How a charismatic leader drives strategic results: Case of Górnik Zabrze football club

Abstract

On the basis of the entrepreneurial strategy school and leadership theory
we draw the conclusion that firms managed by strong charismatic leaders
exclusively responsible for the strategy formulation have higher volatility
of results than firms with a planned and more predicable formal, corporate
approach to strategy formulation. It is so because a strong charismatic leader
may have a clear and solid vision, however he might be wrong and his vision
could result in a significant failure. As a charismatic leader has a strong
influence on all stakeholders his decisions are usually unquestioned and his
power and his decisions affect the major dependent variable – organisational
performance. Furthermore, we argue that the entrepreneurial school
is usually employed in the early stages of a firm’s life cycle. As the firm
matures the role of entrepreneurial visionary strategies scales down leaving
the place for a more formalised planning process. However, in some cases an
entrepreneurial visionary strategist is necessary even at the mature stages of
the organisation life-cycle when the company is a in difficult, turbulent position
as well as in a fierce competitive environment. The entrepreneurial strategic
approach is the most suitable for some types of organisations where other
approaches would not be so successful. Our findings indicate that a single
charismatic leader’s strategic management could result in a terrific success or
in a terrible failure. However, the entrepreneurial strategic approach should
not be mixed with the formal planned approach of strategic management.
These two perspectives at least in some type of organisations are mutually
exclusive because of different fundamental assumptions. While in separation
they could be successful, together they result in a failure.