Week 1
actual vs perceived intelligence
intelligence is a positive but modest predictor of leadership, and when actual intelligence is measured with paper-and-pencil tests, its relationship to leadership is a bit weaker compared to when intelligence is defined as the perceived intelligence of a leader
traits that show relatively strong relations with leadership
intelligence, Self-esteem, integrity
task-oriented behaviors-- sometimes called initiating structure
involve structuring the roles of subordinates, providing them with instructions, and behaving in ways that will increase the performance of the group. Task-oriented behaviors are directives given to employees to get things done and to ensure that organizational goals are met.
Achievement-oriented leaders
set goals for employees and encourage them to reach their goals. Their style challenges employees and focuses their attention on work-related goals.
Agreeableness
Being affable, tolerant, sensitive, trusting, kind, and warm.
Neuroticism
Being anxious, irritable, temperamental, and moody
Openness
Being curious, original, intellectual, creative, and open to new ideas
Conscientiousness
Being organized, systematic, punctual, achievement-oriented, and dependable
Extraversion
Being outgoing, talkative, sociable, and enjoying social situations
four tools of transformational leaders
Charisma refers to behaviors leaders demonstrate that create confidence in, commitment to, and admiration for the leader (Shamir, House, & Arthur, 1993). Charismatic individuals have a "magnetic" personality that is appealing to followers. Second, transformational leaders use inspirational motivation, or come up with a vision that is inspiring to others. Third is the use of intellectual stimulation, which means that they challenge organizational norms and status quo, and they encourage employees to think creatively and work harder. Finally, they use individualized consideration, which means that they show personal care and concern for the well-being of their followers.
transactional leaders use three different methods
Contingent rewards mean rewarding employees for their accomplishments. Active management by exception involves leaving employees to do their jobs without interference, but at the same time proactively predicting potential problems and preventing them from occurring. Passive management by exception is similar in that it involves leaving employees alone, but in this method the manager waits until something goes wrong before coming to the rescue.
Decision-Making Styles
Decide. The leader makes the decision alone using available information. Consult Individually. The leader obtains additional information from group members before making the decision alone. Consult as a group. The leader shares the problem with group members individually and makes the final decision alone. Facilitate. The leader shares information about the problem with group members collectively, and acts as a facilitator. The leader sets the parameters of the decision. Delegate. The leader lets the team make the decision.
OB Toolbox: Be a Servant Leader
Don't ask what your employees can do for you. Think of what you can do for them. Your job as a leader is to be of service to them. How can you relieve their stress? Protect them from undue pressure? Pitch in to help them? Think about creative ways of helping ease their lives. One of your key priorities should be to help employees reach their goals. This involves getting to know them. Learn about who they are and what their values and priorities are. Be humble. You are not supposed to have all the answers and dictate others. One way of achieving this humbleness may be to do volunteer work. Be open with your employees. Ask them questions. Give them information so that they understand what is going on in the company. Find ways of helping the external community. Giving employees opportunities to be involved in community volunteer projects or even thinking and strategizing about making a positive impact on the greater community would help.
Be Charismatic!
Have a vision around which people can gather. When framing requests or addressing others, instead of emphasizing short-term goals, stress the importance of the long-term vision. When giving a message, think about the overarching purpose. What is the ultimate goal? Why should people care? What are you trying to achieve? Tie the vision to history. In addition to stressing the ideal future, charismatic leaders also bring up the history and how the shared history ties to the future. Watch your body language. Charismatic leaders are energetic and passionate about their ideas. This involves truly believing in your own ideas. When talking to others, be confident, look them in the eye, and express your belief in your ideas. Make sure that employees have confidence in themselves. You can achieve this by showing that you believe in them and trust in their abilities. If they have real reason to doubt their abilities, make sure that you address the underlying issue, such as training and mentoring. Challenge the status quo. Charismatic leaders solve current problems by radically rethinking the way things are done and suggesting alternatives that are risky, novel, and unconventional.
OB Toolbox: Ideas for Improving Your Relationship With Your Manager
Having a good relationship with your manager may substantially increase your job satisfaction, improve your ability to communicate with your manager, and help you be successful in your job. Here are some tips to developing a high-quality exchange. Create interaction opportunities with your manager. One way of doing this would be seeking feedback from your manager with the intention of improving your performance. Be careful though: If the manager believes that you are seeking feedback for a different purpose, it will not help. People are more attracted to those who are similar to them. So find out where your similarities lie. What does your manager like that you also like? Do you have similar working styles? Do you have any mutual experiences? Bringing up your commonalities in conversations may help. Utilize impression management tactics, but be tactful. If there are work-related areas in which you can sincerely compliment your manager, do so. For example, if your manager made a decision that you agree with, you may share your support. Most people, including managers, appreciate positive feedback. However, flattering your manager in non-work-related areas (such as appearance) or using flattery in an insincere way (praising an action you do not agree with) will only backfire and cause you to be labeled as a flatterer. Be a reliable employee. Managers need people they can trust. By performing at a high level, demonstrating predictable and consistent behavior, and by volunteering for challenging assignments, you can prove your worth. Be aware that relationships develop early (as early as the first week of your working together). So be careful how you behave during the interview and your very first days. If you rub your manager the wrong way early on, it will be harder to recover the relationship.
integrity
Research also shows that people who are effective as leaders tend to have a moral compass and demonstrate honesty and integrity. Leaders whose integrity is questioned lose their trustworthiness, and they hurt their company's business along the way.
Self-esteem
The degree to which a person is at peace with oneself and has an overall positive assessment of one's self worth and capabilities seem to be relevant to whether someone is viewed as a leader
Vroom and Yetton's Normative Decision Model
The model starts by having leaders answer several key questions and working their way through a decision tree based on their responses.
Transformational Leadership
The theory distinguishes transformational and transactional leaders.
when leaders are task oriented, productivity tends to be?
a bit higher
Fiedler's Contingency Theory
a leader's style is measured by a scale called Least Preferred Coworker scale (LPC). People who are filling out this survey are asked to think of a person who is their least preferred coworker. Then, they rate this person in terms of how friendly, nice, and cooperative this person is.
Servant Leadership
a leadership approach that defines the leader's role as serving the needs of others. According to this approach, the primary mission of the leader is to develop employees and help them reach their goals. Servant leaders put their employees first, understand their personal needs and desires, empower them, and help them develop in their careers.
General mental ability
an overall factor of intelligence, as suggested by the positive correlations among specific intellectual ability dimensions
Situational Leadership Theory (SLT)
argues that leaders must use different leadership styles depending on their followers' development level
What are the three types of decision making styles?
authoritarian decision making, democratic decision making, laissez-faire decision making
path-goal theory of leadership
based on the expectancy theory of motivation (House, 1971). The expectancy theory of motivation suggests that employees are motivated when they believe—or expect—that (a) their effort will lead to high performance, (b) their high performance will be rewarded, and (c) the rewards they will receive are valuable to them. A theory that states that the most important aspect in leadership is the follower's expectation that a task can be accomplished and that it will lead to rewards.
another personality trait related to leadership
conscientiousness
emotional intelligence (EQ)
demonstrate a high level of self awareness, motivation, empathy, and social skills.
Four Leadership Styles
directive, supportive, participative, achievement oriented
authentic leadership approach
embraces this value: Its key advice is "be yourself." Think about it: We all have different backgrounds, different life experiences, and different role models. These trigger events over the course of our lifetime that shape our values, preferences, and priorities. Instead of trying to fit into societal expectations about what a leader should be, act like, or look like, authentic leaders derive their strength from their own past experiences. Thus, one key characteristic of authentic leaders is that they are self aware. They are introspective, understand where they are coming from, and have a thorough understanding of their own values and priorities. Secondly, they are not afraid to act the way they are. In other words, they have high levels of personal integrity. They say what they think. They behave in a way consistent with their values. As a result, they remain true to themselves. Instead of trying to imitate other great leaders, they find their own style in their personality and life experiences
Theory X
employees are lazy, do not enjoy working, and will avoid expending energy on work whenever possible.
Theory Y
employees are not lazy, can enjoy work, and will put effort into furthering organizational goals.
democratic decision making
employees participate in the making of the decision.
extraversion
enjoy interacting with others in their environment and demonstrate self-confidence. Because they are both dominant and sociable in their environment, they emerge as leaders in a wide variety of situations. Out of all personality traits, extraversion has the strongest relationship with both leader emergence and leader effectiveness. This is not to say that all effective leaders are extraverts, but you are more likely to find extraverts in leadership positions.
transactional leaders
ensure that employees demonstrate the right behaviors and provide resources in exchange
Out of all personality traits, the strongest relationship to both leader emergence and leader effectiveness is:
extraversion
Leaders do not rely on the use of
force to influence people. Instead, people willingly adopt the leader's goal as their own goal. If a person is relying on force and punishment, the person is a dictator, not a leader.
formal leaders
hold a position of authority and may utilize the power that comes from their position, as well as their personal power to influence others
people-oriented behaviors--also called consideration
include showing concern for employee feelings and treating employees with respect. People-oriented leaders genuinely care about the well-being of their employees, and they demonstrate their concern in their actions and decisions
Transformational leaders
lead employees by aligning employee goals with the leader's goals. Thus, employees working for transformational leaders start focusing on the company's well-being rather than on what is best for them as individual employees.
authoritarian decision making
leaders make the decision alone without necessarily involving employees in the decision-making process.
laissez-faire decision making
leave employees alone to make the decision. The leader provides minimum guidance and involvement in the decision.
Participative leaders
make sure that employees are involved in the making of important decisions.
Theory X and Theory Y
manager's actions toward employees were dictated by having one of two basic sets of assumptions about employee attitudes.
In small companies, task-oriented behaviors were found to be?
more effective than in large companies.
Big 5 Personality Traits
openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism
Conscientious people are
organized, take initiative, and demonstrate persistence in their endeavors, more likely to emerge as leaders and be effective in that role
Leader-Member Exchange (LMX) Theory
proposes that the type of relationship leaders have with their followers (members of the organization) is the key to understanding how leaders influence employees. Leaders form different types of relationships with their employees.
Supportive leaders
provide emotional support to employees. They treat employees well, care about them on a personal level, and they are encouraging.
Directive leaders
provide specific directions to their employees. They lead employees by clarifying role expectations, setting schedules, and making sure that employees know what to do on a given work day. The theory predicts that the directive style will work well when employees are experiencing role ambiguity on the job. If people are unclear about how to go about doing their jobs, giving them specific directions will motivate them. On the other hand, if employees already have role clarity, and if they are performing boring, routine, and highly structured jobs, giving them direction does not help.
general mental ability
psychologists refer to as "g" and which is often called "IQ" in everyday language
when leaders demonstrate people-oriented behaviors, employees tend to be more?
satisfied and react more positively.
openness to experience
those who demonstrate originality, creativity, and are open to trying new things—tend to emerge as leaders and also be quite effective.
Leadership
the act of influencing others to work toward a goal.
trust
the belief that the leader will show integrity, fairness, and predictability in his or her dealings with others.
low-quality LMX relationships
the leader and the member have lower levels of trust, liking, and respect toward each other. These relationships do not have to involve actively disliking each other, but the leader and member do not go beyond their formal job descriptions in their exchanges. In other words, the member does his job, the leader provides rewards and punishments, and the relationship does not involve high levels of loyalty or obligation toward each other
high-quality LMX relationships
the leader forms a trust-based relationship with the member. The leader and member like each other, help each other when needed, and respect each other. In these relationships, the leader and the member are each ready to go above and beyond their job descriptions to promote the other's ability to succeed.
informal leaders
without a formal position of authority within the organization but demonstrate leadership by influencing others through personal forms of power