Organizational Behavior: Chapter 16

Gender and Leadership

(1) Men and women were seen as displaying more task and social leadership, respectively; (2) women used a more democratic or participative style than men, and men used a more autocratic and directive style than women; (3) men and women were equally assertive; and (4) women executives, when rated by their peers, managers, and direct reports, scored higher than their male counterparts on a variety of effectiveness criteria.

Leadership

-Process between leaders and followers -Involves social influence -Occurs at multiple levels in an organization -Focuses on goal accomplishment

Approaches to Studying Leadership

Contingency approaches focused on identifying the types of leadership behaviors that are most effective in different settings. The transformational approach is the most popular perspective for studying leadership today.

Is Emotional Intelligence a Key Leadership Trait?

Emotional intelligence is the ability to manage oneself and one's relationships in mature and constructive ways: The six components of emotional intelligence are shown in Table 5-5. Given that leadership is an influence process between leaders and followers, it should come as no surprise that emotional intelligence is predicted to be associated with leadership effectiveness. While Goleman and other consultants contend that they have evidence to support this conclusion, it has not been published in scientific journals. We agree with others who contend that there presently is not enough research published in OB journals to substantiate the conclusion that emotional intelligence is significantly associated with leadership effectiveness.

Is Honesty a Critical Leadership Trait?

James Kouzes and Barry Posner attempted to identify key leadership traits by asking the following open-ended question to more than 20,000 people around the world: "What values (personal traits or characteristics) do you look for and admire in your superiors?" The top four traits included honesty, forward-looking, inspiring, and competent. The researchers concluded that these four traits constitute a leader's credibility. This research suggests that people want their leaders to be credible and to have a sense of direction. That said, our discussion in Chapter 3 revealed that an organization's culture significantly influences the extent to which leaders encourage and reinforce integrity at work.

Categories of Leader Behavior within the Revised Path-Goal Theory

Three key changes: 1) Leadership is more complex and involves a greater variety of leader behavior. 2) The role of intrinsic motivation and empowerment in influencing leadership effectiveness 3) Shared leadership

Situational theories

propose that the effectiveness of a particular style of leader behavior depends on the situation.

Path-Goal Theory

Describes how leadership effectiveness is influenced by the interaction between four leadership styles - directive, supportive, participative, achievement-oriented Path-goal theory has two groups of contingency variables. They are employee characteristics and environmental factors. Five important employee characteristics are locus of control, task ability, need for achievement, experience, and need for clarity. Two relevant environmental factors are task structure (independent versus interdependent tasks) and work group dynamics. Employees with an internal locus of control are more likely to prefer participative or achievement-oriented leadership because they believe they have control over the work environment. Such individuals are unlikely to be satisfied with directive leader behaviors that exert additional control over their activities. In contrast, employees with an external locus tend to view the environment as uncontrollable, thereby preferring the structure provided by supportive or directive leadership. An employee with high task ability and experience is less apt to need additional direction and thus would respond negatively to directive leadership. This person is more likely to be motivated and satisfied by participative and achievement-oriented leadership. Oppositely, an inexperienced employee would find achievement-oriented leadership overwhelming as he or she confronts challenges associated with learning a new job. Supportive and directive leadership would be helpful in this situation. Finally, directive and supportive leadership should help employees experiencing role ambiguity. However, directive leadership is likely to frustrate employees working on routine and simple tasks. Supportive leadership is most useful in this context. Three key changes: 1) Leadership is more complex and involves a greater variety of leader behavior. 2) The role of intrinsic motivation and empowerment in influencing leadership effectiveness 3) Shared leadership

The Leader-Member Exchange (LMX) Model of Leadership

Focuses on the quality of relationships between managers and subordinates as opposed to the behaviors or traits of either leaders or followers. Assumes that leaders develop unique one-on-one relationships with direct reports. In-group exchange -Leaders and followers develop a partnership characterized by reciprocal influence, mutual trust, respect and liking, and a sense of common fates. Out-group exchange -Leaders are characterized as overseers who fail to create a sense of mutual trust, respect, or common fate Leaders are encouraged to establish high-performance expectations for all of their direct reports. Managers should be careful that they don't create a homogeneous work environment. **tips for improving the quality of leader-member exchanges. - Stay focused on your department's goals and remain positive about your ability to accomplish your goals. An unsupportive boss is just another obstacle to be overcome -Do not fall prey to feeling powerless, and empower yourself to get things done. - Exercise the power you have by focusing on circumstances you can control and avoid dwelling on circumstances you cannot control. -Work on improving your relationship with your manager. Begin by examining the level of trust between the two of you and then try to improve it by frequently and effectively communicating. You can also increase trust by following through on your commitments and achieving your goals. -Use an authentic, respectful, and assertive approach to resolve differences with your manager. It also is useful to use a problem-solving approach when disagreements arise.

Behavioral Styles Theory

The Ohio State Studies identified two independent dimensions of leader behavior. -Consideration: creating mutual respect and trust with followers. -Initiating structure: organizing and defining what group members should be doing. -Leader behaviors can be systematically improved and developed. -There is no one best style of leadership. -The effectiveness of a particular leadership style depends on the situation at hand.

The Full-range Model of Leadership

Transactional Leadership focuses on clarifying employees' role and task requirements and providing followers with positive and negative rewards contingent on performance. encompasses the fundamental managerial activities of setting goals, monitoring progress toward goal achievement, and rewarding and punishing people for their level of goal accomplishment. Transformational leaders transform followers by creating changes in their goals, values, needs, beliefs, and aspirations. They accomplish this transformation by appealing to followers' self-concepts—namely their values and personal identity. -engender trust, seek to develop leadership in others, exhibit self-sacrifice and serve as moral agents, focusing themselves and followers on objectives that transcend the more immediate needs of the work group. Transformational leader behavior is first influenced by various individual and organizational characteristics. -tend to have personalities that are more extraverted, agreeable, and proactive and less neurotic than nontransformational leaders. -have higher emotional intelligence. -Female leaders also were found to use transformational leadership more than male leaders. -less traitlike and more susceptible to managerial influence. -an individual's life experiences play a role in developing transformational leadership and that transformational leadership can be learned. -organizational culture influences the extent to which leaders are transformational. Cultures that are adaptive and flexible rather than rigid and bureaucratic are more likely to create environments that foster the opportunity for transformational leadership to be exhibited. Transformational leaders engage in four key sets of leader behavior: (attached) 1) The first set, referred to as inspirational motivation, involves establishing an attractive vision of the future, the use of emotional arguments, and exhibition of optimism and enthusiasm. A vision is "a realistic, credible, attractive future for your organization." 2) Idealized influence includes behaviors such as sacrificing for the good of the group, being a role model, and displaying high ethical standards. 3) individualized consideration, entails behaviors associated with providing support, encouragement, empowerment, and coaching to employees. These behaviors necessitate that leaders pay special attention to the needs of their followers and search for ways to help people develop and grow. You can do this by spending time talking with people about their interests and by identifying new learning opportunities for them. Showing interest in people by remembering their names and previous conversations are other simple ways in which you can demonstrate individualized consideration. Finally, treating people with respect and telling them the truth with compassion also represent examples of consideration. 4) Intellectual stimulation involves behaviors that encourage employees to question the status quo and to seek innovative and creative solutions to organizational problems. -pertains to encouraging employee creativity, innovation, and problem solving. -The group problem-solving techniques discussed in Chapter 12 can help to stimulate employees. -fostering an adhocracy culture will assist in creating a work environment that promotes intellectual stimulation. You can use any of the cultural embedding techniques we discussed in Chapter 3 in this pursuit.

Shared Leadership

dynamic, interactive influence process among individuals in groups for which the objective is to lead one another to the achievement of group or organizational goals or both This influence process often involves peer, or lateral, influence and at other times involves upward or downward hierarchical influence. Shared leadership is most likely to be needed when people work in teams, when people are involved in complex projects, and when people are doing knowledge work—work that requires voluntary contributions of intellectual capital by skilled professionals. Shared leadership also is beneficial when people are working on tasks or projects that require interdependence and creativity. A simple way to make this work is for one leader to focus on internal matters while the other is concerned with external issues. The application of shared leadership in this manner also helps organizations build a leadership pipeline for executive-level positions. shared leadership in teams was positively associated with group cohesion, group citizenship, and group effectiveness.Table 16-6 contains a list of key questions and answers that managers should consider when determining how they can develop shared leadership.

Is Personality More Important Than Intelligence?

extraversion was most consistently and positively related to both leadership emergence and effectiveness. Conscientiousness and openness to experience also were positively correlated with leadership effectiveness. personality is more important than intelligence when selecting leaders.

Servant leadership

focuses on increasing services to others rather than to oneself less likely to engage in self-serving behaviors that hurt others

Bad Leader Traits

-Incompetent - The leader and at least some followers lack the will or skill (or both) to sustain effective action. With regard to at least one important leadership challenge, they do not create positive change. -Rigid - The leader and at least some followers are stiff and unyielding. Although they may be competent, they are unable or unwilling to adapt to new ideas, new information, or changing times. -Intemperate - he leader lacks self-control and is aided and abetted by followers who are unwilling or unable effectively to intervene. -Callous - The leader and at least some followers are uncaring and unkind. Ignored or discounted are the needs, wants, and desires of most members of the group or organization, especially subordinates. -Corrupt - The leader and at least some followers lie, cheat, or steal. To a degree that exceeds the norm, they put self-interest ahead of the public interest. -Insular - he leader and at least some followers minimize or disregard the health and welfare of "the other," that is, those outside the group or organization for which they are directly responsible. -Evil - Evil leaders such as Adolf Hitler and Saddam Hussein encourage their followers to commit atrocities. They tend to use pain as an instrument of power. The harm done to men, women, and children is severe rather than slight. The harm can be physical, psychological, or both.

Implicit leadership theory

based on the idea that people have beliefs about how leaders should behave and what they should do for their followers. These beliefs are summarized in what is called a leadership prototype.

Leader Trait Theory

Trait theory is the successor to what was called the "great man" theory of leadership. This approach was based on the assumption that leaders such as Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King Jr., or Mark Zuckerberg were born with some inborn ability to lead. In contrast, trait theorists believed that leadership traits were not innate but could be developed through experience and learning. Leader Traits are physical or personality characteristic that can be used to differentiate leaders from followers. five traits tended to differentiate leaders from average followers: -Intelligence -Dominance -Self-confidence -Level of Energy & Activity -Task-relevant Knowledge First, organizations may want to include personality and trait assessments into their selection and promotion processes. Second, management development programs can be used to build a pipeline of leadership talent.

Fiedler's Contingency Model

based on the premise that a leader's effectiveness is contingent on the extent to which a leader's style fits or matches characteristics of the situation at hand. Fiedler believes that leaders have one dominant or natural leadership style that is resistant to change. A leader's style is described as either task-motivated or relationship-motivated. Task-motivated leaders focus on accomplishing goals, whereas relationship-motivated leaders are more interested in developing positive relationships with followers. These basic styles are similar to initiating structure/concern for production and consideration/concern for people that were previously discussed. To determine an individual's leadership style, Fiedler developed the least preferred co-worker (LPC) scale. High scores on the survey (high LPC) indicate that an individual is relationship-motivated, and low scores (low LPC) suggest a task-motivated style. Situational control refers to the amount of control and influence the leader has in his immediate work environment. Three Dimensions of Situational Control: -Leader-member relations the extent to which the leader has the support, loyalty, and trust of the work group most important component of situational control. Good leader-member relations suggest that the leader can depend on the group, thus ensuring that the work group will try to meet the leader's goals and objectives. -Task structure concerned with the amount of structure contained within tasks performed by the work group. For example, a managerial job contains less structure than that of a bank teller. Because structured tasks have guidelines for how the job should be completed, the leader has more control and influence over employees performing such tasks. This dimension is the second most important component of situational control. -Position power the degree to which the leader has formal power to reward, punish, or otherwise obtain compliance from employees

Characteristics of Being a Leader and a Manager

leaders manage and managers lead, but the two activities are not synonymous Broadly speaking, managers typically perform functions associated with planning, investigating, organizing, and control, and leaders deal with the interpersonal aspects of a manager's job. Leaders inspire others, provide emotional support, and try to get employees to rally around a common goal. Leaders also play a key role in creating a vision and strategic plan for an organization. Managers, in turn, are charged with implementing the vision and strategic plan. Good leaders are not necessarily good managers, and good managers are not necessarily good leaders. Effective leadership requires effective managerial skills at some level. Good managerial skills turn a leader's vision into actionable tasks and successful implementation. Organizational success requires a combination of effective leadership and management. This in turn leads to the realization that today's leaders need to be effective at both leading and managing.

Leadership prototype

mental representations of the traits and behaviors that people believe are possessed by leaders. Although past research demonstrated that people were perceived as leaders when they exhibited masculine-oriented traits and behaviors associated with masculinity, and dominance, more recent studies showed an emphasis on more feminine traits and styles that emphasize empowerment, fairness, and supportiveness. This change in prototypes bodes well for reducing bias and discrimination against women in leadership roles.

Applying Situational Theories

1) Identify important outcomes. This step entails a determination of the goals the leader is trying to achieve. It is important to identify the key goals that exist at a specific point in time. 2) Identify relevant leadership types/behaviors. This step requires the manager to identify the specific types of behaviors that may be appropriate for the situation at hand. The list of behaviors shown in Table 16-5 is a good starting point. Don't try to use all available leadership behaviors. Rather, select the one or two that appear most helpful. 3) Identify situational conditions. Fiedler's contingency theory and House's path-goal theory both identify a set of potential contingency factors to consider. That said, there may be other practical considerations. 4) Match leadership to the conditions at hand. This is the step in which research cannot provide conclusive recommendations because there simply are too many possible situational conditions. This means that you should use your knowledge about organizational behavior to determine the best match between leadership styles/behaviors and the situation at hand. 5) Determine how to make the match. It's now time to implement the leadership style or behaviors you determined were most appropriate in step 4. There are two basic approaches you can use according to contingency theory and House's path-goal theory. You can either change the person in the leadership role or the leader can change his or her style or behavior. **there are unintended negative consequences when managers use a situational approach with members from a team. Treating group members differently resulted in some employees feeling that they were not among the leader's "in-group" (i.e., a partnership characterized by mutual trust, respect, and liking): These negative feelings in turn had a counterproductive effect on employees' self-efficacy and subsequent group performance. leaders of teams need to be careful when treating individual team members differently. There are potential pros and cons to the application of situational theories in a team context.

Support for transformational leadership underscores six important managerial implications.

1) the establishment of a positive vision of the future—inspirational motivation—should be considered a first step at applying transformational leadership. 2) the best leaders are not just transformational; they are both transactional and transformational, and they avoid a laissez-faire or "wait-and-see" style. 3) transformational leadership not only affects individual-level outcomes like job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and performance, but it also influences group dynamics and group-level outcomes. Managers can thus use the four types of transformational leadership shown in Figure 16-4 as a vehicle to improve group dynamics and work-unit outcomes. The key point to remember is that transformational leadership transforms individuals as well as teams and work groups. 4) transformational leadership works virtually. If you lead geographically dispersed people, then it is important to focus on how you can display the four transformational leader behaviors in your emails, tweets, webinars, and conference calls. 5) employees at any level in an organization can be trained to be more transactional and transformational. This reinforces the organizational value of developing and rolling out a combination of transactional and transformational leadership training for all employees. These programs, however, should be based on an overall corporate philosophy that constitutes the foundation of leadership development. 6) transformational leaders can be ethical or unethical. Whereas ethical transformational leaders enable employees to enhance their self-concepts, unethical ones select or produce obedient, dependent, and compliant followers. Top management can create and maintain ethical transformational leadership by -Creating and enforcing a clearly stated code of ethics -Recruiting, selecting, and promoting people who display ethical behavior. -Developing performance expectations around the treatment of employees—these expectations can then be assessed in the performance appraisal process. -Training employees to value diversity. -Identifying, rewarding, and publicly praising employees who exemplify high moral conduct.

four-step process for followers to use in managing the leader-follower relationship.

First, it is critical for followers to understand their boss. Followers should attempt to gain an appreciation for their manager's leadership style, interpersonal style, goals, expectations, pressures, and strengths and weaknesses. One way of doing this is to ask your manager to answer the following seven questions: 1) How would you describe your leadership style? Does your style change when you are under pressure? 2) When would you like me to approach you with questions or information? Are there any situations that are off-limits (e.g., a social event)? 3) How do you want me to communicate with you? 4) How do you like to work? 5) Are there behaviors or attitudes that you will not tolerate? What are they? 6) What is your approach toward giving feedback? 7) How can I help you? Second, followers need to understand their own style, needs, goals, expectations, and strengths and weaknesses. The next step entails conducting a gap analysis between the understanding a follower has about his or her boss and the understanding the follower has about him- or herself. With this information in mind, followers are ready to proceed to the final step of developing and maintaining a relationship that fits both parties' needs and styles. This final step requires followers to build on mutual strengths and to adjust or accommodate the leader's divergent style, goals, expectations, and weaknesses. a follower may not be able to accommodate a leader's style, expectations, or weaknesses and may have to seek a transfer or quit his or her job to reconcile the discrepancy. we can all enhance our boss's leadership effectiveness and our employer's success by becoming better followers.

The Role of Followers in the Leadership Process

the success of both leaders and followers is contingent on the dynamic relationship among the people involved. both leaders and followers are closely linked. You cannot lead without having followers, and you cannot follow without having leaders. both leaders and followers to focus on developing a mutually rewarding and beneficial relationship. three types of followers: helpers, independents, and rebels. -Helpers show deference and comply with the leadership; -independents distance themselves from the leadership and show less compliance; and -rebels show divergence from the leader and are at least compliant. Among other types of followers, moderate in compliance, are diplomats, partisans, and counselors. Leaders obviously want followers who are productive, reliable, honest, cooperative, proactive, and flexible. Leaders do not benefit from followers who hide the truth, withhold information, fail to generate ideas, are unwilling to collaborate, provide inaccurate feedback, or are unwilling to take the lead on projects and initiatives. followers seek, admire, and respect leaders who foster three emotional responses in others: Followers want organizational leaders to create feelings of significance (what one does at work is important and meaningful), community (a sense of unity encourages people to treat others with respect and dignity and to work together in pursuit of organizational goals), and excitement (people are engaged and feel energy at work).