Robert Nardelli s Leadership Style - 1338 Words

When one thinks of the retail giant Home Depot they think of reasonably priced items that will aid them in home improvement projects. In the business world though, the mention of this chain store brings to mind the controversial CEO Robert Nardelli who left an organizational path of destruction upon his departure from the company. Nardelli had an interesting leadership style that bordered on the edge of being considered unethical and was considered by many as not being beneficial for the company overall. By evaluating Robert Nardelli’s leadership style against known leadership theories such as trait, behavioral, situational and contingency theories it is easy to dissect his leadership style and make a final decision as to how ethical he†¦show more content†¦One of the theories that can be used to dissect Nardelli’s role as a leader is the trait theory. Trait theories are based upon the concept that leaders are simply born with a set of traits such as social , personal, and personality traits and also physical characteristics that outline how they are as a leader (Baack, 2012). Nardelli had a good foundation of traits for being a leader but there were some personality traits that kept him from being a great leader. He had a strong desire for setting and achieving goals but his interactions with people, employees and customers alike, were what caused him problems. Robert Nardelli was not known as being a personable individual and tended to focus more on the numbers that the stores were generating rather than the people that were providing those numbers. As a leader it is important to be balanced between the two aspects as you cannot have one without the other. It is impossible to lead people if there is no desire to relate to them and this is the issue that Nardelli was faced with. The profits that an organization is generating can only take you so far; it is the people that need to be the focus first and then one can move on to oth er aspects. Whereas trait theory believed that leadership traits are something and individual is born with, behavioral theory is based on the concept that