Sir Alex Ferguson’s Leadership Principles of Management

Summary of the Alex Ferguson Leadership Style

Sir Alex Ferguson’s leadership style is characterised by a tough, autocratic approach underpinned by loyalty, high ethical standards, and a strong commitment to discipline and control. His career trajectory—from a modest playing background to managing Manchester United through difficult times—illustrates his persistence and ability to transform teams over time rather than instant success. 

Ferguson’s style does not align with the Great Man, Contingency, or Path-Goal theories. In truth, Sir Alex maintained a consistent, firm approach across different teams; focusing on setting goals himself rather than adapting to players’ goals or situations.

Instead, his leadership fits best with Trait and Behavioural theories, demonstrating self-confidence, drive, integrity, and a disciplinarian attitude. He demanded respect and hard work, exemplified by his rigorous training routines and strict enforcement of rules, even with star players. While this autocratic style yielded remarkable success, some players experienced motivation issues over time. Incorporating elements of democratic leadership and the Path-Goal theory could enhance motivation by involving players in decision-making and aligning individual and team goals. 

Ferguson’s leadership was shaped by early experiences, including his role as a Trade Union representative, which instilled a strong sense of unity and authority. Comparisons with contemporaries like Arsène Wenger suggest that Ferguson’s method was uniquely effective, and alternative styles would unlikely have produced better results. Ultimately, his legacy is a testament to a personalised leadership model forged through experience and unwavering principles.

Playing Days and Early Managerial Roles

Sir Alex Ferguson is a Scottish football manager, born on December 31st, 1941 in Glasgow. He is considered by many as the best manager in modern football. But before becoming the famous and well-known manager of Manchester United, he went through several stages. Alex Ferguson started as an amateur playing for Queen’s Park, while working in a shipyard as an apprentice and a Trade Union representative (Alex). Then, in 1964 he turned professional when he joined Dunfermline and afterward Rangers FC where he was successful. His professional career was marked by a low point when he left Rangers FC, later he joined two teams but he was not as successful. 

In 1974 he started his managing career with East Stirlingshire at the early age of 32 as a part-time job, but quickly changed teams for a full time position by signing with St Mirren. While managing them he was able to lead them to the First League in only three years. But his contract was cancelled due to several violations.

Ferguson then moved to Aberdeen where he had a difficult beginning, especially with some of his players, who did not respect him because he was not much older than them. His first year of acceptable performance he finished fourth in the league. But later he was able to lead them to success by winning the League and the European Cup Winners’ Cup. At this point Ferguson won the respect of his players and built a solid reputation in the field. After four successful seasons with Aberdeen he joined Manchester United in 1986.

Early Days With United

When Ferguson joined Manchester United, it was going through tough times. Many players were not in a good physical condition and some of them were heavy drinkers. Although he was able to put them back in shape, he did not succeed to win any title for more than 6 seasons. His results disappointed fans, but top executives at Manchester United decided to stick with him. This decision paid off when he led the team to the Premier League title, and it was the start for its legend as a manager of Manchester United. From this point and so on Alex Ferguson always led them to win titles, and he became the legend he is now.

The Ferguson leadership style in a nutshell

The Alex Ferguson leadership style is said to be tough, aggressive and loyal. Complete with high ethical standards and commitment toward (and from) his players. Many of his players highly regarded him and considered him as a disciplinarian with a hard character and a stubborn man. But Alex Ferguson proved that his leadership style is working and producing great results. It is demonstrated by the fact that he was able to lead each team he managed to great results through his 38 years managing career, even if the team is in the worst positions, before he started managing it.

This case study will look at the leadership style of Sir Alex Ferguson and analyze it. First, it will start by looking at different management styles and see the ones that are close to the one of Alex Ferguson. Then using these leadership styles it will explore how they can be used to improve Alex Ferguson style. The case study will also try to explain the reasons for Alex Ferguson’s management style. Finally, it will try to see if Alex did things differently would it make him as successful as he is now. But first the case study will define the scope of leadership it will be working with.

Leadership Breakdown

Leadership is the ability to unite and mobilise the energies around a one action. It is generally the result of a formal or informal election, explicit or implicit, in which the majority of the group’s members recognises one of them as the legitimate leader and delegates its decision-making power (Definition Leadership).

However, leadership has various meanings for people and mainly among leaders. Each leader/authority emphasises on different aspects of leadership that he believes are the most important. Three Authorities serve in defining and narrowing the scope of leadership for the case study. Each one has its own approach, which you will see below.

Drucker, Adair and Guiliani

Peter Drucker (1909-2005), a famous American theorist of management affirms that a leader must always think through the organisation’s missions, goals and define them. He also believes that no one can be a leader without trusting his team or having the responsibility to encourage the team to be stronger. (Definition Leadership – for the 21st Century.”)

John Adair (1934-), a British academic and theorist of leadership believes that all leadership skills are related to the triumvirate (Task, Team, Individual) and the connection between those three. Moreover he considers that there’s no single style of leadership, that all potential leaders will have to cope with different situations continuously and that making strategies is a priceless added value. He also contrasts leadership and management. (Definition Leadership – for the 21st Century.”)

Rudolph Guiliani (1944-), an American lawyer and politician, former Mayor of New York (U.S.A) believes that all leaders must be always prepared and aware of its surrounding environment. For him, representing people is a big responsibility. The leader must never harm the image of his people, by paying attention to every single detail of his words and actions. According to him, a true leader should always impose his values, principles and beliefs so he won’t seem weak and be discarded by people. Being loyal to your follower’s is also an essential trait of leadership because it keeps them stimulated and motivated. (Definition Leadership – for the 21st Century.”)

Leadership Theories

In the light of these definitions of leadership from different authorities and an investigation of leadership theories, several of them seem to be candidates to match Alex Ferguson leadership style. These theories include:

• Great Man;
• Trait;
• Contingency and Situational;
• Path Goal;
• Behaviour.

Below is a concise description of each one of them which gives the necessary information needed to compare them to Alex Ferguson leadership style.

Great Man

Thomas Carlyle developed it in the mid-19th century. This theory states that leadership skills are innate, not acquired or developed and that people are born natural leaders. Hence there is an inheritance character. The theory also emphasises the fact that leaders arise to lead others when the circumstances present themselves. (Leadership Styles)

Trait Theory

Traits theory built up on the Great Man theory. It took successful and less successful leaders through history and defined traits that are common between them. The results were classified to the following categories “Drive, desire to lead, honesty and integrity, self-confidence, intelligence, job-relevant knowledge, and extraversion” (Sidanim, Jamali, Robbins & Coulter).

Contingency and Situational Theory

This theory relies on the fact that leadership style depends on variables and erratic conditions, and that we could choose the one that fits the best our situation. This implies that we can use a leadership style or just a part of it and that no theory is better than the other. (Boyd)

Path Goal

This theory emphasises on the idea that a leader’s duty is to assist his employee to achieve their goals and to make sure that their goals align with the company’s ones. (Boyd)

Behavioural Theory

The Behavioural theory assumes (contrary of the Great Man theory) that society makes leaders rather than see them be born. The central idea of the theory is that the leadership style is about what the leader does and not about its traits (Leadership Style). The behavioural theory defines three leadership styles: Democratic style, Autocratic style and Laissez-faire style. 

Democratic is about involving employees and other staff in decision making and taking their opinion into account. Autocracy is a one man rule. The leader gives instructions, dispatch tasks and dictates rules, the participation of other members is minimal if not absent. The laissez-faire style offers freedom to employees in decision making and lets them accomplish their tasks the manner they want.

Alex Ferguson’s Leadership Style

From the theories cited above we can discard three that do not match the Alex Ferguson Leadership style. These theories are Great Man theory, Contingency and Situation theory and Path Goal theory. Below are the reasons for each of them about why they do not match Alex Ferguson style.

The Great Man theory does not apply to Alex Ferguson, simply because in each team he did not meet success until he spent a few years fine tuning his strategies. If he was a born leader he would have met success in his first or second year at most. 

A Great Man would be José Mourinho. Although he was a translator and had no experience in managing teams, he was able to make a breakthrough in the football world. Mourinho met success in his early career by winning the Champions League with a mid level team, which was FC Porto. In a timespan of just eight years, he was able to win 20 titles. He was also able to win a major title with each team he managed.

The Contingency and Situational theory does not match Alex Ferguson style for the simple reason that Ferguson Kept the same management style in each team he managed. We see a demonstration of this through his quote “My way or the Highway.”

Path Goal does not fit Alex Ferguson style because he has an autocratic leadership style. He is the one who decides the goals for the team, hence he does not care for the goals of other players and staff.

Ferguson: Behavioural and Trait

As we we toss away the theories above, there remains only with two theories that match completely or partially Alex Ferguson leadership style. These theories are Behavioural and Trait.

The Traits theory partially fits Alex Ferguson’s leadership style, even though it relies on the Great Man theory because of three reasons. 

First, Ferguson is self-confident. He always believes in his leadership style, applying it in every managerial role. Also he asked the players to believe in him even though they were not doing well at the beginning. The best example for that is his winning of the league cup after a disastrous previous season while Manchester United was risking a fall to the second division. 

Second, he has an achievement drive trait. Alex Ferguson invests a lot of energy in everything he does: by attending every training session and involving himself in anything that of interest to the team. He is always first in the practice session, the last to leave and he wants to convey that behaviour to all players. One example is Ryan Giggs, a Manchester United player since 1993.

“We might have got home from a European away game at four in the morning, yet you can pretty much guarantee he’ll be first in at Carrington at 8am the next day – and will be last to leave. You’ll then stick the TV on later that night and see him at a function in London. It’s unbelievable.”
– (Giggs)

Third, Ferguson also has the “Honesty and integrity” trait. Anyway, he has always been frank with his players and staff. Accordingly, he applies the rules he wants his players to observe on himself. He also won the FIFA Presidential Award in 2011, for his exemplary attitude.

Behavioural/autocratic

The Behavioural trait remains due to Alex Ferguson’s autocratic leadership characteristics. He has autocratic leadership first because he needs to control everything inside the club. He oversees transfers, the practice squad, and hiring staff. The second reason is because he is a disciplinarian and a feared coach. One example of his disciplinarian aspect is his finding of Beckham and suspending him for an important game, because he was taking care of his son while his wife was in a fashion week. 

This disciplinarian attitude with all players including the highly paid players remains a heavy factor in his overall success. Another aspect of his autocratic style is mixing players around to have better mechanics inside the team, without anyone complaining about it. The final aspect of the autocratic style is his mind game with other managers; he tries to intimidate them by making deprecating comments.

Way of Improving the Leadership Style

Now that Ferguson’s leadership style encapsulates two theories, it is safer to look for ways that can improve Ferguson’s leadership style. It is very difficult to do so, because one must dissect flaws in a method that has been working for 38 years. However, during the analysis I came to discover that some of the players would lack motivation or have it fade with time. 

That’s why using the democratic style from the behavioural theory would keep the players motivated and the manager will get some feedback on what he is doing and can resolve ongoing problems inside the team. He will also give details about his decision which will help some player get out of the fog and understand better what he is doing, especially when there is a Sword of Damocles on a player and his situation is unclear. The second theory that would help keep the player motivated is the path goal one. It will be helpful to use it because it cares more about the player and works with him to achieve his own goal. Hence, he will always be motivated to work harder.

Reasons behind Ferguson’s Leadership Style

Covering the type of Alex Ferguson leadership style and how he can improve it lead to try to find the reasons he chose to be this kind of leader. One reason for developing an authoritative style is because he started young, and he had some respect issues from some players because he was not much older than them or sometimes younger than them. A second reason would be his position as a Trade Union representative in his early twenties, which made him lead all the workers and defend them in front of the managers of the shipyard. 

This experience helped him a lot in shaping a tough and self-confident personality. It also allowed him to understand the sense of a culture and how much it is important to have one inside a group of people. Another point due to his membership to the union is developing a sense of unity; thus his saying no one is above the team. Being in an environment composed only by male imposed some kind of strict rules that would keep the player respecting the team.

Another way of Leadership?

Understanding why Alex Ferguson developed his leadership as described above begs a question. Could he have done better by choosing another strategy? 

This question is hard to answer because at any point through his career its method did not fail him, but always proved him right. However, an attempt to answer this question would not harm. To do so, there is only one case where we can compare him to another manager. This manager would be Arsene Wenger, he is the only one who spent a considerable amount of time with a team as a manager and is still managing it. Doing a quick comparison over 2000-2010, we notice that Ferguson won more titles than Wenger. One would object that they do not have the same resources. It is not true Arsenal and Manchester United are both major clubs of the Premier League. 

Now, performing a quick comparison in their leadership style we find out that Wenger lacks some traits that Ferguson has, and also that he follows the democratic style whereas Ferguson follows the autocratic. One major difference is Wenger also the path goal theory. From these points we can deduce that Ferguson could not have done better if he chooses a different method. However, the reader should keep in mind that this is just a quick comparison and might be misleading since it interpolates from basic data and does not go thoroughly through all the points mentioned in the case study.

Conclusion

Through the analysis of Alex Ferguson’s leadership style in this case study, there is no doubt of the greatness of the man. He was able to impose his way of doing things everywhere he went. Alex Ferguson was able to partially merge two leadership theories that are not compatible into a single one and came up with his own management style. His life experience played a major role in developing his leadership style. In fact, being part of the Trade union and starting as a young manager were decisive in building up his leadership style. Finally, the case study proves that doing things differently would not alter the great things that Alex Ferguson was able to achieve in his career.