Fairholm (2004a) offers a classification of five leadership perspectives culled from
researching the practice of local government managers. The first leadership perspective is
Leadership as (Scientific) Management. The underlying strategic assumption is that
organizations and their leaders need to control chaos so that predictable, verifiable, and
routinizable processes and outputs are the norm. Basically, this perspective focuses on strategic
planning for efficiency. The second perspective is Leadership as Excellence Management,
which assumes, like the one above, that leaders should control chaos. Its difference lies in the
focus given to process improvement and employee participation to assist in developing strategic
plans to control the organizational chaos and disorder.