An examination of Latino/a American Chief Executive Officers' leadership styles

The purpose of this study was to examine Latino/a American Chief Executive Officers' leadership experience(s), and leadership styles. 12 Latino/a American Chief Executive Officers were interviewed in order to address the research question: What leadership communication style do Latino/a American Chief Executive Officers employ? In addition, the researcher addressed three sub-questions, namely: (1) How do Latino/a American Chief Executive Officers' understand/describe their leadership styles? (2) What leadership styles do participants use when communicating with subordinates? (3) Do participants employ a more transformational approach to leadership versus a more transactional approach to leadership?;First, the study illustrated based on the findings, that many of the participants adhered to the delegating style found in Hersey and Blanchard's (1982) situational leadership theory. Using the delegating style allowed the CEOs' to focus on business development and growth. Adherence to a number of Latino/a cultural scripts were evident in the participants' responses thus, demonstrating the centrality of culture and the impact it has on the CEOs' approach to leadership. A majority of the participants used many transformational behaviors (Bass, 1985) evident in their overall value for employees. The transformational leadership behaviors used by the participants in this study helped to facilitate employees' transition to high job maturity and high psychological maturity where the delegating style in Hersey and Blanchard's (1982) situational leadership theory is appropriate, thus demonstrating the link between transformational leadership theory (Bass, 1985) and situational leadership theory (Hersey and Blanchard, 1982).