From the point of view of results, the effectiveness of an organization is determined by the way work is organized through structures and by the way people work with or against each other. The way, in which people co–operate with each other, with the leadership and with the community, indeed the extent of their commitment to their organization, depend on the style of management. The terms management style and leadership are sometimes used interchangeably. Each person has a leadership style that he feels comfortable with and there are different situations, which a leader faces, that call for different approaches.

Management style is an integrative concept that covers the content, process of decision making and the decisions related to goals, policies, functions etc. It is well that the management style needs to serve the process and hence it is a matter to be considered carefully. The management styles possible include autocratic/authoritative; democratic/participatory; and laissez–faire. The extremes of authoritarian and fully participative organizations can be considered to be a spectrum and the position of any organization on the scale depends on the degree of participation in decision–making.

Given the above background what is a suitable style to manage schools? Successful leaders have learned to view their organizational environment in a holistic way and this wide–angle view is what the concept of school culture offers principals and other leaders. It gives them a broader framework for understanding difficult problems and complex relationships within the school. By deepening their understanding of school culture, school leaders will be better equipped to shape the values, beliefs, and attitudes necessary to promote a stable and nurturing learning environment. The term school culture is used synonymously with concepts, including climate, ethos and ambience.

The concept of culture came to education from the corporate workplace with the notion that it would provide direction for a more efficient and stable learning environment. School culture can be defined as the historically transmitted patterns of meaning that include the norms, values, beliefs, ceremonies, rituals, traditions, and myths understood, maybe in varying degrees, by members of the school community. This system of meaning often shapes what people think and how they act.

School culture also correlates with teachers' attitudes toward their work. A study that profiled effective and ineffective organizational cultures found stronger school cultures had more motivated teachers. In an environment with strong organizational ideology, shared participation, charismatic leadership, and intimacy, teachers experienced higher job satisfaction and increased productivity.

Leaders who are interested in changing the culture of their school need to understand the existing culture because cultural change by definition alters a wide variety of relationships. These relationships are at the very core of institutional stability. Reforms should be approached with dialogue, concern for others, and some deliberation. Hence, the most suitable management style for schools seems to be a participative, democratic and shared–decision making one, which involves many people who are in the front. When the frontline staff is involved in deciding their affairs, the quality of decisions is obviously better and implementation is easier.