Leadership Styles Workbook

Formerly called the Managerial Style Workbook, this test was renamed as the Leadership Styles Workbook as of December 2015.

The MSW was recently updated to bring it in line with revisions to The inventory of leadership styles (ILS) and The organizational climate survey (OCS) 180-degree diagnostic surveys.

The changes are very minor and include:

• Renaming the word managerial to leadership throughout the workbook
• Renaming 3 of the style labels. Coercive, Authoritative, and Democratic will now be called Directive, Visionary, and Participative
• Renaming the workbook from Managerial Style Workbook to Leadership Styles Workbook

Everything else, including the exercises, are exactly the same!

The Leadership Styles Workbook (formerly known as the Managerial Style Workbook) is a paper-based, self-scored learning and professional development tool designed to measure a manager’s operational approach. Taking less than 30 minutes to complete, this workbook guides individuals to identify which of the six core leadership styles they rely on most: Directive, Visionary, Affiliative, Participative, Pacesetting, or Coaching. Rather than serving as a complex clinical evaluation, it uses minor, practical reflection exercises to show managers how to actively match their natural management habits to the shifting demands of their daily workplace situations.

What It’s Best Used For

• Mapping personal leadership frequencies: Helping managers figure out exactly which of the six core behavioral styles they rely on most frequently during day-to-day operations.
• Conducting workplace situational audits: Prompting leaders to actively contrast their current, instinctual management habits against what their unique business team actually requires.
• Identifying style limitations: Providing targeted tips to expose when a specific leadership approach is highly effective versus when it becomes counterproductive.
• Drafting management action steps: Serving as a structured, low-stress foundation for supervisors to brainstorm personal career growth, style changes, and team morale improvements.
• Analyzing workplace environment loops: Unifying with companion resources—such as the Organizational Climate Workbook (OCW) or the Tower Building Exercise—to map out how a chosen leadership approach fundamentally reshapes a team’s physical and psychological working climate.

Everyone can recall their best manager – and their worst – and the specific things they did to boost (or dent) morale and performance. This workbook gives managers a chance to understand, and improve, their own managerial style. Research has identified six styles that managers use to bring out the best in their teams.

By matching the right style to a given situation, managers can make a positive impact on the business. Use the Leadership Styles Workbook (LSW) to help your managers:

• understand which of the six styles they use most frequently
• compare what they do with what their situation requires of them
• get tips on when a particular style is more, or less, effective
• start to think about areas for action and improvement.

Why choose the Leadership Styles Workbook?

This workbook gives managers a chance to understand their own managerial style, reflect on whether it suits the situations they face, and make appropriate changes. The LSW is a simple tool that introduces the six managerial styles, which are:

• Directive
• Visionary
• Affiliative
• Participative
• Pacesetting
• Coaching

It enables managers to identify their intentions and think about whether they are using the managerial styles to best effect. The LSW is most effective when used in conjunction with the Organizational Climate Workbook (OCW) as managerial style impacts the climate a manager creates for their team.

• Self-scored
• Paper based
• English

See the Leadership Styles Workbook and Organizational Climate Workbook and Tower Building Excercise as well.