Autocratic Leadership

Correct Answer: Start to delegate decision making in their respective areas to the competent team members.

The Agile methodology encourages team empowerment and decision-making. As an autocratic leader, it's not recommended to make all decisions yourself, which makes the option 'Continue making all the decisions yourself.' incorrect. Agile reflects a culture that encourages learning by doing. So, ignoring the issue and hoping it resolves over time isn't the right approach. Similarly, assigning less competent team members to easier tasks does not promote growth, learning, and confidence. The best course of action is to 'Start to delegate decision-making in their respective areas to the competent team members.' This not only strengthens the team's independence but also promotes trust and professional development.

Correct Answer: Analyze the project issues and make necessary decisions to improve, communicating changes clearly to your team.

As an autocratic leader on an Agile project, the most constructive, and hence the right answer is to 'Analyze the project issues and make necessary decisions to improve, communicating changes clearly to your team.'. To explain why this is the best response, it is because Agile projects are built upon communication, collaboration and effective problem-solving strategy. It involves identifying the root causes of issues and taking necessary actions to improve the conditions, keeping open and clear communication with the team members. Blaming the team for their incompetence is neither productive nor constructive as it does not identify or solve the current issue. Persisting with the same approach, despite it consistently resulting in missed deadlines and poor quality, indicates inflexibility and is contrary to Agile's foundational beliefs of adaptability and continuous improvement. Delegating decision-making to team members may share the burden, but as a leader, it is your responsibility to guide and coordinate the team's effort in the right direction. Therefore, the other three responses are not the best approaches to solve the issue as they neglect the basic principles of Agile methodology.

Correct Answer: Consider the proposal, but make the final decision yourself after assessing its feasibility and impact on the current project.

In an autocratic style of leadership, the Project Manager typically makes unilateral decisions after evaluating the situation. Therefore, in this situation, when presented with the innovative idea that could speed up the delivery, the most appropriate response for an autocratic leader would be to consider the proposal seriously and make the final decision personally after assessing its feasibility and possible impact on the ongoing project. The option to dismiss the idea without consideration is not advisable as it does not promote team spirit, and it also hampers the possibility of process improvement. The choice to implement the idea immediately without analysis ignores the prudent steps of risk and feasibility analysis, which could lead to potential project complexities. Lastly, letting the team decide without the PM's input contradicts the autocratic style where decision-making is mostly centralized.