Dicussion reply

PAF 410 Building Leadership Skills

Session 6

Leadership in Different Contexts

Agenda

• Recap

• Leadership in different contexts

Recap

• Leader-Member Exchange Theory

• Dyadic approach; leader-follower relationship in focus

• Descriptive vs prescriptive

• In-group vs out-group relationships

• Temporal development?

Leadership in Different Contexts

Individual and Organizational Characteristics

What is the idea?

• Contextual factors create opportunities or barriers for …

• Leadership emergence • Leadership effectiveness

• Ex. 1: Transformational leadership in organizations with large or small spans of control

• Ex. 2: Transactional leadership in complex organizations like hospitals versus structured organizations like assembly plants

• Other examples …

Illustration

Leadership

Training

Leadership

Behaviors

Leadership

Effectiveness

Context

(Cultural, Structural (Organization; Job),

Individual (Personality, Gender, Tenure)

Contextual Factors

• Many more than we can possibly cover … but relevant ones are:

• Individual characteristics (e.g., personality) and attitudes (e.g., values, motivation, and commitment)

• Job design: Beneficiary contact (Grant HBR)

• Organizational characteristics (e.g., stability/change, structures)

• National characteristics (e.g., culture, economy, political climate/regulation)

Individual characteristics

• Personality …

• Leadership emergence: Openness to new information; Extraversion?

• Ex. Charisma and communication: Are some traits more likely to make the leader succeed in these respects?

• Does follower personality matter? Conscientious people already operate at high levels of motivation (Grant HBR)

Individual attitudes

• Motivation …

• Drive to engage in specific job behaviors

• Expectancy theory (Vroom 1964):

• Capable of performing task

• Task will lead to result

• Result will be rewarded

Individual attitudes (cont.)

• Commitment…

• ”Whether a person has developed a positive attitude regarding a goal” (Northouse 2016: 96)

• Can also be wider …

• Positive affect and identification with work group or entire organization

Individual skills

• Competencies required to master task:

• Technical

• Human

• Conceptual

Situational Leadership

• Basic idea: Leaders should adapt their style according to the competencies and commitment of the followers

• Two general behavioral patterns that can be combined …

• Directive: Giving direction, setting goals, timelines and roles etc.

• Supportive: Social and emotional support

Where have we seen this before?

Situational Leadership (cont.)

Directing

(High Directive – Low

Supportive)

Coaching

(High Directive – High

Supportive)

Supporting

(Low Directive – High

Supportive)

Delegating

(Low Directive – Low

Supportive)

Low Competence

High Commitment

Low/Some

Competence

Low Commitment

Moderate/High

Competence

Variable Commitment

High Competence

High Commitment

DevelopedDeveloping

Adaptation of leadership style

Situational Leadership (cont.)

Path-Goal Theory (Contingency Theory)

• Concerned with follower motivation as a means to enhance goal attainment

• Effect of leadership behaviors (directive, supportive, participative, and achievement-oriented) is contingent on follower and work characteristics

• Grant HBR: Relative job design offers one example …

Path–Goal Theory

• Path–goal theory centers on how leaders motivate followers to accomplish designated goals

• Emphasizes the relationship between

• the leader’s style

• the characteristics of the followers

• the work setting

Path–Goal Theory

Path–Goal Theory

How does Path-Goal Theory Work?

• The leader’s job is to help followers reach their goals by directing, guiding, and coaching them along the way

• Leaders must evaluate task and follower characteristics and adapt leadership style to these

• The theory suggests which style is most appropriate for specific characteristics

Path-Goal Theory

How Customers Can Rally Troops (Grant)

• Point of departure:

• People are motivated by meaningful work

• Leaders can try to highlight importance of work (e.g., through vision statements, stories etc.)

• Beneficiaries (end users) serve as tangible proof of consequences of employees’ effort

• How to capitalize on that?

Relative job design

• The way we structure job and tasks allow for more or less beneficiary contact

• Outsourcing inspiration: Connect frontline workers with beneficiaries

• End users are seen as more credible sources of information than the leader; help bring visions to life

An example

• University fundraising callers (Grant 2011: 98-99)

• Characteristics: Repetitive work, low autonomy, and rude customers

• Intervention: Visit and 5-minute impact speech by one scholarship recipient

• Result: 142 % increase in weekly time spent; 171 % in money raised!

Relative job design (cont.)

• What is going on?

• Impact: Vivid how their work matters

• Appreciation: Employees come to feel valued by end users

• Empathy: Develop a deeper understanding of users’ problems and needs that in turn fosters a commitment to help

Organizational characteristics

• Stability vs change of the internal environment of a collective entity

• Adaptive leadership: How leaders encourage people to deal with problems and changes in their environment

• Identify challenges; engage in behaviors that encourage a holding environment in which people can work with the challenge at hand

Leadership in Different Contexts

National and Cultural Characteristics

Contextual Factors

• Many more than we can possibly cover …

• Economy

• Political climate

• Today: Focus on culture

• Within and between country variation!

How do you define culture?

National characteristics: Culture

• Collection of related ideas

• Definition: Learned beliefs, values, rules, norms, symbols, and traditions that are common to a group of people (Northouse 2016: 428)

• Shared qualities of a group that make them unique

Exercise: Cultural dimensions

• For each of the nine cultural dimensions outlined in the GLOBE project (pp. 431–434) discuss the following questions …

1. What characterizes the cultural dimension?

2. How can the cultural dimension create opportunities or barriers for one or more of the main leadership strategies we have discussed (transformational leadership, transactional leadership, servant leadership, leader-member exchange …)

Be prepared to present your answers

Dimensions of Culture

• Hofstede/GLOBE: 9 Dimensions

• Uncertainty avoidance: Use of rules to make things more predictable

• Power distance: Whether power should be shared unequally

• Institutional collectivism: Societal collective action

• Gender egalitarianism: Gender roles and equality

Dimensions of Culture

• In-group collectivism: Pride, loyalty, and cohesiveness in org and families

• Assertiveness: Determined, confrontational and aggressive

• Future orientation: Planning and investing in the future

• Performance orientation: Reward group members for performance

• Humane orientation: Reward people for being altruistic, generous, and caring

Hofstede

• https://www.hofstede-insights.com/product/compare-countries/

Clusters

Northouse 2016:

435

How do you feel about cultural clustering?

Characteristics of clusters

Northouse 2016:

436

Global leadership behaviors

1. Charismatic-value based: Ability to inspire, to motivate, and to expect high performance. Visionary

2. Team-oriented: Team building and common purpose. Collaborative and integrative

3. Participative: Involving others in making and implementing decisions

Global leadership behaviors (cont.)

4. Humane-oriented: Emphasis on being supportive, considerate, and compassionate. Sensitive to others

5. Autonomous: Independent and individualistic leadership

6. Self-protective: Ensure safety and security of the leader and the group. Self-centered and status conscious

Culture and Leadership

• Basic idea: Culture defines framework within which some leadership behaviors are more likely to be perceived as legitimate than others

• E.g., in the US a high performance orientation may pave the way for transactional leadership behaviors. You are rewarded based on your performance

• Power distance: Participative leadership more likely to flourish in low power distance countries like Denmark

Case: A Challenging Workplace

Read case 16.1 (pp. 452-454) and discuss the following questions with your group:

1. What similarities and differences can you identify between North American and Japanese working style?

2. In what way did this company reflect the characteristics of other Confucian Asia countries?

3. Why do you think Samira was not seen as a team player?

4. What universal leadership attributes did Samira exhibit?

5. What other suggestions would you have for Samira in this situation?

Questions?

Discussion.docx

According to reading and class discussions, organizational culture is learned behavior; not a by-product of operations. According to Edgar Northouse, organizational culture is defined by how people inside the organization interact with each other. This means it’s not an overlay. We create our organizational culture by the actions we take in an organization and the societies were interacting with.

Since many of the valuable qualities a leader might have never taught in the classrooms, shaping a culture is a difficult task. However, it can be learned, but only from life experiences. Emotional maturity, authenticity, and a strong character are all essential if leadership in a culture-driven company is to be effective.

The link below is a full interview of Edgar Schein, a former professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management. He defines Culture, Leadership & Humble Inquiry to a new and unique prospective.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7MwebWXtKBs