Contingency Theories of Leadership and Adaptive Leadership Chapter 7

Fiedler’s Contingency Theory No “one best” leadership: The effectiveness of Leadership depends on leader’s style, follower’s behavior and the favorableness of the situation Component 1 of the theory: 1.Leader’s orientation 2.Elements of situation

1.Leader’s Orientation 1.1 Task oriented : cares more about the task and not on the personnel (Initiating Structures) 1.2 Relationship Oriented: cares more on the people (considerate)

How to determine the orientation ? By Least Preferred Co-worker (LPC) tool

Interpreting LPC scores Relationship oriented: if LPC Score is high (it means leadership behavior is considerate) Task oriented: if LPC Score is low (it means leadership behavior is IS – initiating structures of directive)

Component 2 of the theory: Situational favorableness 1.leader-member relationship (trust, respect between leader and member) 2.Task structure (task is clear or structured, task is not clear or unstructured) 3.Position of power (how much power does leader have over subordinates)

Interpretation When the leader-member relation is good, the task is structured and the leader has enough power, the situation is favorable – thus effective leadership. Situation is unfavorable for leaders vise versa. Fieldler says : low LPC leaders are good in extremely favorable situations while high LPC leaders are effective in moderately favorable situations

Leader’s orientation

Favorableness of the situation

Substitutes for Leadership Kerr & Jermier (1978) Identify Aspects of Situation that Minimize Need for Leaders – Substitutes (Task, Organization, Roles, Subordinate Characteristics) – Neutralizers (Reward, Authority, External) Substitutes Make Leaders Redundant Strong Support for Substitutes and Neutralizers

Path-Goal Theory Leaders Influence Satisfaction and Performance Increase Subordinate Outcomes By: – Clarifying Path to Goals – Reducing Roadblocks to Goals – Increase incentives on the Way Inclusion of Task Characteristics and Subordinate Characteristics 4 Types of Leaders – Supportive (Boring) – Directive (Unstructured) – Participative (Complex) – Achievement-Oriented

Other Referenced Theories Theory X and Theory Y Theory X and Theory Y each represent different ways in which leaders view employees. – Theory X is the traditional view of direction and control by managers. – Theory Y is the view that individual and organizational goals can be integrated.

Management/ Leader Staff/ Followers Alan Chapmen Tight control, lots of rules, no freedom

Alan Chapmen Management/ Leader Staff/ Followers Lots of freedom, creativity & responsibility

ADAPTIVE LEADERSHIP Today’s work environment is increasingly -Turbulent -Unreliable -Unpredictable Today’s companies are increasingly -Interdependent -Organized

How can leaders…. Predict the outcome of their choices ? Determine how leads whom specially when limits and boundaries are increasingly blurred as a result of extra organized systems etc ? Ensure that they have rightly understood signals and messages of changes and varying situations? Be sure that they are right?

These changes call for adaptive strategies and ways of doing business ADAPTIVE LEADERSHIP, THEREFORE, IS TO CREATE AN ENVIORONMENT IN WHICH OBJECTIVES ARE ACHIEVED IN PRESENCE OF UNCERTAINTY

Unique dimensions of Adaptive Leadership Navigate the business environment: -Manage the context in which actors operate -Cultivate diversity of perspectives (Abraham Lincoln idea of opposing ministers) -Share leadership -Curiosity and questioning the world around

Leading with Empathy: -Seeing the world with others’ prisms -Create a shared sense of purpose -Reward independent good work Learning through self-correction -Enable learning through experimentation -Increase organization’s ability to self-correct

Create win-win situations -Enable collaboration (CEO’s need to enable collaboration because the employees already have all the data) -Use influence of leadership to go beyond the firm

Adaptive Leadership Dimensions

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