A leader is the most influential individual in a group (Hollander, 1985; Shaw, 1981). Leadership encompasses the ability to influence or guide other individuals or groups. But are leaders born or made? Is leadership innate or learned? Let’s look at some theories that try to provide answers to this question.
Trait Theory of Leadership
The trait theory of leadership suggests that certain innate qualities and characteristics make someone a leader.
This theory aimed to find the set of traits that makes a person a leader or not, and they might be related to personality traits, physical factors, intelligence, etc. However, researchers only found a very small set of traits that leaders share (for example, there are big differences between Nelson Mandela and Hitler).
Researchers have identified some major leadership traits: intelligence, self-confidence, determination, communication skills, integrity, and sociability. Charisma, ambition, energy, honesty, leadership skills, and knowledge and expertise in the field are other relevant leadership traits.
Did you know? The emergence of the concept of trait leadership can be traced back to the 19th century, with Thomas Carlyle's "great man" theory. More recently, Zaccaro and colleagues (2004) created a model to understand leader traits and their influence on leader effectiveness and performance.
Trait leadership is one of the most criticized theories of leadership. Some consider it to be too simplistic (Conger & Kanugo, 1998). Others argue that behavior is a better predictor of leader effectiveness than traits (Derue et al., 2011). All in all, we don’t have enough evidence that explains how personality predicts (or may predict) the effectiveness of a leader.
Behavioral Leadership Theories
Behavioral leadership theories assume that what defines a leader is how they behave. You don’t need to be born a leader, but you can become one (by imitating other leaders or through training and coaching).
The Ohio State Leadership Studies (1954): a series of studies to identify observable behaviors of leaders. They narrowed down their initial list into two categories that explained most behaviors: initiating structure and consideration.
Initiating structure (task-oriented): the extent to which a leader defines roles and responsibilities, defines and schedules tasks, organizes group activities, and maintains performance, rules, and regulations. It is also known as direction for task behavior.
Consideration (people-oriented): the extent to which a leader promotes trust, looks out for the wellbeing of the team members, treats team members as their equals, and makes themselves available to the rest of the team. It has also been called socioemotional support for relationship behavior.
Situational Leadership Theories
Situational leadership theories argue that a leader will become so based on the moment or situation.
The Situational Leadership Model (Hersey & Blanchard, 1969) was later developed into two evolved theories in the late 1970s/early 1980s.
The main point of this theory is that there is no single best leadership style. Instead, effective leaders are those who adapt their style to the situation, task, and team members. Influential factors to become a leader:
How people seat at the table. Seating at the head of the table confers power.
Seniority.
Group needs. According to situational theories, if the needs of a group change, the leader will change as well.
Interactional Theory of Leadership
Some researchers (Katz & Khan, 1978; Hollander, 1958) argued that becoming a leader was the result of the individual’s traits, their followers, and the situation.
Lewin's Leadership Styles
What leadership style is the most effective? This was one of the main questions that the first studies on leadership tried to answer.
Lewin and his colleagues (1939) compared three leadership styles: autocratic, democratic, and laissez-faire (or anarchic).
An autocratic leader makes all the decisions.
Democratic leadership consists of involving all the team members in the decision-making process.
Laissez-faire leaders are more relaxed and let team members make all the decisions.
The goal of the study was to observe how several groups of children, aged 8-10, would behave based on their teacher’s leadership style. They grouped the children to work on some arts and crafts projects, and the democratic teacher let the children debate which tasks they should do while guiding them through the decision-making process. The group led by an autocratic teacher was given specific instructions on what they were supposed to do. There was no debate and children were not involved in the decision-making. Lastly, those students with a laissaiz-faire teacher were given all the materials and full freedom to do the tasks they wanted, with no limitations.
They observed that those students with a democratic teacher had a good relationship with each other and with the teacher, they were more proactive and cooperative, and they were better behaved –even when the teacher left the classroom. In the group with the autocratic teacher, the children were less spontaneous, more aggressive, and less cooperative. And those with the laissez-faire teacher lacked drive and purpose, and they were more prone to chaos.
Contingency Theory (Fiedler)
The contingency theory of leadership states that effective leadership depends on the situation at hand. It depends on whether an individual's leadership style is appropriate to the situation (someone can be an effective leader in one circumstance and an ineffective leader in another).
Fiedler’s contingency model combines ideas from situational and trait approaches and paves the way for other contingency models. He identified two leadership styles: a task-oriented leader whose main goal is to get the job done, and a relationship-oriented leader focused on the relationships and feelings within the group.
The effectiveness of each style will depend on the situation, and he identified three main factors or dimensions of how favorable it may be:
Quality of the leader-group relationship (trust, admiration, etc.). *The most significant variable in determining how favorable a situation is.
Task structure (task and role clarity).
Leader’s position power (formal authority). The more power, the more favorable.
Task-oriented leaders will be more effective in situations that are either very favorable (it’s easy to focus on the task without worrying about feelings) or not favorable at all (a chaotic situation may overwhelm a leader too concerned about relationships), while relationship-oriented leaders will be more effective in somewhat favorable situations.
Social Identity Theory of Leadership (Hogg)
Hogg (1996) argued that to be able to understand the effectiveness of leadership, we must observe the characteristics of the group in which it arose.
To the extent to which the group is important to us, the identity of the group will be important to anticipate the effectiveness of their leader. Members of the group will want to have a leader that embodies the prototype of the group’s social identity.
Knowledge Check
1. Hogg’s Identity Theory of Leadership argues that…
a. Team members identify themselves better with democratic leaders.
b. That relationship-oriented leaders will be more effective because they help build the group’s identity.
c. Members of the group prefer leaders that embody the prototype of the group’s identity.
d. Laissez-faire leaders help create a group’s identity by allowing team members to make decisions.
2 - In Lewin’s leadership experiments, they observed that the students with a democratic teacher…
a. Were better behaved even when the teacher left the classroom.
b. Lacked drive and purpose.
c. Were less proactive and cooperative.
d. Were more prone to chaos because the teacher let them make decisions.
3 - Fiedler’s contingency theory states that…
a. Democratic leaders are more effective than autocratic ones.
b. Effective leadership depends on the situation at hand.
c. Becoming a leader is the result of the leader’s traits, their followers, and the situation.
d. Leaders are born with innate characteristics.
4 - In Situational Leadership Theories, which of the following factors is not relevant?
a. Seniority.
b. Group needs.
c. Personal traits
d. Options a and c are correct.
Answer Key
1-c / 2-a / 3-b / 4-b