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Throughout the history of the Tech industry, we have many familiar names associated with leadership, but none come close to William Henry Gates III or Bill Gates

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Throughout the history of the Tech industry, we have many familiar names associated with leadership, but none come close to William Henry Gates III or Bill Gates. Bill Gates is known for leading his corporation, Microsoft, to the top for software and computer products. He is iconized as one of the great leaders of our times and is the benchmark that many others use to gain competitive advantages. He is the role model and savior to many. In this paper we will dive into Bill’s leadership skills, overview his management style and highlight his key strengths that molded him into a successful leader.

“Bill Gates launched Microsoft with his friend Paul Allen in 1975. It went on to become the largest personal computer software company. Gates led the company as chairman and CEO until January 2000 before stepping down and remaining as chairman and chief software architect. (1)” Gates dropped out from Harvard Law to pursue his dream of starting a business. Under his leadership Microsoft grew from a start up to partnerships with IBM to the development of Windows software. This eventually led Microsoft to the largest personal computer software company in the world which is currently valued around 44.3 billion US dollars. During this unprecedented rise, Gates became a leader. He had a proven record of creation, invention, leadership and management. In many eyes he became the benchmark for what a CEO should embody. This lead many to analysis his leadership qualities and management style.

Bill Gates is a once in a generation talent. He inspires others, creates innovative processes and champions philanthropic causes. “He created his own path to his success like dropping out of school to pursue his dream. He took risks and trusted his knowledge and skillset instead of what others taught him. This is something that differs from many other leaders in the world (2)”. I believe he is the perfect example for a term we learned in class this semester known as a Transformational Leader. “A transformational leader has a desire to encourage personal creativity in oneself and the team, support and encourage individual needs instead of team-based perspectives and motivate and inspire via clear communication from the leader (2)”. It is because of these qualities that many who started with gates began to emulate his leadership style and refer to him as a transformational leader. Gates was known for his focus, creativity, ability to care for others, passion and his big picture thinking. Gates focused on what he knew best, which was software. He harnessed his strength and fine-tuned it into an industry dominating product which is renowned for execution. This leads into his philanthropic work after his Microsoft era. His second trait was a big picture approach. Gates had aggressive timelines but used practical thinking to set these goals. He used a step-based approach for his projects which detailed the steps that the project needed in order for its completion and the project only progressed when the current step was completed. Gates possessed creativity in part due to his focus but also his awareness to branch out to other areas and industries. He encouraged others to embrace creativity which resulted in him empowering others to create new opportunities and explore ideas thus resulting in new perspectives (2). Finally, Gates’ ability to care for others despite his high profile and accomplishments leads to his world-wide respect and admiration. He believed that it is better to be respected than feared and he learned that in order to get the most out of people he needed to treat them respectfully and create a nourishing environment to develop in. These are the qualities that make Gates a transformative leader. In addition to these qualities, gates have certain traits that highlight his excellent leadership such as a Competitor, his ability to empower others and his ability to delegate to others.

Bill Gates is an extremely competitive person. Both in his person and professional life he always strives to be the very best. From the days of his childhood of competing against friends to become the top gamer in his circle to challenging the Tech industry and its companies, Gates is a true competitor. He embraces challenges and creates unique solutions to problems that were not present before. Hew takes great pride in himself and his work and he trust his technical abilities. “One famous example of Gates’s competitiveness was described by Fred Thorlin, an Atari executive, in an interview in 2000. Fred recalled showing Gates he was working on and challenged him to 37 games, I which Fred won 35 times. When they met one month later, Gates asked for a redo of the game and won or tied every round. Gates had studied the game until he solved it. That is a competitor (3) “said Thorlin.

“Bill Gates said something years ago that should resonate deep within the collective conscience of leaders everywhere. He pointed out as we look ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who empower others (4).” With these two words, Gates showed just how in tune he was with his audience, his leadership abilities and his environment. He knew that as a company grows, one person cannot run a company. You need competent team members around you in order to truly succeed and make a difference in the world. You have to learn to delegate to others, empower others and trust others. Gates championed the ability to empower others. He always placed his employees first and was proactive in their growth and development. He made his company climate fun and flexible via virtual settings both in and out of work. He understood that work was not everything and that happy employees do their best work. He was a software guy at heart and knew he had to develop and invest in digital solutions for the future. Gates also knew that he would not have all the answers and he needed to gain input and solutions from his employees. In trusting your employees, you give them confidence to create and implement ideas and potential innovative solutions. Gates new that great leaders set themselves apart by effectively influencing and empowering other human beings.

In his speech to his high school alma matter, Gates discussed what his most important take away from leadership was. He stated it was the ability to delegate to others and trust the team surrounding oneself. He acknowledged that it did not come easy for him in the beginning but knew he needed it since his obsession with programming wasn’t sustainable if the company was to scale. Gates had to learn to surrender his control in order to keep up with the pace of his increasing managerial duties due to his company expansion. He used these five theories to help him overcome his deficiency and grow as a leader. He focused on his results – what needed to accomplish instead of getting stuck in the details. He provided clear communication to his team as to why things needed to be accomplished, thereby creating one clear consciousness among the team. This made his tasks relatable and filled his team with reason and inspiration. Gates was very good at perceiving people’s strengths and used this to delegate work to the corresponding individual that possessed the correct skills, knowledge and experience. Finally, one of Gates’s biggest strengths as a leader was his ability to give recognition. This became a part of his delegation and helped to empower others by giving his team the recognition for good performances accomplished. This undoubtedly led to an increase in morale, high productivity efforts and a renewed vigor to accomplish (5).