Scott Parry-Jones from EV helped us think about this. There are two ways to think about how your leading others; the authority continuum, and the discussion continuum.

The authority continuum ranges from “I have all the authority” right over to “I’m giving you all the authority”. Another way of seeing this is the former being “You will do exactly what I do, no questions, no creativity” and the later being “You can do whatever you want, be as creative as you want”.

The discussion continuum ranges from “We’re not going to discuss this often at all; maybe an email every now and then.” all the way over to “We’re going to discuss this all the time; weekly meetings and whenever we get the chance!”

Where does your “natural” leadership style fit on each continuum? How do you prefer to lead people?

What about being led? How do you prefer to be lead? How much Authority do you like being given? How much discussion do you like being brought in on?