Prophetic, Associative, Activist, Straight and Dynamic Leadership, A Phenomenology Study at University of Muhammadiyah Malang Indonesia

Abstract

This study aimed at encompassing the Executive Board’s understanding and interpreting the leadership styles as well as its strategic implementation that could contribute beneficially to both internal and external stakeholders. The variety of leadership styles emerged as a strategy shifting the university from a market follower to a market leader. This study used qualitative approach with Edmund Husserl’s phenomenological philosophy reviewing that the thought pattern of subjectivism does not only regard the visible phenomena but also tries to interpret them thoroughly. The success of an Islamic University, in this case University of Muhammadiyah Malang is a visible phenomenon while the leaders’ interpretation of leadership styles emerged as an object in this study. Several findings on the implementation of leadership styles in this study were: 1) prophetic leadership style with the characteristics of Sidiq, Tabbliqh, Amanah, and Fatonah; 2) associative leadership style with the cultural, collective, and collegial approaches; 3) activist leadership style through an organization mover. The interpretation of activist leadership became a wedge bridging one leadership style and others. This activist leadership style was characterized by massive ideal goals developed through a series of discussions and subsequently be implemented through a series of vigorous movements; 4) straight and dynamic leadership style characterized by progressive, flexible, and rationale movements. This straight leadership style was interpreted as a gradual change from standard movements to more progressive ones. It was mainly due to the impact of standardization determined by either the government or the institution proper.

Keywords: leadership, prophetic, phenomenology