Leadership in Organizations

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• Desire for clarity: directive style appropriate for those who need clarity. For those with a greater tolerance for ambiguity a more ‘hands-off’ approach. • Need for affiliation: task- or relationship oriented approaches and preferences of followers. Third, task characteristics • Task: routine or complex? Routine → leader offers support in order to maintain motivation. Complex → leader need to supply structure and shape to the task. • Authority System: difference between organizations with formal hierarchy and organizations with less well-defined bureaucracy. • Group norms: difference between groups who look out for each other than groups with individuals concerned by their task only. Criticism: The complexity of the model may make it difficult to apply to a ‘real’ situation. Little empirical data to support the validity. Contingency theory – Fiedler • The effectiveness of a leader was contingent upon three distinct factors or situational dependent variables. • He proposed that leader’s effectiveness depends on personality as well as the degree to which the leadership situation provides control and influence. Establishing situational favourableness 1. Leader-member relations: atmosphere within the group, degree of trust and confidence in each other. When leader-member relationships are good, the leader will have more chance of success in terms of influencing followers’ opinions and behaviour. 2. Task structure: high structure type task → clear set of stages, well tested process, unambiguous desired outcome. Little room for creative input, great deal of control for leader. Four dimensions to be considered with examining high or low structure of the task: (1) goal clarity, (2) goal-path multiplicity, (3) decision verification, (4) solution specificity. 3. Leader position power: high level of authority has strong power relationships. Little authority has weak power relationships. ➔ Favourable situation: leader-member relations are good, task is clear and leader has legitimate authority. 16
Black box: Fiedler doesn’t answer why a certain style of leader would work in one situation and not another. It is not clear why certain task/team/power combinations result in certain LPC scores being favoured over others, and whilst some options feel intuitively correct. Criticism: LPC instrument is difficult and misleading. Kerr and Jermier (1978) had a different view on leadership where the leader was placed less in the centre as in the theories before. Leadership Substitute Theory: under certain circumstances, leadership in a formal sense is neither needed nor wanted and may actually have a demotivating and negative impact on the achievement of a task. - Substitutes for leadership: characteristics of the task, organization or followers that make leadership behaviours either irrelevant or unnecessary. - Neutralizers for leadership: characteristics that either prevent effective leadership or nullify the effects of leadership. Kerr and Jermier described three different aspects of the situation that may mitigate against effective leadership. 1. Characteristics of followers a. Ability and experience: when employees know what to do and how, you can better not interfere as a leader. b. Emotional needs: people who prefer to work unsupervised for example. c. Professional orientation: only comments from peer group are valued. d. Reward orientation: degree to which an individual responds to external rewards offered by the organization can neutralize any leadership behaviour. 2. Characteristics of tasks a. Task structure: simple tasks doesn’t always need leader’s input. b. Nature of feedback: when feedback is provided by the task outcome, feedback from the leader is substituted. c. Intrinsic satisfaction: interesting and enjoyable tasks don’t need a leader to motivate other to complete them. 3. Characteristics of the organization a. Bureaucracy: when there are many rules that block new ideas, a leader who wants to investigate new processes etc. is neutralized. b. Formalization: when there are clear written contracts, letters of understanding and codified performance systems, leadership is neutralized. c. Group coherence: a group with high degree of coherence may gain all necessary guidance and support from its own internal resources without the need to refer to an outside authority. d. Limited positional power: predetermined bonus structure can limit a leader’s ability to reward a hard-working employee. e. Geographic proximity: the farther away, the harder it is for a leader. Virtual teams are more difficult to maintain than static, conventional units. 17
Page 1 and 2: Leadership in Organisations Roe, Ke
Page 3 and 4: Chapter 2 Trait theory - descriptio
Page 5 and 6: Chapter 3 Behavioral models Summary
Page 7 and 8: and harmony of employees is importa
Page 9 and 10: Likert - Management System: leaders
Page 11 and 12: • Subordinate expectations: expec
Page 13 and 14: 6. Missionary (low task/high relati
Page 15: Three basic assumptions of the mode
Page 19 and 20: Clayton (2010) suggested two more r
Page 21 and 22: Know what the solution would look l
Page 23 and 24: Kohlberg (1984): humans are capable
Page 25 and 26: Chapter 12 Diversity & Leadership D
Page 27: • GLOBE project: aim of determini

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