Situational Leadership Style And Level Of Development

• Using a delegative style with a team member who knows more about the job than you. You cannot do everything and the employee needs to take ownership of her job.

The word leadership has a lot of meanings, but its meaning is unique to the person who is giving the definition. Leadership is the ability to guide, direct, and motivate others to accomplish a mission or task. It is the ability to make subordinates see their own potential in their abilities and supervisors recognize and respect it. Leaders are entrusted with building up those they lead to ensure the individual can one day assume the responsibility of leading others. It is for this reason that the situational approach style of leadership best describes my leadership style.

In order to determine what behaviors would be effective in inspiring James to be productive, James’s supervisor needs to make select a coaching style that would be most effective in encourage James to develop his skills, knowledge, and capabilities. According to Aguinis (2013), there are four different coaching styles: driver, persuader, amiable, and analyzer (p. 233). The driver style describes a tactic that entails the coach taking a directive approach to coaching the employee (Aguinis, 2013, p. 233). According to Aguinis (2013), a coach who use the driver style tends to be assertive and quick to speak and usually speak about tasks and facts and usually omits personal feelings (p. 233). Conversely, the persuader coaching style describes an approach in which the coach explains the benefits of the coach’s directives (Aguinis, 2013, p. 233). Aguinis (2013) states that, like the driver coaching style, the persuader coaching style denotes coaches that are assertive, yet talk more about feelings and relationships (p. 233). Aguinis (2013) also states that the amiable coaching style emphasizes the importance of feelings and intuition as a guiding principle in coaching (p. 233). Lastly, the analyzer coaching style is inclined to follow logic, rules, and standardized procedures (Aguinis, 2013, p. 233). In addition, the analyzer coaching style is likely to enlist the use of facts and tasks in its approach, much like the tactics used in the driver coaching style (Aguinis,

Situational leadership focuses on adapting your leadership style or approach based on the situation and the amount of direction and support that is needed by followers. As Jesus trained and equipped his disciples from simple fishermen to fishers of men, who carried on his ministry after he ascended to heaven, he integrated different styles and theories of leadership that best served and supported his followers (Blanchard & Hodges, 2003). Depending on the level of competency and commitment of their people, leaders will adjust their style to provide the necessary support and direction. The core competencies of situational leaders are the ability to identify the performance, competence and commitment of others, and to be flexible (Paterson, 2013). From being highly directive, telling their people exactly what to do and how, to delegating, clearly stating the objective and allowing them to complete the task with little direction and support, situational leaders adapt their approach to the needs of their people and the particular situation.

Personality, experience, general operating style and learning of leadership are all contributors in determining what style of leadership an individual will adopt. To be a leader and decide upon a style, one must know their self and have an understanding of their own abilities, as well as having a knowledge base on their prospective followers (Sellgren, Ekvall, & Tomson, 2006). I will be discussing two leadership styles, situational and authoritarian. Situational leadership is a style of leadership developed by Dr. Paul Hersey, which is categorised under the core theory of contingency. This theory was first introduced as “Life Cycle Theory of Leadership”, which was renamed to “Situational Leadership” in the mid 1970s. This style teaches that there is no one particular style that is efficient for every situation and effective leaders adapt their style to accommodate the range of individuals within a group. An effective leader must have the ability to diagnose, adapt and communicate based on the readiness of followers and other situational variables. Dr. Paul Hersey describes the “an individual’s readiness level as their willingness and ability to complete a particular task. He proposes that a situational leader is able to change their leadership style depending on the situation and a follower’s readiness level. This is a significant element in ensuring the task gets completed successfully (Mujtaba & Sungkhawan, 2011). According to this style, there are four readiness levels. Style one is when the followers are unable and unwilling to perform the task. Upon identifying this, the leader is able to explain to followers what, where, how and when to do this particular task. This particular style is also known as “telling” and is optimal when attempting to influence followers with low readiness levels. Style two, also called “selling” is described as when

Urban Meyer is the head coach for The Ohio State Buckeyes football team. He is 49 years old and was born in Toledo Ohio. He attended University of Cincinnati where he played football. Coach Meyer is married and has three children. Prior to coaching Ohio State he retired from coaching was working as a sports analyst for ESPN. Before retiring and working for ESPN, Coach Meyer was the head coach for the University of Florida. He led the Gators to two BCS championship wins and he held the highest percentages of wins for any active college football coach. (www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com).

Situational leadership has very little in common with the other models mentioned herein. This model revolves around the leader changing leadership behaviors to meet the needs in relationship to the follower (Kouzes, 2003, p. 111). The difference between situational leadership and charismatic, servant, and transformational leadership is the lack of an organizational vision and the empowerment of the followers. Situational leadership uses followers based on their readiness level that relate to their ability and willingness to complete the task (Wren, 1995, p. 208). This aspect coupled with the leader’s task and relationship behavior is used in relation to the

There are three elements in the leadership system: leader, follower, and situation. The course 15 material defines a leader as, someone who influences other to achieve a goal. It defines a follower as someone who chooses to follow a leader because of the leader’s character, abilities, and vision. The course

Of course, equipping leadership qualities, such as charisma, confidence, and determination, provides an extra boost towards the goal. To be a successful leader, being committed and knowledgeable will get the work done, but it takes a team to work well. Building strong relationships with your team members is a crucial part of success. Without trust, the team will fabricate doubt and drown the team. Strong relationships allow you to utilize individual skills from each team member for better efficiency. By encouraging group members to avoid groupthink and push boundaries, the team will step further towards success. Motivating team members provides the team with the determination and force to see the work done. Leaderships in organizations proves critical to the completion of projects and proposals. Providing an environment to learn allows the team to grow together and individually for

In all honesty each of the theories in our reading carry some sort of relevance and irreloevance, not to mention that everyone one of them are interesting theories. Above all things there will always be a prejudice depending on one's frame of reference and the context of a situation, but from a general point of view these are the theories I find to be most agreeable with, most disagreeable with, and most interesting. Before I follow on though I must mention that the theory I find most agreeable with would be my most interesting one too as my interest would lean to that of something I would intend on implementing the most from a leadership point of view, but for the sake

Edmonson, J. (2009). Let's be clear: How to manage communication styles. T & D, 63(9), 30-31.

If I were the new director of an art gallery in New York City, I would utilize a mixture of transformational leadership and situational leadership styles. Transformational leadership is "based on mutually beneficial relationships between leaders and followers whereby the leader is seeking to promote growth and real charge" (Shriberg & Shriberg, 2011, p. 78). Since the twenty employees have opinions of the former leader and how the gallery should be run and the stockholders also have input about what art to display and events to hold, the past managerial style did not sufficiently unify all stakeholders in the business. Utilizing the transformational style of leadership, I would strive to get everyone invested in a shared vision of what the gallery could be. I would listen to everyone 's input because ideas can come from unlikely places and everyone needs to feel that they are a valued part of the whole company. Studies conducted on transformational leadership show organizations led by transformational leaders perform at higher levels and have a higher satisfaction rating, by workers, than organizations led by other types of leaders (Riggio, 2009, March 24). There are four aspects of transformational leadership. They provide intellectual stimulation by encouraging employees to think outside of the box. They give individualized consideration by acknowledging each employee as an individual. They offer inspirational motivation to help employees have a passion for the shared

Hersey and Blanchard’s Situational Leadership Theory (SLT) asserts that a leader’s effectiveness is dependent upon the readiness, or ability and willingness, of the leader’s followers to complete a task. This leadership style is an amalgamation of task-oriented and relationship-oriented characteristics that are employed depending upon the situation and the followers involved. According to the SLT, as followers increase in readiness the leader’s style is to adapt accordingly (Kinicki & Kreitner, 2009).

Situational leadership is the second model that may fit with poverty in mind. This style of leadership involves having different levels of leadership based on where that employee or student is at. Blanchard (1982) suggests that leadership is always in a fluid state. This state does not allow for a “one size fits all” approach to leadership. Wu, Tsui, & Kinicki (2010) concur that this approach looks at every situation in a vacuum and no situation is identical. They carry on Blanchard’s belief that individualized leadership examines the individuals’ strength and use those skills to fit the tasks that fit that individual.

Over the years, scholars and management theorists have cultivated several leadership styles that they have encouraged people to apply and try to implement. However, most of these theories have shown various short comings. Typically, none of these styles has proven to work best in diverse situations. In the late 1960’s, the Situational Leadership Model was developed. In this paper, I will discuss the details about the situational leadership model. In detail, the paper begins with a defined introduction of what the situational leadership model is about and an interpretation of its origination. An outline of the model will follow after which a discussion about the benefits and drawbacks of this model will shortly follow.