Most of what is written about leadership has been written by western scholars and practitioners—mostly from the United States. Thus, what we have studied in this module so far reflects western assumptions and values about how to improve leadership performance.
But leadership quality, we know, is mostly about perception. If the followers perceive that a person is a leader, that person will be treated with respect and the followers will grant him the power and authority to guide their actions. These perceptions can vary across cultures, and successful global leaders know that leadership is viewed differently in different cultures and modify their behaviors to align with culturally diverse expectations. This is what is called Cultural Intelligence.
Required Reading
The following reading discusses the importance of cultural awareness in increasing organizational effectiveness:
O’Reilly, C. (2013). Why is cultural intelligence important? Retrieved from https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/topic/soft-skills/why-cultuiral-intelligence-important/181942
Assignment
In this exercise, there are two sets of quizzes (A & B) that you will participate in.
Select either the Cross Cultural Work Scenarios or Working Globally Across Cultures quiz from https://www.commisceo-global.com/quizzes/cultural-awareness-quizzes?view=qcategory&cat_id=39
Choose any one of the country quizzes at https://www.commisceo-global.com/quizzes/cultural-awareness-quizzes?view=qcategory&cat_id=41 that looks interesting to you.
After completing the quizzes, address the following questions in a 2- to 3-page essay:
Which quizzes did you take?
Include your actual results in an Appendix at the end of your paper.
Were you surprised at your score?
What strengths do you think you have in intercultural awareness?
What weaknesses are you able to identify?
If there were gaps between your assessment results and your own thoughts about your level of cultural awareness, why do these gaps exist?
Create a plan of specific, concrete actions you can take to build on your strengths and improve areas of weakness so that you improve your cultural awareness.
Why is it important for managers to increase their levels of cultural awareness?
People have wondered about what makes a great leader since the beginning of recorded history – and undoubtedly long before. The formal study of leadership dates back to the 1950s, and is probably one of the most researched topics in Organizational Behavior. Today, after decades of study, we believe that:
Leaders are made, not born, and leadership can be taught.
Leadership occurs in all kinds of organizations and at all levels.
To be a great leader, one does not have to be charismatic.
There is no one right way to lead that will fit all situations.
In this module, we will review the major theories of leadership that persist to this day. Although some are more complex than others, each seems to have a nugget of truth and adds to our overall understanding of how leadership works and what makes great leadership. The following chart summarizes the major approaches or models that we will cover.
Leadership Model
Principles
Trait Model
Leaders have special innate qualities. Certain people are “natural leaders.”
Behavioral Models
Leaders are concerned primarily with task or relationships, though the best leaders are concerned with both.
Contingency Models
Different leader behaviors are effective for different types of followers and situations.
Influence (Power) Models
Leadership consists of influencing others.
Transformational Models
Leaders are visionaries who change organizations and people’s behavior.
Let’s begin with a PowerPoint presentation that will provide some background on these different models:
Eveland, J. D. (n.d.) Leadership. Trident University International.
The exercise of leadership, by definition, involves compelling people to do something they might not otherwise have done. The manner in which they carry out these tasks varies, however. The degree of motivation and enthusiasm with which a follower performs his or her work is related to the type of leadership that is used. Here are the most common reactions by followers:
Commitment is characterized by the internalization of a leader’s goal or request and the follower’s decision to carry it out effectively. Frequently, the follower will go beyond what the leader has asked or expects – in other words, goes the extra mile.
Compliance is an apathetic response where the follower does what the leader asks, but exerts no more than the required amount of effort.
Resistance is a reaction where the follower opposed the leader‘s direction and avoids carrying it out (passively through avoidance or aggressively through rebellion).
Let’s take a look at power, which is closely tied to leadership. Review the sources of power in the following video presentation:
Retrieved April 2017 from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eSb06mh7EHA.
Now, consider reactions to leadership’s exercise of power (by type):
Type
Most Common Reaction
Reward
Compliance
Coercive
Compliance or resistance
Legitimate
Compliance
Referent
Commitment
Expert
Commitment
This chart would indicate that the most a leader can hope for if he relies on the power received from holding a position (legitimate, reward, coercive) is compliance with directives. If leaders rely too heavily on coercive power, they risk meeting resistance. If, instead, a leader needs to have the follower’s commitment (the knowledge that a follower will comply with directives regardless of whether or not the follower is being monitored or not), then the leader must rely on personal sources of power – such as referent or expert power.
While commitment is very often the most desired reaction, sometimes compliance is enough to accomplish the leader’s objectives. Resistance, however, is something all leaders should want to avoid as it could render them totally ineffective.
Contingency Models
The Eveland PowerPoint presentation also covered contingency models of leadership. Contingency models are based on the idea that the most effective leadership style is one that matches the demands of the situation. There are three basic models of contingency leadership that we will cover in this module. Each has a slightly different prescription as to the factors that a leader needs to consider when exercising the most successful leadership style.
The Fiedler Model
The Path-Goal Model and
The Normative Decision Model
The Fiedler Model
Unlike the behavioral theorists who came before him, Fiedler did not believe that there was one best style of leadership. He agreed that individuals tend to possess either a task-oriented or relationship-oriented leadership style, but that to know the appropriate style for a given circumstance, you also needed to understand the situation:
Situational Factor
Characteristics
Leader-Member Relations
Do the followers have trust and confidence in the leader?
Task Structure
Is the task structured or unstructured?
Leader’s position power
Does the leader have the discretion to reward or punish?
Read the following article to learn how these factors combine to indicate which leadership style would be most effective given specific situational constraints, and criticisms of the model:
Fiedler’s Contingency Theory (2016). Leadership-central. Retrieved from https://www.leadership-central.com/fiedler%27s-contingency-theory.html#axzz3OemkTtoM
While Fiedler thought that different leadership styles worked better under different conditions, he did not think that people could change their preferred style. So the important task of management was to match the leader with the right style to the right situation. The next contingency theory of leadership we will examine does not hold that leadership style is static, and instead proffers the argument that leaders can change and adapt their style to fit the situation.
Path Goal Model
The path-goal model of leadership proposes four different leadership styles and considers two situational factors (the follower’s capabilities and motivation) to match the most effective leadership style with the characteristics of the situation as follows:
Appropriate Leadership Style
Situation
Directive
Employee role ambiguity is high
Employees have low abilities
Employees have external locus of control
Supportive
Tasks are boring and repetitive
Tasks are stressful
Participative
Employee abilities are high
Decisions are relevant to employees
Employees have internal locus of control
Achievement-oriented
Employees have high abilities
Employees have high achievement motivation
In other words, a leader does not use the same approach with hourly employees with limited skills the same way she would lead employees who are highly educated and highly skilled. Read more about this approach to leadership:
Martin, R. (2012) "PathGoal Theory of Leadership." Encyclopedia of Group Processes & Intergroup Relations. Ed. John M. Levine and Michael A. Hogg. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE, 2009. 636-37. SAGE Reference Online . Web. 30 Jan. 2012. Retrieved April 2017 from https://studysites.uk.sagepub.com/northouse6e/study/materials/reference/reference7.2.pdf
Normative Decision Model: Vroom-Yetton-Jago decision tree
The last contingency model we will consider is the Normative Decision Model, so called because it gives leaders a tool to use to decide exactly which of five leadership styles is appropriate for a given circumstance to ensure that the highest quality alternative is selected and the followers have the greatest likelihood of acceptance of that alternative. By asking a series of questions and following the answers through a decision tree, the leader can select the style that is most likely to yield the response she desires. The five leadership styles are:
Decision style
Characteristics
A1: Autocratic
Leader gathers information and decides alone.
A2: Autocratic
Leader gets information from followers but decides alone.
C1: Consultative
Leader shares problem with individual followers, asks for input, but decides alone.
C2: Consultative
Leader shares problem with group of follower, asks for input, but decides alone.
G2: Group based
Leader shares problem with group, seeks consensus on solution.
Find out what the key questions are and see how the decision tree works by reading the following article. Be sure to try out the interactive tool that allows you to try out the decision tree for yourself!
Vroom-Yetton-Jago Decision-making Model of Leadership (2013). Leadership-central. Retrieved from https://www.leadership-central.com/Vroom-Yetton-Jago-decision-making-model-of-leadership.html#axzz3OjpF9lI8
Transformational leadership
Transformational leaders are people who inspire followers to exert their greatest efforts toward achieving a vision for the future of the organization. To do this, the transformational leader needs to clearly communicate his vision for the organization and this vision must be linked to strong values that followers will find motivating. The transformational leader works hard to build trust with his followers – so that his “open area” of the JoHari Window is maximized. (See Module 2 for an explanation of the JoHari Window.)
Although he does not use the term “transformational”, Leadership expert Simon Sinek is clearly describing what constitutes this type of leadership in the following TED talk:
TED (2010) Simon Sinek: How great leaders inspire action. Retrieved from https://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_inspire_action
Much of what is written about transformational leadership focuses on the role of top management – particularly CEO’s - as transformational. But what about the rest of us who lead people on a daily basis, but from the middle of the organization? Does the model of transformational leadership have anything to offer individuals who are not at the top of the leadership “food chain”?
The following article does just that by making clear how managers at all levels of the organization can become more effective leaders by infusing transformational principles into the meaning of work. Drawing on the Job Characteristics Model (remember this from module 1?), the authors show how “transformational leaders promote (i.e., shape) subordinates’ perceptions of work by influencing their perceptions of key job characteristics.” (p. 354)
Dean J., Cleavengera, D. J., and Munyonb, T. P. (2013). It's how you frame it: Transformational leadership and the meaning of work. Business Horizons 56(3), 351-360.
You can find this article in the Trident Online Library.