I/O Psychology Leadership

Many different theories about leadership have
been developed over the last few decades

Personal Characteristics Associated
with Leadership
•In the last 100 years, many
attempts have been made to
identify the personal
characteristics associated with
leader emergence and leader
performance

Leader Emergence
•is the idea that people who
become leaders possess
traits or characteristics
different from people who
do not become leaders

Motivation to lead
has three aspects
(factors):

1. affective identity motivation
•become leaders
because they enjoy
being in charge and
leading others.

2. noncalculative
motivation
•seek leadership positions
when they perceive that
such positions will result
in personal gain.

3. social-normative
motivation
•become leaders
out of a sense of
duty

Leader
Performance
•involves the idea that
leaders who perform
well possess certain
characteristics that
poorly performing
leaders do not.

Traits
•extraversion, openness,
agreeableness, and
conscientiousness were
positively related to leader
performance and that
neuroticism was negatively
related to leader performance.

Self-monitoring
•focuses on what
leaders do as
opposed to what
they are.

Cognitive
Ability• most important when the leader is
not distracted by stressful situations
and when the leader uses a more
directive leadership style.
• the key to effective leadership is the
synthesis of three variables: wisdom,
intelligence (academic and
practical), and creativity

Needs
•A personal characteristic
that has received some
support pertains to a
leader’s need for
power, need for
achievement, and need
for affiliation.

•Need for power, need
for achievement, and
need for affiliation can
be measured through
various psychological
tests.

Thematic Apperception Test
(TAT)
• most commonly used
• a projective test in which a
person is shown a series of
pictures and asked to tell a
story about what is happening
in each
• is time-consuming and
requires a great deal of
training.

Job Choice Exercise
(JCE)
• Developed by Stahl and Harrell
(1982)
• the person reads descriptions of jobs
that involve varying degrees of
power, achievement, and affiliation
needs and rates how desirable he
finds each particular job.

Gender• men were more effective as
leaders in situations
traditionally defined in
masculine terms and in
situations in which the majority
of subordinates were men.
• Women were more effective as
leaders in situations
traditionally defined in less
masculine terms.

Task Versus Person
OrientationThree major schools of thought—
1.Ohio State Studies
2.Theory X and
3.Managerial Grid
• have postulated that differences in
leader performance can be attributed to
differences in the extent to which
leaders are task versus person oriented.

Country Club (MG)
Consideration (OS)
Theory Y
Team (MG)
Impoverished ( MG)
High
P
E
R
S
O
N
O
R
I
E
N
T
A
T
I
O
N
Middle of the Road
(MG)
Task-centered (MG)
Initiating Structure (OS)
Theory X
Low High
TASK ORIENTATION
Low

A leader’s task or person orientation
can be measured by several
instruments
•Leadership Opinion Questionnaire (LOQ)
- filled out by supervisors or leaders who want to
know their own behavioral style.
•Leader Behavior Description Questionnaire (LBDQ)
- completed by subordinates to provide a picture of
how they perceive their leader’s behavior

Unsuccessful
Leaders
•The traits and
behaviors of
unsuccessful leaders
are not necessarily the
opposite of those of
successful leaders.

Lack of
Training
•The norm for most
organizations is to
promote a current
employee or hire a
new employee and
place him directly into
a leadership role.

Cognitive
Deficiencies
•believes that poor leaders are
unable to learn from experience
and are unable to think
strategically—they consistently
make the same mistakes and do
not plan ahead.

Personalit
y
- many unsuccessful leaders are
insecure and adopt one of three
personality types:
1.Paranoid or passive-aggressive
2.High-likability floater
3. Narcissist.

• The source of insecurity for leaders who are
paranoid, passive-aggressive, or both is some
incident in their life in which they felt
betrayed.
• On the surface, these leaders are charming,
quiet people who often compliment their
subordinates and fellow workers.
• But they resent the successes of others and
are likely to act against subordinates in a
passive-aggressive manner; that is, on the
surface they appear to be supportive, but at
the same time they will “stab” another
person in the back.
Paranoid/ Passive-aggressive leader

High-likability
floater
• goes along with the group, is friendly to
everyone, and never challenges anyone’s ideas.
• never does anything, challenges anyone, or
stands up for the rights of his employees.
• Such leaders will be promoted and never fired
because even though they make no great
performance advances, they are well liked. Their
employees have high morale but show relatively
low performance

Narcissist
s
• are leaders who overcome their
insecurity by overconfidence.
• like to be the center of attention,
promote their own
accomplishments
• take most, if not all, of the credit for
the successes of their group—but
they avoid all blame for failure.

Interaction between the Leader
and the Situation• a leader’s effectiveness
often depends not only
on the traits she
possesses, but also on
the particular situation in
which the leader finds
herself

Situational
Favorability• developed by Fred Fiedler in the mid-
1960s
• an individual’s leadership style is the
result of a lifetime of experiences and
thus is extremely difficult to change.
• Fielder developed the Least-Preferred
Coworker (LPC) Scale where Leaders
identify the subordinate or employee
they would least want to work.

01/13/18
Favorableness of a situation is
determined by:
1. Task Structuredness. - Structured tasks have goals that are
clearly stated and known by group members, have only a few
correct solutions to a problem, and can be completed in only a
few ways.
2. Leader Position Power. - the greater the position or
legitimate power of the leader, the more favorable the situation..
3. Leader–Member Relations - The more the subordinates like
their leader, the more favorable the situation. The leader–
member relationship is considered the most important of
the three variables.

Organizational
Climate•known as IMPACT theory, was
developed by Geier, Downey,
and Johnson (1980),
• believed that each leader has
one of six behavioral styles:
informational, magnetic,
position, affiliation, coercive,
or tactical.

Informational Style in a Climate of
Ignorance•provides information in a
climate of ignorance, where
important information is
missing from the group.

Magnetic Style in a Climate of
Despair
•A leader with a magnetic
style leads through
energy and optimism and
is effective only in a
climate of despair, which
is characterized by low
morale.

Position Style in a Climate of
Instability
•A person who uses the
position style leads by
virtue of the power
inherent in that
position.

Affiliation Style in a Climate
of Anxiety
•A person with an
affiliation style leads
by liking and caring
about others

Coercive Style in a Climate of Crisis
•A person using the
coercive style leads by
controlling reward and
punishment and is most
effective in a climate of
crisis

Tactical Style in a Climate of
Disorganization
•A leader with a
tactical style leads
through the use of
strategy and is most
effective in a climate
of disorganization.

Subordinate
Ability•leaders will be successful
only if their subordinates
perceive them as working
with them to meet certain
goals and if those goals
offer a favorable outcome
for the subordinate.

•Instrumental - calls for planning, organizing, and
controlling the activities of employees.
•Supportive -shows concern for employees
•Participative - shares information with employees and
lets them participate in decision making
• Achievement-oriented - sets challenging goals and
rewards increases in performance
According to House’s path–goal theory, a
leader can adopt one of four behavioral
leadership styles to handle each situation:

• developed by Hersey and Blanchard (1988)
• postulated that a leader typically uses one of four behavioral
styles: delegating, directing, supporting, or coaching.
Follower Readiness
- the ability and willingness to perform a particular task.
Situational leadership
theory

• developed by Dansereau, Graen,and Haga (1975)
• originally called vertical dyad linkage (VDL) theory.
• leaders develop different roles and relationships with the people
under them and thus act differently with different subordinates.
Subordinates fall into one of two groups
1.In-group - characterized by a high-quality relationship with the
leader
2. Out-group - characterized by a low-quality relationship with the
leader.
Leader–member exchange (LMX)
theory

•excellent leaders
possess specific skills
or engage in behaviors
that poor leaders do
not.
Specific Leader Skills

Leadership through Decision
Making
•decisions are best
made with the
participation of a
leader’s subordinates,
colleagues, or both.

Vroom-Yetton
Model
•provide a flowchart
that can tell a
leader what process
to go through to
make a decision in a
particular situation.


Leadership through Contact:
Management by Walking Around
•leaders and managers are
most effective when they
are out of their offices,
walking around and
meeting with and talking to
employees and customers
about their needs and
progress.

Leadership through
Power
•Leaders who have power
are able to obtain more
resources, dictate policy,
and advance farther in an
organization than those
who have little or no
power.

Expert Power
•Leaders who have expert
knowledge will have
power.
Legitimate Power
Obtained through the basis
of positions.

Reward and Coercive
Powers•Leaders also have power to the
extent that they can reward and
punish others.
•Reward power involves having
control over both financial and
nonfinancial rewards
•Coercive power - ability to
punish

Referent Power
•positive feelings
that others hold for
him.

Leadership through Vision:
Transformational Leadership• Transactional leadership consists of many of the task-oriented
behaviors.
• Thought to have three dimensions:
• Contingent Reward - Dimension - leaders who reward
followers for engaging in desired activity
• Management by Exception–Active - leaders who actively
monitor performance and take corrective action when
needed
• Management by Exception–Passive - leaders who do not
actively monitor follower behavior and who take corrective
action only when problems are serious

Transformational
leadership• focuses on changing or transforming the goals, values, ethics, standards,
and performance of others
• It is believed that there are three highly related dimensions to
transformational leadership:
• Charisma (idealized influence, inspirational motivation) - leaders with
high moral and ethical standards who have a strong vision of where they
want their followers to go and who use enthusiasm to motivate their
followers
• Intellectual Stimulation- leaders who encourage change and open
thinking, challenge the status quo, and appreciate diversity
• Individual Consideration- leaders who encourage individual growth and
take the time to mentor and coach their followers

Vision
•good leaders have a
vision of where they
want the organization
to go and provide
direction toward that
end.

Differentiation
•Successful leaders are somehow different from their
followers. In some cases the difference might be one
of personality; in others, it might be one of charisma,
knowledge, or skill. Though successful leaders are
somehow different from their followers, they are also
similar enough to relate to and empathize with them.

Values
•Successful leaders have strong values
Transmission of Vision and
Values
Successful leaders are able to communicate their
vision and values to others

Flaws
•Interestingly, successful leaders
typically have a major flaw and
they know it. This flaw makes
the leader more human and
provides a target that followers
can focus on when they are
upset with the leader.

Leadership through Persuasion
•One skill that is
commonly needed
by leaders is the
ability to persuade
others.

Persuasion by
Communication• People who have certain characteristics can communicate through
persuasion more easily than people who lack these characteristics.
• Expertise - Leaders who either has or is perceived as having
expertise about a topic will be more persuasive than a leader who
does not.
• Trustworthiness - a leader can communicate not only that is
similar to them but also that his goals are the same as theirs.
• Attractiveness. Attractiveness has the same effect with persuasion:
Attractive people are more persuasive than unattractive people


The Message
•the type of message
that is presented also
has a role in
persuasion.

Three aspects of the message
1. Message discrepancy
2. One-sided versus two-sided
arguments
3. Use of threats.

Threats
• method of persuasion a leader
can use when appropriate.
• For a threat to be effective,
however, the person being
persuaded must actually believe
it will be carried out—that is,
that the consequences of not
complying are undesirable and
inevitable.

I/O Psychology Leadership

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