Ricardo Semlers Leadership

In the case of Ricardo Semler, the leadership style that he applied in his machinery industry is participative management where he involved other leaders in making decisions that affected the operations of the company. Throughout his leadership, Ricardo wondered what could happen if he was not there to support the company. This made him trust the employees with all the activities of the organization as well as making decisions regarding the company. Investigations reveal that participative management allows leaders to trust workers and offer them the freedom to innovate and apply their creativity and ingenuity in the enterprise which allows many organizations to thrive in their business (Session 3). This is because employees are capable of directing themselves and maintaining self-control whenever they are treated as responsible individuals.

This approach has worked for Ricardo despite the fact that it seems upside down and limits the power of the leader. The employees of the company know the primary objectives and vision of the firm and they can do whatever it takes to meet these goals. Semco machinery industry is among the companies that have explicitly adopted a corporate code of ethics which guides how employees should be treated while in the organization. The joint venture selection criteria used by Semco industry is the same where the interested partners should be among the two top companies in the markets or product niche. In addition to that, the organizations should also have the right to a highly engineered and complex product or service that is hard to imitate (Michalski).

This is why most of the Brazilian companies have not partnered with companies from other countries despite the friendly environment offered by the country. Strengths Semler Ricardo used participative management which has made the company survive in the twisted economy of Brazil. In this leadership style, the employees are involved in making decisions regarding the industry and decide on the pay of the services offered. This has consequently maintained employment democracy in the industry (Fisher, 2005). Employees are allowed to do what they want and when they want it since all the actions are aimed at achieving the goal of the industry. The leadership of Ricardo makes the industry to be admired by international partners who desire to invest with the company.

Weaknesses The weakness of the style used by Ricardo in his leadership is that it allows employees to work within their schedules rather than having a defined working time for all employees. In his argument, this was a way of ensuring that employees traveled in hours that were nonpeak. Moreover, involving employees in making decisions of an organization slows down the decision-making time because all workers have diverse ideas. This system of leadership limits the power of the leader because employees are used to working on their own time and do what they want, which can lead to the failure of an organization. This can raise the values and aspiration of followers (Session 2). It also allows communication of the company vision.