Chapter 01 - Introduction to Leadership
Chapter 1
Introduction to Leadership
Summary
This section is divided into several parts: Introduction to leadership, and Readings 1-4. The Introduction to Leadership suggests that leadership is multi-faceted, with many views and definitions. Reading 1 addresses the question, “What does the concept of leadership mean?”. Reading 2 discusses the leadership process from a sociological standpoint. Reading 3 discusses leadership as a social influence process, rather than a fixed state of being. Reading 4 discusses the balance between the actions of leaders and the responsiveness of followers.
I. Introduction to Leadership
A. The study of leadership started with the assumption that it was a phenomenon embedded in the leader, as opposed to within the follower and/or the relationship that brings and holds them together.
B. Although there is no clear-cut and universal definition of leadership, definitions have referred to leadership as:
1. A focus on group processes
2. A personality attribute
3. The art of introducing compliance
4. An exercise of influence
5. A particular kind of act
6. A form of persuasion
7. A power relation
8. An instrument in the attainment of goals
9. An effect of interaction
10. A differentiated role
11. The initiation of structure
C. According to Albert Murphy (1941), leadership is sociological in nature, rather than a psychological phenomenon. Viewed from a sociological perspective, leadership is an interplay and relationship between two or more actors within a particular context.
D. According to Linda Smircich and Gareth Morgan (1982), leaders assign meaning to events for others. The importance of a leader is what he or she can do for the group.
E. The difference between management and headship
1. The formal role of leadership: a designated leader in a group
2. The informal role of leadership: an emergent leader arising from a set of dynamics that are transpiring between members of a group
F. Differences between the concept leader and manager:
1. Their respective definitions
2. The process/path by which one comes to the position
3. The source and type of power frequently employed
4. The base of respective legitimacy
5. How the position or role is maintained and lost
6. The fact that the substance or the connection between leader and follower differ from that of a manager and subordinate.
G. Concept overlap
1. To be an outstanding manager often necessitates being a good leader
2. To be an outstanding leader requires one to be good at decision making, planning, organizing, directing, and controlling – the essence of managing
H. Five Components of Leadership and the Leadership Process
1. The leader takes charge and guides the performance or activity
2. The follower performs under the guidance and instructions of the leader
3. The context is the situation surrounding a leader-follower relationship
4. The process reflects that which is embedded in the act of leadership
5. The outcome includes anything arising from interplay between the leader, follower, and situation (context)
I. The leadership process is both interactive and dynamic.
J. Defining leadership:
Leadership is a dynamic and working relationship, built over time, involving an exchange between leader and follower in which leadership is a resource embedded in the situation, providing direction for goal attainment.
II. Reading 1: On the Meaning of Leadership (Pierce & Newstrom)
A. Historical impact of leadership
1. Homer’s Odyssey – emphasizes the importance of self-confidence in successful leadership
2. Confuciun writings – emphasize the importance of setting a moral example and using rewards and punishment
3. Taoism – emphasizes that effective leaders maintain a low profile and work through others
4. Old and New Testament – leadership challenges confronting Moses
5. 20th Century – Publications such as Leadership Quarterly, Leadership, Leadership and Organization & Studies, Journal of Leadership Studies and leadership books such as Covey’s The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, and Peter Dean’s Leadership for Everyone
B. Great Person Theory of Leadership
1. Leaders are “born” with a set of personal qualities that make them great leaders
2. Focus on identifying the personal traits that characterize those individuals who emerge as leaders
C. The Meaning of Leadership – several approaches to defining leadership
1. Leadership as a focus of group processes – leadership is a point of polarization for group cooperation
2. Leadership as personality and its effects – leadership is determined by personal attributes and strength of character
3. Leadership as an act or behavior – leadership results in others acting or responding in a shared direction
4. Leadership as an instrument of goal achievement – a leader has a program and is moving toward an objective with his group in a definite manner
5. Leadership as an emerging effect of interaction – leadership is an effect or outgrowth of group interaction
6. Leadership as a differentiated role – leadership is a role that integrates the other roles to advance the cause of the social system
7. Leadership as the initiation of structure – leadership is the initiation and maintenance of structure in expectation and interaction
8. Leadership as the art of inducing compliance – molding the group around the will, intentions, and/or wishes of the leader
9. Leadership as the exercise of influence – the activity of influencing people to cooperate toward some goal, which they come to find desirable
10. Leadership as a form of persuasion – the final test of a leader is that he leaves behind him in other men the conviction and the will to carry on
11. Leadership as a power relationship – group members perceive a leader as someone who has the right to prescribe behavior patterns for the group
D. Alternative Conceptualizations – the many categories to which the leadership concept been employed
1. Levels of analysis perspective – leadership on the community, industry, organization, small group team work, and self leadership levels
2. Stylistic perspective – references made to autocratic, democratic,
servant, people-and task oriented, and laissez faire leadership
3. Thematic perspective – the free world, strategic leadership, ethics,
and campaign finance reform leadership
4. The perspective of where the leader comes from – designated and
emergent leaders, formal and informal leader, and vertical and
horizontal leaders
5. Coleadership – team leadership wherein two or more people
simultaneously serve as leader
6. Symbolic leadership – the institutionalization of symbols as the
tools of leadership
E. Emerging Roles
1. Smircich and Morgan (1982) – leaders provide meaning by framing reality for others
2. Stogdill (1948) – leaders orchestrate group activity
3. Manz and Sims (1991) – Super leadership
4. Senge (1990) – accompanying the emergence of the learning organization, a new leadership role emerges, and the role of leader is that of designer, teacher, and steward
5. “Over-managed and under led” concept
III. Reading 2: A Study of the Leadership Process (Murphy)
A. A fault of some leadership studies is emphasis upon the “individual” rather than the individual as a factor in a social situation
B. Leadership study calls for a situational approach, which is fundamentally sociological rather than psychological
C. Leaders in Work Camps – Case study of leadership traits
1. Efficiency – “he gets the work done”
2. Reasonableness – “he explains things to you and doesn’t yell”
3. Justice – “he plays no favorites and treats all men alike”
4. Strictness – “he isn’t so easy that you can step all over him”
5. Carefulness – “he watches out for the safety of the men in his crew”
D. The Leadership Process
1. The group has certain needs, practical and emotional
2. The leader responds to the situation as a whole with appropriate activities
3. Those responses are classified and labeled with trait names
4. These names, which are abstractions and summational fictions, are imputed to the leader as causal psychological entities
E. Summary
1. Leadership is the process of securing direction in social activity which otherwise would be blind and disorderly
2. Leadership activities are resultants of the interplay of the factors which emerge out of a situation and reenter it as controls
Leadership may be defined as that element in a group situation which, when made conscious and controlling, brings about a new situation that is more satisfying to the group as a whole.
IV. Reading 3: Contemporary Trends in the Analysis of Leadership Processes (Hollander & Julian)
A. The psychological study of leadership started with a primary focus on the personality characteristics that distinguished leadership
B. Kurt Lewin (1939)
1. Turned attention to the “social climates” created by several styles of leadership (authoritarian, democratic, and laissez-faire)
2. Lewin’s approach left two residues:
a. A concern with leader style
b. Evolution of the situational approach
C. Main focus of the situational approach was to study leaders in different settings
D. An Overview – The problems with studying leadership
1. An early element of confusion in the study of leadership was the failure to distinguish the role of leader as central in the process
2. The relationship between leader and follower is built over time, and involves an exchange of transaction, in which a leader gets something and gives something
3. There are differential tasks or functions attached to being a leader, and personality characteristics which may fit a person to be a leader are determined by the perceptions held by followers
4. Despite the persisting view that leadership traits do not generalize across situations, leader effectiveness can and should be studied as it bears on the group’s achievement of desired outputs
E. Whither the “Situational Approach”?
1. The situational approach made it seem that the leader and the situation were separate
2. It is now possible to see that the trait and situational approaches merely emphasize parts of a process, which are by no means separable
3. A leader sets the basis for relationships within a group, and thereby can affect outcomes and initiate structure
F. Legitimacy and Social Exchange Leadership
1. Perceived legitimacy – how a leader attains and sustains legitimacy
2. An exchange of rewards
3. Hollander (1958) developed the idiosyncrasy credit concept, which suggests that a person’s potential to be influential arises out of the positive dispositions others hold toward him
G. Effectiveness of the Leader
1. The leader is not effective merely by being influential, without regard to processes and ends achieved
2. According to Selznick (1957), the leader’s function is to define the ends of group existence, to design an enterprise distinctively adapted to these ends, and to see that the design becomes a living reality
3. Katz and Kahn (1966) observed that any group operates with a set of resources to produce certain outputs
4. According to Stogdill (1959), resources are dispersed based on a group’s performance, integration, and member satisfaction as group outputs of the leadership process
H. Identification with the Leader
1. The factors of favorability and effectiveness depend upon the perceptions of followers
2. Kelman (1961) distinguished identification, internalization, and compliance as important in identifying leaders
3. Sears (1960) and Bandura and Walters (1963) studied leadership identification by observing children with adult models
I. Conclusions and Implications
1. The influence process is key to understanding leadership
2. In studying the effectiveness of the leader, more emphasis should be placed on the outcomes for the total system
3. Research on task-oriented groups must attend more to the organizational frameworks within which these groups are imbedded
- Goal-setting, legitimacy of authority, and leader succession are critical
V. Reading 4: Leadership: The Management of Meaning (Smircich and Morgan)
A. The Phenomenon of Leadership
1. Leadership situations may be conceived as those in which there exists an obligation on the part of certain individuals
2. Leadership emerges in a natural and spontaneous manner
a. Informal leaders
b. Formal leaders
3. Leadership is socially constructed through interaction, emerging as a result of the constructions and actions of both leaders and followers.
4. Leadership is dialectic – it is shaped through the interaction of at least two points of reference (i.e. leader and follower). This dialectic is the source of powerful internal tensions.
5. Four Aspects of the Leadership Phenomenon
a. Leadership is essentially a social process defined through interaction
b. Leadership involves a process of defining reality in ways that are sensible to the led
c. Leadership involves a dependency relationship in which individuals surrender their powers to interpret and define reality to others
d. The emergence of formal leadership roles represents an additional stage of institutionalization, in which rights and obligations are recognized and formalized
B. Leadership in Formalized Settings – Formal organization condenses the leadership process observed in natural settings, concretizing its characteristics as a mode of social organization into sets of predetermined roles, relationships, and practices
C. Leadership as the Management of Meaning
1. A focus on the way meaning in organized settings is created, sustained, and changed provides a powerful means of understanding the nature of leadership as a social process
2. Leadership works by influencing the relationship between figure and ground, and defines context as a whole
3. The actions of leaders frame and shape the context of action (Figure 1, p. 25). When leaders act, they punctuate contexts in ways that provide a focus for the creation of meaning.
4. A leader’s actions may generate a variety of interpretations that set the basis for meaningful action.
a. Counterrealities are a source of tension on the group situation that may set the basis for change
b. “Yes-men” versus “rebels” or “out-groups”
5. Effective leadership depends upon the extent to which the leader’s definition of the situation serves as a basis for action by others
a. The key challenge of a leader is to manage meaning in such a way that individuals orient themselves to the achievement of desirable ends
D. Implications for the Theory and Practice of Contemporary Organization
1. A leader must recognize the nature of his or her influence and manage the meaning of situations in a constructive way. This involves:
a. An attempt to deal with the equivocality that permeates many interactive situations
b. Attending to the interpretive schemes of those involved
c. Embodying, through use of appropriate language, rituals, and other forms of symbolic discourse, the meanings and values conducive to desired modes of organized action
2. Role of Power – a defining feature of the leadership process
3. Most patterns of formal organizations institutionalize the emergent characteristics of leadership into roles, rules, and relations that give tangible and enduring form to relationships between leaders and led.