi, 2016).  The theory further suggests that leaders have certain innate traits such as tolerance, problem solving abilities, intelligence and assertiveness. Hence, leaders with these traits are expected to be effective in providing leadership to help their organization achieve higher level of performance. The critics of the theory argue that situations do vary hence, require flexibility of different trait to solve or accomplish at that level.

Another style is the transactional leadership, which is much like authoritative, except that this approach relies on rewards-based system to motivate, subordinates (University of San Diego, 2018). The performance of the subordinates and adherence to rules is what determines the punishment or the reward.  The followers have to conform to the rules and vision of the leader for them to receive award. Those that go contrary to the leader’s vision face the brunt of the leader. The fear of discipline for performing poor versus the anticipation of positive reinforcement for positive performance influences that behavior.

Heifetz’s leadership model, on the other hand, holds that a leader has the responsibility to directly initiate change and help it become more competitive and strong despite of the challenges facing it. The leader has the ability to build an adaptive capacity of an organization that allows for survival even during periods of crisis (Heifetz and Linsky, 2002).

AlShamsi (2016) also discusses some of the factors that shape leadership styles including; communication, empowerment, performance and culture. A good leader has to understand the culture, communicate effectively, empower others and aspire to perform to the expected standards. Figure 1 below show she factors that shape leadership style while figure 2 shows the link between leadership style, organizational culture and organizational performance

Figure 1: Factors that shape leadership style.  AlShamsi (2016).

Figure 2: The link between leadership style, organizational culture and organizational performance. AlShamsi (2016).

Leadership Styles and Characteristics

Leadership styles and designs in criminal justice system vary from one region to another because of the differences in the laws and agencies that have the responsibility to serve justice (Dean & Gottschalk, 2013). In a study  that was carried out in two police districts in Norway to study the attitude of police managers on different leadership roles, majority of the respondents stated that personnel role and resource allocator roles stood out as the most important roles.  Most of the law enforcers felt that they were less competent in the liaison role (Dean & Gottschalk, 2013). The study also noted that a well-regarded police service remains a prerequisite for positive perception of law enforcement and justice.  Leadership is also major element to ensure accountability and integrity in policing and in criminal justice system.

According to Labriola (2013), criminal justice leaders need to be innovative in their duties to earn the trust and confidence of the followers. Innovativeness has become key in this age whereby technology has evolved at a faster pace.  According to AlShamsi (2016), criminal justice leaders need to have an excellent personal ethics, stronger inner sense of right and wrong as the work of a criminal justice leader involves working and meeting with the public and making decisive decisions. Additionally, the leaders own criminal background should be clean to demonstrate respect for the law and to act as a role model for the rest of the people. 

According to University of San Diego (2018), currently, many organizations and departments  in criminal and justice are increasing acknowledging and embracing the benefits of a more transformative and inclusive approach of leadership as opposed to over relying  solely on the authoritative, militaristic approach that has for  decade characterized police work. Leaders exhibiting transformational style are people centered as they inspire, motivate and empower their teams. Such leaders closely work with their teams and are committed to a shared vision and goals for the organization.  The leaders encourage open communication, creativity and innovation in pursuit of the goals (Labriola, 2013). Such leaders are inclusive, and consider the uniqueness of each individual needs, skills and motivations. The leaders have an open door policy that facilitates open communication. According to Andreescu and Vito (2010), a transformational leader allows new ideas and is visionary. In a study conducted by Bruns and Shuman (1988), police officers expressed their desire for a more participative organizational style leadership as opposed to benevolent-authoritative. This is an indication of the need for better leadership styles that would allow better working conditions and increase public confidence in the law enforcement agencies. In a study  that comprised of 161 police chiefs in Texas  that completed the multifactor leadership questionnaire leader form, background characteristics form and the NEO Five Factor Inventory, findings indicated that transformational leaders exemplified the following attributes; confident, energetic and open-minded (Sarver & Miller, 2014).   Murphy and Drodge (2004) conclude that transformational leaders have particular relational strengths that help in the elevation of commitment levels, motivation and work satisfaction.  Such leaders have the potential to turn their constraints into opportunities as they pursue shared vision.

The most common police leadership styles include; authoritative police leadership, transactional police leadership and transformative leadership. Authoritative police leadership is ruled based focusing on order and more of military like approach (Labriola, 2013). Police and military utilize this approach.

Application and Benefit to the Leaders

Globally, leaders in criminal justice have embraced different leadership styles to execute their mandate. The choice of leadership style depends on the task and the situation at hand. The ever-changing environment, especially increasing reliance on IT infrastructures, has rendered some of the theories vague and futile. Some of these theories place responsibilities on leaders such as situational leadership, while others focus on tasks and rewards such as task oriented and transactional models (Labriola, 2013). Others such as authentic, transformational and shared leadership seem favorite by many of the stakeholders in the criminal justice system because they focus on building relationship and nurturing new leaders. Heifetz model, authentic leadership style and transformational style stand out as most promising in the 21^st century organization because they adequately endeavor to address today’s volatile environment. Similarly, most of the study findings have rooted for these styles of leadership as they allow for inclusivity, creativity and innovation.  For example, criminal justice leader that embodies this attributes is Joseph Arpio, an elected sheriff of Maricopa County, Arizona (Labriola, 2013). The sheriff was open minded and receptive to new idea that transformed the leadership helping improve service delivery.

Similarly, these theories serve as a foundation of helping any aspiring leader become successful. Leaders in the criminal justice system just need to have integrity, competence, empathy, creativity and adaptability, to make a leader successful. The moral code should be strong and consistently the leaders have to exemplify goodness of character and personal courage. William Bratton, who served as a chief of Police in Los Angeles, in Boston and New York City embodies these leadership traits enabling him to be recognized and appreciated for his good leadership (Labriola, 2013).  Leaders can also be innovative and creative to inspire and bring changes. Examples of such leaders in criminal justice who embodies these attributes are Dr. Edward Latesa also a professor at the University of Cincinnati well known for his Risk Principle piece of work that draws on various studies and Governor Jerry Brown who also became the Governor of California in 2013 (Labriola, 2013). 

Leadership is exercised in context; there must be followers and a leader to provide direction. Figure 3 below shows visual representation of emergence of a leader as a social process.

Figure 3: Emergence of a Leader as a social process (Murphy and Drodge, 2004)

Conclusion: How Criminal Justice Leaders Can Benefit

The research has provided insights on what criminal leaders ought to do to benefit from various leadership styles. Criminal justice leaders must be flexible and innovative for them to offer the best of services. They need become more reflective to avoid getting swept up in a moment when making decisions. The problems or challenges that leaders in criminal justice system encounter are varied and multifaceted hence require high innovativeness and flexibility (Deluga & Souza, 1991). Despite the leader having embraced a specific leadership style, some situations and circumstances call for flexibility and switching off to other appropriate style of leadership to  deal with  the situation at hand in an amicable manner.

The leaders’ character in the criminal justice must be above reproach. They have to act professionally and uphold to ethical standards. The character of the leader should be excellent to inspire and guide the followers to lead or live better live devoid of criminal activities. Therefore, integrity, honesty, competence, compassion, and empathy remain as some of the key attributes to embrace one another. A leader must also be always psychologically prepared to deal with instances of tension. Keeping broad perspective courage, strength, maturity, patience and grace remain pivotal in addressing and solving conflict (Schafer, 2010). Personal defensive is not encouraged amongst leaders as they may strain the relationship.

 The leaders in the criminal justice system have another obligation to embrace Heifetz leadership model and transformational leadership styles and authentic leadership styles as these styles of leadership allow for creativity and adaptation to situations. A leader in this field has to be in a position to work closely with the team to enhance their thinking and decision making process. Leaders have to share their views with members to reach amicable decisions (Heifetz, Linsky, 2002). Reducing the heat especially during period where the level of tension is high requires decisive action to restore calm. Affording more time for people to calm down or revising the ideas can help in the reassessing the situation and taking corrective action.