Chapter 10 - Leadership:
Non-Communication Approaches
THIS CHAPTER WILL DISCUSS:
1. How permanent characteristics are related to members'
perceptions of leadership.
2. Lewin's distinctions between
democratic, authoritarian, and laissez faire styles.
3. The later distinction between task and maintenance styles.
4. The influence of situations on leadership style.
5. The ways in which traits and situations interact to determine leadership
effectiveness.
INTRODUCTION
We have purposely
delayed discussing group leadership until this point because leadership is a
complex subject best approached after one has a grounding
in the other topics that we have examined, such as conformity and power.
However, the time has come for us to approach the topic head on and discuss it
fully.
In this chapter, and the
next, we will present a series of theoretical approaches to leadership. In this
chapter, we will examine approaches in which communication is not given a
central role in explanations for how leadership works. In the next, we will
describe approaches that do give communication a critical role in explanations.
To a greater or lesser extent, every approach we will discuss has made a
contribution to our knowledge about leadership. It is best to examine all the
theories to understand fully what scientists know about leadership.
Interestingly, hindsight helps us to realize this. The contribution that each
theoretical viewpoint made was not always apparent to the scientists who used
them.
First, before we go any
further, we need to define leadership.
What Is Leadership?
When we began
examining groups in Chapter 1, we needed to define the term because scientists
use different perspectives to study small groups, and each perspective has its
own view of what a group is and how it works. We now need to define the term
"leadership" for similar reasons. To reach our definition, we shall
examine various perspectives in turn. Each has its own view of leadership.
Relational Definition Let us begin with the relational point of view. As
we described earlier, this perspective holds that a group is a collection of people with interdependent goals. Members are
able to promote one another toward the goals that each has. How would the
concept of leadership fit into this idea?
We can use a matrix to
diagram how the relational perspective defines leadership. Recall from Chapter
5 how we are able to represent the concept of "behavior control"
through the use of these diagrams. Consider a two-person group, in which members
Harold and Tim must choose between two options. Their possible choices are
illustrated in the matrix shown in Figure 10.1. As you can see, each has some
behavior control over the other.
FIGURE 10.1
|
|
|
Tim |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Yes |
|
No |
|
Harold |
|
|
8 |
|
4 |
|
|
Yes |
6 |
|
-5 |
|
|
|
|
|
2 |
|
6 |
|
|
No |
-7 |
|
8 |
|
According to the
relational perspective, one of the men is the "leader" in the matrix.
Let us describe why this is so. Both Tim and Harold receive their best returns
when they make the same choice, both choosing "Yes"
or both choosing "No." It is true that Tim has a slight
preference for the simultaneous choice of "Yes." Similarly, Harold
would be happiest if both group members decided on "No."
Nevertheless, neither "Yes" nor "No" is intrinsically a
better choice for either man. Something different happens, however, when the
men make opposite choices. Tim will always receive some profit, no matter what.
This is not true for Harold. Instead, Harold actually loses "points"
when the men do not agree. This means that each choice affects Harold more than
it affects Tim. In essence, Harold needs to try not to conflict with the choice
that Tim makes. Tim has no such worries.
Thus, we can say that
Tim has more behavioral control over Harold than Harold has over Tim. Tim has a
power "differential." Tim can use this differential, for instance, by
always choosing "Yes." This means that he rewards Harold for choosing
"Yes" but punishes him if he chooses "No." If Harold does
rebel and chooses "No," Tim still receives a score of two. Harold
would prefer that both men decide on "No," but he will probably
follow Tim's lead and say "Yes" in this situation. According to the
relational perspective, the outcome is that Tim will be "leading"
Harold. The matrix has shown how one person can be a "leader" over
another.
This approach implies
that a group's leader is the person who is able to act the most independently
in relation to the other group members. He or she has the most to win and/or
the least to lose from group interaction. This concept matches the intuitive
notion of "power." However, this is not our natural idea of
"leadership." For instance, we know that when a company goes bankrupt
it is the owner who has the most to lose. Thus, the relational definition may
not imply a satisfying definition of leadership. Thibaut
and Kelley (1959) examined the relational approach to leadership.
Interactional Definition
According to the
interactional approach, a group is a collection of
individuals whose interaction has become interdependent. Let us again use the
example of a two-person group to illustrate this idea. The two members in this
situation can either ask each other questions or make comments to each other.
Figure 10.2 is a diagram of the interact probabilities of the group.
FIGURE 10.2 
As you can see, for whatever reason, Person B always
makes comments after Person A asks questions. In contrast, when Person B asks
something, Person A never replies with comments. Instead, Person A responds to
questions by posing further questions. When this happens, his or her new
questions receive comments again from Person B.
The result of this is
that Person A appears to control the conversation. This is because he or she is
"leading" the discussion, from an interactional
perspective. Person A can control the conversation by refusing to answer
questions. A police interrogation is an example of this kind of conversation.
The interrogator is the "leader," according to the interactional point of view. He or she leads by controlling
the interaction that can take place. This is a different definition of
leadership than the one that the relational perspective provides. However, as
with the relational definition it appears more in line with our idea of
"power" than "leadership." This ut
also may not imply a satisfying conception of leadership.
Structural Perspective
As you recall, a
scientist who has a structural perspective conceives of a group according to
the roles that members play. In a group, each person functions in a certain
capacity. For example, a group might have "jokesters" or
"organizers" and so on. In addition, the theorist with this viewpoint
would expect each role to fulfill certain group norms. The norms describe the
behaviors expected from a group member with that role. For example, the
jokester should make people feel relaxed, the
organizer should give the group an outline of tasks, and so on.
How does this
perspective define leadership? The implication of the structural point of view
is that groups need to have a member who plays the role of "leader."
This person fulfills the group norms regarding leadership. In essence, he or
she performs the behaviors that leaders are supposed to fulfill. For example, a
leader may speak first at meetings, call for votes, and give praise to the
group. This perspective is probably closest to how we naturally conceive of
leadership.
Functional Perspective
There is a functional version of the structural perspective, as we have
discussed previously. The functional viewpoint maintains that a group is a
social system. The system has certain goals, such as survival and goal
attainment. To fulfill these goals, the social system must contain a set of
properties. For example, a group might have the property that it contains four
members who are very good at math. These properties have to be capable of
performing certain "functions." Functions, like norms, are behaviors.
The functions are necessary for the group to attain its goal. For instance, the
group with members who are good at math may have the goal of winning a math
prize. The talented members must function in a way that will help the group
succeed at this goal.
Researchers with this
perspective believe that some of the necessary functions in groups are
leadership functions. Therefore, groups must exhibit the appropriate
properties so that the groups can perform
these functions. What properties can fulfill the leadership behaviors? In
essence, a group needs to have the property of a member or members who lead.
Leaders could do things such as direct meetings and create rules. In this way,
the group could fulfill its necessary leadership functions and help the group
reach its goals.
Overall, the functional
variant maintains that leaders are able to perform certain functions to help
groups succeed. The functional viewpoint is an extremely valuable approach to
leadership, as our discussion will reveal.
Motivational Perspective
According to
this point of view, a group is a collection of people who react to some force.
Something drives or prompts them to act as they do. Scientists who hold this
viewpoint think of a leader in a group as the person or persons associated with
the force that guides the group. He or she either provides the drive itself or
determines the means for satisfying it.
Perceptual Perspective
The perceptual
perspective maintains that a group is a gathering of individuals who define and
perceive themselves as a group. This group perception determines who is the group's leader. In essence, the members define a
person as leader, and he or she then is so.
Our Perspective
As you might
expect, different perspectives have definitions of leadership that vary
greatly. Which definition will we use as we examine the topic in this book? The
answer is that we will not use a precise definition. Instead, we will be using
all of the concepts that we have discussed above. However, we will rely on them
to varying degrees because some of the perspectives we have discussed are more
appropriate for our discussion than others. We can make some overall comments
here as to why this is so.
The relational and interactional perspectives, as we have shown, do not sugest satisfactory definitions of leadership. Perhaps
because of this, neither has had a great deal of influence on specific theories
and research concerning leadership. On the other hand, the remaining four
viewpoints have had a definite impact on the study of leadership. We will be
making many references to the definitions that all four perspectives provide.
Each has been important, in different ways, for the research that we shall
examine.
THE TRAIT APPROACH
TO LEADERSHIP
The first time that
researchers attempted to use a scientific method to study leadership was in the
1920s. Taken as a group, these early scientists worked with a basic hypothesis
regarding who leaders were. They assumed that leaders were people with personal
characteristics, or traits, that set them above and
apart from nonleaders. This assumption was consistent
with a philosophical view that was popular in the nineteenth century.
The "Great Man Theory"
The 1800s philosophical
outlook that created the trait approach is known as
the "Great Man Theory of
Leadership." The theory states that certain people are born to be leaders.
They have a special quality that sets them apart from "common" folk.
The idea is that the great leaders of the world would have assumed a leadership
role at any place or time in history. Thus, Julius Caesar or Napoleon would
have been influential figures anywhere, at any time. Note that the "Great
Man" title reflects the thinking of the times. Back then, most people did
not consider women capable of possessing leadership qualities. We use the title
here only because it is historically correct.
The Early
Scientific Approach
Literal Approach
In the 1920s,
various leadership researchers occasionally took the "Great Man"
hypothesis literally. They searched for characteristics that differentiated
between leaders and followers. They thought that there were certain qualities
that only a leader could possess, such as charisma. Usually, however, the
scientists looked at the characteristics that all people possess to some
degree. They then would cautiously attempt to discover which traits were particularly evident in leaders.
It was true that the
idea that certain people would always be leaders, no matter what, intrigued
researchers. However, it was not just the nineteenth century "Great
Man" theory that caused scientists to examine leadership. In the 1930s,
fascist governments in
Early scientists created
various types of leadership tests that they hoped would fulfill this need. Each
test attempted to create a method to predict who would be a leader and who
would not be. Before we describe the results of these tests, it is useful for
us to discuss how the researchers performed their studies.
Methodology
These early
researchers were interested in discovering which traits contributed to a
person's degree of leadership. To do this, they decided to compare measurements
of leadership scores with measurements of other traits. The scientists used a
particular method to compare various measurements. This technique allowed the
researchers to discover how the different measurements were related. We shall
discuss their methodology step by step.
For example, five people
have taken an IQ test. The researchers designed
the IQ exam to measure the
characteristic of "intelligence." The average score on this test is
100. A score above this mark means a person is more intelligent than the
average person. The test participants have also taken an exam to measure
leadership. The leadership test has 10 items. Their scores on the two
examinations are shown in Table 10.1.
|
Table
10.1 |
Positive
Correlation |
|
|
Person |
IQ |
# of
Leadership Items Correct |
|
A |
140 |
10 |
|
B |
120 |
8 |
|
C |
100 |
6 |
|
D |
80 |
4 |
|
E |
60 |
2 |
Positive
correlation. As you can see, as one column increases, the other also increases.
We call this relationship between the two columns a positive correlation. In addition, whenever the IQ score
increases by 20 points, there is a corresponding increase of two correct items
on the leadership test. Thus, the relationship between the two tests is
perfect. They have an exact correlation of 20 IQ points for every two correct
leadership items.
We could take this
result and conclude, for instance, that an IQ test can measure leadership
without error. We shall represent this relationship between IQ and leadership
with the number +1.0.
Negative
correlation. The study also created a column with the number of items that the
participants answered incorrectly on the leadership exam. The researchers
examined the relationship between the IQ scores and this new column. The data
are shown in Table 10.2.
|
Table
10.2 |
Negative
Correlation |
|
|
Person |
IQ |
# of
Leadership Items Wrong |
|
A |
140 |
0 |
|
B |
120 |
2 |
|
C |
100 |
4 |
|
D |
80 |
6 |
|
E |
60 |
8 |
In this case, there is still a perfect relationship between the two columns of
data. Whenever the IQ score increases by 20 points, the number of leadership incorrect answers decreases by two. This is again a
perfect correlation, but it is a negative
one. As
Degree
of correlation. The point is that there is a difference between the number of a
correlation value and the sign of that value. The number shows the degree of correlation and it reflects
the research data findings. The sign, on the other hand, reveals the way in
which researchers have chosen to define the columns. Something has a
"+" or a "-" value based on which data the scientists have
chosen to examine together. The scientists essentially can control which
research findings they compare and, in turn, whether the correlation has a
negative or a positive sign. This means that scientists often are not very
surprised about what sign a correlation might have.
Instead, it is usually
the degree of association that researchers find of most interest. Whether
positive or negative, this number is what reveals how well the data columns
relate. This is information the scientists want most.
No correlation. Finally, the study compared one
last pair of example columns as seen in Table 10.3. As you can see, there is no
relationship between IQ levels and artistic ability. The former does not
measure the latter. In this case, we can represent the relationship between
these columns with the number 0.
|
Table
10.3 |
No
Correlation |
|
|
Person |
IQ |
Score
on Artistic Ability Test |
|
A |
140 |
6 |
|
B |
120 |
7 |
|
C |
100 |
5 |
|
D |
80 |
7 |
|
E |
60 |
6 |
The correlation
coefficient. What do scientists call a number, such as
+1.0 or -1.0, that shows the degree of correlation? Such a number is a
"correlation coefficient." It is a measure of the relationship
between two sets of research data. Any coefficient has a possible range of +1.0
to -1.0. In "real life," correlations will never be perfect, as our
first two examples were. A measurement of "1.0" is practically
impossible. The only way researchers can achieve a perfect correlation is if
they mistakenly relate two alternative measures of the same thing. For
instance, they might accidentally compare columns of the number of correct
items and the number of incorrect items from the same test. Such a comparison
would create a perfect correlation.
Use of Correlation Coefficients
Researchers
consider that any coefficient more extreme than .7, either positive or
negative, is very strong. It is extreme enough so that the two measures are
indistinguishable for most practical purposes. For example, in the example
study that we reviewed, there was a perfect correlation, with the very large
number of 1.0, between the column from the IQ test and the column from the
leadership test. This means that scientists could interchange the tests. If
they want to find out someone's IQ level, they could just as well give the
person the leadership examination as the IQ exam, and vice versa.
Scientists could equate
two tests that correlate at a level of .7 similarly. They could interchange them.
Scientists have found that such extreme correlations are not necessary for
their purposes, however. Any coefficient greater than +/.-5 can be quite
useful.
"Overlapping"
data.
How much can a correlation coefficient reveal? Scientists find the idea of "overlapping"
data helpful to them. To discover how information overlaps, they take the
coefficient and square it. This gives them a number that equals the degree of
usefulness of the correlation. It represents the extent to which the two columns
of data overlap. When information overlaps a great deal, the findings are very
useful. Consider Diagrams 1 through 4 in Figure 10.3.
Imagine that every
circle represents the "space" that measure A and measure B occupy.
Diagram 1 represents a correlation of 0. There is no overlap between the spaces
of A and B. They have no relationship. In Diagram 2, the spaces overlap
totally. The coefficient for this diagram is 1.0. The 1.0 is either positive or
negative, depending on how the researchers have defined the measures. The
"square" of this coefficient is 1.0 in either case.
The degree of
correlation in Diagram 3 is about .7, positive or negative. The square of this
coefficient is about .5. This means that each measure accounts for half the
space of the other. Diagram 4 shows a correlation of about +/-.3. The space the
two measures share works out to about .1. Such an overlap may not seem like a
large amount. However, there are many factors that can affect any one variable.
Hence, a consistent relationship of .1 can be
FIGURE 10.3 
quite meaningful in theoretical
research.
It is true,
however, that a correlation of +/-.3 is not of so much use practically as it is
theoretically. In a "real world" sense, a person would hardly be able
to predict much about one measure by using the other if the coefficient were
only +/-.3.
The early scientists
researching leadership used the correlation coefficient as an important part of
their methodology. The coefficient could help them relate their various tests.
It helped them judge whether traits determine who is a leader and who is not.
The Research
Physical
characteristics. The earliest studies regarding leadership attempted to
discover whether the physical characteristics of people correlated with group
leadership. The experimenters found out that groups tended to choose relatively
tall and large people as leaders more often than relatively shorter and smaller
individuals. This may have been because large people seem most similar to what
leaders are supposed to look like physically.
However, research showed
that size had no appreciable effect on the success rate of leaders. Hence, the
scientists failed to show any correlation between physical characteristics and
leadership abilities.
Psychological
characteristics. The researchers then turned to psychological traits.
Throughout the 1930s and 1940s, experimenters performed scores of studies to
investigate this idea. Their work was based on the hypothesis that various
psychological characteristics exist. They attempted to relate these
characteristics either to whether people were chosen to be leaders, or whether
outside observers believed that a person was acting like a leader. In Chapter
3, we discussed how people form impressions of one another. They do so by using
adjective terms to describe "traits." The early researchers used this
idea also, labeling the psychological characteristics
they studied "traits."
However, in these
studies, traits played a role that was different from the one they usually play
in the formation of impressions. As we discussed earlier, people wish to form
impressions of one another. To do so, they use traits merely as labels to represent behavior that they assume is consistent.
They use adjectives to describe behavior that they see during particular
circumstances. They might say a person is "clumsy" or
"smart," for instance, as they watch a person behave at a party. The
early leadership researchers used adjectives differently. They believed that
traits represent actual characteristics that influence people's behavior. The
traits influence people across time and in all situations.
Research
results.
The results of these studies were discouraging. The researchers had
hypothesized that certain traits relate to who does and does not become a
leader. In the experiments, very little commonality existed among these
variables. Stogdill reviewed this research in 1948.
He was able to show evidence that a few traits were related to leadership
choice. These traits were intelligence, initiative, sociability, dependability,
and activity. Experimenters measured these traits and then measured the data
regarding leadership choice. They were able to find a correlation between the
two sets of measurements. However, it was rarely higher than a coefficient of
.25.
In other words,
researchers could discover the degree to which a person possessed a certain
trait and relate it to the odds that the person will become a leader. However,
at best, this process could help them predict only 6 percent of these odds.
This is far too small a correlation to have any practical value. It would be
very difficult for society to test a person's psychological traits and predict
who would become a leader and who would not.
Since that time, some
researchers have turned their attention away from leadership choice and studied
whether traits are related to people's success
as leaders. Bass (1990) reviewed much of this research. The same types of traits
that are associated with leadership choice, such as intelligence and
initiative, are also related with leadership success. Again, the correlations
are fairly low, rarely higher than .3.
Further Research
Further studies
have also shown the fallacy of the "Great Man Theory of Leadership."
We now know that it is wrong for researchers to believe that a person can have
specific characteristics that would make him or her a
leader in all circumstances. Certain experiments have particularly revealed
that a person who is a leader in one situation might not be a leader in a
second one.
Carter and Nixon (1949)
had high school juniors and seniors work in two-person groups on three tasks.
The first task was an intellectual one, involving plotting data on a graph. The
second was a clerical job, during which the students sorted cards and
proofread. The last was a mechanical task, in which the students built a
scaffold. The researchers measured leadership behavior in two ways. First, they
had observers subjectively judge which students provided leadership during the
tasks. Second, the experimenters analyzed tape recordings of the dyads'
conversations. Whenever a participant made suggestions or initiated activities,
the researchers counted that as an example of leadership behavior.
Before the dyads met
together, Carter and Nixon asked school administrators to rate each student's
leadership. Apparently, these administrators implicitly believed in the
"Great Man" theory. They generally believed that certain students would
always be leaders, no matter what the task. Hence, the school officials
expected consistent leadership among the three tasks. The correlation
coefficient of their predictions across the three tasks was an extremely high
.90.
However, the
administrators were wrong. Actual leadership behaviors were not strongly
correlated among the tasks. The same students were not always the leaders.
Between the intellectual and clerical tasks, the correlation was .48. For the
clerical and mechanical jobs, the correlation dropped further to .38. Finally,
for the intellectual and mechanical tasks, the coefficient was only .18.
Clearly, leadership behavior in this study was task-specific. Participants led
each other according to the tasks they were performing. It was not true that
certain students always were better leaders than other participants.
General
Conclusions: Trait Approach
We must conclude two
things from these various studies. First, personality traits do not predict
leadership. Second, leadership is not constant across situations. However,
despite these conclusions, we should not completely dismiss the trait approach
to leadership. We have been examining studies in which impartial observers
rated the leadership behaviors of group members. What happens when the actual
members rated one another? How do they perceive one another's leadership
abilities? Scientists have found that traits are important to these
"internal" group perceptions.
This is a valid aspect
of the "Great Man" theory. Traits do relate to the perceptions that
group members have regarding one another's leadership abilities. It seems that
people often perceive of leaders in a certain way. This can carry over into
whether they believe someone is a leader in their group. For instance, as we
noted earlier, researchers have known for a long time that tall and large
people are more likely to become leaders than small people.
Lord, DeVader, and Alliger Review. Lord, DeVader,
and Alliger (1986) reviewed research regarding this
aspect of the trait approach. They looked at studies in which group members
rated one another's leadership. Lord et al. found consistent correlations
between these ratings and certain traits. Particularly, the trait of
intelligence related to leadership ratings. The coefficient for this
relationship was .38.
Kenny
and Zaccaro Review. Kenny and Zaccaro
(1983) similarly reviewed leadership research. They examined three types of
studies. The first type included groups in which a constant membership
performed a number of tasks. This setup was the same as the Carter and Nixon
study described above. The second type included groups with a changing
membership that worked on the same task several times. The third category of
groups included ones with a changing membership that performed a number of
tasks. In all groups, the members rank-ordered one another
for leadership abilities. Kenny and Zaccaro
found great stability in these rankings across tasks. They were stable despite
changes in task type and/or changes in group membership.
Thus, it appears that
specific people may have qualities that lead other group members to choose them as leaders across
different situations. However, there is no reason to believe that these
qualities have any effect on people's success
at leadership across different circumstances. As we all can predict, it is success at leadership that particularly interests
researchers. Theorists wish to account for who can truly lead and who cannot.
Success proves who is actually a leader.
Hence, we can use the
trait approach as a tool to help us predict the person a group will choose as
leader. However, the approach is not very helpful as far as predicting whether
that person will be able to lead successfully..
By the 1950s it seemed
clear to researchers that leadership ability is task-specific. This led
experimenters to search for situational factors in leadership. However, in the
meantime, other theorists had been experimenting with a "style"
approach to leadership. We shall examine this hypothesis next.
THE STYLE APPROACH
TO LEADERSHIP
The basic premise of the
style approach to leadership is that a leader's "style" determines
his or her success. A style is the method of leading that a person uses.
Kurt Lewin
was the theorist most responsible for this approach. We have discussed Lewin's theoretical contributions to small-group research
throughout this book. It is now time to discuss the man himself. His life
affected how he viewed leadership. Lewin was a German
Jew who gained an international reputation for his research on perception
during the 1920s. During the 1930s, Lewin was able to
escape the fate that the Nazis planned for the Jewish citizenry of
We examined Lewin's field theory in Chapters 3 and 5. As we explained,
he conceived of a life-space for every person and group. There are regions
within this life-space. Forces attract people to or repel them from the various
regions. As we have described, we can represent the group itself as an entity
that moves around its own life-space.
Lewin believed that a leader has the
ability to manipulate the group's life-space and direct its movement toward
various goals. Thus, consistent with our discussion in Chapter 5, the leader
has power over the group. Lewin decided that there
are three styles of leadership. The styles are based on the relationship that
the leader has with his or her group. A leader has a "democratic"
style if he or she manipulates the life-space to help the group reach its own
goals. A leader with an "authoritarian" style manipulates the group's
life-space to force the group to reach the leader's goals. A leader with a
"laissez faire" style does not manipulate the group's life-space at
all.
Lewin's Research
Methodology
In the late
1930s, Lewin and his students Lippitt
and White performed a landmark study of the three leadership styles. They
wanted to determine how each style would affect a group (see White & Lippitt, 1968). The groups they chose to study were made up
of 10-year-old boys. There were four groups with five members in each. The boys
met to participate in arts and crafts activities or in similar hobbies. The
groups experienced a succession of various adult leaders. These leaders were Lippitt, White, and two other coworkers. Each adult assumed
a different leadership style. The study defined these styles in the following
ways:
1. Authoritarian leaders
a. These leaders
determined all policies for the group members. They told the boys which
projects to do.
b. They also dictated the methods and stages of goal attainment one step at a
time. The adults would give instructions for a subsequent step only after the
boys had completed the previous step. They did not give them all of the
instructions at once at the beginning of a project. The researchers reasoned
that the boys would have little understanding of the project as a whole if the
leaders gave them instructions in this step-by-step manner. Without an
understanding of the whole project, the boys would have little ability to make
their own creative contributions to the assignment. This meant that the leader
would have increased control over their activities. Remember that according to Lewin, the authoritarian leader wants group members to
reach the leader's goals, not their own.
c. The authoritarian leaders also assigned work companions. They told the boys
with whom they could work on their projects.
d. They further evaluated the boys individually. They did not judge the group
as a whole. They expected that the approach would cause the boys to be
concerned with their own tasks rather than with the work of the group as a
whole.
2. Democratic leaders
a. These leaders
encouraged the group to make its own policy. They asked the boys which projects
they wanted to do.
b. They also explained the stages of the project, along with the methods of
goal attainment, in advance. This gave the boys the knowledge that they needed
to take the initiative concerning how the group would perform its task.
Remember that the democratic leader wants to help group members reach their own
goals.
c. They further allowed the boys to choose their own work companions.
d. The democratic leaders evaluated the work of the group as a whole. They did
not judge members separately. They expected that this method would influence
the boys to be concerned with the whole group's efforts rather than with only
their own work.
3. Laissez faire leaders
a. Laissez faire
leaders refused to help the group choose its policy.
b. They also never volunteered information on the stages and methods necessary
to attain the group's goals.
c. Further, these leaders refused to help the boys choose their work
companions.
d. They also did not evaluate any work. The laissez faire leaders only answered
questions and provided work materials.
Findings
Lewin et al. performed a detailed
analysis of the behavior of the boys during their meetings. They also
interviewed the boys concerning their feelings about the sessions. This work
resulted in a mass of information from the study.
Maintenance
output.
First, the researchers found that the democratic leadership style led to
greater satisfaction with the group experience than either the authoritarian or
the laissez faire styles. The experimenters asked the 20 boys if they preferred
the democratic or the authoritarian leaders. Nineteen of them said that they
favored the democratic leaders. The scientists then asked 10 of the boys to
compare the democratic and the laissez faire-style leaders. Out of these 10, 7
said that they preferred the democratic leadership method.
Second, the groups that
had the democratic-style leaders appeared to be the most cohesive. During the
study, one of the methods that scientists used to measure levels of
cohesiveness was to determine the ratio between how often the members used
group-oriented pronouns, such as "we" and "us," and how
often they used individual-oriented pronouns, such as "I" and
"me." In addition, the researchers looked at other indicators of
cohesiveness, including the levels of friendly statements, mutual praise,
sharing of work materials, and playfulness. The democratic groups had the
highest levels of these factors. The laissez faire groups were also fairly
cohesive, perhaps in response to their "nonleading"
leaders.
In contrast, the groups
with leaders who used an authoritarian style were far less cohesive than the
other groups. Observers compared the behavior of the boys in the
authoritarian-led groups with the behavior of those in the democratic-led
groups. They noted 30 times as many acts of hostility and 8 times as many acts
of aggression in the authoritarian groups. In addition, authoritarian-led
sessions had the highest levels of statements of discontent and the largest
levels of absenteeism.
Task
output.
As for their work output, both the authoritarian and the democratic groups
outpaced the laissez faire groups. The boys in the authoritarian groups worked
74 percent of the time when their leaders were present. This compared with a
work level of 50 percent for boys in democratic groups and 33 percent in the
laissez faire groups. However, when the leaders left the room, these
percentages changed. Groups following a democratic leader continued to work at
a 46 percent level. In contrast, the work time for authoritarian groups fell
drastically to only 29 percent, implying that the members of the authoritarian
groups had little desire to work. On the other hand, groups with leaders using
a laissez faire style actually worked more when their leaders left the room.
Their work time increased to 52 percent. This result implies that these members
remained motivated.
Finally, the researchers
judged the work of democratic groups highly. They considered this work to be of
higher quality and originality than the performance of authoritarian and
laissez faire groups.
Revisions of Lewin's Research Findings
Lewin et al. found that a democratic
leadership style caused the groups of boys in their study to have high levels
of satisfaction and cohesiveness. In addition, these groups had a great desire
to work and to produce quality work. Due to these findings, Lewin
et al. concluded that the democratic method is the best of the three leadership
styles. However, there is some doubt about this conclusion. Subsequent research
has led scientists to reconsider the idea that the democratic style of
leadership is always best. A review of this research by Gastil
(1994) revealed that no consistent differences in group
performance has been found between groups led by democratic and
authoritarian leaders. Member satisfaction appears to be higher for democratic-led
groups when the task the group is performing is complex. When the group's task
is simple, there is no difference in satisfaction due to leadership style.
Some studies have been
performed that have suggested that authoritarian leadership may sometimes be
better that democratic. Here are two examples.
Shaw's
research. Shaw's (1955) study of imposed networks is representative
of some of the later studies that reconsidered Lewin's
findings. Shaw used three kinds of four-person groups in his study: (1) wheel
structures, (2) kite configurations as illustrated 
and (3) comcon
networks. Each group performed mathematical problems, using either a democratic
or an authoritarian leader. For almost every combination of network and
problem, authoritarian-led groups were less satisfied but worked faster than
democratic-led groups. Authoritarian groups also made fewer errors and needed
to exchange fewer messages to complete the task, in comparison with the
democratic groups.
"Real-World"
Research.
Studies of "real-world" groups also add doubt to Lewin's
conclusions. Berkowitz (1953) studied 72 business and government groups. He
found that these groups were most satisfied when they had leaders who
controlled their procedures and made their decisions. However, significantly,
the members were only satisfied as long as they felt that their input could
influence the leader. Similarly, research has found that military groups expect
authoritarian leadership. They are confused when their leaders use another
leadership style. With these situations, scientists found that authoritarian
leadership worked best, when it was done well.
New Conclusions
We have 50 years
of hindsight to our advantage as we reexamine Lewin's
experimental findings. It now appears that Lewin's
studies were biased against authoritarian leadership. As we discussed, he had
an ideological commitment to discredit Nazism. This apparently influenced him
to use Hitler as a model for the authoritarian leadership style. How did he
create this particular type of authoritarian person? Lewin's
authoritarian leaders gave instructions only step by step, and they evaluated
only individuals, not the group as a whole.
However, is this the dictionary
definition of an authoritarian leader? It is not. Clearly, by definition, an
authoritarian leader must determine all group policy. However, there is no
reason an authoritarian leader has to give out instructions step by step. For
instance, a football coach cannot win unless the entire team understands the
game plan before the game. Similarly, there is no reason an authoritarian
leader cannot evaluate the group as a whole. Any good sports coach knows this.
Thus, Lewin's research showed only how a Hitler-type
authoritarian leader would affect a group. It did not credit the advantages
that a good authoritarian leader can give to group members. Shaw's and
Berkowitz's studies were able to reveal some of these advantages.
Despite these problems, Lewin's work on leadership continues to be very
influential. This is because the distinction between the three styles of
leadership that Lewin defined is very useful. We
imagine that many of our readers have worked under leaders who could be
classified as either democratic, authoritarian, or laissez faire in their
styles. Perhaps that style of leadership had an effect on how successfully the
group performed or how satisfactory the experience was for the members.
Task and Maintenance
as Leadership Styles
Throughout this book, we
have made the distinction between task and maintenance factors in group
discussion. We can make this distinction once again in the area of leadership.
We can talk about leaders as having either a task or a maintenance style of
leadership.
Different theorists have
approached this distinction between task and maintenance leadership styles
differently. These differences have important implications. In this section, we
will describe three different approaches to task and maintenance leadership
style and what these implications are for all three.
After Stogdill published his review of research
casting doubt on the value of the trait approach to leadership,
he and several colleagues at
Consideration is the extent to which a leader
shows concern for the welfare of subordinates. Considerate leaders show
appreciation for good work. They stress the importance of job satisfaction and
make their subordinates feel comfortable. These leaders also allow the
subordinates to participate in decision making.
Initiation of
structure is
the extent to which leaders organize work. Structuring leaders initiate and
maintain standards and deadlines. They also define in detail their
responsibilities and that of their subordinates (see Bass, 1990, for a detailed
review of this work).
Hence, organization
members perceive two overall sets of behaviors that are appropriate for
leaders. One is to be considerate, and the other is to initiate structures. In
essence, these two perceptions distinguish between maintenance and task
behaviors.
The important question
is whether leaders who are rated highly in their performance on these two
dimensions are more successful than leaders who are rated low. Bass (1990)
reported the findings of an unpublished review of research performed by Fisher
and Edwards that supported this conclusion. On average, leadership ratings on
both dimensions were correlated more than .4 with subordinate job performance
and more than .5 with subordinate job satisfaction. However, in an earlier
review, Korman (1966) found many studies showed
consideration to correlate negatively
with job performance and worker satisfaction. It appears that in some
situations, group members prefer leaders low on maintenance activities.
Blake and Mouton
Other studies
into organizational leadership continued the work of the
According to their point
of view, assigned leaders have two responsibilities. One involves the group's
task, or "production." The other includes the maintenance, or
"people," side of the group experience. Blake and Mouton contend that
assigned leaders have implicit theories of how important each responsibility
is. These theories influence the manner in which assigned leaders work in their
groups.
Blake and Mouton gave
organizational leaders questionnaires in order to discover what their implicit
theories of leadership were like. They then quantified the various implicit
theories of leadership that they distinguished by placing the theories on
various coordinates on a "Managerial Grid." The researchers have
plotted certain coordinates that correspond to theories (see Figure 10.4).
FIGURE 10.4 
The grid coordinates,
such as 1,9 or 9,5, indicate some theories that Blake
and Mouton specifically discussed in their book. The researchers gave names to
the types of assigned leaders that might exist. The names indicated the theory
that each type of leader would use. The kinds of leaders and their theories are
as follows:
1. 1,1
on the graph = The Bureaucrat. This assigned leader believes in exerting the
minimum amount of effort necessary to get the required work done. He or she
believes that this minimum is enough to sustain organization membership.
2. 1,9
on the graph = The Country-Club Manager. This leader gives thoughtful attention
to the needs that people have for satisfying relationships. He or she believes
that this will lead to a comfortable, friendly organizational atmosphere and
work tempo.
3. 5,5
on the graph = The Compromiser. He or she thinks that adequate organizational
performance is possible through balancing the necessity to produce work with
the necessity of maintaining the morale of the group at a satisfactory level.
4. 5,9
on the graph = The Consultative. This person believes that a leader can gain
support for his or her performance objectives by involving people in decision
making.
5. 9,1
on the graph = The Task-Master. This assigned leader wants to arrange work
conditions in such a way that human elements interfere to only a minimum
degree. He or she thinks that this will lead to efficiency in the organization.
6. 9,5
on the graph = The Benevolent Autocrat. Such a person has a need to control
without being arbitrary. This latter concern modulates his or her strong
production demands.
7. 9,9
on the graph = The Ideal. This assigned leader thinks that committed people
best accomplish work demands. He or she believes in creating an
interdependence, through a common stake in the purpose of the organization,
among workers. This leader believes that relationships of trust and respect are
important.
The style Blake and
Mouton would most like a leader to adopt is "The Ideal." This style
combines concern with the task with consideration for the people performing it.
Blake and Mouton expected the best performance from group with
"Ideal" leaders.
General
Conclusions: Style Approach
The style approach makes
a significant contribution to our knowledge about leadership. The manner in
which a person leads is important. However, one must remember that no one style
is inherently the "best." Why is this true?
We have described how
the first group of researchers who studied leadership were
influenced by the "Great Man Theory." As a result, they assumed that
the same person could successfully lead a group in different situations.
However, research we discussed earlier showed that different people lead groups
in different tasks. A person who is a good leader in one situation may be a
poor leader in a different situation.
It is the same with
leadership styles. The research studies we have described in this chapter show
that no one style is always better than all the others. The method that
succeeds in one situation might fail in another. We can conclude that situation
has a great impact on the success of particular leadership styles. If these
conclusions are correct, perhaps scientists can best approach their study of
leadership by examining situations.
Perhaps the circumstance in which group members and their leader find
themselves is the most important factor of all. Some researchers reasoned that
this might be the case. They were proponents of a third approach to leadership,
the situational approach.
THE SITUATIONAL
APPROACH TO LEADERSHIP
The situational approach
to leadership is an outgrowth of the style approach. Most generally, the
situational approach to leadership is based on the presumption that different
styles of leadership are effective in different situations. Therefore, to be
successful, leaders must understand the situation in which they and their group
is in, and adopt that style of leadership that works
best in that circumstance.
There are several
different situational theories of leadership. We will describe two of the most
influential of them.
Hersey and Blanchard's "Life Cycle
Theory" of Leadership
Situational theorists
have both agreed and disagreed with the ideas we have discussed up to now. They
have agreed that there is a distinction between task and maintenance
orientation. However, they have disagreed with Blake and Mouton's claim that an
ideal leader necessarily performs both dimensions well. Hersey
and Blanchard (1969) claimed that the success of a leadership style depends on
the subordinates' abilities to accept responsibility and work independently.
They believed that leaders should see how independent their subordinates are
and adjust their leadership style accordingly.
To illustrate their
claim, Hersey and Blanchard matched "subordinate
independence" levels with "directive" and "supportive"
leadership styles. In their view, very dependent organization members require
leaders to focus all of their attention on task directions. As organization
members become somewhat less dependent, leaders must still attend to task direction,
but also concern themselves with giving group members emotional support. When
organizational members are somewhat independent, leaders need only provide
supportiveness. Finally, very independent subordinates prefer to be left alone.
Table 10.4 illustrates these predictions. One interesting implication of this
idea is that leaders can oversee larger and larger groups as their subordinates
become increasingly independent because leaders need to spend less time with
each member.
|
Table
10.4 |
Leadership
Style |
|
|
Subordinate
Independence Level |
Directive |
Supportive |
|
Very
Low |
High |
Low |
|
Somewhat
Low |
High |
High |
|
Somewhat
High |
Low |
High |
|
Very
High |
Low |
Low |
Subordinates' personalities have an effect on their level of independence.
However, the task that the group is performing also has a large impact on
independence levels. At one extreme, we know how assembly line tasks affect
people. Such jobs require little initiative on the part of the workers. This
results in very low independence. This, in turn, requires leaders to adopt a
high-task, low-maintenance leadership style. At the other extreme, we see
people who are members of "think tanks." These people often require a
great deal of direction at the beginning of a project but then progressively
less guidance as the task develops. As a consequence, the leader's style should
change as the members' independence grows.
Essentially, there is a
process by which group members can become more independent as tasks progress. Hersey and Blanchard compared this process with the changes
a person goes through as he or she grows from dependent infancy to independent
adulthood. They have come to call their approach the "life cycle
theory" of leadership.
The life-cycle theory
makes some intuitive sense. Unfortunately, research studies attempting to
evaluate its predictions have only had mixed success. It is not clear whether Hersey and Blanchard's theory is accurate.
Vroom and Yetton's "Decision-Making Theory" of Leadership
Perhaps sometime you
have played the following guessing game: Someone says that they have a number
in their head within some range of numbers and you have to guess what that
number in their heads is. For example, they might say "I have a number in
my head between 1 and 100." You can ask them questions, to which they only
respond "yes" or "no." If you plan your sequence of
questions correctly, you ought to be able to figure out what the number is
using the minimum number of questions. In this example, your first question
should be "Is the number between 1 and 50?" You should be able to
find the number using at most seven questions.
Vroom and Yetton's (1973) approach to leadership has some
similarities with that guessing game. Vroom and Yetton
believe that a leader can decide what the best style of leadership is for the specific
situation in which they find themselves. The leader does this by asking a
series of questions whose answers determine that best style. Instead of
numbers, what Vroom and Yetton "have in their
heads" is a set of the following leadership styles:
1 - authoritarian
- where the leader makes the decision alone.
2 - consultative
- where the leader makes the decision after getting suggestions from the rest
of the group.
3 - group
- where the leader and the group make the decision together.
4 - delegative - where the group makes the decision
without the leader.
Rather than the range of
numbers, the questions one asks serve to narrow down the type of leadership to
that which best fits the situation. These are the questions the leader asks:
1 - Is the quality of
the decision important?
2 - Does the leader have
sufficient information to make a high quality decision?
3 - Does the group have
sufficient information to make a high quality decision?
4 - Is the information
needed to make the decision readably available?
5 - Is it important
whether the group will accept the decision?
6 - If the leader makes
the decision alone, would it be accepted by the group?
7 - Can the group be
trusted to base their own decision on what is best for the organization?
8 - Is conflict among
the group members about the decision likely?
Vroom and Yetton's book includes charts that show which style of
leadership they believe to be best depending on how the questions are answered.
For example, if you answer yes to questions 1, 3, 5, and 7, and no to questions
2, 4, and 6, you will choose the "group" style of leadership. (Note
that you did not ask question 8. That is because not every question always has
to be asked to determine the best leadership style for the situation.) If you
change your answer to question 7 to no, then the "consultative" style
will be chosen instead. We have not included the charts here; the interested
reader can find them in Vroom and Yetton's book.
It is important to
remember that the charts are based on Vroom and Yetton's
opinions about which style
works best in which situation. They claim to have based their opinions on the
best available research. Although we trust this claim, research has testing
their charts has only had mixed success. Therefore, as with Hersey
and Blanchard, it is unclear how accurate their theory is.
Selecting a Group
Leader
As we have discussed,
the style and situational perspective leads to extremely useful approaches to
leadership. These approaches shows us the different
ways in which leaders can lead groups. They also give us suggestions about when
each style must be the most successful.
Neither approach,
however, addresses the problem of leadership selection. How can we choose the
best person to perform task leadership functions? The contingency approach to
leadership has been able to provide some insight into this problem. It is
influenced by all three of the approaches that we have covered so far. We shall
examine this point of view in the next section.
THE CONTINGENCY
APPROACH TO LEADERSHIP
The trait approach was
based on the idea that leadership can be predicted by considering the impact of
one variable, the personality of the leader. The style approach was also based
on the idea that leadership can be explained through the effect of one
variable, the manner by which the leader leads. The situational approach was
likewise based on the idea that the style that a leader should adopt is based
on one variable, the situation in which the leader is in.
The contingency approach
to leadership is based on the idea that scientists can account for leadership
by examining the ways in which two or more variables work together to determine
leadership. As we have discussed, the various earlier approaches were
unsuccessful in describing how leadership works. In contrast, there is some
reason to believe that considering the impact of multiple variables
simultaneously may lead to some success.
The most well known
example of a contingency perspective toward leadership is Fiedler's
"contingency theory" (1964, 1978). Fiedler's work involved not only
the relationship between trait and situation, but also style variables. He thus
incorporated into his theory all of the various approaches that we have
discussed.
In the following
section, we will describe Fiedler's theory in detail. We shall begin with his
proposed leadership trait and its effect on leadership style. We will then turn
to his typology of situations. We shall finish our discussion of Fiedler's work
by examining his view concerning the manner in which trait and situation
interact.
Leader Trait - LPC
Fiedler devised a test
that he used to help him determine what he could consider a leadership trait. Imagine that you are taking
this test. You are given a questionnaire with the following opening
instructions:
Think of all the people
you have ever known or with whom you have worked. Describe the one person with
whom it has been the most difficult to work. In other words, think of the
person who has been your least preferred coworker. In order to describe the
person, rate him or her on a scale of 8 (positive side) to 1 (negative side) on
the following pairs of items:
|
pleasant/unpleasant |
friendly/unfriendly |
|
accepting/rejecting |
relaxed/tense |
|
close/distant |
warm/cold |
|
supportive/hostile |
interesting/boring |
|
harmonious/quarrelsome |
cheerful/gloomy |
|
open/guarded |
loyal/backbiting |
|
trustworthy/untrustworthy |
considerate/inconsiderate |
|
nice/nasty |
agreeable/disagreeable |
|
sincere/insincere |
kind/unkind |
According to Fiedler,
your answers to this questionnaire indicate the degree to which you possess a
certain trait. For want of a better name, Fiedler called this permanent
characteristic the "Least Preferred Coworker" trait. Scientists call
it "LPC" for short. What is this characteristic? Fiedler would not
necessarily agree with our interpretation of LPC, but the following discussion
reveals how we believe LPC functions.
"High"
LPC score.
Suppose your answers on the questionnaire averaged 6 or higher on each item.
This would give you a total score of at least 108 out of a possible total score
of 144. With this high score, Fiedler would say that you are a "high"
LPC person. What does this mean? As you recall, Fiedler's questionnaire asked
you to describe the person you would least like to have as a coworker. A high
score on this questionnaire means that you have judged this "least
preferred coworker" to be, nevertheless, a pleasant, friendly individual.
The evaluation may seem a bit of an inconsistency on your part.
However, what you have
done is come to two separate conclusions about the person. On the one hand, you
do not want to work with him or her. You have made a negative task-oriented
judgment of the person. On the other hand, you think the person is relaxed,
friendly, and so on. You have thereby made a positive social judgment of this
person. Apparently, you are able to differentiate between how this least
preferred coworker is as a worker
and how he or she is as a person.
In essence, you are able to separate the task and social aspects of the people
around you. This ability makes you a high LPC person.
"Low"
LPC score. In contrast, suppose your answers on each item on the questionnaire
averaged 3 or lower. This would give you a low score, of only 54 at most, with
18 points being the lowest possible outcome. In this case you have judged your
least preferred coworker to be an unfriendly, unpleasant person. This means
that you give your coworker a negative rating for both task-oriented and social
skills. The implication is that you cannot differentiate between the person's
abilities as a worker and his or her skills as a person. You appear to be
unable to separate the task and social aspects of people. This makes you a
"low" LPC person.
LPC
and leadership. How does the LPC trait affect a person in a leadership position? It
appears that LPC has an influence on the leadership style that the person
prefers to use. High LPC leaders like to follow a style that is maintenance
oriented. When they feel pressured, they try to relieve the pressure by improving
social relationships.
Low LPC leaders, on the
other hand, prefer a task-oriented style. They receive their greatest
satisfaction from the successful performance of a work assignment. When they
feel pressure, they respond by working harder on the task than they had
previously. In comparison with high LPC leaders, Fiedler has found that low LPC
people tend to be more task-oriented during group discussion. They ask for and
give more suggestions, demand greater member participation, and make negatively
toned statements more often. The low LPC leaders also tend to be more active.
They talk and interrupt more frequently and control the conversation to a
greater degree than high LPC people do.
Finally, there is a
third possible type of LPC trait. This is medium LPC. Medium LPC people have
scores from each questionnaire item that average between 3 and 6, with total
points ranging from 54 to 108. Fiedler finds that these people are socially
independent. They are unconcerned with other people's evaluations of them and
uninterested in leadership. Beyond identifying that they can exist, Fiedler
ignores medium LPC people in his leadership theory.
Group Situation
One of the strong points
of Fiedler's theory is the way in which he views the group situation. He does
not present an unorganized list of possible circumstances. Instead, Fiedler has
turned his attention to the features
that make up a circumstance. This viewpoint has led to an orderly typology of
group situations.
In general, Fiedler
classifies situations according to their favorableness
to a group leader. Different features within the circumstance can increase or
decrease how favorable the circumstance is for a leader. Favorableness is the
extent to which a leader can make decisions and take actions in his or her
group. Further, it is the degree to which a leader can be confident these
decisions and actions will lead to the outcomes that he or she intended.
Specifically, Fiedler
defines situations in terms of the following three features:
1. Leader-member relations. This is the
most important feature. Fiedler defines it as the degree to which a leader has
the support and loyalty of the other group members. He categorizes this feature
as existing only at either end of the continuum. The continuum runs from
"good" to "bad." If relations are good, the leader is
confident that group members will follow his or her directions. According to
our definition above of "favorableness," good relations are favorable
to the leader. If relations are bad, a leader lacks confidence. This is
unfavorable for him or her.
2. Task structure. This feature is half
as important as leader-member relations. Fiedler defines it as the extent to
which the group can clearly specify the requirements for completing the task.
The task structure also exists along a continuum. "Clear" is at one
end of the continuum, and "unclear" is at the other end. A task
structure is clear if the group members know the requirements for completing
the task, if there is only one method for performing the task, if there is only
one best solution, and if the group can verify whether a proposed solution is
the best one. This is a favorable structure for leaders. In contrast, the task
structure is unclear if the group members do not know the requirements for completing
the task, if there is more than one method for performing the task, if there
may be many "best" solutions, and if the group cannot verify which
proposal is the best. Such a situation is unfavorable for a leader.
3. Position power. This feature is half
as significant for a group situation as task structure is, and thus one-fourth
as important as leader-member relations. Fiedler defines position power as the
extent to which a leader has legitimacy in a group. A leader's legitimacy is
measured by the degree to which the leader has a position that allows him or
her to reward and punish the other group members. The continuum for this
feature runs from "strong" to "weak." A strong level of
position power is favorable for a leader, whereas a weak level is unfavorable.
A leader has strong position power if he or she has legitimacy as part of an
organizational chain of command, as in the military. Position power is weak if
a leader does not have such legitimacy.
Categorizing Group Situations by
Feature.
As you can see, Fiedler
has proposed that the three features have varying degrees of importance
relative to one another. His research supported this idea. A useful method for
indicating their relative importance is to assign each a numerical weight. Using
this scheme, leader-member relations receives a weight of four. Task structure
receives a two, and position power gets a one.
We can also categorize
these features according to their degree of favorableness. Each has two
favorableness ratings. For example, position power can be either strong, which
is favorable, or weak, which is unfavorable.
There are eight possible
combinations of these different aspects of features. It follows from this that
there are eight possible group situations. For instance, one of the eight
combinations would be good leader-member relations, unclear task structure, and
strong position power. There are seven other possible combinations.
Using our numbering
system, we can assign every circumstance the summed weight of its favorable
features. By doing this, it is then possible for us to rank-order the
situations according to their favorableness. The result is Fiedler's typology
of group situations. Table 10.5 summarizes this classification system.
|
Table
10.5 |
Fiedler's
Typology of Group Situations |
|||
|
Situation |
Leader-Member
Relations |
Task
Structure |
Position
Power |
Favorableness |
|
I |
Good
(4) |
Clear
(2) |
Strong
(1) |
Very
High (7) |
|
II |
Good
(4) |
Clear
(2) |
Weak |
High
(6) |
|
III |
Good
(4) |
Unclear |
Strong
(1) |
High
(5) |
|
IV |
Good
(4) |
Unclear |
Weak |
Medium
(4) |
|
V |
Bad |
Clear
(2) |
Strong
(1) |
Medium
(3) |
|
VI |
Bad |
Clear
(2) |
Weak |
Low
(2) |
|
VII |
Bad |
Unclear |
Strong
(1) |
Low
(1) |
|
VII |
Bad |
Unclear |
Weak |
Very
Low (0) |
Trait/Situation Relationship
Earlier, we described
how scientists conducted research using the trait approach to leadership. The
experimenters correlated measurements of traits with measurements of leadership
effectiveness. The results were various correlation coefficients. These
researchers hoped to find a strong relationship between certain traits and leadership
capability. As you can recall, they failed to find this relationship.
Fiedler likewise
correlated a trait measurement with a measurement of leader effectiveness, but
he used different methods. His experiments involved hundreds of business and
military groups and sports teams. The trait measurement that Fiedler used was
the leader's LPC score. He then measured leadership effectiveness by rating how
well the various groups performed their tasks.
There was a significant
difference between Fiedler's research methods and the studies that had failed
earlier. Fiedler classified each group into one of the eight possible
circumstances that his typology distinguished. He was thus able to calculate a
separate trait/performance correlation for each possible situation. In his 1964
article, he reported the results of his first decade of research. As you will
recall, any correlation coefficient above .3 may have some practical value.
Table 10.6 shows the correlations Fiedler found among the different situations.
|
Table
10.6 |
Fiedler's
Findings |
||
|
Situation |
Correlation |
Situation |
Correlation |
|
I |
-.52 |
V |
.42 |
|
II |
-.58 |
VI |
not
studied |
|
III |
-.41 |
VII |
.05 |
|
IV |
.47 |
VIII |
-.43 |
]Findings of Fiedler's Research
In Situations I, II,
III, and VIII there is a considerable negative correlation between leader LPC
scores and group performance. This means that in these circumstances group
performance goes up as leader LPC goes down. As you can note from the earlier
table listing favorableness rankings, Situations I, II, and III are all generally
very favorable for leaders. In contrast, Situation VIII received a very low
favorableness ranking. Despite these differences, all four circumstances are
most effective when they have a low LPC leader.
Situations
IV and V, on the other hand, have a considerable positive correlation between
leader LPC and group performance. These circumstances have medium favorableness rankings.
As leader LPC increases in these situations, performance goes up. Hence, people
in Situations IV and V do best with high LPC leaders. Finally, there appears to
be no relationship between leader LPC and group outcome in Situation VII. The
correlation was a statistically insignificant .05. With Situation VI, Fiedler
could not find enough groups to get any meaningful results.
In a nutshell, Fiedler's
research found that low LPC leaders are most effective in situations that
either highly favor the leader or do not favor him or her very much. In
contrast, high LPC leaders are best in circumstances that are of medium
favorableness. This is an example of two variables working together. The
effectiveness of a leader depends on the extent to which the leader's LPC fits
the group situation. This dependency means that neither high nor low LPC
leaders are best suited for all situations. Each leader type does well in some
circumstances and poorly in others. Similarly, no one situation leads to the
best group performance. Any circumstance can lead to a successful group outcome
if the group has the right type of leader. Fiedler proposed that we should keep
in mind this dependency between leader LPC and group situation. If we do, we
can predict whether a group will perform its task well.
Explanations
Scientists are never
satisfied with recording research findings; they also wish to explain them. We
will attempt to explain why Fiedler obtained the results that he did. As with
our description of LPC, it is not clear whether Fiedler himself would agree
with our explanation.
In circumstances of low
favorableness, things are not going well at all for the group members. In this
negative environment, the members need direction that is strongly task oriented
to complete any work at all. Low LPC leaders are best able to provide this task
direction.
In circumstances of
medium favorableness, groups are fighting against mixed odds. Members require
interpersonal support as they struggle to reach their goal. High LPC leaders
can provide this social support.
Circumstances that
highly favor the leader are somewhat different from these two situations. In
circumstances of high favorableness, things are going well for the group. We
must assume that when things are going well the members of a group prefer to be
left alone to do their work. They do not need as much from their leader. They
do not need either task direction or social support. These are circumstances of
high favorableness for the group, but they can cause problems for some leaders.
Despite the group's success, a high LPC leader will continue to try to provide
social support for members; yet members would prefer to be left alone. They
respond negatively when the high LPC leader continues attempts to give social
support.
The low LPC leader will
respond differently in this type of situation. He or she would be very
satisfied with a successful group and would see no reason to provide any more
task direction. Therefore, this leader will leave the group alone. As we have
stated, this is exactly what the group in a highly favorable situation wants.
As a result, the members will respond positively to the low LPC leader.
This proposal would
explain why members in a highly favorable situation respond more positively to
a low LPC leader than to a high LPC leader. The low LPC leader leaves them
alone. The high LPC leader continues trying to provide them with unnecessary
social support.
Implications of Fiedler's Theory
Assigned
leaders in organizations. In practice, Fiedler's theory has some straightforward
implications. Organizations that need to assign leaders to groups can look at
his theory. One option organizations have, using his idea, is to train leaders
to employ whichever style best suits their group's situation. The leaders could
strive to use a laissez-faire style when favorableness is high, a
social-oriented style in medium-favorableness situations, and a task-oriented
technique when favorableness is low. However, Fiedler thinks that training
leaders to employ styles that are inconsistent with their personal tendencies,
as indicated by their LPC scores, is difficult. A second option, which Fiedler
prefers, is that organizations test potential leaders to discover their LPC
scores; then the organization can place leaders in situations in which the
style they naturally prefer is best. Leadership training should only include
instruction on how to use one's natural style better.
The effects of
leader experience on group performance. Fiedler's theory also has some more subtle
implications for assigned leadership. For example, let us examine the factor of
leader experience. Most of us probably assume that a leader's past experience
is positively related to group performance. However, Fiedler reviewed research
that showed a surprising -.12 correlation between these two variables. This
basically nonexistent relationship no doubt seems very odd to most people. However,
it was no surprise for Fiedler. How does Fiedler recognize that leader
experience can sometimes harm group performance?
First of all, we must
assume that experience gives leaders increased ability to predict the outcomes
of their decisions and actions. This ties into
Fiedler's idea of favorableness. As you recall, he rates the favorableness of a
situation by how well a leader is able to predict the outcomes of his or her
decisions and actions. For example, Joyce is in a very favorable circumstance as
the leader of a hiking group because she knows the right decisions, and she
knows that her group will follow her. She is confident in the outcome when she
tells her group of hikers, "Go up that path to the right and you will see
a beautiful view of the waterfall."
Following this line of
thought, Fiedler says that leader experience increases a situation's
favorableness. The favorableness of a circumstance can go from low to medium or
from medium to high. These fluctuations change group situations. What does this
mean for the group? The answer is that a leader's effectiveness can both
increase and decrease when a group situation changes. A leader's effectiveness,
in turn, influences group performance.
Let us consider the
example of a high LPC leader in a situation of low favorableness. As the leader
gains experience, the situation changes into one of medium favorableness. As we
have just discussed, high LPC people are most effective in circumstances of
medium favorableness. Therefore, this changed group will no doubt do rather
well with the high LPC leader. In a similar fashion, in a situation of medium
favorableness, a low LPC leader's experience would raise the favorableness to
high. This will help the low LPC leader become increasingly effective for the group.
However, other
situations are different. There are times when increasing a situation's
favorableness can harm a leader's effectiveness. For example, a low LPC person
in a circumstance of low favorableness should be a good leader for the group.
Experience begins to work on the situation, however, and raises it to one of
medium favorableness. As you recall, a low LPC person is not the best leader
for medium favorableness. Hence, experience has harmed the effectiveness of the
low LPC leader in this group. Another example is the high LPC leader who starts
to work with a group in a situation of medium favorableness, in which he or she
is an effective leader. However, as the situation's favorableness changes to a
high level, the high LPC person is no longer the best kind of leader for the
group.
Therefore, Fiedler finds
that leader experience, situation, and leader LPC are three variables that work
together to determine leader effectiveness. This, in turn, affects group
performance. Whether experience will help a leader depends on the type of
leader and the situation.
Short-term
versus long-term group performance. There are further implications
of the relationship between experience and leader LPC. Consider the effect that
the association can have on short-term versus long-term group performance. A
low LPC leader should get good immediate results in an unfavorable situation.
However, if experience changes the situation to medium favorableness, in the
long term the group's performance will deteriorate. An organization should keep
this idea in mind. If it can afford to sacrifice short-term results, it should
assign a high LPC leader to a group in a situation of low favorableness. Things
will not go very well in the beginning, but the organization should receive
long-term benefits as the high LPC leader gains experience.
Another option for an
organization is to assign a low LPC person to a situation of low favorableness.
The group will do well. When the group gets itself back on its feet, the
organization can replace the leader with a high LPC person. This is common
practice in many organizations. They employ a few low LPC leaders on temporary
assignments. They send these task-oriented leaders to sections that are doing
poorly and wait until they have succeeded in turning the sections around. The
low LPC people are then reassigned.
Evaluating
Fiedler's Theory
Fiedler's contingency
theory has been the object of severe negative criticism over the years. Some of
this criticism is justified. In this section, we shall describe a few of the
reactions to Fiedler's theory. We will organize our discussion of these
criticisms consistently with the way in which we organized our description of
the theory.
Trait. Critics have questioned the use
of the LPC measurement scale. They have done so with good reason. As you
recall, high LPC leaders are able to separate the task and social management
aspects of their least preferred coworker. In contrast, low LPC people cannot
make this separation. Does Fiedler's questionnaire accurately reflect whether a
person has the ability that high LPC people should have?
Let us consider an
example that may show the difficulties with Fiedler's technique for rating LPC.
Janet is able to separate the task and social aspects of the people around her.
However, Janet's least preferred coworker, Dave, is not only a poor worker, but
also an unfriendly, unpleasant person. Janet fills out the LPC scale and
accurately portrays Dave as unfriendly, unpleasant, and so on. The test will
then inaccurately classify Janet as a low LPC person.
In general, the LPC test
implicitly assumes that the least preferred coworker is actually a pleasant
person. It further assumes that the high LPC person recognizes this fact,
whereas the low LPC person does not. These implied assumptions are untenable.
The least preferred coworker may, in fact, be a rather unpleasant person
generally. Criticisms of Fiedler's LPC test may raise valid questions
concerning his LPC scoring technique.
Situation. First, critics have claimed that
Fiedler's view of situations is oversimplified. They say that three features
are not enough to define situations and that situations
actually have far more than three features. Fiedler accepts this criticism to
some extent. However, he also defended his classification system by reminding
us that scientists must make generalizations in order to say anything useful.
He further states that any generalization will be oversimplified in some way.
To persuade us that
their criticisms are justified, the doubting scientists must show that
Fiedler's view of situations is oversimplified to the extent that it seriously
misinterprets "real life." However, the strength of Fiedler's
research results suggests that he is tapping into something "real,"
and no researcher has truly shown that this is not the case.
Second, others have
claimed that Fiedler's ordering of the importance of the three situation
features is arbitrary. Remember that Fiedler places leader-member relations
first in importance and places position power last. It is true that at the
beginning of his work Fiedler used arbitrary rankings. However, in 1978,
Fiedler presented research evidence that supported his rank-ordering of the
features.
Third, scientists have
looked at the correlation coefficients of the three factors and found cause for
concern. The three must be uncorrelated for us to consider them totally
different features of a situation. If two variables are highly correlated, they
actually measure the same thing. Scientists have found that "leader-member
relations" is unrelated to "position power." There is a
coefficient of only -.09 between these two features. In addition,
"leader-member relations" and "task structure" are
unrelated, with a coefficient of .03.
However, it turns out
that position power and task structure are strongly and positively correlated,
with a coefficient of .75. If position power and task structure are this highly
correlated, it may be that they both measure the same thing in a group. If so,
situations have only two features, not three. In turn, there are only four, not
eight, types of situations. This would mean that Fiedler's theory is more
complex at the moment than it needs to be. This is a cause for real concern.
Task/situation
relationship. First, scientists have questioned whether all of Fiedler's
experiments have shown a correlation between leader LPC and group performance.
In Table 10.6, we reported LPC/group performance correlations from Fiedler's
first decade of research. He reported this summary of his work in a 1964 review
of his studies. However, Graen et al. reviewed the
next five years of Fiedler's work in a report they published in 1970. In their
findings, they state that leader LPC/group performance correlations were much
lower. This cast doubt on Fiedler's theory.
In 1978, Fiedler
responded to this criticism in another review of his own. He claimed that his
post-1964 results only differed randomly from his findings prior to 1964. He
stated that his work still supported his theory. Peters, Hartke,
and Pohlmann came out with a more recent and
sophisticated review of Fiedler's work in 1985. Their review came out in
general support of Fiedler but found enough anomalies to conclude that
contingency theory is incomplete. They believed that scientists need to consider
other factors in order to create a complete hypothesis.
General Conclusions: Contingency Theory
It should be clear that
Fiedler's contingency theory has several problems. Nevertheless, there is a
great deal of research that supports his proposal. In other words, despite its
problems, the theory works fairly well. Nonetheless, it has enough problems to
warrant alternative theories.
Since Fiedler's work,
several other contingency theories of leadership have been proposed. These
theorists tend to propose that situational factors and characteristics of the
group members determine the circumstance under which different leadership
styles are best. A good review of some important alternatives to Fiedler can be
found in Yukl (1981).
General Conclusions
The trait, style,
situational, and contingency approaches to group leadership all have noteworthy
implications for the practice of leadership. The trait approach describes how a
person's personality may help determine whether other group members see that
person as a leader. The style approach explains the effect that the way in
which the leader leads has on a group. The situational approach accounts for
when a leader should use one style rather than another. The contingency theory
is concerned with how leadership traits and styles can effect how successful a
leader will be in differing group situations.
However, we can see much
room for improvement in all of these approaches. The trait approach was
unsuccessful in showing what type of person would make a good leader. The style
approach erred by presuming that a particular style would always be best. The
situational approach attempted to fix this error, but the situational theories
have not been supported by research studies. Although contingency theory is our
most sophisticated and successful theory of leadership, we have just discussed
many problems that face it.
Notions such as the
trait and style views were rather simplistic. In comparison with these earlier
approaches, we have obviously come a long way. Nevertheless, it is equally
obvious that we still have a long way to go. There is still much to learn
before we can have a really good understanding of how leadership works.
One thing missing from
these theories is any serious consideration of the role played by communication
in leadership. In the next chapter, we will turn our attention to approaches to
leadership in which communication is critical. As we shall see, including
communication in our theories allows us to come to a greater understanding of how
group leadership works.
SUMMARY
We can approach the
concept of leadership from any of the perspectives that small-group researchers
use, such as the relational perspective. Each of these viewpoints defines
leadership in a different way. However, in this book, we have not chosen one
specific definition. Instead, we keep all of the perspectives in mind as we
examine the question of leadership. Each perspective has its own definition of
leadership, but only some viewpoints actually have had an impact on the study
of the topic. What researchers have done is to propose different approaches to
the study of leadership. In this chapter, we have examined four approaches that
have developed in a roughly sequential order in history.
In the beginning, some
scientists believed that certain people had special qualities that would cause
them to assume leadership positions in any situation. This was the trait approach to leadership.
Researchers attempted to find specific characteristics that distinguished
leaders from other group members. They were not able to do so. In fact, there
is a great deal of evidence that the trait approach is flawed. Studies have
shown that leadership ability differs among tasks. Thus, we cannot believe that
leaders are consistent across different circumstances. However, traits do
appear to influence group members' perception
of who should lead. Certain traits are associated with leadership in the minds
of group members. These perceptions are consistent across situations.
Later, scientists attempted
to evaluate the style that
leaders use in groups. This was the style approach to the study of leadership. Lewin proposed three styles: democratic, authoritarian, and
laissez faire. He provided evidence that the democratic leadership style leads
to higher quality work, more cohesive groups, and more satisfied members than
the other two styles. However, other studies have shown that there can be
advantages with the authoritarian style also. It now appears that neither style
is the "best." Each is better in different circumstances.
Other researchers
distinguished between task and maintenance styles of leadership. One group of
researchers working at
In response to this
problem, the situational
approach has attempted to determine which style of leadership is best in which
situation. Hersey and Blanchard argued that
leadership style should be based on the degree of independence exhibited by the
members of the group. Vroom and Yetton developed a
table for determining which style of leadership is best given the answers to
eight questions about the group situation. Unfortunately, research has not
provided strong support for either of these approaches.
Fiedler developed the contingency theory of leadership. He
presented data showing that leadership effectiveness is a product of the
relationship between a certain leader trait and different group situations. The
leader trait Fiedler examined consists of the ability to distinguish between
two aspects of someone's personality. The two aspects are how attractive an
individual is as a worker and how attractive he or she is as a person. Fiedler
had leaders answer a questionnaire about their least preferred coworker, or
LPC, in order to discover the extent to which they could distinguish between
these two aspects. High LPC leaders have a high ability to make this
distinction. In contrast, low LPC people cannot distinguish between the aspects
very well. High LPC leaders tend to be socially oriented and low LPC people are
usually task oriented.
Fiedler rank-ordered
group situations by how favorable they are to the group leader. Situation
favorableness is a function of three factors. These factors are the
relationship between leader and group members, the clarity of the task, and the
extent to which organizational structure gives the leaders power over group
members. Research has shown that low LPC leaders, who tend to be task oriented,
are most effective when favorableness is either rather high or rather low. In
contrast, high LPC leaders, who usually are socially oriented people, are most
effective when the level of favorableness is medium.
Fiedler's contingency
theory has been the most successful approach to leadership. However, even it
suffers from several problems and weaknesses.