In contrast to more traditional hierarchical models, participative leadership values collaboration and inclusion in decision-making. It recognizes the unique contributions of each team member and thus generally fosters the creation of a climate of trust, stimulates creativity and encourages innovation. In this article, we examine the foundations of this leadership style, its practical benefits and the essential skills needed to implement it effectively in a variety of organizational contexts. 

1. Listen and let opinions be heard

The first foundation of participative leadership is, of course, active listening. Indeed, to create an environment where everyone feels free to express themselves, it's crucial to be a good listener and to give everyone the chance to have their say. 

Good listening skills

A good leader knows how to rely on others to develop his team. And to do this, he or she must, of course, know how to listen to everyone's opinion. There are many ways of doing this, such as : 

• Encourage the expression of opinions from different profiles to create constructive debates. "I suggest that everyone gives their opinion on the point we've just seen, so that we can show our different points of view and think together".
• Taking the time to recognize individual contributions. "I'd like to thank Sophie for her very good time management, which enabled us to meet our deadlines."
• Make sure everyone feels respected during exchanges. "I'd like us to listen to each other's opinions without interrupting, even if we don't agree with our neighbor.

Indeed, when team members feel valued and respected, they are more inclined to share their ideas openly, even when they disagree.

Another point of attention when practicing active listening: taking the time to check everyone's alignment with the decisions being made. Rather than simply asking if the directives are clear, leaders need to engage in an in-depth conversation to ensure that every team member understands not only what needs to be done, but also why it's important and how it fits into the organization's overall vision .

Finally, it's essential to remain alert to superficial or ambiguous answers. Asking for rephrasing or clarification helps to ensure a real and thorough understanding. This encourages team members to think critically and express their ideas clearly and concisely. Asking open-ended questions and encouraging discussion enables managers to create a space where everyone feels safe to contribute meaningfully.

Having put these good practices in place, managers can encourage active and committed participation from all team members, which contributes to effective decision-making and the achievement of organizational goals.

Giving everyone a voice

In meetings, giving everyone a place is essential to creating cohesion and ensuring that communication flows smoothly. It's not enough to give the floor to the most talkative people; it's more a question of creating an environment where everyone feels free to contribute, whatever their temperament: 

• Open-ended questions, which encourage in-depth reflection and active participation, are an essential practice. These questions allow everyone to share their ideas, concerns and suggestions more freely and creatively, thus encouraging a rich and diverse discussion.

• Informing team members in advance of the topics to be discussed at meetings enables them to prepare adequately. It gives them the opportunity to reflect on their points of view, gather relevant information and formulate constructive questions or comments. This upstream preparation helps make exchanges more productive and ensures balanced participation by all team members.

In short, to ensure fair and constructive participation in meetings, you need to create a climate of inclusiveness. This means using open-ended questions, proactively preparing for upcoming discussions, and paying particular attention to letting all team members have their say, putting everyone on an equal footing, whatever their personality or communication style. 

2. Encourage initiative

To encourage initiative-taking, you need to facilitate an open mode of communication that allows everyone to gain confidence and therefore take more initiative. 

Create a space for exchanging ideas

Creating a space conducive to ideation and sharing initiatives can be achieved in two ways: 

1. Facilitating the circulation of ideas: this is essential to stimulate creativity, a certain collective intelligence and innovation within a team. This can be achieved by setting up dedicated communication channels in online tools, such as messaging platforms or collaboration spaces. These channels provide a space where team members can freely share ideas, ask questions and collaborate on projects.Actively encourage the search for and sharing of interesting information: thiscan be achieved by setting up training programs, recommending reading or disseminating relevant articles and resources. Show each team member the way to new ideas: "I saw this article on artificial intelligence, it might be interesting to look into it..."

• Get out of your own environment to draw inspiration from practices outside the company: this may involve attending industry conferences, participating in professional networks or forging partnerships with other organizations. Opening up to new experiences and exchanging with outsiders enables team members to draw on a wide range of ideas, and feeds their creativity. 

With the various approaches combined, managers can create an environment where the free flow of ideas is truly and concretely encouraged. This helps to develop a genuine culture of creativity and to design ever more innovative projects.

Encouraging autonomy

To create the conditions that enable employees to gain autonomy, a good leader needs to know how to develop a framework in which calculated risks and mistakes are accepted. Several initiatives can help create this dynamic: 

• Explicitly recognize that all decisions involve a certain level of risk, but that this risk can be mitigated by good upstream analysis and careful planning. 
• Encourage the sharing of convictions and points of view, rather than immediately imposing strict guidelines. 
• Let employees take the initiative on tasks that are a little more challenging than the average.
• Recognize and value small initiatives that contribute to the organization's overall strategy. Even seemingly insignificant actions can have a significant impact on the achievement of long-term objectives. These small, celebrated victories also recognize the contribution of all individuals within the company, so leaders reinforce the sense of belonging and encourage involvement at all levels of the organization.

3. Allow failure

Of course, if you want to develop participative leadership within your teams, you have to accept and value failures. It's up to you to turn them into opportunities for continuous improvement. 

Adopting the right approach

Failure is an integral part of the learning process. The role of a good leader? To identify the warning signs of failure, so as to intervene early and limit the damage. These may be, for example, recurrent delays or interpersonal tensions. Managers or teams can act swiftly to adjust plans or reallocate resources according to the elements detected. For example, if they notice a rise in tensions between team members, they can organize a meeting to clarify objectives and redistribute tasks in order to re-establish a positive dynamic.

Anticipation is all very well, but sometimes you also have to accept failure and learn from it to strengthen your teams and help them improve continuously. 

Turning failure into strength

The DAKI (Drop, Add, Keep, Improve) method is an agile retrospective tool that turns failures into strengths by focusing on learning and continuous improvement. Here's how it works and why it's effective:

1. Drop: Identify the practices, behaviors or elements that didn't work and contributed to the failure. By dropping them, the team eliminates the sources of recurring problems.
2. Add: Recognizing new ideas, methods or tools that could be beneficial in the future. By adding these new elements, the team enriches its arsenal to better respond to future challenges.
3. Keep: Record the practices and elements that have worked well despite failure. By keeping them, the team capitalizes on its strengths and uses them as a foundation for future success.
4. Improve: Identify aspects which, although functional, can still be optimized. By improving these elements, the team ensures constant progress and avoids repeating the same mistakes.

Using the DAKI method, teams transform failures into opportunities for learning and growth. Each failure becomes a source of valuable feedback , enabling precise adjustments to be made to strengthen the team's resilience and effectiveness over the long term.

How to develop participative leadership?

Why take the time to develop this leadership style vs. a more traditional approach? 

1. To stimulate innovation: participative leadership encourages team members to share their ideas and collaborate. This diversity of perspectives stimulates innovation, as solutions emerge from collective contribution, often more creative and effective than a traditional top-down approach.
2. To develop team motivation : When team members feel listened to and valued, their commitment and motivation increase. They are more inclined to invest themselves fully in their tasks and work together towards common goals, which improves productivity and job satisfaction.
3. To develop employees: participative leadership offers opportunities for personal and professional development, as team members can take part in decision-making. This strengthens their leadership and project management skills. This individual growth benefits the whole company. 
4. Improve resilience to change: by involving team members in decision-making, the company becomes more adaptable and responsive to change. Teams are better prepared to anticipate and overcome challenges, because they benefit from a collective vision and faster, better-informed decision-making.

How do I go about it? 

By developing good practices and behaviors. To do this, you can either start off on your own, or get support through training. The NUMA Collaborative Leadership training course gives you the keys to creating the conditions for a team where everyone can put forward their ideas, share their doubts and take the initiative. Through the sharing of case studies, tools and methods, in just 2 hours you'll learn how to : 

• Create an environment where everyone feels free to share their ideas and fears.
• Support your teams' creativity, encourage them to take the initiative and challenge the quality of their proposals.
• Value learning by talking about successes and failures as sources of improvement.

Want to find out more? Discover our training catalog.