Abstract
This article examines the impact of local leadership on decision-making in local
government, based on the premise that success or failure of local government is,
among other factors, the product of the character of its leaders' decision-making. The
study indicates that decision-making of local leaders is a core factor in the success or
failure of local government. "Strong" local governments were found to exhibit
strongly-led leadership that was professional, operated within budget, was more open
to consultation and more inclusionary. Weaker local governments exhibited core
leadership faults in decision-making, such as strategic decisions resting on intuition,
lack of caution, over-optimism, lack of skill navigating among key players, surrender
to pressures, difficulty consulting others and an over-centralized leadership style, poor
staff management, insufficient utilization of professional ranks, reversals of decisions
and lack of purposefulness. Moreover, the research revealed: Strong local authorities
were typified by integration of or a combination of all four classic leadership models
– strategic, managerial, political and layman leadership in their decision-making
processes. By doing so they bring the strong points of each model into play (and
avoiding the specific pitfalls each carried). The research labels this new leadership
model the Integrated MPLS Leadership Style.
The research at hand seeks to answer three core questions: What is the
impact of leadership on decision-making in local governance? Are strong and
weak local councils marked by different decision-making styles of their
mayors? How is success in decision-making of local leadership expressed
and what are their primary failures?
