Skip navigation.

Kaplan DeVries Inc.

Please support Web standards. Have a look at this page on the Web Standards Project site.



Publications & Resources

Kaplan, R.E. (1996). Forceful leadership and enabling leadership: You can do both. Greensboro, NC: Center for Creative Leadership.

Leaders need to be forceful - to assert themselves, be a force intellectually, push others to perform, make tough calls. Leaders also need to be enabling - to empower others, be receptive to others’ ideas, coach, give recognition. Every manager uses a mix of both of these approaches, but most managers favor one over the other. In the extreme cases, managers become so wedded to one way that they have little use for the other. Rather than see forceful leadership and enabling leadership as complementary, they experience the two as polar opposites. This publication is about development - how managers, leaning toward forceful or enabling leadership, can grow and become more versatile. The challenge is not just to learn new skills; it is to overcome negative attitudes about the other approach. 

Brief essay available at: Forceful and enabling leadership.


Filed under: Books & Book Chapters















Search This Site

Join our Mailing List

Call 336.288.8200


Consulting to CEOs
& Executive Teams
since 1992.
Kaplan DeVries Inc
1903-G Ashwood Ct
Greensboro, NC 27455 USA


privacy policy