Lecture 9: Leadership

Question 1

Leadership

Answer 1

“Leadership is the ability to influence people towards the attainment of organisational goals”

Question 2

Predictor Variable 1: Sources of Power

Answer 2

• Position power
  1. Legitimate power: power derived from a person’s position or job in an organisation
  2. Reward power: Power base on the capacity ti provide valued rewards to others. Eg. promotion
  3. Coercive power: power based in the ability to punish and threaten others
• Personal power
  4. Expert power: power that stems from special knowledge of or skill in the tasks performed by employees
  5. Referent power: power that results from characteristics that command employee’s identification, respect and admiration, so that they wish to match the leader
• Empowerment: the goal of senior executives in many organisaiotns is not simply to wield power but also to give it away to people who can get jobs done
• Autocratic leader tends to centralise authority and rely on legitimate, reward and coercive power
• Democratic leader delegates authority to others, encourages participation and relies on expert and referent power

Question 3

Predictor Variable 2: Leadership - Behavioural Approaches

Answer 3

• Consideration:
  o the extent to which a lesser is sensitive to employees, respect their ideas and feelings and establish a mutual trust
• Initiating structure:
  o the extent to which leader is task-oriented and directs employee’s work activities towards goal achievement
• Employee-centered leaders:
  o Effective supervisors focused on employee’s human needs
  o Builds effective work groups with high performance goals
• Job-entered leaders:
  o Meeting schedules, keeping costs low and achieving production efficiency
• The leadership grid:
  o Two dimensions: 1. Concern for production 2. Concern for people

Question 4

Predictor Variable 3: Situation

Answer 4

Fiedler’s contingency theory
o Leadership style: Relationship orientated, task orientated
o Situation: 1. Leader-member relations (good v poor), 2. Task structure (structured v unstructured), 3. Position power (strong v weak)

Question 5

Predictor Variable 4: Change

Answer 5

• Transactional leaders
  o Clarifies employees’ roles and task requirements, initiates structure and provides rewards
• Transformational-charismatic leaders
  o Ability to motivate employees to transcend their expected performance
  o Distinguish by a special ability to bring anoint innovation and change

Leading change
- Interpersonal influence tactics
o Use rational persuasion
o Make people like you
o Develop allies
o Ask for what you want
o Makes use if higher authority in a positive way
o Reward behaviours that are good for the business
Contemporary leaders
- Great leaders are able to:
o Set vision and strategy
o Communicate/inspire
o Have integrity
o Be humble
o Be tough
o Be empathetic
o Be knowledge focused
o Flexible

Question 6

Predictor Variable 5: Follower-ship

Answer 6

• Critical think vs uncritical thinking
• Active vs Passive