Organizational Leadership: A Literature Review

Organizational Leadership: A Literature Review

The turn of the 21st century brought with it a plethora of global challenges, particularly in the area of higher education administration, but also in other administrative areas. Leaders in higher education have had to call upon many different theorists for use with their evidence-driven leadership theories. These have been addressed as approaches to explore, and they have also worked to explain the complexity of needs that are facing many of the global challenges today. A review of the related literature has cited many theorists' suggestions as being models which, though diverse, seem to contain some common threads among them. However, most of these theories also seem to point toward organizational leadership, and to a lesser degree toward educational leadership. To meet those demands, leaders must be able to understand that there is a real demand for change. The leader must recognize the constraints that may accompany those demands and be able to adapt a leadership style that is acceptable to the situation. The leader must also be able to develop the means to change some or all of the variables in the environment that brought on those demands. This is often highly difficult, but it can be done through the proper leadership ideals.

This paper will compare and contrast three different models of leadership that have been the most prevalent within the last thirty years, evaluate the effectiveness of each leadership model in administration. The three models of leadership theories that have gained recognition in the past thirty years and that will be examined here are situational leadership, servant leadership, and transformational and transactional leadership.

Bolman and Deal (2003) argue that effective leaders are those who are able to work within a set organizational frame - political, human resources, structural and symbolic - to re-engineer organizations, motivate and inspire subordinates, create and achieve visions, and design systems for ongoing improvement. The goal of leadership is clearly, as the authors recognize, to move an organization forward while maximizing its human potential, increasing its productivity and profitability, and capitalizing upon its emergent opportunities via the implementation of flexible work relationships. The process of leading, as described by Bolman and Deal (2003), is holistic and requires leaders to understand each of these frames or mechanisms for understanding the organization, its activities, and its stakeholders.

Yukl (2002) believes that "leadership is about change and it is about producing excellence...leadership is about tensions and balances. That leadership is to be able to lead people sensitively so they can independently address the new problems of tomorrow" (p.8-9)

As has been mentioned previously, many different theories of leadership have been advanced in recent years. Similarly, Spears (2004) infers that leaders must demonstrate flexibility and be able to adjust to changing situations in an organized fashion. Minas and Callaly (2005) suggest that the importance of knowing the different concepts between leadership and management is one of the most significant concepts that leaders and managers can be aware of, and it is a highly significant part of the process.

Leadership is more concerned with how things can be done in the future and what is needed to get things done in order for transformation to occur as the leader envisions it to be, while management is generally more concerned with the way the situation is right now, and how to get the job done just as it is at the present time. In other words, leadership's vision is more focused on the periphery and is more distal, whereas management's focus is much more central or proximal. The focus is on how the organization's climate is functioning, and on matters of efficiency, productivity, internal relations between people, and organizational structures or divisions. As such, leadership conveys a perceived vision of the climate of the organization that is able to efficiently and effectively articulate the perception of the vision among the followers that are affected. This process fosters change among all levels of the organizational structure or its divisions.

What leaders "do" in this theoretical orientation are motivate, influence, inspire, and model desired behaviors. In order to best understand this, the three major leadership theories that were mentioned previously and that have gained recognition in the past three decades, which are situational leadership, servant leadership theory, and transformational/transactional leadership, must be addressed here.

Situational leadership.

Over 30 years ago, theorist Fred E. Fiedler (1972) asserted that the most effective leaders are always cognizant of the situation in which they are required to act or against which they must respond. What this means, in essence, is that leadership itself is a form of response to internal and external environmental imperatives. Responding to such imperatives requires a willingness to consider the status quo and to accept or reject it accordingly, which is something that many leaders have not yet learned to do and are still struggling with, which also harms the employees.

The situational leader must first understand his or her own behavior before he or she can understand his or her followers. A clear understanding of human behavior, therefore, is an important characteristic for the situational leader because in order to apply an appropriate leadership style, the leader must be able to assess and make an appropriate diagnosis of the situation. Leadership style can be task-oriented or relationship-oriented leadership. However, according to Fiedler's (1992) studies, as cited in Donnelly, Gibson and Ivancevich (2000), individuals cannot be both task -- and relationship-oriented. Furthermore, it has been suggested that leaders practice the leadership style that supports their personality, which indicates that many leaders will have difficulty with specific styles of leadership simply because those styles do not fit in with 'who those leaders are.'

Fiedler (1972) further proposes three situational factors that determine whether a task-oriented or relationship-oriented style is more likely to be effective. Three dimensions of situational control identified by Fiedler (1972) are Leader-Member relations, Task Structure, and Position Power. Leader-member relation addresses degree of confidence, trust, and respect that the leader obtains from the followers. A practical application of this factor is the lack of respect that doctors give to nurses. Most nurses and doctors are in constant conflict, because many doctors do not perceive nurses as being capable of doing the actual jobs that they were trained to do. Task structure factor refers to the job structure and problem solving.

What is most important about this contingency factor is the nature of the task assigned to the leader. Fiedler (1972) contends that task-oriented, controlling leaders are more successful in situations that are either highly favorable or highly unfavorable. Conversely, in standard, favorable situations, a permissive, relationship-oriented leader is more successful. Fiedler (1972) also says that position power refers to "the power in the leadership position" (pp.281-283). For example, a department dean can recommend promotions or demotions. Fiedler's (1992) contingency theory is an offshoot, therefore, of situational leadership theory. The styles of leadership are either task-oriented or relationship-oriented and most of these factors are work-related situations. Hersey and Blanchard's (1982) situational leadership model emphasizes the situational contingency of maturity or "readiness" of followers to accomplish the task. Hersey (1984) defines task behavior as "the extent to which the leader engages in spelling out the duties and responsibilities of an individual or group." (p. 31-32). In task oriented leadership behavior, the leader defines roles by telling and explaining what, who, how, and when to perform tasks. In addition, the relationship-oriented leadership behavior communicates, listens, gives feedback, and facilitates tasks. These leadership behaviors are referred to by Hersey & Blanchard (1984) as S1-S4 styles of situational leadership. S1 is commonly referred to as the telling style of leadership behavior, while S2 refers to the selling style of leadership behavior. In addition, the S3 leadership style of behavior is referred to as the participating style, and S4 refers to the delegating style.

In the telling style of leadership, the leader defines the roles needed to correctly perform the job. An example would be the unit manager ensuring that new graduates receive appropriate orientation and training with skills needed to perform safe practices. This particular kind of leadership style is high on task behavior and low on relationship or supportive behavior. The hospital leader's goal in the telling style, for example, is to increase the maturity level of the new nurse.

The selling leader provides followers with structured instructions. At the selling level, the leadership style is based on a low to moderate readiness level. There is more support at this level, but not as much as some other levels. The new nurse in this example is now looking at the unit manager as having legitimate power, and will listen more attentively when following his or her directions.

The participating leader and followers share in all decisions. They conduct two-way communication that is high in relationship or supportive behavior and low in task or directive behavior. The new nurse in an example such as this one is able to perform nursing functions; however, she still feels insecure without some supervision. The participating leadership style is facilitative, and the nurse will receive the supervision that she needs to feel completely comfortable with the work that she is doing.

The delegating leader provides less specific directions and engages in two-way communication with his or her subordinates. The unit manager decreases both the amount of task or directing behavior and the amount of relationship or supportive behavior. The unit manager develops trust in the new nurse in this way, and the delegating leader is confident that he or she has high-readiness followers.

Chen and Silverthorne (2005) conducted a study designed to test the Situational Leadership Theory (SLT) refined by Hersey and Blanchard (1984) and earlier explicated by Fiedler (1972). These researchers looked specifically at the viability of the theory of leadership effectiveness and the impact of what they called the degree of match between the leadership style and the employee readiness level on a variety of measures regarding leadership outcome. Chen and Silverthorne (2005) noted that the influence of leadership style on job performance, satisfaction, stress, and turnover intention has been well established in numerous empirical studies. At the same time, there is also evidence regarding the necessity of eliminating leader reliance on a single leadership style and the development of competencies which permit the leader to assess specific situations and respond to those situations appropriately.

Major findings generated by the authors include a failure to support SLT predictions advanced by earlier researchers that an appropriate match between leadership style and subordinate readiness invariably results in higher levels of followers' job satisfaction and overall performance in tandem with lower levels of job stress and intent to leave the company. At the same time, the study did suggest that SLT is correct in that the higher that a leader scores in terms of the SLT leadership inventory, the more effective that his or her influence will be. Chen and Silverthorne (2005) do note that a leadership score in and of itself does not predict job performance but that there is a positive correlation between ability and willingness, employee job satisfaction, and job performance. It should be noted, however, that the study was conducted in Taiwan and therefore may not generalize well to other populations, especially those in Western countries where ideas regarding employment, management, and leadership are often looked at somewhat differently. A questionable bias in Fiedler's (1992) theories, according to the literature that was researched, is an assumption that women leaders are not task-oriented and men are not sensitive, nurturing, and/or caring (Smith, and Doyle, 2001). According to Murphy (2005), as cited in Marquis and Huston (2006), Fiedler's (1992) theories of SLT focuses on the situation only, with little emphasis on interpersonal and intrapersonal factors.

Transformational and Transactional Leadership Theories

The concepts of both transformational and transactional leadership theories were first introduced by James MacGregor Burns (1978) in his treatment of political leadership, but are now used as well in organizational psychology and in higher education institutions. According to Gardiner (2006), Burns asserted that, "the result of transforming leadership is a relationship of mutual stimulation and elevation that converts followers into leaders and may convert leaders into moral agents" (p.2). Transformational leadership appeals to the moral values of followers in an attempt to raise their consciousness about ethical issues and to mobilize their energy and resources to reform institutions. The followers experience a sense of trust, admiration, loyalty, and respect toward the leader, and they are motivated to do more than they originally expected to do.

Yukl's (2002) explanation of transformational leadership is that it helps ordinary people to do extraordinary things; they then develop a higher vision that is shared, thus creating a feeling of empowerment. However, to achieve this level of leadership effectiveness, certain competencies are necessary, and these require intellectual growth (Murphy 2005). To maintain intellectual growth, Leithwood (1994) suggests three fundamental goals that education leaders must pursue: (1) to help people develop and maintain a collaborative culture; (2) to foster staff development; and (3) to help their people to solve problems together more effectively.

Ciulla (2004) noted that many organizations are now demanding that their leaders become transformational leaders who function with respect to a set of moral commitments but who also introduce other leadership issues. This new paradigm of leadership issue, according to Ciulla (2004), does not ignore the influence of situational leadership theory (SLT), but instead tends to focus on leadership style in all situations automatically, instead of focusing on the leadership style because of the situation. Ciulla (2004) takes the position that transformational (or charismatic) leadership has become too definitive a focus of leadership studies and that what is needed is an exploration of honesty, trust, and related questions that actually shape the relationship between leaders and followers. Ciulla (2004) appears to be largely focused on the idea that followers will respond positively to leaders that they perceive as honest, trustworthy, and responsible. Whether or not such leaders are highly charismatic or able to transform their followers through empowerment may be less significant than the fact that they transform others because they are trustworthy role models.

Transactional leaders, in contrast, are less focused on enlarging the capacities of others. According to Huston and Marquis (2006) "the transactional leader focuses on management tasks, is a caretaker, uses trade-offs to meet goals, does not identify shared values, examine causes, and uses contingency reward" (p. 56). In addition, according to Burns (1978) transactional leaders "approach their followers with an eye to trading one thing for another: jobs for votes, subsidies for campaign contributions" (p. 213).

An example from the health care field comes to mind and therefore will be discussed here. When a new nurse advances to the fourth leadership style of situational leadership, that of 'delegating,' her leadership style will be at a high-readiness level, she will require fewer directives from the unit manager, and more respect will be given to her by her unit manager as well. Based on contingency variables, the transformational leader will begin to develop a visualization of change; a visualization that could solve the problem; a visualization of the outcome. The transactional leader, therefore, not only sees these visualizations but hones the visual directives given by the transformational leader, who then begins to direct and strategize with regard to the situation that needs to be changed. It is up to the transactional leader to decide on the who, when, where, how, why, and/or what of the situation. The new nurse, in this example situation and with a transactional leader, would have received the unit managers' visualization of what could fix the problem (the outcome) and it is incumbent upon him or her to then implement a plan of care to meet that goal. He or she must now be sure to also maintain the culture of the environment during this process.

These final comments are those that most reflect this writer's understanding of what an effective leader must do and achieve. Such a leader will be able to empower, inspire, motivate and transform others. He or she will be an excellent and proactive communicator and mentor for others; able to delegate when possible and able to adapt to the demands of uncertain environments requiring change. The transformational leader is able to capitalize upon situational opportunities and is flexible, but he or she is driven by a vision of the organization and a personal commitment to excellence in all things. A transformational leader in the educational and nursing arena is likely to possess the skills and attitudes needed to motivate, inspire, teach and empower subordinates and students. By having these abilities, the transformational leader also performs as a servant leader who demonstrates sensitivity to what motivates others to achieve shared goals and visions of the institution. In essence, the servant leaders' goal is to foster an interactive theory of leadership.