Lesson 5: Theories on Leadership Part 2

A. Situational and contingency theory:

Situational theory also appeared as a reaction to the trait theory of leadership. Social
scientists argued that history was more than the result of intervention of great men as Carlyle
suggested. Herbert Spencer (1884) said that the times produce the person and not the other way
around. This theory assumes that different situations call for different characteristics; according
to this group of theories, no single optimal psychographic profile of a leader exists.
According to the theory, "what an individual actually does when acting as a leader is in
large part dependent upon characteristics of the situation in which he functions."Some theorists
started to synthesize the trait and situational approaches. Building upon the research of Lewin
et.al, academics began to normalize the descriptive models of leadership climates, defining three
leadership styles and identifying in which situations each style works better.
The authoritarian leadership style, for example, is approved in periods of crisis but fails
to win the "hearts and minds" of their followers in the day-to-day management; the democratic
leadership style is more adequate in situations that require consensus building; finally, the laissez
faire leadership style is appreciated by the degree of freedom it provides, but as the leader does
not "take charge", he can be perceived as a failure in protracted or thorny organizational
problems.
This theorist defined the style of leadership as contingent to the situation, which is
sometimes, classified as contingency theory. Four contingency leadership theories appear more
prominently in the recent years: Fiedler contingency model, Vroom-Yetton decision model, the
path-goal theory, and the Hersey-Blanchard situational theory.
The Fiedler contingency model bases the leader’s effectiveness on what Fred Fiedler
called situational contingency. This results from the interaction of leadership style and situational
favorableness (later called "situational control"). The theory defined two types of leader: those
who tend to accomplish the task by developing good relationships with the group (relationship-
oriented), and those who have as their prime concern carrying out the task itself (task-oriented).
According to Fiedler, there is no ideal leader. Both task-oriented and relationship oriented
leaders can be effective if their leadership orientation fits the situation. When there is a good
leader-member relation, a highly structured task, and high leader position power, the situation is
considered a "favorable situation". Fiedler found that task-oriented leaders are more effective in
extremely favorable or unfavorable situations, whereas relationship-oriented leaders perform best
in situations with intermediate favorability.
Victor Vroom, in collaboration with Phillip Yetton (1973) and later with Arthur Jago
(1988), developed a taxonomy for describing leadership situations, taxonomy that was used in a
normative decision model where leadership styles where connected to situational variables,
defining which approach was more suitable to which situation. This approach was novel because
it supported the idea that the same manager could rely on different group decision making
approaches depending on the attributes of each situation. This model was later referred as
situational contingency theory.
The path-goal theory of leadership was developed by Robert House (1971) and was based
on the expectancy theory of Victor Vroom. According to House, the essence of the theory is "the
meta proposition that leaders, to be effective, engage in behaviors that complement subordinates'
environments and abilities in a manner that compensates for deficiencies and is instrumental to
subordinate satisfaction and individual and work unit performance.

The theory identifies four leader behaviors, achievement-oriented, directive, participative,

and supportive; those are contingent to the environment factors and follower characteristics. In
contrast to the Fiedler contingency model, the path-goal model states that the four leadership
behaviors are fluid, and that leaders can adopt any of the four depending on what the situation
demands. The path-goal model can be classified both as a contingency theory, as it depends on
the circumstances, but also as a transactional leadership theory, as the theory emphasizes the
reciprocity behavior between the leader and the followers.
The situational leadership model proposed by Hersey and Blanchard suggest four
leadership-styles and four levels of follower-development. For effectiveness, the model posits
that the leadership-style must match the appropriate level of follower ship-development. In this
model, leadership behavior becomes a function not only of the characteristics of the leader, but
of the characteristics of followers as well.

B. Functional theory:
 Functional leadership theory (Hackman & Walton, 1986; McGrath, 1962) is aparticularly
useful theory for addressing specific leader behaviors expected to contribute to organizational or
unit effectiveness.
This theory argues that the leader’s main job is to see that whatever is necessary togroup
needs is taken care of; thus, a leader can be said to have done their job well when they have
contributed to group effectiveness and cohesion (Fleishman et al., 1991; Hackman & Wageman,
2005; Hackman &Walton, 1986). While functional leadership theory has most often been applied
to team leadership (Zaccaro, Rittman, & Marks, 2001), it has also been effectively applied to
broader organizational leadership as well (Zaccaro, 2001).
In summarizing literature on functional leadership (see Kozlowski et al. (1996),Zaccaro
et al. (2001), Hackman and Walton (1986), Hackman & Wageman (2005), Morgeson (2005)),
Klein, Zeigert, Knight, and Xiao (2006) observed five broad functions a leader provides when
promoting unit effectiveness. These functions include: (1) environmental monitoring, (2)
organizing subordinate activities, (3) teaching and coaching subordinates, (4) motivating others,
and (5) intervening actively in the group’s work.
A variety of leadership behaviors are expected to facilitate these functions. In initialwork
identifying leader behavior, Fleishman (Fleishman, 1953) observed that subordinates perceived
their supervisors’ behavior in terms of two broad categories referred to as consideration and
initiating structure.
Consideration includes behavior involved in fostering effective relationships. Examples
of such behavior would include showing concern for a subordinate or acting in a supportive
manner towards others. Initiating structure involves the actions of the leader focused specifically
on task accomplishment. This could include role clarification, setting performance standards, and
holding subordinates accountable to those standards.

C. Transactional and transformational theory:

The transactional leader (Burns, 1978) is given power to perform certain tasks and reward
or punish for the team’s performance. It gives the opportunity to the manager to lead the group
and the group agrees to follow his lead to accomplish a predetermined goal in exchange for
something else. Power is given to the leader to evaluate, correct and train subordinates when
productivity is not up to the desired level and reward effectiveness when expected outcome is
reached.
The transformational leader (Burns, 2008) motivates its team to be effective and efficient.
Communication is the base for goal achievement focusing the group on the final desired outcome
or goal attainment.
This leader is highly visible and uses chain of command to get the job done. Transformational
leaders focus on the big picture, needing to be surrounded by people who take care of the details.
The leader is always looking for ideas that move the organization to reach the company’s vision.