ASSIGNMENT 6-2

Leadership Styles: Literature Review

Karen Crump

Argosy University

LITERATURE REVIEW

There is vast literature on leadership and more specifically on different styles of leadership. The literature spans many decades and there are hundreds if not thousands of researchers that have aired their opinion in this imperative subject. This study is an extension of the vast literature that has been conducted on leadership styles drawing largely from some of the articles that we have studied in this course. The course largely focused on three leadership styles that include the transformative style of leadership, the personality and charismatic leadership style and the situational leadership style. The literature review will begin with an analysis on these leadership styles and the purpose of every article. The literature review will them highlight some of the themes that emerge in all the articles.

James Downton was the pioneer of transformational leadership after he coined the term in 1973. One of the earliest and most renowned researchers in James Burns who provided the first definition on transformational leadership. He cited transformational leadership as a leadership that aims at changing the already existent thoughts, goals and techniques in order to change results for the better. Lee et al. (2013) also voiced his opinion on transformational leadership by asserting that it is a leadership style that focuses on supporting the needs of the people and more so those that are following the leaders.

There are various renowned business leaders who were known for employing transformative leadership as postulated by Mercedes et al. (2013). He cited William Edward Deming as one of the notable leaders who employed transformational leadership style in the control of the quality of statistics. Another notable leader that he cited was Ross Perot who started his own company the Electric Data Systems after working for IBM as a salesperson. His transformational leadership mainly focused on improving customer services with waiting for approval and without monitoring. His transformative leadership also focused on bringing an order during chaotic times and therefore making it easy for work to be done. Avolio and Yammarino (2013) also introduces us to a number of renowned leaders that also used transformational leadership such as Peter Drucker who provided a balance between long term plans and short term plans in his transformational leadership style.

In additional his transformative leadership also focused on mixing both entrepreneurship and innovation. They further cited John D. Rockefeller as another notable leader who used transformational leadership. Rockefeller who was once the richest man in the world through his company, the Standard Oil transformed the growth of his company by guaranteeing the standard of kerosene that was being produced by the company. His transformative leadership styles also focused on critical and disciplined strategies and tactics.

The personality and charismatic leadership style primarily focuses on the persuasiveness and charm of the leader. The charismatic style of leadership is mainly driven by the commitment and the convictions of the leaders towards their cause. According to Avolio and Yammarino, (2013), the charismatic style of leadership is mainly traced to Max Weber in 1958 in his book, “The three types of legitimate rule”. They cited various notable leaders that that employed this kind of leadership style. One of the most notable and most popular of them all is Martin Luther King Jr. Throughout his political and civil rights movement journey, Martin Luther King Jr. used a charismatic style of leadership. This was particularly proven through his numerous speeches that mainly focused on peaceful protest during the civil rights movement. One event that reveal his charismatic leadership is during his famous; ‘I have a dream’ speech that moved the over 200,000 people in the crowd and millions of people around the world in 1963 and consequently to the passing of the Civil Rights Act in 1964.

Another notable figure is Pope John Paul 11. He used charismatic leadership in redefining the role of the Catholic Church to the modern world and further travelled to many countries around the world to advocate for human rights. Another notable figure is Mother Teresa who was well known for her work with the poor. It is no doubt that she was an inspiration to the world and combined with her devotion and dedicated persona, there is no doubt that she was a charismatic leader. In politics, there have also been a number of charismatic leaders such as Ronald Reagan and Sir Winston Churchill as espoused by Zehndorfer (2013). He also cited some business leaders who have also employed charismatic leadership such as Jack Welch and Lee Iacocca.

Blanchard (2008) is one researcher with a vast experience on leadership and he introduced situational leadership as a leadership style that is adaptive and accommodates different needs and situations. There are various styles that are involved in this kind of leadership as asserted by Daniel Goleman. He cited pacesetting leaders, coaching leaders, affirmative leaders, democratic leaders, coercive leaders and authoritative leaders.

The history of situational leadership is mainly seen through the lenses of Blanchard (2008) who traced the development of this style of leadership to 1969 in a publication titled; “Management of organization behavior”. He cited various companies that successfully used this kind of leadership style such as the British Telecom, Adobe, Royal New Zealand Navy, the San Diego Padres, Michigan and WD-40. In addition, he further cited popular leaders in his publication that employed this kind of leadership such as Dwight Eisenhower who is a former president of the United States, John Wooden who is a former coach of the men basketball team and Pat Summit a former coach of the Tennessee volunteers’ lady’s team and also Margaret Thatcher.

Purpose of the chosen article

The first article assesses whether transformational leadership style influences the attitude of employees and more so in regards to the safety practices. The second article assesses how transformative leadership can foster changes within an organization. The third article assesses how school administrators can employ diverse leadership skills. The fourth article assesses the situational variables that unravel how leadership impacts individuals and originations. The fifth article assesses personality and charismatic leadership and how it can moderate and control stress. The sixth article introduces us to leadership and organizational management in general. The seventh article unravels how leadership behavior can influence the commitment of the employees.

The key themes that emerge across the first article as espoused by Lee et al. (2013) is the importance of transformative style of leadership in changing the attitude of employees and more particularly in promoting safety practice in food. Lee et al. (2013) particularly unravels how companies can use transformative leadership style to ensure that the employees have goof practices when handling food. It centers more on a food handling facility but this does not negate the fact that it is also applicable in other fields.

Mercedes et al. (2013) in the second article titled ‘Transformational leadership as an antecedent of change-oriented organizational citizenship behavior’ the primary theme is transformation leadership and how it can be used to change the behavior of the employees within an organization. The third article titled “Diversity leadership skills of school administrators a scale development study” by Polat, Arslan and Olcum (2017) primary theme is on the different leadership skills that can be used by school administrators. The fourth article “Exploratory leadership: understanding situational variables on the impact of leadership” by Holly Gruhlke (n.d) and the primary theme us how to employ a balanced approach to leadership.

The fifth article “Personality and charismatic leadership in context: the moderating role of situational stress” by Berson and Oreg (2015) primary theme is on personality and charismatic leadership. The sixth article on “Leadership and organizational management journal” by Tyre (n.d) primary theme is leadership statement. The seventh article titled “Building bank brands: How leadership behavior influences employee commitment” by Wallace, Chernatony and Buil (2013) primary theme is on how leadership behaviors influence the commitment of the employees.

A synthesize of the material and summary of the patterns of similarities and differences regarding how each of the authors has presented on each leadership approach reveals the following. There are similarities between Lee et al. (2013) article and Mercedes et al. (2013) in the fact that they both sensitize on the importance of transformational leadership in changing the behavior and attitude of the employees. Polat, Arslan and Olcum (2017) article on diversity leadership skills align or exhibits similarities with Tyre (2015) journey on leadership and organization management since they both focus on leadership experiences and more particularly on various leadership skills that should be employed in order to become an effective leader.

In addition, both also articles also have similarities with Gruhlke (n.d) article on exploratory leadership since it also highlights how leaders can have a balanced approach in order to become an effective leader. Oreg and Berson (2015) article on personality and charismatic leadership however differs with the other article since it focuses solely on charismatic leadership style and how it can be used to avert and circumvent a stressful situation during leadership. Wallace, Chernatony and Buil (2013) article on how leadership behavior can influence the commitment of the employees has both similarities and differences with the other articles. The similarity is that they highlight some of the skills and behaviors that should be employed by leaders which align with the studies by Polat, Arslan and Olcum (2017) and Tyre (n.d). The difference however is that it focuses on a banking sector contrary to other articles that focus on a general setting.

In conclusion, based on my analysis of the literature, the leadership approach which I feel would be the most effective for managing an ethical behavior within the organization is situational leadership style. This is because of the fact that it makes it easy to adapt to different situations within an organization and also the different needs of the employees. Employees have different behaviors and needs within an organization and therefore using a fixed leadership style would be advantageous to some employees and disadvantageous to others. Moreover, the fact that renowned companies such as the San Diego Padres, Adobe, Michigan and British Telecom have successfully used situational leadership style implies that it would also be a viable option in the organization.

References

Avolio, B. J., & Yammarino, F. J. (2013). Transformational and Charismatic Leadership: The Road Ahead. New York, NY: Emerald Group Publishing.

Blanchard. (2008). Situational Leadership: Info Set. New York, NY: Jossey-Bass.

Gruhlke. H. (n.d) Exploratory Leadership: Understanding Situational Variables On The Impact of Leadership. 34-44.

Lee et al. (2013). Does transformational leadership style influence employees’ attitudes toward food safety practices? International Journal of Hospitality Management 33, 282–293.

Mercedes et al. (2013). Transformational leadership as an antecedent of change-oriented organizational citizenship behavior. Journal of Business Research 66, 2147–2152

Oreg, S. & Berson, Y. (2015). Personality and charismatic leadership in context: the moderating role of Situational stress. Personnel Psychology 68, 49–77.

Polat, S, Arslan, Y. & Olcum. D. (2017). Diversity leadership skills of school administrators: A scale development study. Issues in Educational Research, 27(3) 512-526.

Tyre, T. (2015). Leadership statement. Leadership & Organizational Management Journal 1, 1-6.

Wallace, E., Chernatony, L., & Buil, I. (2013). Building bank brands: How leadership behavior influences employee commitment. Journal of Business Research 66, 165–171.

Zehndorfer, E. (2013). Leadership: A Critical Introduction. New York, NY: Routledge.