Leadership Style of Homestay Entrepreneurs: A Preliminary Study in Sabah, Malaysia

Leadership has been found by many scholars as one of the vital factors that can affect the development and growth of an enterprise. Different leadership styles may affect enterprise effectiveness and performance. Small community-based enterprise like the homestay program may require different leadership style beyond the conventional leadership style portrayed in the general leadership literature. This is because, homestay entrepreneurship revolved in several related industries including education, technology, tourism and hospitality. which had a high velocity and called for sustainable development. Therefore, this study aims to explore the leadership styles of homestay entrepreneurs in Sabah by gaining their perspectives on how they perceive themselves as leader to the homestay operators. The methodology of research involved face-to-face structured interviews with Sabah homestay entrepreneurs. The findings suggested that no single leadership style was found appropriate for homestay business, and different leadership style might have impact on different level of performance. This study contributed some insights on the characteristics of homestay entrepreneurs in managing their homestay business.