Organizational behaviour
Siti Nazrana 
Lecture6-CommunicationLeadership.pptxBX3171 Organisational Behaviour Topic 10: Communication Topic 11: Leadership
Lecturer: Jaime Wong
This deck is available in Subject hompage -> Learning Activities -> Slides -> Lecture 6 – Communication….
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Topic 10
Communication
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You’ve probably discovered the link between communication and employee satisfaction in this chapter; the less uncertainty there is, the greater the satisfaction. Distortions, ambiguities and incongruities between verbal and nonverbal messages all increase uncertainty and reduce satisfaction.
Remember that your communication mode will partly determine your communication effectiveness.
Obtain feedback from your employees to make certain your messages—however they are communicated—are understood.
Remember that written communication creates more misunderstandings than oral communication; communicate with employees through in-person meetings when possible.
Make sure you use communication strategies appropriate to your audience and the type of message you’re sending.
Keep in mind communication barriers such as gender and culture.
Learning Objectives
Contrast downward, upward and lateral communication through small-group networks and the grapevine
Reflect on how channel richness underlies the choice of communication method
Identify the common barriers to communication and overcoming the potential problems of cross-cultural communication
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https://www.poppulo.com/blog/importance-of-communication-in-an-organization/
Communication is the cornerstone of any organization’s success; business comprises of continuous interactions with multiple parties – managers, employees and clients. Effective communication ensures the flowing of information between all relevant parties, reducing the potential for misunderstanding, dissatisfaction and lack of trust.
Communication within an organization takes many forms: from oral communication and written communication to communicate through email/intranet/IM/business networks and even body language, which can be so important in today’s increasingly multi-cultural workplace. And so, the way in which an organization communicates needs to be consistent and clear across multiple channels.
Good managers possess good communication skills. Crucially, good communication needs to come from the top down. The way a manager communicates with direct employees is generally regarded as an indicator of how an organization communicates with its workforce. It is essential leadership skills for senior management:
Giving a clear sense of direction
Bringing the customer into the boardroom
Communicating clearly – both inside and out
Being flexible but not floppy
Taking risks but not ‘betting’ the company
Building the team around you
Listening with humility, acting with courage
Earning your reward through building trust
What’s worth noting is that communication is, without a doubt, a basic function of management. Over 90% of personnel officials at 500 US businesses said increased communication skills are needed for success in the 21st century. This is supported by the list above where we can see that all of the named skills are in some way communication related and some, for example, number 3, are wholly focused on communication.
Introduction
All individuals, groups and organisations need to share meaning by conveying information and ideas in order to exist.
Communication must include both the transfer and the understanding of meaning.
Perfect communication is never achieved in practice.
Why is effective communication important?
Type your answer in Chat
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https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/tools-and-samples/toolkits/pages/managingorganizationalcommunication.aspx
Communication is a vital management component to any organization. Whether the purpose is to update employees on new policies, to prepare for a weather disaster, to ensure safety throughout the organization or to listen to the attitudes of employees, effective communication is an integral issue in effective management. To be successful, organizations should have comprehensive policies and strategies for communicating with their constituencies, employees and stakeholders as well as with the community at large.
The Importance of a Comprehensive Communication Strategy
Most HR professionals and organizational leaders agree that linking corporate communication to business strategy is essential to effective and consistent business operations. With a formal and comprehensive communication strategy, organizations can ensure that they:
Communicate consistent messages.
Establish a recognizable employment brand.
Deliver messages from the top that are congruent with the organization's mission, vision and culture.
The impact of effective communication
Effective communication may contribute to organizational success in many ways. It:
Builds employee morale, satisfaction and engagement.
Helps employees understand terms and conditions of their employment and drives their commitment and loyalty.
Educates employees on the merits of remaining union-free (if that is the organization's goal).
Gives employees a voice—an increasingly meaningful component of improving employees' satisfaction with their employer.
Helps to lessen the chances for misunderstandings and potentially reduces grievances and lawsuits.
Improves processes and procedures and ultimately creates greater efficiencies and reduces costs.
The impact of ineffective communication
Ineffective communication may increase the chances for misunderstandings, damage relationships, break trust, and increase anger and hostility. Ineffective communication may stem from poorly aligned strategy, a failure to execute the strategy, use of the wrong communication vehicle, bad timing, and even nuances such as word choice or tone of voice.
Two-way communication
HR professionals may initially think of communication mainly in the context of delivering messages to employees about business issues, policies and procedures, but two-way communication plays an essential role in a comprehensive communication strategy. Listening to employee issues and concerns builds loyalty and drives improved productivity. Organizational leaders can learn through listening about issues or concerns before they become formal grievances or lawsuits. They can also discover potential employee relations issues and learn about attitudes toward terms and conditions of employment.
Functions and process of communication
Communication serves four major functions:
Manage member behaviour to comply with company policies
Foster Feedback
Emotional expression – satisfaction, frustration
Information exchange to facilitate decision making
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What are the primary functions of the communication process in organisations? There are four major functions:
Communication acts to control member behaviour in several ways. When work groups tease or harass a member who produces too much, they are informally communicating with, and controlling, the member’s behaviour.
Communication fosters motivation by clarifying to employees what is to be done, how well they are doing and what can be done to improve performance. The formation of specific goals, feedback on progress towards the goals and reinforcement of desired behaviour all stimulate motivation and require communication.
Communication provides a release for the emotional expression of feelings and for fulfilment of social needs. For many employees, their work group is a primary source for social interaction.
Communication facilitates decision making. It provides the information.
Functions and process of communication
The channel – the medium through which the message travels - formal and informal
Decoding – translate into understandable form
The receiver
Noise – communication barriers
Feedback – check the success of the message transfer
The communication process
The sender
Encoding - a thought
The message - speech, written, gesture
Exhibit 10.1
The communication process
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What are the key parts of the communication process, and how do you distinguish formal and informal communication? The communication process, the key parts are the following:
Sender
Encoding
The message
The channel
Decoding
The receiver
Noise
Feedback.
Formal communication channels are established by the organisation and transmit messages that are related to the professional activities of members. Informal channels are used to transmit personal or social messages in the organisation. These informal channels are spontaneous and emerge as a response to individual choices.
Direction of communication
Downward communication
assign goals, instructions, explain policies, point out problems
explain why, repeat
Upward communication
Provide feedback, inform
Communicate headlines, actionable
Lateral communication
Formal small-group networks
The grapevine
Informal, word-of-mouth
Is “grapevine” communication good or bad? Explain your answer.
Type your answer in Chat
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https://study.com/academy/lesson/what-are-the-functions-of-communication-definition-examples.html
The functions of communication in an organization are to inform, persuade, and motivate. Employees need to have effective organizational communication in order to achieve excellent job performance.
Functions of Communication
The most basic functions of communication in an organization are to inform, persuade, and motivate. Yummy Cakes is a manufacturer of desserts that utilizes all the functions of communication in order to be successful.
Inform
Let's take a look at how Yummy Cakes uses communication to inform within their organization. The idea of informing within an organization is to provide data and information so that employees can effectively complete their job. Information ensures that an employee is aware of the rules and procedures of an organization. It also eliminates job uncertainty for workers when they are fully informed.
There are three types of ways information can travel in a company. Downward-moving communication is information that moves from superiors to subordinates and usually consists of directives or updates. Yummy Cakes' CEO recently sent out an email to all of his managers that there would be mandatory layoffs that needed to be implemented by the end of the month. This would be considered an example of downward-moving communication.
Upward-moving communication is information that moves from subordinates to superiors and usually consists of feedback or reports. For instance, Yummy Cakes' marketing manager wanted an increase in her monthly advertising budget. She asked the vice president of marketing for a consideration of a $10,000/month increase.
Horizontal-moving communication is information that flows from worker to worker or manager to manager (peer to peer) and consists of reports or data. An example of this type of communication would be one co-worker telling another co-worker about the company stock price.
https://study.com/academy/lesson/what-are-the-functions-of-communication-definition-examples.html
Formal communication networks consist of centralized and decentralized channels, while the grapevine is an informal network. In this lesson, you'll learn how most organizational communication happens using an informal network due to friends, usage and efficiency.
Communication Problems
Spiffy Cowboy Clothes Corporation was having a successful year. Employee morale was at an all-time high. Tex was an employee at Spiffy who had been problematic to the company in the past. He was reprimanded this week for inappropriate business behavior at a meeting. Tex was furious that he was 'singled-out' and started a very negative campaign within the organization. He started rumors and innuendo about employees, managers and the company through the corporate grapevine. A grapevine is an informal communication network of an organization. The company's morale started a precipitous decline due to the rumors. The human resource manager started an investigation to see how they could combat this huge issue that Tex started through the formal communication networks, or official, corporate-endorsed communication channels.
Formal Communication Networks
Traditionally, companies utilize formal communication networks to communicate with an organization. Formal networks depend upon the location of the workers, rules of communication and status hierarchy of the employees. Many companies pursue communication flow through an organigram, also known as organogram, which is a diagram of a company's hierarchy that reflects formal lines of communication. For example, it would be inappropriate for Tex, who is a lower level manager, to email the CEO directly with a question or complaint. Tex should contact his direct superior with any issue. Centralized and decentralized are two types of formal communication networks.
Lateral communication
When communication takes place among members of the same work group, members of work groups at the same level, managers at the same level or any other horizontally equivalent workers, we describe it as lateral communication.
Lateral communication is needed even if a group’s or an organisation’s vertical communications are effective because it saves time and facilitates coordination. Some lateral relationships are formally sanctioned. More often, they’re informally created to short-circuit the vertical hierarchy and expedite action. So, from management’s viewpoint, lateral communications can be good or bad. Because strictly adhering to the formal vertical structure for all communications can be inefficient, lateral communication occurring with management’s knowledge and support can be beneficial. But it can create dysfunctional conflicts when the formal vertical channels are breached, when members go above or around their superiors to get things done, or when bosses find that actions have been taken or decisions made without their knowledge.
Exhibit 10.2
Three common small-group networks
Rigidly follows the chain of command
Central figure act as conduit
Practice by self-managed teams
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Formal small-group networks
Formal organisational networks can be very complicated; they can involve hundreds of people and half a dozen or more hierarchical levels. To simplify our discussion, we’ve condensed these networks into three common small groups of five people each (see Exhibit 10.2): chain, wheel and all-channel - three common small-group networks
The chain rigidly follows the formal chain of command. This network approximates the communication channels you might find in a rigid three-level organisation. The wheel relies on a central figure to act as the conduit for all of the group’s communication. It simulates the communication network you would find in a team with a strong leader. The all-channel network permits all group members to actively communicate with each other. It is most often characterised in practice by self-managed teams, in which all group members are free to contribute and no one person takes on a leadership role. Many organisations today like to consider themselves all-channel, meaning that anyone can communicate with anyone (but sometimes they shouldn’t).
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Exhibit 10.3
Small-group networks and effective criteria
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As Exhibit 10.3 demonstrates, the effectiveness of each network depends on the dependent variable you’re concerned about. The structure of the wheel facilitates the emergence of a leader, the all-channel network is best if you desire high member satisfaction and the chain is best if accuracy is most important. Exhibit 10.3 leads us to the conclusion that no single network will be best for all occasions.
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Exhibit 10.4
Suggestions for reducing the negative consequences of rumours
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The grapevine
The informal communication network in a group or an organisation is called the grapevine. Although the grapevine may be informal, it’s still an important source of information. A survey found that it’s where 75% of employees hear about matters first. A recent study shows that grapevine, or word-of-mouth, information from peers about a company has important effects on whether job applicants join an organisation.
Grapevine - An organisation’s informal communication network.
The grapevine is an important part of any group or organisation communication network and is well worth understanding. It gives managers a feel for the morale of their organisation, identifies issues that employees consider important and helps tap into employee anxieties. The grapevine also serves employees’ needs: small talk creates a sense of closeness and friendship among those who share information.
Can managers control the flow of small talk among followers? No. Should they want to? Maybe not. In addition to the opportunities for managers to learn from the grapevine, some forms of small talk provide prosocial motivation for employees to help each other achieve organisational goals. What they should do, however, is minimise the negative consequences of small talk by limiting their range and impact. Exhibit 10.4 offers a few suggestions about how to reduce the negative consequences of rumours
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Modes of communication
Oral communication
Meetings
Videoconferencing and conference calling
Telephone
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https://www.educba.com/different-methods-of-communication/
Different Effective Methods of Communication – Most of the times, when the word communication comes to the mind of the people, they think about exchanging ideas and information by means of words but such type of verbal communication is just a small component of communication. In the 21st century, businesses have access to a number of methods of communication which can be used with internal and also with external audiences. The main methods of communication which the businesses can use include the traditional business meetings as well as print to the videoconferencing and social media of the new age. Several tools can be utilized by the businesses for addressing audiences who are in locations which are both near and far. While a lot of attention is received by the methods of effective communication that are new, the value along with the relevance of the traditional methods of communication still exists. Thus, several different methods of communication exists and the determination of the method that is right for the organisation is a vital decision that needs to be taken.
Verbal Communication
Verbal communication involves the usage of words while the delivery of the intended message is being made. It can be one-on-one, over the phone or in group settings, etc. it is a methods of effective communication that is personal and has to be used more than only phone calls and emails whenever possible. The medium of the message in case of verbal communication is oral. Simple speaking is verbal communication. Seeing the person with whom face-to-face communication is taking place helps in gauging the response of that person by understanding their body language and also assists in active participation of the dialogue. Thus, written as well as oral communication are the two main types of verbal communication.
Storytelling
Storytelling is a form of verbal communication that is effective. A vital organisational function is served by it as it helps in the construction of common meanings for the individuals in the organisation. Stories assist in clarifying key values and also help in demonstrating the way thing are done in an organisation. The tone, strength and frequency of the story have a relation with higher organisational commitment. The quality of stories that are told by the entrepreneurs is related to the capability of securing capital for their organisations. Stories can help in serving to reinforce as well as perpetuate the culture of an organisation.
Face-to-Face Communication
This is usually preferred methods of communication although it is not realistic all the time, especially in organisations that are based in several locations around the globe. However, tools like videoconferencing make approximate face-to-face communication possible and help even the large organisations in creating personal connections between the management and the staff.
Meetings
Meetings are common in almost all the business settings and now it has become possible to augment them via use of the tools of technology which allow the participants in the remote locations to participate in the discussions, although they are not present physically on the meeting site.
While using verbal communication, the person needs to be aware of his tone of voice, inflection as well as speed. Use of sarcasm and angry tones should be avoided otherwise the person with whom you are communicating will go on the defensive. While speaking to your team or to a group of people, you should ensure that you speak loudly as well as clearly so that everyone is able to understand what you are saying. Use of the microphone should be made if a group in is being addressed in a large room. Verbal communication is best used when something has to be discussed in detail or when someone has to be complimented or reprimanded. Verbal communication makes the conveying of thoughts faster and easier and is the most successful methods of communication. However, it makes up just 7% of all the human communication.
Modes of communication
Written communication
Letters
PowerPoint
Instant messaging
Text messaging
Social media (Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter)
Blogs
Other forms of online communication (Flickr, Pinterest, YouTube, Wikis, etc)
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https://www.educba.com/different-methods-of-communication/
Written communication cannot be avoided in the workplace. It is present everywhere and consists of traditional paper and pen documents and letters, text chats, emails, typed electronic documents, reports, SMS and anything else that might be conveyed by the use of written symbols like language which includes any documents that are a part of the day to day business life. Such methods of communication is indispensable for any formal business communication and also for the issue of legal instructions.
The methods of communication that mainly make use of written communication consist of formal business proposals, press releases, memos, contracts, brochures, handbooks and the like. How effective the written communication is will depend on the style of writing, vocabulary, grammar along with clarity. Written communication is most suitable in cases that require detailed instructions, when something has to be documented or in situations where the person is too far away to speak in person or over the phone. Some of the written methods of communication include –
Social Media
Tools of the social media such as Facebook can be used in an effective way in the organisations for the purpose of communicating between locations, divisions, departments and employees. Certain tools such as Yammer are specifically designed for creating social media networks in the confines of a particular domain of business.
The email communication in organisations has become very common and is a highly essential tool for sharing of information with one, hundreds as well as thousands of employees. It is usually a significant component of the communication plan and even though it may not be a replacement for face-to-face or other methods of communication, it is easily accessible and inexpensive.
The growth of email since its inception nearly 50 years ago has been spectacular, and its use is so pervasive it’s hard to imagine life without it. Recent research found there are more than 3.8 billion active email accounts worldwide (half the world’s population),and corporate employees average 105 emails each day.
Written communication includes memos, letters, email, instant messaging, organisational newsletters and any other method that conveys written words or symbols.
With all the technology available, why would anyone write, print and send a letter? Of all the forms of written communication, letter writing is the oldest—and the most enduring. We have scrolls of writing from thousands of years ago, and we still put ink on paper when we want to create a lasting record. Research indicates that when we write by hand, the content is much more memorable to us than when we type.
PowerPoint
PowerPoint and other slide formats, such as Prezi, can be an excellent mode of communication because slide-generating software combines words with visual elements to engage the reader and help explain complex ideas. PowerPoint is often used in conjunction with oral presentations, but its appeal is so intuitive that it can serve as a primary mode of communication. It’s not without its detractors, however, who argue that it’s too impersonal, disengaging and frequently misused.
Exhibit 10.5
Allocation of time at work for managers and professionals
Source: Based on M. Chui et al., ‘The social economy: unlocking value and productivity through social technologies’, McKinsey & Company, July 2012, www.mckinsey.com/insights/high_tech_telecoms_internet/the_social_economy.
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Exhibit 10.5 shows the time managers and professionals spend daily on various tasks. Many managers report that they spend too much time on email. Email messages can be quickly written, edited, sent and stored. They can be distributed to one person or thousands although some companies (such as data company Nielsen) have banned the ‘reply to all’ feature. Email is not without cost, however. In fact, according to research by global consultancy firm CIPHR, the average worker spends 13 hours a week on emails—that’s almost 150 000 emails dealt with each minute. A recent study also indicated that people focus longer on tasks and are less stressed when they’re cut off from checking email, although other research suggests that email is only stressful for employees when their workload is already heavy.
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Modes of communication
Non-verbal communication
Body movements
The intonations of emphasis we give to words
Facial expressions
Physical distance between the sender and the receiver
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https://www.educba.com/different-methods-of-communication/
Communication by sending as well as receiving wordless messages is a part of nonverbal communication. Such messages are a vital part of any communication and generally provide reinforcement to verbal communication. However, they can also convey their own feelings and thoughts.
Physical Nonverbal Communication
A major role is played by the nonverbal communication in the way you communicate with other people. It cannot be relied as a sole means of communication except in cases where the person makes use of sign language. Physical Nonverbal Communication or the body language consists of body posture, facial expressions, eye contact, gestures like a pointed finger, wave and the like, touch, tone of voice, overall movements of the body and others.
You need to be aware of the nonverbal communication. Your movements, eye contact and gestures, the way you sit and stand all help in conveying a message to the person with whom you are communicating. Gestures should be used appropriately or the hands should be left at your sides. You should avoid fidgeting as it is distracting and the arms should not be crossed as it sends a signal of being closed off or angry. You should always look in the eyes of the person to whom you are speaking and never stare or roll your eyes when they are talking.
The most common among all the nonverbal communication are the facial expressions. For example, a frown or a smile conveys emotions that are distinct and are difficult to express by means of verbal communication. Research has shown that nonverbal cues or body language along with facial expressions, tone of voice and body stance account for almost 55% of all the communication that takes place. As per the research, only 7% of the message’s comprehension by the receiver is based on the actual words of the sender, 38% is on the basis of para language (the volume, tone and pace of speech) while 55% is on the basis of nonverbal cues (body language).
Research has also revealed that nonverbal cues may also have an effect on whether you are successful in getting a job offer. Judges who examine the videotapes of the applicants were able to make assessments of their social skills even when the sound was off. They had a look at the gesturing rate, time that was spent on talking and the dress formality for determining the candidates who would be most successful for the job socially. Thus, it is essential to consider the way one appears in the business and also what one says. Our emotions are conveyed by our facial muscles. A silent message can be sent without uttering a word. A change in our emotional state is visible in the change of our facial expression.
For example, if we focus on being confident prior to an interview, the confidence will be conveyed to the interviewer by our face. Putting up a smile even when feeling stressed can reduce the stress levels of the body.
Exhibit 10.6
Intonations: it’s the way you say it!
Source: Based on M. Kiely, ‘When “no” means “yes”’, Marketing, October 1993, pp. 7-9. Reproduced in A. Huczynski and D. Buchanan, Organizational Behavior (4th edn), Essex, U K: Pearson Education, 2001, p. 194.
Try this yourself. Can you see/hear the difference?
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Every time we deliver a verbal message, we also impart a non-verbal message. Sometimes the non-verbal component may stand alone as a powerful message of our business communication. So, no discussion of communication would be complete without consideration of non-verbal communication, which includes body movements, the intonations or emphasis we give to words, facial expressions and the physical distance between the sender and the receiver.
We could argue that every body movement has meaning, and no movement is accidental (although some are unconscious). We act out our state of being with non-verbal body language. We can smile to project trustworthiness, uncross our arms to appear approachable and stand to signal authority. Body language can convey status, level of engagement and emotional state. Body language adds to, and often complicates, verbal communication. A body position or movement can communicate something of the emotion behind a message, but when it is linked with spoken language, it gives fuller meaning to a sender’s message. Studies indicate that people read much more about other people’s attitudes and emotions from their non-verbal cues than from their words. If the non-verbal cues conflict with the speaker’s verbal message, the non-verbal cues are sometimes more likely to be believed by the listener.
If you read the minutes of a meeting, you wouldn’t grasp the impact of what was said at the meeting in the same way as if you had been there or could see the meeting on video. There may be a range of reasons for this, including that the minutes are a record of events, as perceived and interpreted by the minute writer and endorsed by the meeting’s chair. However, there’s also no record of non-verbal communication. The emphasis given to words or phrases is missing. Exhibit 10.6 illustrates how intonations can change the meaning of a message. Facial expressions also convey meaning. Facial expressions, along with intonations, can show arrogance, aggressiveness, fear, shyness and other characteristics.
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Choice of communication method
Channel richness
The amount of information that can be transmitted during a communication episode
Choosing communication methods
Depends on whether the message is routine or non-routine
Routine – straightforward, minimal ambiguity – channels low in richness
Non-routine – select rich channels
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https://courses.lumenlearning.com/wm-principlesofmanagement/chapter/channels-of-business-communication/
Business communication is held to a higher standard than everyday communication. The consequences of misunderstandings are usually higher and the chances to recognize and correct a mistake are lower. The barriers to communication and technique for improving communication are the same regardless of where the conversation takes place.
Business Communication Channels
There’s a well-known expression that goes “It’s not what you say, it’s how you say it.” It’s really both.
A communication channel is the medium, mean, manner or method through which a message is sent to its intended receiver. The basic channels are written (hard copy print or digital formats), oral or spoken, and electronic and multimedia. Within those channels, business communications can be formal, informal, or unofficial. Finally, communications can be rich or lean.
Channel richness refers to the amount and immediacy of information that can be transmitted. Face-to-face communication is very high in richness because it allows information to be transmitted with immediate feedback. A tweet is very low in richness because it allows only 140 characters to be transmitted with no feedback. On the other hand, face-to-face communication is limited to one person communicating with a few other people in close proximity, whereas a tweet can go out to thousands of followers around the world. The following diagram shows the richness of different types of communication.
Which Channel Is Best?
Quite simply, the best channel is the one that most effectively delivers the message so that it is understood as the sender intended. Nuanced or emotionally charged messages require a rich medium; simple, routine messages don’t need the personal touch. If you want to advise your department that at 2 p.m. you want to have a five-minute stand-up meeting in the hallway outside of your office to congratulate them on meeting a goal, then send a quick e-mail. You really don’t want people to reply with questions. E-mail is a lean medium but works very well when the content of the message is neither complex nor emotionally charged. On the other hand, a telephone call is a more appropriate channel to apologize for having to cancel a lunch date. The speaker can hear the sincerity in your voice and can express their disappointment or offer to reschedule.
A good rule of thumb is the more emotional the context of the message, the richer the medium should be to deliver the message. But remember—even face-to-face business meetings can be followed up with a written note to ensure that both parties are truly on the same page. If a meeting results in assignments or agreements, then a written note will be useful documentation for future reference.
Channel richness - The amount of information that can be transmitted during a communication episode.
Choosing communication methods
The choice of channel depends on whether the message is routine or non-routine. Routine messages tend to be straightforward and have minimal ambiguity; channels low in richness can carry them efficiently. Non-routine communications are likely to be complicated and have the potential for misunderstanding; managers can communicate them effectively only by selecting rich channels.
Channel richness is a helpful framework for choosing your mode of communication. It isn’t always easy to know when to choose oral rather than written communication, for instance, although experts say oral communication is key to success.
Whenever you need to gauge the receiver’s receptivity, oral communication is usually the better choice. The marketing plan for a new product, for instance, may need to be worked out with clients in person so that you can see their reactions to each idea you’re proposing. Also consider the receiver’s preferred mode of communication; some individuals focus on content better over the phone than in meetings. The pace of your work environment matters, too. A fast-paced workplace may thrive on pop-by meetings, while a deadline-heavy team project may progress faster with scheduled videoconferences.
Much of what we communicate face-to-face is in the delivery, so also consider your speaking skills when choosing your communication method. Research indicates that the sound of your voice is twice as important as what you’re saying. A good speaking voice—clear, moderated—can assist your career, while loud, questioning, irritating, immature, falsetto, breathy or monotone voices can hinder you.
Exhibit 10.7
Information richness of communication channels
Source: Reproduced from R. L. Daft and R. A. Noe, Organizational Behavior, Fort Worth, T X: Harcourt, 2001, p. 311.
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Channels differ in their capacity to convey information. Some are rich in that they can handle multiple cues simultaneously, facilitate rapid feedback and be very personal. Others are lean in that they score low on these factors. As Exhibit 10.7 illustrates, face-to-face conversation scores highest in channel richness because it transmits the most information per communication episode: multiple information cues (words, postures, facial expressions, gestures, intonations), immediate feedback (both verbal and non-verbal) and the personal touch of ‘being there’. Impersonal written media, such as formal reports and bulletins, rate lowest in richness.
Exhibit 10.7 Information richness of communication channels - A continuum shows the information richness of communication channels.
Written communication is generally the most reliable mode for complex and lengthy communications, and it can be the most efficient method for short messages as well, such as when a two-sentence text can take the place of a 10-minute phone call.
Choose written communication when you want the information to be tangible and verifiable and ‘on the record’. People are usually forced to think more thoroughly about what they want to convey in a written message than in a spoken one, so your written communications should also be well thought out, logical and clear. But be aware that, as with oral communication, your delivery is just as important as the content.
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Choice of communication method
Issues to consider before using email:
Risk of misinterpreting the message
Fallout from negative messages (eg dismiss employee)
Time-consuming nature – sort, read, write, file
Limited expression of emotion – praise seen as emotionally neutral
Privacy concerns – “don’t write anything you wouldn’t want made public”
Professionalism – avoid jargon, slang
Information security
Personal data
Security in cloud computing
Monitor employee internet use, email records, video surveillance, record phone conversations – invasive to employees
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Information security
Security is a huge concern for nearly all organisations with private or proprietary information about clients, customers and employees. Organisations worry about the security of the electronic information they seek to protect, such as hospital patient data, the physical information they still keep in file cabinets and the information they entrust their employees with knowing, such as Apple’s need-to-know-only information sharing. The recent adoption of cloud-based electronic data storage has brought a new level of worry and, given 51% of managers in a recent survey stated that they were considering cloud-based human resources software, its business use will likely increase. However, fears about cloud computing continue in the light of multiple cyber-security breaches. Australia introduced a notifiable breaches scheme in early 2018 and within the first 6 months there were 487 reported breaches, including the widely publicised breaches at the Australian Government’s My Health Record, Facebook, Amazon and the Commonwealth Bank of Australia.
As we’ve seen, most companies actively monitor employee Internet use and email records, and some even use video surveillance and record phone conversations. However, practices such as these can seem invasive to employees. An organisation can relieve employee concerns by engaging them in the creation of information-security policies and giving them some control over how their personal information is used.
https://fsd.servicemax.com/2018/01/09/8-reasons-email-is-ineffective-in-workplace/
Why Email is Ineffective for Workplace Communication
Does your company’s internal communication happen through email? Are employees relying on email to communicate while collaborating or troubleshooting a problem? Are answers to important questions buried under long threads? Or worse under hundreds of ‘reply all” messages? If you answered yes to any of these, you probably already know that email is ineffective for a lot of the day to day communication we do at work.
While it is a great tool for certain types of communication, such as reaching out to third-party vendors or contacting customers, using it as the default tool for getting work done is not ideal. The following eight points reveal why email is ineffective for productivity as well as a big source of frustration and an exclusionary communication method for deskless employees.
1. Email Overload
In 2017, over 269 billion emails were sent/received each day. The average worker will receive 122 of those emails each day, of which only 38 percent will contain important, relevant information. When people are bombarded with all of this superfluous information, they simply bulk delete or skim through, making it easy to miss important information that is buried.
2. Wasted Time
The McKinsey Global Institute found that the average employee spends 13 hours a week checking, reading and responding to emails— eating up 28 percent of the work week. With less than half of emails deserving attention and many going unread, this is a big chunk of wasted time. On top of this, simply getting back to work after answering an email takes an average of 64 seconds. This decreases productivity when employees are checking their emails 36 times per hour. A customer-facing employee simply cannot check email at that rate as it would not only impact productivity but also customer satisfaction.
3. Not Made for Collaboration
Email was not designed to be a collaboration tool, yet so many people use it that way. From managing projects to troubleshooting a problem, neverending email threads become inefficient, confusing, and bad for productivity. With many collaboration and project management products now available, email should never be the place you turn in order to stay on top of tasks and projects.
Persuasive communications
Automatic and controlled processing
Automatic processing – a relatively superficial consideration of evidence and information
Controlled processing – detailed consideration of evidence, information relying on facts, figures and logic
What makes one engage in automatic or controlled processing?
Interest level
Prior knowledge
Personality
Message characteristics (eg automatic for TV advertisements, deliberate processing for long articles)
Match persuasive message to the type of processing your audience is likely to use
EXAMPLES
Automatic processing – buy a can of soda
Controlled processing – find a place to live
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Persuasive communications
Automatic and controlled processing
To understand the process of communication, it’s useful to consider two relatively different ways that we process information.66 Think about the last time you bought a can of soft drink. Did you carefully research brands and engage in your own taste test to see which types you actually prefer? Or did you reach for the can that had the most appealing advertising images? If we’re honest, we’ll admit glitzy ads and catchy slogans do indeed have an influence on our choices as consumers. Automatic processing takes little time and effort, so it makes sense to use it for processing persuasive messages related to topics we don’t care much about. The disadvantage is that it lets us be easily fooled by a variety of tricks, such as a catchy jingle or glamorous photograph.
Automatic processing - A relatively superficial consideration of evidence and information making use of heuristics.
Now consider the last time you chose a place to live. For this more important decision, you probably did some independent research with experts who know something about the area, gathered information about prices from a variety of sources and considered the costs and benefits of renting versus buying. Here, you’re relying on more effortful controlled processing, a detailed consideration of evidence and information relying on facts, figures and logic. Controlled processing requires effort and energy, but it’s harder to fool someone who has taken the time and effort to engage in it.
Controlled processing - A detailed consideration of evidence and information relying on facts, figures and logic.
So what makes someone engage in either automatic or controlled processing? There are a few rules of thumb for determining what types of processing an audience will use.
Interest level
One of the best predictors of whether people will use an automatic or a controlled process for reacting to a persuasive message is their level of interest in the message. Interest levels reflect the impact a decision is going to have on your life. When people are very interested in the outcome of a decision, they’re more likely to process information carefully. That’s probably why people look for so much more information when deciding about something important (such as where to live) rather than something relatively unimportant (such as which soft drink to buy).
Prior knowledge
People who are very well informed about a subject are also more likely to use controlled processing strategies. They have already thought through various arguments for or against a specific course of action; therefore they won’t readily change their position unless very good, thoughtful reasons are provided. On the other hand, people who are poorly informed about a topic can change their minds more readily, even in the face of fairly superficial arguments presented without a great deal of evidence. In other words, a better-informed audience is likely to be much harder to persuade.
Personality
Are you the type of person who always likes to read at least five reviews of a movie before deciding whether to see it? Do you carefully consider several movies
Barriers to effective communication
Filtering where the sender manipulate information so it will be seen more favorably by the receiver
Selective perception base on one’s needs, motivation experience, background or personal characteristics
Information overload where information flow exceeds one’s processing capacity
Emotions - negative moods scrutinize message in more details, positive moods accept at face value
Language – words mean different things to different people
Silence – absence of information
Communication apprehension – social anxiety: undue tension & anxiety about oral and/or written communication
Lying – outright misrepresentation of information
jcu.edu.au
https://www.skillsyouneed.com/ips/barriers-communication.html
here are many reasons why interpersonal communications may fail. In many communications, the message (what is said) may not be received exactly the way the sender intended. It is, therefore, important that the communicator seeks feedback to check that their message is clearly understood.
The skills of Active Listening, Clarification and Reflection may help but the skilled communicator also needs to be aware of the barriers to effective communication and how to avoid or overcome them.
There are many barriers to communication and these may occur at any stage in the communication process. Barriers may lead to your message becoming distorted and you therefore risk wasting both time and/or money by causing confusion and misunderstanding.
Effective communication involves overcoming these barriers and conveying a clear and concise message.
Common Barriers to Effective Communication:
The use of jargon. Over-complicated, unfamiliar and/or technical terms.
Emotional barriers and taboos. Some people may find it difficult to express their emotions and some topics may be completely 'off-limits' or taboo. Taboo or difficult topics may include, but are not limited to, politics, religion, disabilities (mental and physical), sexuality and sex, racism and any opinion that may be seen as unpopular.
Lack of attention, interest, distractions, or irrelevance to the receiver. (See our page Barriers to Effective Listening for more information).
Differences in perception and viewpoint.
Physical disabilities such as hearing problems or speech difficulties.
Physical barriers to non-verbal communication. Not being able to see the non-verbal cues, gestures, posture and general body language can make communication less effective. Phone calls, text messages and other communication methods that rely on technology are often less effective than face-to-face communication.
Language differences and the difficulty in understanding unfamiliar accents.
Expectations and prejudices which may lead to false assumptions or stereotyping. People often hear what they expect to hear rather than what is actually said and jump to incorrect conclusions. Our page The Ladder of Inference explains this in more detail.
Cultural differences. The norms of social interaction vary greatly in different cultures, as do the way in which emotions are expressed. For example, the concept of personal space varies between cultures and between different social settings. A skilled communicator must be aware of these barriers and try to reduce their impact by continually checking understanding and by offering appropriate feedback.
Cultural factors
Cultural barriers
Semantics - words mean different things to different people from different national cultures. Some words don’t translate
Word connotations – words imply different things in different language eg “yes”
Tone differences
Differences in tolerance for conflict and methods for resolving conflicts
Cultural context
High-context cultures, low-context culture
jcu.edu.au
https://www.businesstopia.net/communication/cultural-barriers-communication
Causes of Cultural Barriers
There are billions of people in the world who do not understand English or cannot communicate in English properly. Not speaking properly can cause various misunderstandings and be a barrier to communication.
Different cultures have developed their own language as a part of their heritage. People are comfortable communicating in their own language whereas have to work hard to learn new languages. For example, separation of East and West Germany for 40 years caused the language to differ a lot. The dialect became very different as people of East Germany had an influence of Russian language whereas West Germany had influence of English. They had a barrier in communicating with each other for decades.
Even when people try to express in their own language, many misunderstandings arise. It becomes more profound in people speaking different languages.
Non-verbal communication cannot be relied upon in communication between people from different cultures as that is also different like language. Signs, symbols and gestures varies in different cultures.
For example, the sign “thumbs up” is taken as a sign of approval and wishing luck in most of the cultures but is taken as an insult in Bangladesh. Similarly, the “V” hand gesture with palm faced outside or inside means victory and peace in US, but back of hand facing someone showing the sign is taken as insulting in many cultures.
The culture sets some meanings of signs like the ones mentioned above, which might not be the same in other culture.
Stereotypes and Prejudices
Stereotyping is the process of creating a picture of a whole culture, overgeneralizing all people belonging to the same culture as having similar characteristics and categorizing people accordingly. It is a belief about a certain group and is mostly negative.
Stereotyping can be done on the basis of many things like nationality, gender, race, religion, ethnicity, age, etc. For example, Asian students are stereotyped to be good at Math which is a positive stereotype. But, there is also cultural stereotype of all people following a particular religion as being violent like Islam and is negative stereotyping.
Negative stereotyping creates prejudices as it provokes judgmental attitudes. People look at those cultures as evil and treat the people following the religion wickedly. Media is a tool of mass communication which promotes stereotypes and prejudices and creates more communication barriers.
Behavior and Beliefs
Cultural differences causes behavior and personality differences like body language, thinking, communication, manners, norms, etc. which leads to miscommunication. For example, in some cultures eye contact is important whereas in some it is rude and disrespectful. Culture also sets a specific norms which dictates behavior as they have guidelines for accepted behavior. It explains what is right and wrong. Every action is influenced by culture like ambitions, careers, interests, values, etc. Beliefs are also another cause for cultural barrier.
For instance, mostly, people who believe in god can cope with their lows of life easily than atheists but atheists are more hardworking at all times which relates to their behavior and communication.
Cite this article as: businesstopia, "Cultural Barriers to Communication," in Businesstopia, January 6, 2018, https://www.businesstopia.net/communication/cultural-barriers-communication.
Appropriate amount of emotion that must be displayed is also different in different cultures. Roles are defined by culture. Good communication only occurs between people with different cultures if both accept their differences with open mind.
Ethnocentrism
Ethnocentrism is the process of dividing cultures as “us” and “them”.
The people of someone’s own culture are categorized as in-group and the other culture is out-group. There is always greater preference to in-group. There is an illusion of out-group as evil and inferior. This evaluation is mostly negative.
If the culture is similar to us, then it is good and if is dissimilar, it is bad. Other’s culture is evaluated and assessed with the standard being their own culture. Ethnocentrism affects the understanding of message, and encourages hostility. For example, the books in schools use reference of their own culture to describe other cultures by either showing common things or differences.
Religion
Similar to ethnocentrism and stereotyping, religion also disrupts communication as it creates a specific image of people who follow other religions. People find it difficult to talk to people who follow different religions. Religious views influence how people think about others. It creates differences in opinions.
For example, in Pakistan, the Christians have to speak up for their rights as the majority is of Islam and the Christians are discriminated. There is also a lack of communication between these religious groups.
Overcoming cultural barriers
There are other cultural barriers like frames of reference, political opinions, priorities of life, age, etc. Cross cultural communication is not only a barrier but also an opportunity for creativity, new perspectives, and openness to new ideas and unity in the world.
To make communication effective, the causes of cultural communication barriers must be eliminated as much as possible. Cross cultural understanding must be increased as it decreases communication barrier caused by culture difference.
Exhibit 10.8
High-context versus low-context cultures
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Cultures tend to differ in the degree to which context influences the meaning that individuals take from communication.86 In high-context cultures, such as China, Korea, Japan and Vietnam, people rely heavily on non-verbal and subtle situational cues in communicating with others, and a person’s official status, place in society and reputation carry considerable weight. What is not said may be more significant than what is said. In contrast, people from Europe and Australia reflect low-context cultures. They rely essentially on spoken and written words to convey meaning; body language and formal titles are secondary (see Exhibit 10.8).
High-context cultures - Cultures that rely heavily on non-verbal and subtle situational cues in communication.
Low-context cultures - Cultures that rely heavily on words to convey meaning in communication.
What do these contextual differences mean in terms of communication? Actually, quite a lot. Communication in high-context cultures implies considerably more trust by both parties. What may appear to be casual and insignificant conversation in fact reflects the desire to build a relationship and create trust. Oral agreements imply strong commitments in high-context cultures. And who you are—your age, seniority, rank in the organisation—is highly valued and heavily influences your credibility. Managers tend to ‘make suggestions’ rather than give orders.
But in low-context cultures, enforceable contracts tend to be in writing, precisely worded and highly legalistic. Similarly, low-context cultures value directness. Managers are expected to be explicit and precise in conveying intended meaning.
22
Cultural factors
A cultural guide
Know yourself
Foster a climate of mutual respect, fairness, and democracy
Learn the cultural context of each person
When in doubt, listen
State facts, not your interpretation
Consider the other person’s viewpoint
Proactively maintain the identity of the group, common goals, mutual respect.
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A cultural guide
There’s much to be gained from business intercultural communications. It’s safe to assume that every single one of us has a different viewpoint that’s culturally shaped. Because we do have differences, we have an opportunity to reach the most creative solutions possible with the help of others if we communicate effectively.
According to Fred Casmir, a leading expert in intercultural communication research, we often don’t communicate well with people outside of our culture because we tend to generalise from only knowing their cultural origin. This can be insensitive and potentially disastrous, especially when we make assumptions based on observable characteristics. Many of us have a richly varied ethnic background and would be offended if someone addressed us according to what culture our physical features might favour, for instance. Also, attempts to be culturally sensitive to another person are often based on stereotypes propagated by media. These stereotypes usually don’t have a correct or current relevance.
Casmir noted that because there are far too many cultures for anyone to understand completely, and individuals interpret their own cultures differently, intercultural communication should be based on sensitivity and pursuit of common goals. He found the ideal condition is an ad hoc ‘third culture’ that a group can form when they seek to incorporate aspects of each member’s cultural communication preferences. The norms this subculture establishes through appreciating individual differences create a common ground for effective communication. Intercultural groups that communicate effectively can be highly productive and innovative. Casmir and other experts offer the following suggestions to reduce misinterpretations when communicating with people from a different culture:
Know yourself. Recognising your own cultural identity and biases is critical to understanding the unique viewpoint of other people.
Foster a climate of mutual respect, fairness and democracy. Clearly establish an environment of equality and mutual concern. This will be your ‘third culture’ context for effective intercultural communication that transcends each person’s cultural norms.
Learn the cultural context of each person. You may find more similarities to or differences from your own frame of reference than you might expect. Be careful not to categorise them by culture of origin, however.
When in doubt, listen. If you speak your opinions too early, you may be more likely to offend the other person. You’ll also want to listen first to better understand the other person’s intercultural language fluency and familiarity with your culture.
State facts, not your interpretation. Interpreting or evaluating what someone has said or done draws more on your own culture and background than on the observed situation. If you state only facts, you’ll have the opportunity to benefit from the other person’s interpretation. Delay judgement until you’ve had sufficient time to observe and interpret the situation from the differing perspectives of all concerned.
Consider the other person’s viewpoint. Before sending a message, put yourself in the recipient’s shoes. What are their values, experiences and frames of reference? What do you know about their education, upbringing and background that can give you added insight? Try to see the people in the group as they really are first, and take a collaborative problem-solving approach whenever potential conflicts arise.
Proactively maintain the identity of the group. Like any culture, the establishment of a common-ground ‘third culture’ for effective intercultural communication takes time and nurturing. Remind members of the group of your common goals, mutual respect and the need to adapt to individual communication preferences.
Summary
The greater the clarity in communication, the better the employee outcomes.
Careful attention to the methods and modes for each communication ensures that the message is interpreted properly by the receiver.
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You’ve probably discovered the link between communication and employee productivity, engagement and satisfaction in this chapter: the greater the clarity, the better the employee outcomes. Distortions, ambiguities and incongruities between verbal and non-verbal messages all increase uncertainty and reduce effectiveness. Careful attention to the methods and modes for each communication ensures that the message is interpreted properly by the receiver.
Implications for managers
Remember that your communication mode will partly determine your communication effectiveness.
Obtain feedback from your employees to make certain your messages—however they are communicated—are understood.
Remember that written communication creates more misunderstandings than oral communication; communicate with employees through in-person meetings when possible.
Make sure you use communication strategies appropriate to your audience and the type of message you’re sending.
Keep in mind communication barriers such as culture and an individual’s capacity and psychology
24
Topic 11
Leadership
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25
Leadership is the process, whereby a leader enlists others to help achieve a change, vision, or goal. Leadership is primarily built on three important dimensions.
Traits and behaviors of the leader
Context, situation, or contingences
Those being led
People often become attracted to leaders because they use peculiar words, gestures or they may take unconventional stances on issues. Some researchers argue that charismatic leaders gain influence over followers due to the unconventional behaviours they display and the compelling ideas they communicate.
Leadership is a matter of mobilizing those who report to you. Yet it is important to not see this as purely a downward focus, but to also see the importance of leading up. Leading up is not the same as managing up. Leading up is a different calling, one that places enterprise purpose above parochial interest. Leading up is a two-pronged affair, requiring leaders in two opposed directions at the same time. It is also important to note leading up is not always invited or welcomed. Whether a community cause or a company leadership means mustering those below for a higher purpose or at least that is a common definition of what it means to lead other people.
Leadership plays a central role in understanding group behaviour because it’s the leader who usually directs us towards organizational goals. Knowing what makes a good leader is valuable in improving group performance. Using the BIG 5 personality framework show strong and consistent relationships between leadership and extraversion, conscientiousness and openness to experience.
Learning Objectives
Assess the central tenets and main limitations of behavioural theories
Assess contingency theories of leadership by their level of support
Analyse the contemporary theories of leadership and their relationship to foundational theories
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Five Keys to Leadership
As a leader you are involved in a balancing act, there are five keys to successful leadership.
1. Knowing and showing yourself
2. Taking personal risks
3, Reading and rewriting the context
4. Managing social distance
5. Communicating with care
Leadership is personal. It is unlikely that you will be able to inspire, arouse, excite, or motivate people unless you show then who you are, what you stand for, and what you can and cannot do.
Showing yourself as a leader always involves risks, and the risks are personal. Leaders must always be willing to commit themselves – knowing that they can be undone
Effective leaders understand that there are no universal, or guaranteed ways of ensuring leadership impact – appraise the ability to rewrite the context
Effective leaders are able to evoke high levels of emotional response, loyalty, and affection
Skilful managers make sure they use the right mode of communication
Leaders versus Managers
Leaders
Organizational flexibility
Helping others, producing change
Communicating and inspiring
Managers
Creating order and efficiency
Establishing plans
Allocating resources
There is a distinct difference between leaders and managers, but it is easy to confuse them. Leadership involves activities such as increasing organizational flexibility, helping others understand the most important things to get done, producing change, communicating, and inspiring. Managing involves creating order and efficiency, establishing plans, and allocating resources. Management is normally associated with a formal position, but leadership can be demonstrated by anyone. More contemporary approaches emphasize facets of a leader that are learned behaviours. Researchers have identified two types of behaviours that are critical to leadership; task focused or interpersonal behaviours related to people.
Introduction
Leadership is the ability to influence a group towards the achievement of a vision or set of goals.
Leaders can emerge from within a group as well as by formal appointment.
Organisations need strong leadership and strong management for optimal effectiveness.
jcu.edu.au
https://www.managementstudyguide.com/role_of_a_leader.htm
The following are the main roles of a leader in an organization :
Required at all levels- Leadership is a function which is important at all levels of management. In the top level, it is important for getting co-operation in formulation of plans and policies. In the middle and lower level, it is required for interpretation and execution of plans and programmes framed by the top management. Leadership can be exercised through guidance and counseling of the subordinates at the time of execution of plans.
Representative of the organization- A leader, i.e., a manager is said to be the representative of the enterprise. He has to represent the concern at seminars, conferences, general meetings, etc. His role is to communicate the rationale of the enterprise to outside public. He is also representative of the own department which he leads.
Integrates and reconciles the personal goals with organizational goals- A leader through leadership traits helps in reconciling/ integrating the personal goals of the employees with the organizational goals. He is trying to co-ordinate the efforts of people towards a common purpose and thereby achieves objectives. This can be done only if he can influence and get willing co-operation and urge to accomplish the objectives.
He solicits support- A leader is a manager and besides that he is a person who entertains and invites support and co-operation of subordinates. This he can do by his personality, intelligence, maturity and experience which can provide him positive result. In this regard, a leader has to invite suggestions and if possible implement them into plans and programmes of enterprise. This way, he can solicit full support of employees which results in willingness to work and thereby effectiveness in running of a concern.
As a friend, philosopher and guide- A leader must possess the three dimensional traits in him. He can be a friend by sharing the feelings, opinions and desires with the employees. He can be a philosopher by utilizing his intelligence and experience and thereby guiding the employees as and when time requires. He can be a guide by supervising and communicating the employees the plans and policies of top management and secure their co-operation to achieve the goals of a concern. At times he can also play the role of a counselor by counseling and a problem-solving approach. He can listen to the problems of the employees and try to solve them.
Trait theories
Focus on personal qualities and characteristics.
Most of the dozens of traits in various leadership reviews fit under one of the Big Five.
Extraversion is the most predictive trait of how leaders emerge.
Conscientiousness and openness to experience show strong relationships to leadership.
Emotional intelligence (E I) is critical to effective leadership.
Traits can predict leadership but does not actually distinguish effective and ineffective leaders.
Name a leader you admire, what traits does he/she exhibit?
Type your answer in Chat
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Traits can predict leadership – the BIG 5 framework is an example of trait measurement. Traits a distinguishing quality or characteristic, typically one belonging to a person. Traits do a better job of predicting the emergence of leaders and the appearance of leadership than actually distinguishing between effective and ineffective leaders. The fact that an individual exhibits the traits and others consider that person to be a leader does not necessarily mean that the leader is successful at getting his or her group to achieve goals.
https://www.managementstudyguide.com/trait-theory-of-leadership.htm
The trait model of leadership is based on the characteristics of many leaders - both successful and unsuccessful - and is used to predict leadership effectiveness. The resulting lists of traits are then compared to those of potential leaders to assess their likelihood of success or failure.
Scholars taking the trait approach attempted to identify physiological (appearance, height, and weight), demographic (age, education and socioeconomic background), personality, self-confidence, and aggressiveness), intellective (intelligence, decisiveness, judgment, and knowledge), task-related (achievement drive, initiative, and persistence), and social characteristics (sociability and cooperativeness) with leader emergence and leader effectiveness.
Successful leaders definitely have interests, abilities, and personality traits that are different from those of the less effective leaders. Through many researches conducted in the last three decades of the 20th century, a set of core traits of successful leaders have been identified. These traits are not responsible solely to identify whether a person will be a successful leader or not, but they are essentially seen as preconditions that endow people with leadership potential.
Behavioural theories
Theories proposing that specific behaviours differentiate leaders from non-leaders.
Two dimensions account for most leadership behaviour
Initiating structure: the extent to which a leader is likely to define and structure theirs and subordinate roles. Attempt to organise work, work relationships and goals.
Consideration: the extent to which a leader have job relationship characterised by mutual trust, respect & regard for feelings.
Two behavioural dimensions:
Employee-oriented leaders
Production-oriented leaders
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Blake and Mouton’s leadership grid shows how leaders vary in their level of concern for either people or task. The leadership grid describes five different styles of leadership based on the degree to which a leader shows concern for people or a task. The Blake Mouton Managerial Grid is based on two behavioural dimensions:
Concern for People: this is the degree to which a leader considers team members' needs, interests and areas of personal development when deciding how best to accomplish a task.
Concern for Results: this is the degree to which a leader emphasizes concrete objectives, organizational efficiency and high productivity when deciding how best to accomplish a task.
Blake and Mouton defined five leadership styles based on these, as illustrated in the diagram below.
The Leadership Grid® figure from "Leadership Dilemmas – Grid Solutions," by Robert R. Blake and Anne Adams McCanse (formerly the Managerial Grid by Robert R. Blake and Jane S. Mouton). Houston: Gulf Publishing Company, Copyright 1991 by Grid International, Inc.
The Country Club style of leader shows high concern for people but fails to focus on task. The impoverished style of leader shows concern for neither people or task. The Authoritarian style of leader shows high concern for task but little or no concern for people. The team leader style shows concern for people and task. The middle of the road leadership style shows a limited, but by no means high, concern for both people and task. Some researchers suggest that by themselves, leadership traits and behaviours fail to distinguish leaders from non leaders.
https://iedunote.com/ohio-state-leadership-studies
Ohio State Leadership Studies is Behavioral Leadership Theory. A series of studies on leadership was done by Ohio State University in 1945 to identify observable behaviors of leaders instead of focusing on their traits.
They found two critical characteristics of leadership either of which could be high or low or independent of one another.
The research was based on questionnaires to leaders and subordinates of the organizations.
These are known as the Leader Behavior Description Questionnaire (LDBQ) and the Supervisor Behavior Description Questionnaire (SBDQ).
Ultimately, these studies narrowed the description of leader behavior into two dimensions:
Initiating Structure Behaviour: The behavior of leaders who define the leader-subordinate role so that everyone knows what is expected, establish formal lines of communication, and determine how tasks will be performed.
Consideration Behaviour: The behavior of leaders who are concerned for subordinates and attempt to establish a warm, friendly, and supportive climate.
The Ohio State Leadership Studies also showed that initiating structure and consideration are two distinct dimensions and not mutually exclusive.
A low score on one does not require a high score on the other.
Behavioural theories
Summary of trait and behavioural theories
Parts of each theory can help explain aspects of leadership emergence and effectiveness, but identifying the exact relationships is not a simple task.
More research is needed to explore the relationship between the two theories.
jcu.edu.au
http://www.yourarticlelibrary.com/leadership/top-3-leadership-theories-trait-situation-and-behaviour-theories/25805
Top 3 Leadership Theories: Trait, Situation and Behaviour Theories
Theories of Leadership: Trait Theory, Situation Theory and Behaviour Theory!
1. Trait Theory:
The trait theory says that there are certain identifiable qualities or characteristics that are unique to leaders and those good leaders possess such qualities.
The trait theorists have identified a list of qualities that are as follows:
(1) Intelligence:
A leader should be intelligent enough of understanding the context and contents of his position and function. He should be able to grasp the dynamics of environmental variables, both internal as well as external, which affect the activities of the enterprise. He should also have technical competence and sound general knowledge.
(2) Personality:
The term personality here means not only physical appearance but also inner-personality qualities. Such qualities include emotional stability and maturity, self-confidence, decisiveness, strong drive, extrovertedness, achievement orientation, purposefulness, discipline, skill in getting along with others, integrity in character and a tendency to be co-operative.
(3) Other qualities:
In addition, a good business leader should possess qualities such as open mindedness, scientific spirit, social sensitivity, ability to communicate, objectivity and a sense of realism.
2. Situation Theory:
The situation approach does not deny the importance of individual traits in leadership. But it goes further and asserts that leadership pattern is the product of a situation in a particular group and that leadership will be different in different situations.
It was discovered in a research study conducted by Bavelas and Barrett that no individual emerges as leader when all the participants have equal access to the information and that the individual commanding maximum information will sooner or later emerge as a leader.
Thus it is obvious that a leader can so structure the organisation that a favourable situation is created for the subordinates to emerge as a leader. Fred E. Fiedler has developed a contingency model of leadership effectiveness. This approach was the result of the most extensive programme of research about leadership styles and effective group performance carried out by Fred E. Fiedler.
The situational variables considered by this research are:
(1) Leader-member relations:
Leader – member relations are good or bad depending upon leader being liked or not liked by the group being supervised.
(2) Task structure:
Task structure is said to be high or low depending upon the extent to which work to be done and goals to be achieved, are defined clearly and unambiguously.
(3) Power position:
Power position is strong or weak depends upon the amount of reward and coercive and legitimate power possessed. Only the above three factors are considered by this theory. However, there are other situational factors (such as group performance) that also have a bearing upon the pattern of leadership style. Finally, he concluded that production oriented leadership is most efficient either in highly favourable or un-favourable situations from the point of view of the leader.
A task oriented leader is needed when difficult situation is en-counted, things are not clear, work to be carried out and goals to be attained are ambiguous and have to be defined by the leader. In the intermediate situations, a manager who is people- oriented is likely to do better.
3. Behavioural Theory:
The behavioural theory of leadership lays emphasis on this fact that the leadership is the outcome of effective role of behaviour. It relies mainly on the acts of an individual rather than his traits. Under this approach leadership is described as what leaders do instead of what they are. This theory states that a leader to be effective should perform his function in such a way that will enable the group to attain its goals.
Contingency theories
The Fiedler contingency model
Effective leadership is contingent on matching the leader’s style to the right setting.
Identifying leadership style: least preferred co-worker (L P C) questionnaire
Defining the situation (or contingencies)
Leader–member relations: the degree of confidence, trust and respect members have in their leader
Task structure: the degree to which the job are procedurised i.e. structure/unstructured
Position power: influence from position includes power to fire, discipline, promote..
Matching leaders and situations: 8 possible situations
Evaluation
Describe favorably a person you are least able to work with - high LPC score – relationship- oriented
Describe unfavorably a person our least able to work with – low LPC score – task-oriented
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The first comprehensive contingency model for leadership was developed by Fred Fiedler. The Fiedler contingency model proposes that effective group performance depends on the proper match between the leader’s style and the degree to which the situation gives the leader control.
Fiedler contingency model - The theory that effective groups depend on a proper match between a leader’s style of interacting with subordinates and the degree to which the situation gives control and influence to the leader.
Identifying leadership style
Fiedler believes that a key factor in leadership success is the individual’s basic leadership style. He created the least preferred co-worker (LPC) questionnaire to identify that style by measuring whether a person is task-oriented or relationship-oriented. The LPC questionnaire asks respondents to think of all the colleagues they have ever had and describe the one person they least enjoyed working with by rating that person on a scale of 1 to 8 for each of 16 sets of contrasting adjectives (such as pleasant–unpleasant, efficient–inefficient, open–guarded, supportive–hostile). If you describe the person you are least able to work with in favourable terms (a high LPC score), Fiedler would label you relationship-oriented. In contrast, if you see your least-preferred colleague in relatively unfavourable terms (a low LPC score), you are primarily interested in productivity and are task-oriented. About 16% of respondents score in the middle range 20 and fall outside the theory’s predictions. The discussion that follows relates to the 84% who score in either the high or the low range of the LPC questionnaire.
Least preferred co-worker (LPC) questionnaire - An instrument that purports to measure whether a person is task- or relationship-oriented.
Fiedler assumes that an individual’s leadership style is an internal trait and relatively stable or permanent in nature. This means that if a situation requires a task-oriented leader and the person in the leadership position is relationship-oriented, either the situation has to be modified or the leader has to be replaced by one whose leadership style matches the situational context to achieve optimal effectiveness.
Defining the situation
After assessing an individual’s basic leadership style through the LPC questionnaire, Fiedler developed another framework in which he made empirically supported generalisations about which styles of leadership were best or worst for different organisational settings. Fiedler sought to determine the ‘favourableness’ of a setting towards either task-orientated or relationship-orientated leadership behaviours by using three situational variables, prioritised in a hierarchy as follows:
Leader–member relations is the degree of confidence, trust and respect members have in their leader.
Task structure is the degree to which the job assignments are procedurised (i.e. structured or unstructured).
Position power is the degree of influence a leader has over power variables such as hiring, firing, discipline, promotions and salary increases.
For Fiedler, leader–member-relations was twice as important as task structure, which, in turn, was twice as important as a leader’s position power. The order of importance was based on the perceived contribution of each situational variable to the leader’s sense of control in a leadership situation, which he called ‘situational favourability’. A high score in leader–member relations indicated a positive leader–follower culture and loyal followers who had confidence in their leader. A high score in task structure indicated task requirements were clear, possible solutions was finite and success was easily measured. A high score in position power indicated that the leader had power to reward and punish followers.
Accordingly, a high score in the leader–member relations, task structure and position power indicates high levels of leader control, a ‘favourable situation’ to use Fiedler’s terminology. A very favourable situation might include a payroll manager who is well respected and whose employees have confidence in them (good leader–member relations), for which the activities to be done—such as wage calculations, cheque writing and report filing—are specific and clear (high task structure), and where the job provides considerable freedom to reward and punish employees (strong position power). An unfavourable situation might be that of the disliked chairperson of a volunteer church fundraising team. In this job, the leader has very little control.
Matching lea
Exhibit 11.1
Findings from the Fiedler model
Summary:
Task-oriented leaders perform best in situations of high and low control
Relationship-oriented leaders perform best in moderate control situations
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Matching leaders and situations
Combining the three situational variables yields eight possible situations in which leaders can find themselves (see Exhibit 11.1). The Fiedler model proposes matching an individual’s LPC score and these eight situations to achieve maximum leadership effectiveness. Fiedler concluded that task-oriented leaders perform better in situations that are either very favourable to them or very unfavourable. So, when faced with a category I, II, III, VII or VIII situation, task-oriented leaders perform better. Relationship-oriented leaders, however, perform better in moderately favourable situations—categories IV to VI. Fiedler subsequently condensed these eight situations down to three. He maintains that task-oriented leaders perform best in situations of high and low control, while relationship-oriented leaders perform best in moderate control situations.
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Contingency theories
Situational leadership theory (S L T)
Focuses on followers’ readiness
Effective leadership is achieved by selecting the appropriate leadership style to match the followers’ readiness, or ability and willingness to accomplish a specific task.
S L I I, an updated paradigm, leadership behaviors were identified as
Directing
Coaching
Supporting
Delegating
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https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-the-situational-theory-of-leadership-2795321
The situational theory of leadership suggests that no single leadership style is best. Instead, it all depends on the situation at hand and which type of leadership and strategies are best-suited to the task. According to this theory, the most effective leaders are those that are able to adapt their style to the situation and look at cues such as the type of task, the nature of the group, and other factors that might contribute to getting the job done.
Situational leadership theory is often referred to as the Hersey-Blanchard Situational Leadership Theory, after its developers, Dr. Paul Hersey, author of "The Situational Leader," and Kenneth Blanchard, author of "One-Minute Manager."
Hersey and Blanchard’s Leadership Styles
Hersey and Blanchard suggested that there are four primary leadership styles:
Telling (S1): In this leadership style, the leader tells people what to do and how to do it.
Selling (S2): This style involves more back-and-forth between leaders and followers. Leaders "sell" their ideas and message to get group members to buy into the process.
Participating (S3): In this approach, the leader offers less direction and allows members of the group to take a more active role in coming up with ideas and making decisions.
Delegating (S4): This style is characterized by a less involved, hands-off approach to leadership. Group members tend to make most of the decisions and take most of the responsibility for what happens.
Maturity Levels
The right style of leadership depends greatly on the maturity level (i.e., the level of knowledge and competence) of the individuals or group.
Hersey and Blanchard's theory identifies four different levels of maturity, including:
M1: Group members lack the knowledge, skills, and willingness to complete the task.
M2: Group members are willing and enthusiastic, but lack the ability.
M3: Group members have the skills and capability to complete the task, but are unwilling to take responsibility.
M4: Group members are highly skilled and willing to complete the task.
The SLII Model
The Situational Leadership II (or SLII model) was developed by Kenneth Blanchard and builds on Blanchard and Hersey's original theory. According to the revised version of the theory, effective leaders must base their behavior on the developmental level of group members for specific tasks. The developmental level is determined by each individual's level of competence and commitment. These levels include:
Enthusiastic Beginner (D1): High commitment, low competence.
Disillusioned Learner (D2): Some competence, but setbacks have led to low commitment.
Capable But Cautious Performer (D3): Competence is growing, but the level of commitment varies.
Self-Reliant Achiever (D4): High competence and commitment.
SLII Leadership Styles
SLII also suggests that effective leadership is dependent on two key behaviors: supporting and directing. Directing behaviors include giving specific directions and instructions and attempting to control the behavior of group members. Supporting behaviors include actions such as encouraging subordinates, listening, and offering recognition and feedback.
The theory identifies four basic leadership styles, including:
Directing (S1): High on directing behaviors, low on supporting behaviors.
Coaching (S2): High on both directing and supporting behaviors.
Supporting (S3): Low on directing behavior and high on supporting behaviors.
Delegating (S4): Low on both directing and supporting behaviors.
The main point of SLII theory is that not one of these four leadership styles is best. Instead, an effective leader will match his or her behavior to the developmental skill of each subordinate for the task at hand.
Important Situational Factors
Experts suggest that there are four key contextual factors that leaders must be aware of when making an assessment of the situation. These factors include:
Leaders need to consider the relationship between the leaders and the members of the group. Social and interpersonal factors can play a role in determining which approach is best. For example, a group that lacks efficiency and productivity might benefit from a style that emphasizes order, rules, and clearly defined roles. A productive group of highly skilled workers, on the other hand, might benefit from a more democratic style that allows group members to work independently and have input in organizational decisions.
The leader needs to consider the task itself. Tasks can range from simple to complex, but the leader needs to have a clear idea of exactly what the task entails in order to determine if it has been successfully and competently accomplished.
The level of authority the leader has over group members should also be considered. Some leaders have power conferred by the position itself, such as the capacity to fire, hire, reward, or reprimand subordinates. Other leaders gain power through their relationships with employees, often by gaining respect from them, offering support to them, and helping them feel included in the decision-making process.
As the Hersey-Blanchard model suggests, leaders need to consider the level of maturity of each individual group member. The maturity level is a measure of an individual's ability to complete a task, as well as his or her willingness to complete the task. Assigning a job to a member who is willing but lacks the ability is a recipe for failure.
Being able to pinpoint each employee's level of maturity allows the leader to choose the best leadership approach to help employees accomplish their goals.
Exhibit 11.2
The Situational Leadership
Theory (SLII Model)
Adapted from K. H. Blanchard, S L I I: A Situational Approach to Managing People, Escondido, C A: Blanchard Training and Development, 1985; and K. H. Blanchard, D. Zigarmi and R. Nelson, ‘Situational leadership after 25 years: a retrospective’, Journal of Leadership Studies 1, no. 1, 1993, pp. 31–36.
jcu.edu.au
Situational leadership theory (SLT) focuses on the followers and draws on the same task and relationship constructs of behaviour used in the Ohio and Michigan studies by proposing that the optimal leadership style will be determined by the situational context and the developmental level of the follower to execute the task. In its original form, the model proposed that effective leadership is achieved by selecting the appropriate leadership style to match the followers’ readiness, or ability and willingness to accomplish a specific task.
Situational leadership theory (SLT) - A contingency theory that focuses on followers’ readiness.
A revision of this model in 1985 led to the proposal of SLII, an updated paradigm using more specific terminology. In this second incarnation of the theory, leadership behaviours were identified as directing, coaching, supporting and delegating. The original terms ‘follower readiness and ability’ were changed to ‘follower developmental level’. Leader relationship behaviours now emphasised emotionally intelligent, socially supportive, two-way communication. The use of the term ‘follower developmental level’ sought to more accurately capture the competence and commitment of followers in completing a specific task.
SLII puts forward a four-quadrant model of leadership as depicted in Exhibit 11.2, where leadership style is considered most effective when it matches the developmental level of the follower.
In SLII, a leader should choose one of four leadership behaviours depending on follower’s developmental level. These are:
directing (low relationship behaviour, high task behaviour by leader, with low competence but high commitment shown by the follower) for what was now called the enthusiastic beginner
coaching (high relationship behaviour, high task behaviour by leader, with some competence but low commitment shown by the follower) for what was now called the disillusioned learner
supporting (high relationship behaviour, low task behaviour by leader, with growing competence and variable commitment by the follower) for what was now called the capable but cautious performer
delegating (low relationship behaviour, low task behaviour by leader, with high competence and high commitment shown by the follower) for what was now called the self-reliant achiever.
SLII has intuitive appeal. It acknowledges the importance of followers and builds on the logic that leaders can compensate for any limitation in follower competence and motivation. Yet research efforts to test and support the theory have generally been disappointing27 because possible explanations include internal ambiguities and inconsistencies in the model itself as well as problems with research methodology in tests. So, despite its intuitive appeal and wide popularity, any endorsement must be cautious for now.
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Situational leadership
Do you agree there are situations in which leadership is not necessary? Identify these situations and explain why or why not?
Type your answer in Chat
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Although theories have increased our understanding of effective leadership, the previous section on socially aversive leadership reveals to us that they don’t explicitly deal with the role of ethics and trust, which many argue is essential to complete the picture. Leadership is not value-free. In assessing its effectiveness, we need to address the means that a leader uses to achieve goals, as well as the content of those goals. The role of the leader in creating ethical expectations for all members is crucial.
Here, we consider the two concepts of ethics and trust under the rubric of authentic leadership and servant leadership. Authentic leadership and servant leadership and the broader philosophical framework of ethical leadership have grown in prominence through the field of positive organisational behaviour (POB), particularly in the past ten years. POB focuses on how organisations can promote productive, healthy, ethical and positive social experiences. The field has developed against a backdrop of increasingly regular reports of corporate scandals and shareholder and stakeholder demands for more ethical conduct within the business world.
Ethical leadership
Only recently have researchers begun to consider the ethical implications in leadership. One reason may be the acknowledgement that many past and current leaders have suffered from ethical shortcomings. Another reason may be the growing realisation that although every member of an organisation is responsible for ethical behaviour, many initiatives aimed at increasing organisational ethical behaviour are focused on the leaders. The role of the leader in creating the ethical expectations for all members is crucial.
Ethical top leadership influences not only direct followers but spreads all the way down the organisational structure because leaders set expectations.95 Leaders rated as highly ethical tend to be evaluated very positively by their subordinates, who are also more satisfied and committed to their jobs and experience less strain and turnover intentions.96 Followers of these leaders are also more motivated, perform better and engage in more organisational citizenship behaviours (OCBs) and fewer counterproductive work behaviours (CWBs).97 Ethical leaders can change norms: one reason why employees engage in more OCBs and fewer CWBs is because their perceptions on whether each is equitable (or ‘fair’) become altered so that OCBs are perceived as more equitable.98 Ethical leaders also increase group awareness of moral issues, increase the extent to which the group is willing to speak up about ethical issues and raise their empathic concern for others. Research also found that ethical leadership reduced interpersonal conflicts.
Ethics and leadership intersect at a number of junctures. Transformational leadership has ethical implications, since these leaders change the way followers think. Charisma, too, has an ethical component. Unethical leaders use their charisma to enhance power over followers, directed towards self-serving ends. For this reason, scholars have tried to integrate ethical and charismatic leadership by advancing the idea of socialised charismatic leadership—leadership that conveys other-centred (not self-centred) values by leaders who model ethical conduct. Socialised charismatic leaders are able to bring employee values in line with their own values through their words and actions.
Socialised charismatic leadership - A leadership concept where leaders convey values that are other-centred versus self-centred and who role-model ethical conduct.
Leaders who treat their followers with fairness, especially by providing honest, frequent and accurate information, are seen as more effective. Related to this is the concept of humility, another characteristic ethical leaders often exhibit as part of being authentic. Research indicates that leaders who model humility help followers to understand the growth process for their own development. Leaders rated as highly ethical tend to have followers who engage in more organisational citizenship behaviours and who are more willing to bring problems to the leaders’ attention. Research has also found that ethical leadership reduces interpersonal conflicts.
Because top executives set the moral tone for an organisation, they need to set high ethical standards, demonstrate them through their own behaviour, and encourage and reward integrity in others while avoiding abuses of power, such as giving themselves large raises and bonuses while laying off employees. One research review found that role modelling by top leaders positively influenced managers throughout their organisations to behave ethically and fostered a climate that reinforced group-level ethical conduct. The findings suggest that organisations should invest in ethical leadership training programs, especially in industries with few ethical regulations. The researchers furthermore advised that ethical leadership training programs to teach cultural values should be mandated for leaders who take foreign assignments or manage multicultural work teams.
For ethical leadership to be effective, it’s not enough for the leader simply to possess high moral character. After all, there’s no universal standard for ethical behaviour, and ethical norms vary by culture, by industry and even sometimes within an organisation. Leaders must be willing to express their ethical beliefs and persuade others to follow their standards. Followers must believe in both the leader and the overlying principles, even if they don’t personally agree with every minor stance.
To convey their beliefs, leaders should learn to express their moral convictions in statements that reflect values shared with their organisation’s members. Leaders can build on this foundation of trust to show their character, enhance a sense of unity and create buy-in from followers. The leader’s message should announce high goals and confidence that they can be reached.
Ethical leaders’ statements are often positive messages, such as Winston Churchill’s opening for his World War II victory speech: ‘This is your hour. This is not a victory of a party or any class. It’s a victory of the great British nation as a whole’. An example of an ethical leader’s negative message is this speech by Gandhi: ‘Even if all the United Nations opposes me, even if the whole of India forsakes me, I will say, “You are wrong. India will wrench with nonviolence her liberty from unwilling hands”’. Positive and negative ethical leader statements can be equally effective when they deliver clear, moral, inclusive, goal-setting statements with persuasiveness. In fact, they can set trends in motion to make the seemingly far-fetched become real.
What is authentic leadership?
Authentic leadership focuses on the moral aspects of being a leader. It’s a relatively recent field of scholarship and there’s a divergence of opinion as to what authentic leadership theory is and how to define it. That said, there seems to be common agreement that at their core, authentic leaders have a strong sense of consistency and continuity in their espoused and enacted values, an ‘individual authenticity’ that enables others to trust them.
Authentic leaders know who they are, know what they believe in and value, and act on those values and beliefs openly and candidly.109 Their followers consider them to be ethical people. The primary quality produced by authentic leadership, therefore, is trust. Authentic leaders share information, encourage open communication and stick to their ideals. The result is that people come to have faith in them. Authentic leaders share information, encourage open communication and stick to their ideals. Authentic leaders are also humble—research indicates that leaders who model humility help followers to understand the growth process for their own development.
Authentic leaders - Leaders who know who they are, know what they believe in and value, and act on those values and beliefs openly and candidly. Their followers would consider them to be ethical people.
Authentic leadership, especially when shared among top management team members, creates a positive energising effect that heightens teamwork, team productivity and the organisation’s performance. When leaders practise what they preach, or act on their values openly and candidly, followers tend to develop a strong affective commitment and trust in their leader and, to a lesser degree, to improve their performance and OCBs.
Because the concept is relatively new, however, there’s only emerging research on authentic leadership. It’s a promising direction to think about ethics and trust in leadership because it focuses on the moral aspects of being a leader. Transformational or charismatic leaders can have a vision and can communicate it persuasively, but sometimes the vision is wrong (as in the case of Hitler), or the leader is more concerned with their own needs or pleasures, such as Bernie Madoff (former New York stockbroker, investment adviser and the confessed operator of a Ponzi scheme).
Servant leadership
Robert Greenleaf first proposed his concept of servant leadership in 1977 and focused on leader humility and servitude. Servant leaders go beyond their own self-interests and focus on opportunities to help followers to grow and develop. They don’t use power to achieve ends; they emphasise persuasion. Recent research has further developed our understanding of servant leadership by defining characteristics of servant leadership as empowerment, accountability, humility and self-awareness, authenticity, courage, empathy and stewardship.114 Because servant leadership focuses on serving the needs of others, research has focused on its outcomes for the well-being of followers.
What are the effects of servant leadership? One study of 123 supervisors found it resulted in higher levels of commitment to the supervisor, self-efficacy and perceptions of justice, which were all related to OCB. This relationship between servant leadership and follower OCB appears to be stronger when followers are focused on being dutiful and responsible. Second, servant leadership increases team potency (a belief that your team has above-average skills and abilities), which in turn leads to higher levels of group performance. Third, a study with a nationally representative sample of 250 workers found higher levels of citizenship associated with a focus on growth and advancement, which in turn was associated with higher levels of creative performance.
Servant leadership may be more prevalent and more effective in certain cultures. When asked to draw images of leaders, a recent study found that Americans tend to draw them in front of the group, giving orders to followers. Singaporeans tend to draw leaders at the back of the group, acting more to gather a group’s opinions together and then unify them from the rear. This suggests the East-Asian prototype is more like a servant leader, which might mean servant leadership is more effective in these cultures.
Trust and leadership
Trust is a psychological state that exists when you agree to make yourself vulnerable to someone else because you have positive expectations about how things are going to turn out.120 Even though you’re not completely in control of the situation, you’re willing to take a chance that the other person will ‘come through’ for you.
Trust - A positive expectation that someone else will not act opportunistically.
Trust is a primary attribute associated with leadership; breaking it can have serious adverse effects on a group’s performance. As one author noted: ‘Part of the leader’s task has been, and continues to be, working with people to find and solve problems, but whether leaders gain access to the knowledge and creative thinking they need to solve problems depends on how much people trust them. Trust and trustworthiness modulate the leader’s access to knowledge and cooperation’.
Followers who trust a leader are willing to be vulnerable to the leader’s actions, confident that their rights and interests will not be abused. Transformational leaders create support for their ideas in part by arguing that their direction will be in everyone’s best interests. People are unlikely to look up to or follow someone they perceive as dishonest or likely to take advantage of them. So, as you might expect, transformational leaders do generate higher levels of trust from their followers, which in turn is related to higher levels of team confidence and, ultimately, higher levels of team performance.
In a simple contractual exchange of goods and services, your employer is legally bound to pay you for fulfilling your job description. But today’s rapid reorganisations, diffusion of responsibility and collaborative team-based work style mean that employment relationships aren’t stable, long-term contracts with explicit terms. Rather, they’re more fundamentally based on trusting relationships than ever before. In contemporary organisations, where work is less closely documented and specified, voluntary employee contribution based on trust is absolutely necessary. And only a trusted leader will be able to encourage employees to reach beyond themselves to a transformational goal.
Contingency theories
Path–goal theory (Robert House)
Followers are motivated if three conditions are met:
Followers believe they’re capable of performing the task if they put in the effort.
Followers can see that their effort will result in the expected outcome.
Followers perceive the expected outcomes to be of value to the followers, as individuals.
Leader’s job - to provide followers with information, support and resources necessary to achieve their goals.
Four leadership behaviour needed to motivate followers – directive, supportive, participative, achievement-orientation
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Path-Goal Theory: Goals and resources emerge from the environment, not from the leader directly. This suggests that access to external resources may be more important in determining leadership success than the capability of the individual leader. Access to resources is another factor linked to leadership. The nature of the organization, the specific task, and the type of occupation should be considered. Path-Goal Theory argues that leaders provide the right context for work when there is (1) Rewards for the work performed (2) a clear path to achieve goals and (3) the right resources necessary to reach goals. Path-Goal Theory suggests that access to external resources may be more important in determining leadership success than the capability of the individual leader.
https://pathgoal.com/path-goal-theory/
The Path-Goal model is a theory based on specifying a leader’s style or behaviour that best fits the employee and work environment in order to achieve a goal. The path-goal theory can best be thought of as a process in which leaders select specific behaviours that are best suited to the employees’ needs and their working environment so that they may best guide the employees through their path in the obtainment of their daily work activities (goals).
Origins & Theory
The Path-Goal theory, inspired by the work of Martin G. Evans (1970),[1] can best be thought of as a process by which leaders select specific behaviours that are best suited to their employees’ needs and their working environment, so that leaders may best guide their employees through their path in the obtainment of their daily work activities (goals) (Northouse, 2013).
The theory argues that leaders will have to engage in different types of leadership behaviour depending on the nature and the demands of a particular situation. It is the leader’s role to assist employees in attaining goals and to provide the direction and support needed to ensure that their individual goals are in concert or compatible with the organization’s goals.
Path-Goal’s Four Styles
The Path-Goal model is a theory based on specifying a leader’s style or behaviour that best fits the employee and work environment in order to achieve a goal. The goal is to increase an employee’s motivation, empowerment, and satisfaction so they become a productive member of the organization. Employee satisfaction is contingent upon the leader’s performance as both a facilitator and coach and rewards their employees for effective performance. The original Path-Goal theory identifies achievement-oriented, directive, participative, and supportive leader behaviours rooted in four (4 styles).
Contingency theories
Leader-participation model (Vroom-Yetton-Jago)
Provides a set of rules to determine the form and amount of participative decision making in different situations.
A decision tree of seven contingencies and five leadership styles help determine the form and amount of participation in decision making.
jcu.edu.au
https://study.com/academy/lesson/the-vroom-yetton-leader-participation-model-rethinking-business-decision-making.html
Leaders in an organizational environment have to make decisions daily. The Vroom-Yetton-Jago Normative Decision Model helps explain when and how to have employees participate in decision making.
Vroom-Yetton-Jago Normative Decision Model
Fun Town Amusement Park's management is facing a huge decision. Every year, the company plans for a new ride to unveil during the opening season. This year, the company has been presented with three new ride options from the design company: a giant swing, a floorless rollercoaster, and a haunted mansion.
Management has to choose what type of leadership decision-making process they will use to choose the ride. Leaders in organizations have to decide when to have employees participate in the decision-making process. Fun Town Amusement Park has decided to follow the Vroom-Yetton-Jago Normative Decision Model to help their managers determine which type of decision-making strategy to use for the ride selection this spring. The model explains the differences between authoritative, consultative, and democratic types of leadership by offering five forms of leadership decision making that Fun Town's managers can choose for the ride.
The managers have been given a one-day, off-site meeting to discuss which type of leadership style they will use to effectively make this massive corporate ride decision. Let's take a look at the first type of leadership decision making they are considering today.
http://changingminds.org/disciplines/leadership/theories/vroom_yetton.htm
Assumptions
Decision acceptance increases commitment and effectiveness of action.
Participation increases decision acceptance.
Description
Decision quality is the selection of the best alternative, and is particularly important when there are many alternatives. It is also important when there are serious implications for selecting (or failing to select) the best alternative.
Decision acceptance is the degree to which a follower accepts a decision made by a leader. Leaders focus more on decision acceptance when decision quality is more important.
Vroom and Yetton defined five different decision procedures. Two are autocratic (A1 and A2), two are consultative (C1 and C2) and one is Group based (G2).
A1: Leader takes known information and then decides alone.
A2: Leader gets information from followers, and then decides alone.
C1: Leader shares problem with followers individually, listens to ideas and then decides alone.
C2: Leader shares problems with followers as a group, listens to ideas and then decides alone.
G2: Leader shares problems with followers as a group and then seeks and accepts consensus agreement.
Vroom and Yetton (1973) took the earlier generalized situational theories that noted how situational factors cause almost unpredictable leader behaviour and reduced this to a more limited set of behaviours.
The 'normative' aspect of the model is that it was defined more by rational logic than by long observation.
The model is most likely to work when there is clear and accessible opinions about the decision quality importance and decision acceptance factors. However these are not always known with any significant confidence.
Contemporary theories of leadership
Leader–member exchange (L M X) theory
Because of time pressures, leaders establish a special relationship with a small group of their followers
In-groups and out-groups
jcu.edu.au
https://managementstudyguide.com/lmx-theory.htm
Informal observation of leadership behavior suggests that leader’s action is not the same towards all subordinates. The importance of potential differences in this respect is brought into sharp focus by Graen’s leader-member exchange model, also known as the vertical dyad linkage theory. The theory views leadership as consisting of a number of dyadic relationships linking the leader with a follower. The quality of the relationship is reflected by the degree of mutual trust, loyalty, support, respect, and obligation.
to interesting tasks, delegation of important responsibilities, information sharing, and participation in the leader’s decisions, as well as special benefits, such as personal support and support and favorable work schedules.
Strengths of LMX Theory
LMX theory is an exceptional theory of leadership as unlike the other theories, it concentrates and talks about specific relationships between the leader and each subordinate. LMX Theory is a robust explanatory theory. LMX Theory focuses our attention to the significance of communication in leadership. Communication is a medium through which leaders and subordinates develop, grow and maintain beneficial exchanges. When this communication is accompanied by features such as mutual trust, respect and devotion, it leads to effective leadership. LMX Theory is very much valid and practical in it’s approach. Criticisms of LMX Theory
LMX Theory fails to explain the particulars of how high-quality exchanges are created. LMX Theory is objected on grounds of fairness and justice as some followers receive special attention of leaders at workplace and other followers do not. Implications
According to many studies conducted in this area, it has been found that leaders definitely do support the members of the in-group and may go to the extent of inflating their ratings on poor performance as well. This kind of a treatment is not given to the members of the out-group. Due to the favoritism that the in-group members receive from their leaders, they are found to perform their jobs better and develop positive attitude towards their jobs in comparison to the members of the out-group. The job satisfaction of in-group members is high and they perform effectively on their jobs. They tend to receive more mentoring from their superiors which helps them in their careers. For these reasons, low attrition rate, increased salaries, and promotion rates are associated with the in-group members in comparison to that of the out-group members.
Exhibit 11.3
Leader–member exchange theory
jcu.edu.au
The theory proposes that, early in the history of the interaction between a leader and a given follower, the leader implicitly categorises the follower as an ‘in’ or an ‘out’, and that relationship is relatively stable over time. Leaders induce LMX by rewarding those employees with whom they want a closer linkage and punishing those with whom they don’t. But for the LMX relationship to remain intact, the leader and the follower must invest in the relationship.
Just how the leader chooses who falls into each category is unclear, but there’s evidence that in-group members have demographic, attitude and personality characteristics similar to the leader’s or a higher level of competence than out-group members (see Exhibit 11.3). Leaders and followers of the same gender tend to have closer (higher LMX) relationships than those of different genders. Even though the leader is doing the choosing, the followers’ characteristics are driving the categorising decision.
Research to test LMX theory has been generally supportive, with substantive evidence that leaders do differentiate among followers. These disparities are far from random. Followers with in-group status receive higher performance ratings, engage in more helping or citizenship behaviours at work, engage in less deviant or counterproductive behaviours at work and report greater satisfaction with their superior. LMX influences these work outcomes by improving employee trust, motivation, empowerment and job satisfaction (although trust in the leader has the largest effect). One study conducted in an entrepreneurial firm in southeast China found LMX is related to creative and innovative behaviour. Another study conducted in Portugal and the United States found that LMX was associated especially strongly with followers’ commitment to the organisation when their leaders were seen as embodying the values and identity of the organisation.
These positive findings for in-group members shouldn’t be surprising, given our knowledge of the self-fulfilling prophecy. Leaders invest their resources in those they expect will perform best. And believing that in-group members are the most competent, leaders treat them as such and unwittingly fulfil their prophecy.
LMX can lead to more negative outcomes. For example, when the treatment of the in-group is starkly different from the treatment of the out-group (e.g. when the leader plays favourites), both the in-group and the out-group can realise negative effects from LMX. One study in Turkey demonstrated that when leaders differentiated strongly among their followers in terms of their relationships (some followers had very positive LMX, others very poor), employees responded with more negative work attitudes and higher levels of withdrawal behaviour.
Moreover, research in China and the United States has indicated that differential leadership treatment hurts team trust and perceptions of procedural justice, especially when the team members work closely together. Other research has shown that, although in-group team members showed increased performance, the team as a whole became uncoordinated in the LMX environment and overall performance suffered. In fact, where close-knit teams choose to help out-group members retain their confidence and self-efficacy by offering a supportive team environment, it will often be at the cost of the relationship between leaders and employees.
These relationships may be stronger when followers have a more active role in shaping their own job performance. Research on 287 software developers and 164 supervisors showed that LMX relationships have a stronger impact on employee performance and attitudes when employees have higher levels of autonomy and a more internal locus of control.
39
Contemporary theories of leadership
Charismatic leadership
Followers attribute heroic abilities when they observe behaviours and tend to give these leaders power.
Individuals are born with traits that make them charismatic, on average.
Correlation between charismatic leadership and high performance/satisfaction.
The dark side – don’t always act in the best interest of the organisations
jcu.edu.au
https://teamworkdefinition.com/charismaticleadership/
Charismatic leadership is basically the method of encouraging particular behaviors in others by way of eloquent communication, persuasion and force of personality. Charismatic leaders motivate followers to get things done or improve the way certain things are done. This is accomplished by conjuring up eagerness in others to achieve a stated goal or vision. In essence, the charismatic leadership style has its basis in a form of heroism. This leadership style is almost of divine origin.
Characteristics of Charismatic Leaders
As previously mentioned, charismatic leaders are communicators who are extremely skilled. These individuals are very eloquent verbally and they have the ability to communicate with the people they lead on a profound, emotional level. One of the advantages of charismatic leadership is the ability of these individuals to articulate a captivating or compelling vision. They have the capacity to evoke strong emotions in their followers as well.
In addition, charismatic leaders have the distinct ability to dissect and decipher any inefficiency within an organization. These visionary traits attributed to this leadership style often result from critical thinking, the compilation of facts and finding ways to solve a variety of problems.
Charisma is essentially a process – an interface between the characteristics of a charismatic leader, the group that is being led, their identification with their leader, their needs and the circumstances that require a charismatic leader like a crisis or need for change. However, as it relates to the charismatic traits of leader, prominence is placed on the way they communicate with members of the group and their ability to gain the trust of followers and inspire these individuals to perform.
A number of politicians have honed and developed the capacity to effectively communicate; working the room and making speeches addressing supporters and potential donors. There are a lot of politicians who exude tons of personal charisma.
Exhibit 11.4
Key characteristics of charismatic leaders
Source: Based on J. A. Conger and R. N. Kanugo, Charismatic Leadership in Organizations, Thousand Oaks, C A: S A G E, 1998, p. 94.
jcu.edu.au
Charismatic leadership theory - A leadership theory where followers make attributions of heroic or extraordinary leadership abilities when they observe certain behaviours.
Are charismatic leaders born or made?
Are charismatic leaders born with their qualities? Or can people actually learn to be charismatic leaders? Yes, and yes.
Individuals are born with traits that make them charismatic, on average. In fact, studies of identical twins found that they scored similarly on charismatic leadership measures, even if they were raised in different households and had never met. Personality is also related to charismatic leadership; charismatic leaders are likely to be extraverted, self-confident and achievement-oriented.
Although a small minority thinks that charisma is inherited and can’t be learned, most experts believe that individuals can be trained to exhibit charismatic behaviours. After all, just because we inherit certain tendencies doesn’t mean we can’t learn to change.
Research indicates that a more charismatic leadership style can be developed in all of us, within our own limitations. One study of German managers suggests that training managers to be inspirational in their communications with followers was successful at increasing related charismatic behaviours.
To develop an aura of charisma, use your passion as a catalyst for generating enthusiasm. Speak in an animated voice, reinforce your message with eye contact and facial expressions, and gesture for emphasis. Bring out the potential in followers by tapping into their emotions, and create a bond that inspires them. Remember, enthusiasm is contagious!
41
Contemporary theories of leadership
Transactional and transformational leadership
Transaction leaders guide followers towards established goals by clarifying role and task requirements
Transformational leaders inspire followers to transcend their self-interests for the good of the organisation
Leadership engagement model
Pro-social and socially aversive leadership
jcu.edu.au
Types of Leaders
Transformational leadership makes a distinction between two types of leaders. A transformational leader obtains followers by building trust and a sense of loyalty between the leader and the follower. A transactional leader appeals to the self-interest of the followers as the leader offers the followers something tangible in exchange for loyalty. The bureaucratic leader is a person who motivates followers by appealing to legitimate authority bestowed by an institution or by appealing to rules and traditions. Leader member exchange (LMX) describes the importance of a strong interpersonal relationship between the leader and a select group of followers. Leaders describes the process whereby a leader influence’s employees to help achieve something important to the organization. Contemporary approaches to leadership emphasise elements of a leader that are learned behaviour, and leadership research focuses on the specific skills a leader needs in order to be effective and the context that this occurs in.
Transactional Leadership refers to a quid pro quo or something in exchange for another
Transformational Leadership involves the following skills. Managing attention by creating a sense of focus and direction related to the clarity or purpose for the organization. Communicating their mission in a way that is accessible or understandable to followers. Gaining the trust of followers in the organization by showing consistency between their message and their action and how they teat various individual within the organization. Showing respect and care about the situation of the followers. Taking risks because they are unafraid of failures that might occur when trying different things. Creating new ways of doing things and new things to do rather than relying on traditions.
Contemporary Leadership Issues
There are a number of contemporary leadership issues which are important to understand. For example, globalization and the impact culture has on leadership theory. Different cultural situations demand different skills, rules, and experiences from the leader. Ethical approaches to leadership build on the notion of integrity and the belief that leaders must be more conscious of their own values, the values of society, and the individual follower. Finally, contemporary leadership theory has begun to account for issues associated with women and diversity when considering leadership. Leaders often take responsibility for developing future leaders. Their role as mentors helps preserve and develop organisational culture and knowledge over time.
Leadership plays a central part in understanding group behaviour because it’s the leader who usually directs us towards our goals. Knowing what makes a good leader should, therefore, be valuable in improving group performance.
The early search for a set of universal leadership traits failed. However, recent efforts using the Big Five personality framework have generated much more encouraging results. Extraversion, conscientiousness and openness to experience show strong and consistent relationships to leadership.
The behavioural approach’s major contribution was narrowing leadership into task-oriented (initiating structure) and people-oriented (consideration) styles. By considering the situation in which the leader operates, contingency theories promised to improve on the behavioural approach, but with the exception of least preferred co-worker (LPC) theory, they have fared well in leadership research.
Research on charismatic and transformational leadership has made major contributions to our understanding of leadership effectiveness.
Are leadership and management different from one another? If so, how? Both leadership and management are essential for organisational success. They are often used synonymously, but they are not the same.
Leadership is the ability to influence a group towards the achievement of a vision or set of goals.
Management is the use of authority to formulate detailed plans, create efficient organisational structures and oversee day-to-day operations.
How do charismatic leadership and transformational leadership compare and contrast? Are they valid? Charismatic leadership success depends, to some extent, on the situation and on the leader’s vision. Some charismatic leaders—Hitler, for example—are all too successful at convincing their followers to pursue a vision that can be disastrous. Just as vision helps explain how charismatic leadership works, vision explains part of the effect of transformational leadership. One study found that vision was even more important than a charismatic (effusive, dynamic, lively) communication style in explaining the success of entrepreneurial companies. Finally, transformational leadership engenders commitment on the part of followers and instils greater trust in the leader.
What is authentic leadership? Why do ethics and trust matter to leadership?
Authentic leadership is a style based on trust. Authentic leaders are ethical people who know who they are, know what they believe in, and value, and act on those values and beliefs openly and candidly. Ethics touch on many leadership styles. As the moral leaders of organisations, CEOs and top executives must demonstrate and set high ethical standards. They dictate the moral tone for an organisation, so they need to demonstrate those standards through their own behaviour and encourage and reward integrity in others, while avoiding abuses of power—such as giving themselves large pay increases and bonuses—while seeking to cut costs by laying off long-time employees. Socialised charismatic leadership is characterised by leaders who model ethical behaviours. Trust is the positive expectation that another person will not act opportunistically. Trust is comprised of a blend of familiarity and willingness to take a risk.
The five key dimensions are: integrity, competence, consistency, loyalty and openness. Trust is a primary attribute associated with leadership; breaking it can seriously and adversely affect a group’s performance. Trust and trustworthiness modulate the leader’s access to knowledge and cooperation, because followers who trust a leader are willing to be vulnerable to the leader’s actions, confident that their rights and interests will not be abused.
How is mentoring valuable to leadership? What are the keys to effective mentoring?
Leaders often take responsibility for developing future leaders. Their role as mentors helps preserve and develop organisational culture and knowledge over time. Protégés can also learn how the mentor has navigated early career issues or has led effectively, and how to work through problems with minimal stress.
Successful mentors are good teachers. They present ideas clearly, listen well and empathise with protégés’ problems. Mentoring has two functions: career mentoring, which includes coaching, assisting and sponsoring; and psychosocial mentoring, which involves counselling, sharing and acting as a role model. Mentor commitment is critical to a program’s effectiveness; mentors must see the relationship as beneficial to themselves and the protégé. The protégé, too, must feel that they have input into the relationship; someone who feels it is foisted on them will just go through the motions of the process. Formal mentoring programs are also most likely to succeed if they appropriately match the work style, needs and skills of protégé and mentor.
The effective mentoring role includes coaching, counselling and sponsorship. As a coach, mentors help to develop their protégés’ skills. As counsellors, mentors provide support and help to bolster protégés’ self-confidence. As sponsors, mentors actively intervene on behalf of their protégés, lobby to get their protégés visible assignments and discreetly obtain rewards for their protégés, such as promotions and salary increases.
Do you agree there are situations in which leadership is not necessary? Why or why not? There are situations in which leadership may not always be important. The attribution theory of leadership says that leadership is merely an attribution that people make about other individuals. Thus we attribute to leaders intelligence, outgoing personality, strong verbal skills, aggressiveness, understanding and industriousness. At the organisational level, we tend to see leaders, rightly or wrongly, as responsible for extremely negative or extremely positive performance.
How can organisations select and develop effective leaders? Organisations can help build effective organisations through their selection and training areas.
Selection
Review specific requirements for the job: the knowledge, skills and abilities needed to do the job effectively.
Use tests that identify personal traits associated with leadership, measure self-monitoring and assess emotional intelligence.
Conduct personal interviews to determine a candidate’s fit with the job.
Training
Recognise that all people are not equally trainable.
Teach skills that are necessary for employees to become effective leaders, such as content themes critical to effective visions.
Provide behavioural training to increase the development potential of nascent and charismatic employees.
Exhibit 11.5
Characteristics of transactional and transformational leaders
jcu.edu.au
Transactional leadership and transformational leadership aren’t opposing approaches to getting things done. They complement each other, although they’re not equally important. Transformational leadership builds on transactional leadership and produces levels of follower effort and performance beyond that which transactional leadership alone can do. But the reverse isn’t true. So, if you’re a good transactional leader but you don’t have transformational qualities, you’re likely to be only a mediocre leader. The best leaders are transactional and transformational.
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Exhibit 11.6
Leadership engagement continuum
Demonstrates the increasing level of emotional engagement invested by the leader
passive
Employees go above and beyond the call of duty
jcu.edu.au
Leadership engagement model
Exhibit 11.6 shows the leadership engagement continuum and demonstrates the increasing level of emotional engagement invested by the leader when they adopt different transactional and transformational leadership styles. Laissez-faire is the most passive and therefore the least emotionally engaged of leader behaviours. Management by exception (active or passive) is slightly better than laissez-faire, but it’s still considered not optimal. Management-by-exception leaders tend to be available only when there’s a problem, which is often too late. Contingent reward leadership can be an engaged style of leadership but won’t get employees to go above and beyond the call of duty. Only with transformational leaders will employees do that.
44
Exhibit 11.5
Characteristics of transactional and transformational leaders
jcu.edu.au
Transactional leadership and transformational leadership aren’t opposing approaches to getting things done. They complement each other, although they’re not equally important. Transformational leadership builds on transactional leadership and produces levels of follower effort and performance beyond that which transactional leadership alone can do. But the reverse isn’t true. So, if you’re a good transactional leader but you don’t have transformational qualities, you’re likely to be only a mediocre leader. The best leaders are transactional and transformational.
45
Exhibit 11.7
Leadership engagement model
jcu.edu.au
Exhibit 11.7 shows the leadership engagement model, in which the level of emotional engagement is plotted against the level of active engagement by the leader with respect to their followers.
Only when all four elements of transformational leadership are present and active will leaders be able to motivate followers to perform above expectations and transcend their self-interest for the sake of the organisation. Individualised consideration, intellectual stimulation, inspirational motivation and idealised influence all result in extra effort from workers, higher productivity, higher morale and satisfaction, higher organisational effectiveness, lower turnover, lower absenteeism and greater organisational adaptability. Based on the leader engagement model, highly effective leaders are those who demonstrate the optimal balance and blend of passivity to activity and degree of emotional engagement needed for the situational context before them.
Transformational leadership theory is not perfect, however, and contingent reward leadership may not characterise transactional leaders only. Indeed, the four defining elements in transformational leadership (see Exhibit 11.5) aren’t always superior in effectiveness to transactional leadership. Contingent reward leadership can work as well as transformational leadership. Even laissez-faire can be optimal with certain followers; for example, highly motivated, high-performance teams, with role, task and goal clarity.
How transformational leadership works
Individual-focused transformational leadership is behaviour that empowers individual followers to develop ideas, enhance their abilities and increase self-efficacy. Followers are more likely to pursue ambitious goals, agree on the strategic goals of the organisation and believe that the goals they’re pursuing are personally important.
Transformational leaders engender commitment on the part of followers and elicit greater trust from subordinates. Research has found such leaders to be more effective because they’re more creative, but also because they encourage those who follow them to be creative too. In companies with transformational leaders, there’s greater decentralisation of responsibility, managers show more propensity to take risks and compensation plans are geared towards long-term results, all of which facilitate corporate entrepreneurship. One study of information-technology workers in China found that empowering leadership behaviour led to feelings of positive personal control among workers, which increased their creativity at work.
Companies with transformational leaders also show greater agreement among top managers about the organisation’s goals, which yields superior organisational performance. Similar results, showing that transformational leaders improve performance by building consensus among group members, have been demonstrated in the military. Transformational leaders are able to increase follower self-efficacy, giving the group a ‘can-do’ spirit. Such team-focused transformational leadership will emphasise group goals, shared values and beliefs, and unified efforts. However, research in China suggests that, in team situations, the members’ identification with the group could override the effects of transformational leadership.
Just as vision helps explain how charismatic leadership works, vision explains part of the effect of transformational leadership. One study found that vision was even more important than a charismatic (effusive, dynamic, lively) communication style in explaining the success of entrepreneurial companies.
46
Ethics and trust in leadership
Ethical leadership
Socialised charismatic leadership: where leaders convey values that are other-centered.
Authentic leadership
Leaders who know who they are, know what they believe in and value, and act on those values and beliefs openly and candidly. Followers considered them to be ethical.
Servant leadership
Focus on leader humility and servitude where leaders go beyond own self-interests and cous on opportunities to help followers to grow and develop.
Trust and leadership
Followers who trust a leader are confident their rights and interests will not be abused.
jcu.edu.au
Although theories have increased our understanding of effective leadership, the previous section on socially aversive leadership reveals to us that they don’t explicitly deal with the role of ethics and trust, which many argue is essential to complete the picture. Leadership is not value-free. In assessing its effectiveness, we need to address the means that a leader uses to achieve goals, as well as the content of those goals. The role of the leader in creating ethical expectations for all members is crucial.
Here, we consider the two concepts of ethics and trust under the rubric of authentic leadership and servant leadership. Authentic leadership and servant leadership and the broader philosophical framework of ethical leadership have grown in prominence through the field of positive organisational behaviour (POB), particularly in the past ten years. POB focuses on how organisations can promote productive, healthy, ethical and positive social experiences. The field has developed against a backdrop of increasingly regular reports of corporate scandals and shareholder and stakeholder demands for more ethical conduct within the business world.
Ethical leadership
Only recently have researchers begun to consider the ethical implications in leadership. One reason may be the acknowledgement that many past and current leaders have suffered from ethical shortcomings. Another reason may be the growing realisation that although every member of an organisation is responsible for ethical behaviour, many initiatives aimed at increasing organisational ethical behaviour are focused on the leaders. The role of the leader in creating the ethical expectations for all members is crucial.
Ethical top leadership influences not only direct followers but spreads all the way down the organisational structure because leaders set expectations.95 Leaders rated as highly ethical tend to be evaluated very positively by their subordinates, who are also more satisfied and committed to their jobs and experience less strain and turnover intentions.96 Followers of these leaders are also more motivated, perform better and engage in more organisational citizenship behaviours (OCBs) and fewer counterproductive work behaviours (CWBs).97 Ethical leaders can change norms: one reason why employees engage in more OCBs and fewer CWBs is because their perceptions on whether each is equitable (or ‘fair’) become altered so that OCBs are perceived as more equitable.98 Ethical leaders also increase group awareness of moral issues, increase the extent to which the group is willing to speak up about ethical issues and raise their empathic concern for others. Research also found that ethical leadership reduced interpersonal conflicts.
Ethics and leadership intersect at a number of junctures. Transformational leadership has ethical implications, since these leaders change the way followers think. Charisma, too, has an ethical component. Unethical leaders use their charisma to enhance power over followers, directed towards self-serving ends. For this reason, scholars have tried to integrate ethical and charismatic leadership by advancing the idea of socialised charismatic leadership—leadership that conveys other-centred (not self-centred) values by leaders who model ethical conduct. Socialised charismatic leaders are able to bring employee values in line with their own values through their words and actions.
Socialised charismatic leadership - A leadership concept where leaders convey values that are other-centred versus self-centred and who role-model ethical conduct.
Leaders who treat their followers with fairness, especially by providing honest, frequent and accurate information, are seen as more effective. Related to this is the concept of humility, another characteristic ethical leaders often exhibit as part of being authentic. Research indicates that leaders who model humility help followers to understand the growth process for their own development. Leaders rated as highly ethical tend to have followers who engage in more organisational citizenship behaviours and who are more willing to bring problems to the leaders’ attention. Research has also found that ethical leadership reduces interpersonal conflicts.
Because top executives set the moral tone for an organisation, they need to set high ethical standards, demonstrate them through their own behaviour, and encourage and reward integrity in others while avoiding abuses of power, such as giving themselves large raises and bonuses while laying off employees. One research review found that role modelling by top leaders positively influenced managers throughout their organisations to behave ethically and fostered a climate that reinforced group-level ethical conduct. The findings suggest that organisations should invest in ethical leadership training programs, especially in industries with few ethical regulations. The researchers furthermore advised that ethical leadership training programs to teach cultural values should be mandated for leaders who take foreign assignments or manage multicultural work teams.
For ethical leadership to be effective, it’s not enough for the leader simply to possess high moral character. After all, there’s no universal standard for ethical behaviour, and ethical norms vary by culture, by industry and even sometimes within an organisation. Leaders must be willing to express their ethical beliefs and persuade others to follow their standards. Followers must believe in both the leader and the overlying principles, even if they don’t personally agree with every minor stance.
To convey their beliefs, leaders should learn to express their moral convictions in statements that reflect values shared with their organisation’s members. Leaders can build on this foundation of trust to show their character, enhance a sense of unity and create buy-in from followers. The leader’s message should announce high goals and confidence that they can be reached.
Ethical leaders’ statements are often positive messages, such as Winston Churchill’s opening for his World War II victory speech: ‘This is your hour. This is not a victory of a party or any class. It’s a victory of the great British nation as a whole’. An example of an ethical leader’s negative message is this speech by Gandhi: ‘Even if all the United Nations opposes me, even if the whole of India forsakes me, I will say, “You are wrong. India will wrench with nonviolence her liberty from unwilling hands”’. Positive and negative ethical leader statements can be equally effective when they deliver clear, moral, inclusive, goal-setting statements with persuasiveness. In fact, they can set trends in motion to make the seemingly far-fetched become real.
What is authentic leadership?
Authentic leadership focuses on the moral aspects of being a leader. It’s a relatively recent field of scholarship and there’s a divergence of opinion as to what authentic leadership theory is and how to define it. That said, there seems to be common agreement that at their core, authentic leaders have a strong sense of consistency and continuity in their espoused and enacted values, an ‘individual authenticity’ that enables others to trust them.
Authentic leaders know who they are, know what they believe in and value, and act on those values and beliefs openly and candidly.109 Their followers consider them to be ethical people. The primary quality produced by authentic leadership, therefore, is trust. Authentic leaders share information, encourage open communication and stick to their ideals. The result is that people come to have faith in them. Authentic leaders share information, encourage open communication and stick to their ideals. Authentic leaders are also humble—research indicates that leaders who model humility help followers to understand the growth process for their own development.
Authentic leaders - Leaders who know who they are, know what they believe in and value, and act on those values and beliefs openly and candidly. Their followers would consider them to be ethical people.
Authentic leadership, especially when shared among top management team members, creates a positive energising effect that heightens teamwork, team productivity and the organisation’s performance. When leaders practise what they preach, or act on their values openly and candidly, followers tend to develop a strong affective commitment and trust in their leader and, to a lesser degree, to improve their performance and OCBs.
Because the concept is relatively new, however, there’s only emerging research on authentic leadership. It’s a promising direction to think about ethics and trust in leadership because it focuses on the moral aspects of being a leader. Transformational or charismatic leaders can have a vision and can communicate it persuasively, but sometimes the vision is wrong (as in the case of Hitler), or the leader is more concerned with their own needs or pleasures, such as Bernie Madoff (former New York stockbroker, investment adviser and the confessed operator of a Ponzi scheme).
Servant leadership
Robert Greenleaf first proposed his concept of servant leadership in 1977 and focused on leader humility and servitude. Servant leaders go beyond their own self-interests and focus on opportunities to help followers to grow and develop. They don’t use power to achieve ends; they emphasise persuasion. Recent research has further developed our understanding of servant leadership by defining characteristics of servant leadership as empowerment, accountability, humility and self-awareness, authenticity, courage, empathy and stewardship.114 Because servant leadership focuses on serving the needs of others, research has focused on its outcomes for the well-being of followers.
What are the effects of servant leadership? One study of 123 supervisors found it resulted in higher levels of commitment to the supervisor, self-efficacy and perceptions of justice, which were all related to OCB. This relationship between servant leadership and follower OCB appears to be stronger when followers are focused on being dutiful and responsible. Second, servant leadership increases team potency (a belief that your team has above-average skills and abilities), which in turn leads to higher levels of group performance. Third, a study with a nationally representative sample of 250 workers found higher levels of citizenship associated with a focus on growth and advancement, which in turn was associated with higher levels of creative performance.
Servant leadership may be more prevalent and more effective in certain cultures. When asked to draw images of leaders, a recent study found that Americans tend to draw them in front of the group, giving orders to followers. Singaporeans tend to draw leaders at the back of the group, acting more to gather a group’s opinions together and then unify them from the rear. This suggests the East-Asian prototype is more like a servant leader, which might mean servant leadership is more effective in these cultures.
Trust and leadership
Trust is a psychological state that exists when you agree to make yourself vulnerable to someone else because you have positive expectations about how things are going to turn out.120 Even though you’re not completely in control of the situation, you’re willing to take a chance that the other person will ‘come through’ for you.
Trust - A positive expectation that someone else will not act opportunistically.
Trust is a primary attribute associated with leadership; breaking it can have serious adverse effects on a group’s performance. As one author noted: ‘Part of the leader’s task has been, and continues to be, working with people to find and solve problems, but whether leaders gain access to the knowledge and creative thinking they need to solve problems depends on how much people trust them. Trust and trustworthiness modulate the leader’s access to knowledge and cooperation’.
Followers who trust a leader are willing to be vulnerable to the leader’s actions, confident that their rights and interests will not be abused. Transformational leaders create support for their ideas in part by arguing that their direction will be in everyone’s best interests. People are unlikely to look up to or follow someone they perceive as dishonest or likely to take advantage of them. So, as you might expect, transformational leaders do generate higher levels of trust from their followers, which in turn is related to higher levels of team confidence and, ultimately, higher levels of team performance.
In a simple contractual exchange of goods and services, your employer is legally bound to pay you for fulfilling your job description. But today’s rapid reorganisations, diffusion of responsibility and collaborative team-based work style mean that employment relationships aren’t stable, long-term contracts with explicit terms. Rather, they’re more fundamentally based on trusting relationships than ever before. In contemporary organisations, where work is less closely documented and specified, voluntary employee contribution based on trust is absolutely necessary. And only a trusted leader will be able to encourage employees to reach beyond themselves to a transformational goal.
Ethics and trust in leadership
Why do ethics and trust matter to leadership?
Type your answer in Chat
jcu.edu.au
Although theories have increased our understanding of effective leadership, the previous section on socially aversive leadership reveals to us that they don’t explicitly deal with the role of ethics and trust, which many argue is essential to complete the picture. Leadership is not value-free. In assessing its effectiveness, we need to address the means that a leader uses to achieve goals, as well as the content of those goals. The role of the leader in creating ethical expectations for all members is crucial.
Here, we consider the two concepts of ethics and trust under the rubric of authentic leadership and servant leadership. Authentic leadership and servant leadership and the broader philosophical framework of ethical leadership have grown in prominence through the field of positive organisational behaviour (POB), particularly in the past ten years. POB focuses on how organisations can promote productive, healthy, ethical and positive social experiences. The field has developed against a backdrop of increasingly regular reports of corporate scandals and shareholder and stakeholder demands for more ethical conduct within the business world.
Ethical leadership
Only recently have researchers begun to consider the ethical implications in leadership. One reason may be the acknowledgement that many past and current leaders have suffered from ethical shortcomings. Another reason may be the growing realisation that although every member of an organisation is responsible for ethical behaviour, many initiatives aimed at increasing organisational ethical behaviour are focused on the leaders. The role of the leader in creating the ethical expectations for all members is crucial.
Ethical top leadership influences not only direct followers but spreads all the way down the organisational structure because leaders set expectations.95 Leaders rated as highly ethical tend to be evaluated very positively by their subordinates, who are also more satisfied and committed to their jobs and experience less strain and turnover intentions.96 Followers of these leaders are also more motivated, perform better and engage in more organisational citizenship behaviours (OCBs) and fewer counterproductive work behaviours (CWBs).97 Ethical leaders can change norms: one reason why employees engage in more OCBs and fewer CWBs is because their perceptions on whether each is equitable (or ‘fair’) become altered so that OCBs are perceived as more equitable.98 Ethical leaders also increase group awareness of moral issues, increase the extent to which the group is willing to speak up about ethical issues and raise their empathic concern for others. Research also found that ethical leadership reduced interpersonal conflicts.
Ethics and leadership intersect at a number of junctures. Transformational leadership has ethical implications, since these leaders change the way followers think. Charisma, too, has an ethical component. Unethical leaders use their charisma to enhance power over followers, directed towards self-serving ends. For this reason, scholars have tried to integrate ethical and charismatic leadership by advancing the idea of socialised charismatic leadership—leadership that conveys other-centred (not self-centred) values by leaders who model ethical conduct. Socialised charismatic leaders are able to bring employee values in line with their own values through their words and actions.
Socialised charismatic leadership - A leadership concept where leaders convey values that are other-centred versus self-centred and who role-model ethical conduct.
Leaders who treat their followers with fairness, especially by providing honest, frequent and accurate information, are seen as more effective. Related to this is the concept of humility, another characteristic ethical leaders often exhibit as part of being authentic. Research indicates that leaders who model humility help followers to understand the growth process for their own development. Leaders rated as highly ethical tend to have followers who engage in more organisational citizenship behaviours and who are more willing to bring problems to the leaders’ attention. Research has also found that ethical leadership reduces interpersonal conflicts.
Because top executives set the moral tone for an organisation, they need to set high ethical standards, demonstrate them through their own behaviour, and encourage and reward integrity in others while avoiding abuses of power, such as giving themselves large raises and bonuses while laying off employees. One research review found that role modelling by top leaders positively influenced managers throughout their organisations to behave ethically and fostered a climate that reinforced group-level ethical conduct. The findings suggest that organisations should invest in ethical leadership training programs, especially in industries with few ethical regulations. The researchers furthermore advised that ethical leadership training programs to teach cultural values should be mandated for leaders who take foreign assignments or manage multicultural work teams.
For ethical leadership to be effective, it’s not enough for the leader simply to possess high moral character. After all, there’s no universal standard for ethical behaviour, and ethical norms vary by culture, by industry and even sometimes within an organisation. Leaders must be willing to express their ethical beliefs and persuade others to follow their standards. Followers must believe in both the leader and the overlying principles, even if they don’t personally agree with every minor stance.
To convey their beliefs, leaders should learn to express their moral convictions in statements that reflect values shared with their organisation’s members. Leaders can build on this foundation of trust to show their character, enhance a sense of unity and create buy-in from followers. The leader’s message should announce high goals and confidence that they can be reached.
Ethical leaders’ statements are often positive messages, such as Winston Churchill’s opening for his World War II victory speech: ‘This is your hour. This is not a victory of a party or any class. It’s a victory of the great British nation as a whole’. An example of an ethical leader’s negative message is this speech by Gandhi: ‘Even if all the United Nations opposes me, even if the whole of India forsakes me, I will say, “You are wrong. India will wrench with nonviolence her liberty from unwilling hands”’. Positive and negative ethical leader statements can be equally effective when they deliver clear, moral, inclusive, goal-setting statements with persuasiveness. In fact, they can set trends in motion to make the seemingly far-fetched become real.
What is authentic leadership?
Authentic leadership focuses on the moral aspects of being a leader. It’s a relatively recent field of scholarship and there’s a divergence of opinion as to what authentic leadership theory is and how to define it. That said, there seems to be common agreement that at their core, authentic leaders have a strong sense of consistency and continuity in their espoused and enacted values, an ‘individual authenticity’ that enables others to trust them.
Authentic leaders know who they are, know what they believe in and value, and act on those values and beliefs openly and candidly.109 Their followers consider them to be ethical people. The primary quality produced by authentic leadership, therefore, is trust. Authentic leaders share information, encourage open communication and stick to their ideals. The result is that people come to have faith in them. Authentic leaders share information, encourage open communication and stick to their ideals. Authentic leaders are also humble—research indicates that leaders who model humility help followers to understand the growth process for their own development.
Authentic leaders - Leaders who know who they are, know what they believe in and value, and act on those values and beliefs openly and candidly. Their followers would consider them to be ethical people.
Authentic leadership, especially when shared among top management team members, creates a positive energising effect that heightens teamwork, team productivity and the organisation’s performance. When leaders practise what they preach, or act on their values openly and candidly, followers tend to develop a strong affective commitment and trust in their leader and, to a lesser degree, to improve their performance and OCBs.
Because the concept is relatively new, however, there’s only emerging research on authentic leadership. It’s a promising direction to think about ethics and trust in leadership because it focuses on the moral aspects of being a leader. Transformational or charismatic leaders can have a vision and can communicate it persuasively, but sometimes the vision is wrong (as in the case of Hitler), or the leader is more concerned with their own needs or pleasures, such as Bernie Madoff (former New York stockbroker, investment adviser and the confessed operator of a Ponzi scheme).
Servant leadership
Robert Greenleaf first proposed his concept of servant leadership in 1977 and focused on leader humility and servitude. Servant leaders go beyond their own self-interests and focus on opportunities to help followers to grow and develop. They don’t use power to achieve ends; they emphasise persuasion. Recent research has further developed our understanding of servant leadership by defining characteristics of servant leadership as empowerment, accountability, humility and self-awareness, authenticity, courage, empathy and stewardship.114 Because servant leadership focuses on serving the needs of others, research has focused on its outcomes for the well-being of followers.
What are the effects of servant leadership? One study of 123 supervisors found it resulted in higher levels of commitment to the supervisor, self-efficacy and perceptions of justice, which were all related to OCB. This relationship between servant leadership and follower OCB appears to be stronger when followers are focused on being dutiful and responsible. Second, servant leadership increases team potency (a belief that your team has above-average skills and abilities), which in turn leads to higher levels of group performance. Third, a study with a nationally representative sample of 250 workers found higher levels of citizenship associated with a focus on growth and advancement, which in turn was associated with higher levels of creative performance.
Servant leadership may be more prevalent and more effective in certain cultures. When asked to draw images of leaders, a recent study found that Americans tend to draw them in front of the group, giving orders to followers. Singaporeans tend to draw leaders at the back of the group, acting more to gather a group’s opinions together and then unify them from the rear. This suggests the East-Asian prototype is more like a servant leader, which might mean servant leadership is more effective in these cultures.
Trust and leadership
Trust is a psychological state that exists when you agree to make yourself vulnerable to someone else because you have positive expectations about how things are going to turn out.120 Even though you’re not completely in control of the situation, you’re willing to take a chance that the other person will ‘come through’ for you.
Trust - A positive expectation that someone else will not act opportunistically.
Trust is a primary attribute associated with leadership; breaking it can have serious adverse effects on a group’s performance. As one author noted: ‘Part of the leader’s task has been, and continues to be, working with people to find and solve problems, but whether leaders gain access to the knowledge and creative thinking they need to solve problems depends on how much people trust them. Trust and trustworthiness modulate the leader’s access to knowledge and cooperation’.
Followers who trust a leader are willing to be vulnerable to the leader’s actions, confident that their rights and interests will not be abused. Transformational leaders create support for their ideas in part by arguing that their direction will be in everyone’s best interests. People are unlikely to look up to or follow someone they perceive as dishonest or likely to take advantage of them. So, as you might expect, transformational leaders do generate higher levels of trust from their followers, which in turn is related to higher levels of team confidence and, ultimately, higher levels of team performance.
In a simple contractual exchange of goods and services, your employer is legally bound to pay you for fulfilling your job description. But today’s rapid reorganisations, diffusion of responsibility and collaborative team-based work style mean that employment relationships aren’t stable, long-term contracts with explicit terms. Rather, they’re more fundamentally based on trusting relationships than ever before. In contemporary organisations, where work is less closely documented and specified, voluntary employee contribution based on trust is absolutely necessary. And only a trusted leader will be able to encourage employees to reach beyond themselves to a transformational goal.
Challenges to our understanding of leadership
Leadership as an attribution
Projecting the appearance of being a leader rather than focusing on actual accomplishment.
Substitutes for and neutralisers of leadership (next slide)
Experience and training can replace the need for a leader’s support or ability to create structure.
Neutralisers (eg indifferent to rewards) are attributes that make it impossible for leader to make a difference to follower
Selecting leaders
Knowledge, skills, abilities, personality tests, social skills, emotional intelligence
Training leaders
strategic vision creation, executive implementation, follower mentoring, trust building, resilence…
jcu.edu.au
https://www.ccl.org/articles/leading-effectively-articles/top-6-leadership-challenges/
What’s most challenging about leading organizations today? And do these leadership challenges differ around the world?
Our researchers went straight to the source to answer these questions about leadership challenges, gathering input from 763 middle- and executive-level leaders in organizations from China/Hong Kong, Egypt, India, Singapore, the U.K., the U.S., and Spain.
Our study found these leaders consistently face the same 6 challenges — even if they describe their leadership challenges and specific context in different ways:
1. Developing managerial effectiveness is the challenge of developing the relevant skills — such as time-management, prioritization, strategic thinking, decision-making, and getting up to speed with the job — to be more effective at work.
2. Inspiring others is the challenge of inspiring or motivating others to ensure they’re satisfied with their jobs and working smarter.
3. Developing employees is the challenge of developing others, including mentoring and coaching.
4. Leading a team is the challenge of team-building, team development, and team management. Specific leadership challenges include how to instill pride, how to provide support, how to lead a big team, and what to do when taking over a new team.
5. Guiding change is the challenge of managing, mobilizing, understanding, and leading change. Guiding change includes knowing how to mitigate consequences, overcome resistance to change, and deal with employees’ reactions to change.
6. Managing internal stakeholders is the challenge of managing relationships, politics, and image. This leadership challenges include gaining managerial support, managing up, and getting buy-in from other departments, groups, or individuals.
Exhibit 11.8
Substitutes for and neutralisers of leadership
Source: Based on S. Kerr and J. M. Jermier, ‘Substitutes for leadership: their meaning and measurement’, Organizational Behavior and Human Performance, December 1978, p. 378.
jcu.edu.au
Substitutes for and neutralisers of leadership
One theory of leadership suggests that, in many situations, leaders’ actions are irrelevant.Experience and training are among the substitutes that can replace the need for a leader’s support or ability to create structure. Organisational characteristics, such as explicit, formalised goals, rigid rules and procedures, and cohesive work groups, can also replace formal leadership, while indifference to organisational rewards can neutralise its effects. Neutralisers make it impossible for leader behaviour to make any difference to follower outcomes (see Exhibit 11.8).
This observation should not be too surprising. After all, we’ve introduced a number of variables—such as attitudes, personality, ability and group norms—that affect employee performance and satisfaction. It’s simplistic to think that employees are guided to goal accomplishments solely by the actions of their leader. Leadership is simply another independent variable in our overall OB model.
There are many possible substitutes for and neutralisers of many different types of leader behaviours across many different situations. Moreover, sometimes the difference between substitutes and neutralisers is fuzzy. If you’re working on a task that’s intrinsically enjoyable, theory predicts that leadership will be less important because the task itself provides enough motivation. But does that mean that intrinsically enjoyable tasks neutralise leadership effects, or substitute for them, or both? Another problem is that, while substitutes for leadership (such as employee characteristics, the nature of the task and so on) matter to performance, it doesn’t necessarily mean that leadership doesn’t.
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Summary
Leadership plays a central part in understanding group behaviour because it’s the leader who usually directs us towards our goals.
Theories of leadership have focused on behaviour approaches and contingency theories, as well as situational factors.
More recent studies of leadership have focused on the importance of ethics, authenticity, and trust.
jcu.edu.au
Summary
Leadership plays a central part in understanding group behaviour because it’s the leader who usually directs us towards our goals. Knowing what makes a good leader should therefore be valuable in improving group performance. The early search for a set of universal leadership traits failed. However, recent efforts using the Big Five personality framework show strong and consistent relationships between leadership and extraversion, conscientiousness and openness to experience. The behavioural approach’s major contribution was narrowing leadership into task-oriented (initiating structure) and people-oriented (consideration) styles. By considering the situation in which the leader operates, contingency theories promised to improve on the behavioural approach. Theories such as LPC and SLII provide leaders with an understanding of the situational factors that affect follower performance. More recent investigations into leadership have alerted us to the importance of ethics, authenticity and trust. These variables are acknowledged to have significant influence on leadership effectiveness in today’s organisations.
Implications for managers
For management positions, recruit candidates who exhibit transformational leadership qualities and who have demonstrated vision and charisma.
Test and interview in order to identify people with leadership qualities.
Recruit candidates you believe are ethical and trustworthy for management roles, and train current managers in your organisation’s ethical standards in order to increase leadership effectiveness.
Seek to develop trusting relationships with followers because, as organisations have become less stable and predictable, strong bonds of trust are replacing bureaucratic rules in defining expectations and relationships.
Consider investing in leadership training, such as formal courses, workshops, rotating job responsibilities, work-based learning projects, coaching and mentoring.
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