Full Range Of Leadership Model Management Essay

Full Range Of Leadership Model Management Essay As indicated in chapter one, this research attempts to fill a void in the discussion of how managers leadership styles influence employees to stimulate their creative performance in public organizations, particularly in developing countries where environmental variables or national contexts have a strong impact on leadership styles. Since the study aims to determine the degree to which Omani civil service managers practise the Full Range of Leadership styles to enhance employees creative performance, three interrelated issues need to be addressed to meet these aims: 1) historical evolution of theories of leadership emphasized in the Full Range of Leadership model; 2) historical development of creativity theories focusing on an individual creativity model; and 3) the interrelationships between the issues 1 and 2. In this way, the three fields of the literature above together constitute a framework which will inform the analysis of this study. Therefore, the chapter is structured into these main areas of interest. In the first part, the chapter examines the leadership concept and its historical evolution theories. It concentrates on the Full Range of Leadership model and its components as a new leadership approach. In part two the chapter reveals the evolution of the creativity concept. It highlights individual cr eativity theories and discusses employees creative performance. In the third part, the chapter demonstrates the relationship between transformational and transactional leadership and employees creative performance. Finally, the chapter illustrates the studys analytical framework. 2.2 Part One: The Historical Evolution of Leadership 2.2.1 Overview of the Leadership Concept The leadership phenomenon is recognized as being the most extensively researched social process known to behavioural science, because it is believed that leadership plays a crucial role in organizations through a direct influence on individuals and groups within those organizations (Yukl, 2008). Leadership is a difficult concept to define. Taylor (1994) argued that the literature has shown no one definition, list of descriptors, or theoretical model that provides a complete picture of either the theory or practice of leadership. Further, Yukl (2008) suggested that despite the fact that many definitions have been offered, no one particular definition captures the essence of leadership. Bass (1999) claimed that the definition of leadership should depend on the purposes to be served by the definition. According to Burns (1978), leadership is identified as the ability to inspire followers to attempt to accomplish goals that represent the values, motivations, wants, needs, aspirations, and expectations of both leaders and followers. Additionally, Schein (1992) referred to leadership as the ability to operate outside of the existing culture to start an evolutionary change processes. Other scholars such as Bass and Bass (2008) attempted to describe leadership in broader terms. They mentioned that the definition of leadership involves a number of assumptions and understandings from both empirical and conceptual sources. Leadership: (a) exists within social relationships and serves social ends; (b) involves purpose and direction; (c) is an influence process; (d) is a function; and (e) is contextual and contingent. Therefore, leadership involves those who work with others to provide direction and who exert influence on persons and things in order to achieve the organizations goals. Leadership is also defined in terms of a process of social influence, whereby a leader influences members of a group towards a goal (Bryman, 1992). In his definition Bryman tends to emphasize three main elements of leadership: influence, group, and goal. Northouse (2012) extended Brymans leadership elements and identifies four main components central to the definition of leadership: (a) leadership is a process; (b) leadership involves influence; (c) leadership occurs in groups; and (d) leadership involves common goals. Therefore, referring to leadership as a process it is not a trait or characteristics that reside in the leader. It means that a leader affects, and is affected by followers. It emphasizes that leadership is an interactive event occurring between the leaders and their followers. Therefore, leadership is concerned with how the leader affects followers, and thus involves influence. Obviously, those definitions want to illustrate that without influences, leadership does not exist. Besides, Northouse (2012) pointed out that leadership is a phenomenon that occurs in groups. Groups are the context in which leadership takes place. Thus, leadership is basically about one individual who influences a group of others to accomplish common goals. Therefore, both leaders and followers are involved together in the leadership process. That is why it is common to say that leaders need followers, and followers need leaders. In fact, it is a transactional event that occurs between the leader and the followers. Although leaders and followers are closely linked, it is the leader who often initiates the relationship, creates the communication linkages, and carries the burden for maintaining the relationship (Bryman, 1992). Briefly, after a careful revision of the enormous variety of conceptualisations of leadership available in the literature, the crucial elements of leadership are best represented in Northouses definition (2012:6), where leadership is defined as a process whereby an individual motivates a group of individuals to achieve a common goal. This definition raises the following question: What are the leadership characteristics that enable an individual to influence others to unite for a common purpose? This question can best be answered by gaining a better understanding of the historical evolution of leadership and the theoretical paradigms in which leadership has been studied. With this in mind, the next sections will discuss the development of leadership theories, from the traditional leadership theories of the mid-1800s and leading to the more modern paradigm of transformational/transactional leadership theory. 2.2.2 Historical Evolution of Leadership Theories Since the early 1800s researchers have attempted to develop different research approaches to analyse the construct of leadership and its relationship with motivating others to greater productivity. The next section focuses on five of the main organizational leadership theories that have been developed over time. These theories are the great-man theory, the trait theory, the behavioural approach, the situational approach, and the integrative approach. 2.2.2.1 Great-Man Theory In the early nineteenth century, great-man theory was popular and focused on great leaders who helped to change and shape world events. Those great leaders or heroes were highly influential individuals due to their personal charisma, intelligence, or wisdom, and they utilized this power in a way that had a decisive historical impact. The theory assumes that leaders are born and not made. Thus, the capacity of the leader is inherent and there is not much you can do about it. The great-man theory believes that those great leaders possessed specific traits or characteristics that enabled them to stand out from others, to attract the necessary followers, to set direction, and to be strong leaders in their time. These theories evolved and were the natural forerunners to trait theory (Bass and Bass, 2008, and Kirkpatrick and Locke, 1991). 2.2.2.2 The Trait Approach The trait approach focuses upon personal qualities of leadership. This approach is based on the assumption that leaders can be identified by specific traits or characteristics. Basically, there are three broad types of trait which have been addressed by the literature: first, physical elements, such as height, weight, appearance, and age; second, ability characteristics, such as intelligence, scholarship and knowledge, knowing how to get things done, and fluency of speech; and third, other personality features, such as self-confidence, inter-personal sensitivity, and emotional control (Yukl, 2008). Hundreds of trait studies were carried out during the 1930s and 1940s, but according to Stogdill (1974) the massive research effort failed to find any traits that would guarantee leadership success. Smith and Peterson (1988) suggest that the failure of the trait approach has been attributed to the following reasons: first, providing only a list of traits and skills found to be productive did not help in understanding leadership; second, the trait approach failed to tell what these leaders actually do in performing their day-to-day leadership tasks; and third, the method of measurement used by researchers for this approach did not include psychological scaling. Obviously, over the years, it has been documented that leader traits contribute significantly to the prediction of leader effectiveness, leader emergence, and leader advancement. However, there is still a lack of agreement among researchers regarding leader traits and attributes (Zaccaro et al., 2004). Realizing the unreliability of trait theory, researchers began to focus on the observable leadership behaviours, an area which came to be known as behavioural leadership theory. 2.2.2.3 The Behavioural Approach The behavioural approach started in the 1950s as researchers became discouraged with the trait approach and started to pay closer attention to what leaders actually do. Yukl (2008) provides details of two major research studies that were conducted by researchers from Ohio State University and the University of Michigan using two lines of research methods developed to study leader behaviour. The method used by Ohio State University utilized observations to investigate how leaders spend their time completing the activities, responsibilities, and functions of the job. Researchers, therefore, collected data from direct observation, diaries, job description questionnaires, and interviews. The other method of research used by the University of Michigan focused on perceptions of effective leadership behaviour. In conformity with Horn-Turpin (2009) and Yukl (2008), from a series of studies which have been conducted at Ohio State University, it was concluded that the major dimensions of leaders behaviour involved two factors: consideration and initiation. Consideration refers to the extent to which the leader shows consideration to followers. This means the leader listens to the members, shows concern for their welfare, is friendly and approachable, expresses appreciation for good work, treats subordinates as equals, increases subordinates work and maintains their self-esteem, reduces inter-personal conflict, and puts subordinates suggestions into operation. On the other hand, initiation refers to task-related behaviour, such as initiating activity in the group, organizing it, coordinating tasks, and defining the problem for the group and outlining the way the work is to be done. The initiation of structure includes such leadership behaviour as planning activities, facilitating goal achievem ents, providing feedback for the group, maintaining standards and meeting deadlines, deciding in detail what should be done, and how establishing clear channels of communication, organizing work tightly, structuring the work context, providing a clear-cut definition of role responsibility. Based on Yukl (1989), the University of Michigan study identified two specific leadership behaviours that corresponded to the two behaviours identified in the Ohio State University study: (1) production oriented; and (2) employee oriented. Production-oriented behaviours, which corresponded to the initiation behaviour in the Ohio State study, involved completion of tasks, while employee-oriented behaviours corresponded to the consideration-based behaviour in the Ohio State study. Leaders who demonstrated the employee-oriented behaviour also exhibited human-relation-oriented skills and relationships with their employees. Actually, these studies supported the notion that effective leaders had to be cognizant of both task and relationship orientation. Additionally, these studies suggested that some organizations may need leaders who are more focused on tasks, while others require a leadership perspective with strong human-relations skills. Despite the significant findings from both studies, Bryman (1992) mentioned four problems that had been identified with the behavioural approach. The first was inconsistent findings that is, the magnitude and direction of the correlations between consideration and initiating styles and various outcome measures were highly variable. Also, some correlations failed to reach statistical significance. Secondly, an absence of situational analysis. Behavioural approach studies failed to include in their research situational variables that are, including variables which moderate the relationship between leader behaviour and various outcomes. Thirdly, there was a measurement problem: for example, the consideration measure seemed to be affected by leniency effect. Ratings of leaders were found to be contaminated by subordinates implicit theory. Finally, there was a problem of causality that is, does the style of leader influence various outcomes, or does the leader adjust his/her style in re sponse to group performance? Thus, some research went further to suggest that different situations may require different leadership styles and approaches. This concept led to a major shift to contingency theory. 2.2.2.4 The Contingency Approach The fourth leadership approach is Fiedlers (1967) contingency theory or the contingency approach. The theory was developed in the 1950s and 1960s and was viewed as a complement to the Michigan and Ohio State studies. It focuses upon the impact of the situation in determining the leaders style. According to Fiedler (1967) as cited by Yukl (2008), leadership performance depends on both the organization and the leader. He suggested that situational variables have a moderate effect on the relationship between leadership style and effectiveness. Fiedler mentioned that leadership performance depends as much on the organization as it does on the leaders own attributes. Evidently, the contingency approach emphasizes the importance of contextual factors that might influence the leadership process. The characteristics of followers, the nature of the work that the leaders unit performs, the organization type, and the external environment are all major situational variables. The theory suggests that the effectiveness of leader behaviour is dependent upon the situation. Indeed, the contingency approach is sometimes referred to as the situational theory (Yukl, 2008). Northouse (2012) argued that the contingency approach is like the behavioural approach and has many problems similar to those identified in the behavioural approach, such as inconsistent findings, causality problems, and measurement problems. Further, the theory has also been criticized as being an ambiguous approach. Thus, the integrative approach appeared as an attempt to integrate all these theories in one. 2.2.2.5 The Integrative Approach The integrative approach involves studying more than one type of leadership variable. Indeed, few theories or studies include traits, behaviour, influence processes, situation variables, and outcomes all in the same design (Northouse, 2012). In fact, as leaders engage in the constantly changing environment and demands of others, Yukl (2008) argued that this approach may offer a meaningful analysis of the practical day-to-day situations that leaders might encounter. He emphasized that leaders influence a number of situations. Leaders impact the effectiveness of a group or organization by influencing the: (a) interpretation of external events by members; (b) choice of objectives and strategies to pursue; (c) motivation of members to achieve the objectives; (d) mutual trust and cooperation of members; (e) organization and coordination of work activities; (f) allocation of resources to activities and objectives; (g) development of member skills and confidence; (h) learning and sharing of new knowledge by members; (i) enlistment of support and cooperation from outsiders; (j) design of formal structure, programme, and systems; and (k) shared beliefs and values of members. All of these situations are important and require that a leader effectively recognizes the situation and employs the appropriate leadership strategies. Over time, the academic focus has moved from leadership traits to leadership behaviours and then to using different leadership styles in various situations; however, it was obvious that because of the limitations found in those leadership theories, a new leadership approach needed to emerge. Problems such as inconsistent findings, measurement problems, and the problem of causality led to general doubt about leadership theory and stimulated fresh thinking, which led to a new approach (Bennett, 2009). 2.2.3 The New Leadership Approach: The Full Range of Leadership Model Leadership theories had focused primarily on making operations more efficient, through looking for ways to increase production and improve operations. Bass (1985) emphasized that in leadership theories, employee motivation was considered not the key; but only the vehicle. Vrooms expectancy theory (1982) demonstrates that motivation influences job performance and employees are motivated by receiving rewards and avoiding punishment. Thus, employees tied their level of effort to their expected outcome. They were transaction driven. In conformity with Bass (1985), transactional leaders understood the needs of their employees and how to meet those needs in exchange for the appropriate level of effort. However, researchers saw situations where individuals were led by visionary and charismatic leaders who helped their organizations achieve more than was believed possible (Bass, 1985; House, 1977; and Bryman, 1992). Hence, those findings helped lay the foundation for transformational and tra nsactional leadership theory, which later extended to the Full Range of Leadership theory. The theory of transformational and transactional leadership began to develop in the 1970s and 1980s. Downton (1973) introduced the term transformational leadership, followed by Burns (1978), who focused on transformational and transactional leadership in the political field. In fact, they opened a new chapter in leadership research. From that time the transformational leadership approach become one of the most popular approaches to leadership that has successfully attracted researchers since the early 1980s. According to Lowe and Gardner (2000), research in transformational leadership was found to cover one third of the all leadership research, and it occupies a central place in leadership studies. As cited by Pearce et al., (2003), the literature confirms that Downton (1973) is the first researcher to make a distinction between transactional and transformational leadership, whereas the idea gained more attention in James McGregor Burns published work (1978) on political leaders. Burns distinguished between ordinary (transactional) leaders, who exchanged tangible rewards for employees work and loyalty, and extraordinary (transformational) leaders, who engaged with employees, focused on higher-order intrinsic needs, and raised consciousness about the significance of specific outcomes and new ways in which those outcomes might be achieved (Barnett et al., 2001; Pearce et al., 2003; Gellis, 2001; Rafferty and Griffin, 2004; and Judge and Piccolo, 2004). Actually, Burns defined transformational and transactional leadership styles as opposites, whereas Bernard Bass added to these concepts but also believed that managers could demonstrate both depending on the situation (Bass, 1985). Furthermore, Bass et al. (1987) and Waldman et al. (1990) noted that transformational leadership was an extension of transactional leadership. Later, Bass introduced the augmentation model, where he argued that transformational leadership augments transactional leadership in predicting levels of individuals performances (Bass and Riggio, 2006). It is obvious, then, that much of the research on transformational leadership today goes back to the original works of Burns and Bass. Indeed, many researchers state that the most elaborate exposition of transformational leadership theory, which was later extended to the Full Range of Leadership theory, belongs to Bernard Bass (for example, Bryman, 1992; Simic, 1998; Zhang, 2011; and Si and Wei, 2012). Bernard Bass applied the work of James McGregor Burns (1978) on transformational and transactional leadership to organizational management. Bass (1999) defined the transactional leader as a leader who: (1) recognizes what his or her employees want to get from their work and tries to see that employees get what they desire if their performance warrants it; (2) exchanges rewards and promises of rewards for appropriate levels of effort; and (3) responds to the self-interests of employees as long as they are getting the job done. On the other hand, Bass and Bass (2008) claimed that transformational leaders motivate subordinates to do more than is expected. They characterized transformational leaders as those who: (1) raise the level of awareness of employees about the importance of achieving valued outcomes, a vision, and the required strategy; (2) get employees to transcend their own self-interest for the sake of the group and organization; and (3) expand employees portfolio of needs by raising their awareness to improve themselves and what they are attempting to accomplish. Horn-Turpin (2009) outlines three important differences between the work of Burns (1978) and Bass (1999) on transformational and transactional leadership. Firstly, Burns (1978) suggested that the two styles of leadership are at opposite ends of the same leadership continuum: that is, the leader cannot be transactional and transformational at the same time, but could be either one of them, while Bass (1999) proposed that both transactional and transformational leadership can be displayed by the same leader. For example, Bass (1999) recognized that the same leader may use both types of the process at different times in different situations. Bass (1999) sees transformational leadership as a higher-order second leadership which is needed in addition to transactional leadership. Secondly, Burns (1978) suggested that actions are transformational if society benefits from them. Bass (1999) sees transformational leadership as not necessarily inherently beneficial; for example, Hitler was negatively transformational. Bass (1999) focuses on the individual personality while Burns (1978) placed emphasis on the leader-follower relationship. Thirdly, Bass (1999) outlined the components of the two types of leadership, specifying their content more than Burns (1978). Based on practical researches, Bass (1985) found evidence for five leadership factors: individualized consideration, charismatic leadership, intellectual stimulation, contingent rewards, and management-by-exception. Transformational leadership consisted of the first three: charismatic leadership, individualized consideration, and intellectual stimulation. Transactional leadership consisted of the last two factors: contingent rewards and management-by-exception. After additional investigation between approximately 1985 and 1995 the theory was expanded to denote three types of leadership behaviour transformational, transactional, and non-transactional laissez-faire leadership or passive leadership and it is referred to in the Full Range of Leadership model (Antonakis, 2003, and Bennett, 2009). Moreover, researchers conducted a meta-analysis of multiple studies which provided a review of hundreds of studies completed over the past twenty years indicate that indicate there has been fairly consistent support for the key factors of transformational leadership: charisma/idealized influence, inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation, and individual consideration (for example, Lowe et al., 1996; DeGroot et al., 2000; Dumdum et al., 2002; and Judge and Piccolo, 2004). Investigation into the Full Range of Leadership theory expanded the components into nine factors: five transformational factors, three transactional factors, and one non-tran sactional leadership factor (for example: Avolio et al., 1999; Avolio and Bass, 2004; Barbuto, 2005; Rowold and Heinitz, 2007). Another modification to the model occurred with regard to its components. Antonakis et al. (2003) suggested using idealized influence instead of charisma and suggested that idealized influence should be separated into two parts: attributes and behaviour. Further, Avolio and Bass (2004) noted that management-by-exception should be divided into two parts: active and passive. Later, studies suggested using the term passive/avoidant instead of laissez-faire as the third leadership type in the Full Range of Leadership theory because it was more descriptive. Also, it was proposed that management-by-exception (active) was a better fit with transactional leadership, and management-by-exception (passive) was a better fit with laissez-faire as two subscales under the third type of leadership, now identified as passive/avoidant (Avolio and Bass, 2004; Avolio et al., 1999; Geyer and Steyrer, 1998; Bennett, 2009 and Den Hartog et al., 2011; and). The Full Range of Leadership model is displayed in Figure 2.1. As illustrated in Figure 2.1, the Full Range of Leadership model components are organized around two axes: level of activity and degree of effectiveness. The activity axis is concerned with how active or passive the leader is in his or her way of being towards employees and towards the aims of the organization. Essentially this axis has to do with the leaders level of engagement and involvement in the leadership process. The effectiveness axis relates to the effect the specific leadership style has on employee, group, and organizational outcomes in this study the outcome being investigated is employees creative performance. Figure 2.1: The Model of the Full Range of Leadership. Source: Adopted from Bass and Riggio (2006). ACTIVE EFFECTIVE INEFFECTIVE 5 Is CR MBE-A MBE-P LF PASSIVE 2.2.3.1 Transformational Leadership The Full Range of Leadership theory demonstrates that transformational leadership is a process whereby a leader utilizes a number of leadership behaviours or practices to influence the commitment and effort of employees toward the accomplishment of organizational objectives. Those practices, indeed, enhance the values and aspirations of both leader and employees (Bass and Riggio, 2006). Unlike other traditional leadership styles, transformational leadership attempts to give adequate support to organizational members so that they become highly engaged and inspired by goals that are motivational, because those goals are associated with values in which those members strongly believe or are persuaded to strongly believe. Thus, a transformational leader undertakes a matching process where he or she identifies which internal states of organizational members are critical to their performance and specifies a set of leaders practices most likely to have a positive influence on those internal states (Leithwood and Sun, 2012). Bennis and Nanus (1985) went beyond that by conceptualizing transformational leadership as a process that changes the organization by focusing on action, and by converting followers into leaders and leaders into agents of change. This notion is also supported by Sergiovanni (1990) and Avolio (1999), who argued that transformational leadership might be defined as the process whereby leaders develop followers into leaders. Followers become leaders when they are committed to a cause and are self-managing. For the purpose of this study, transformational leadership is defined in conformity with Bass and Riggio (2006), as a process through which a leader influences the organizational members toward the achievement of organizational goals by utilizing his social charisma and actions to encourage people in organization, articulate an inspiring vision for the future, create an environment for creativity, and pay close attention to individuals needs and wants. 2.2.3.2 Components of Transformational Leadership According to Bass and Avolio (1985), transformational leaders motivate others to do more than they originally intended and often even more than they thought possible. They behave in ways to achieve superior results by employing one or more of the four core components of transformational leadership, which are: (1) idealized influence (attributed and behaviours); (2) inspirational motivation; (3) intellectual stimulation; and (4) individual consideration. To some extent Bass and Riggio (2006) stated that those components have evolved, as refinements have been made in both the conceptualization and the measurement of transformational leadership. For example, Bass and Riggio (2006) argued that there are two aspects to idealized influence: the leaders behaviours, and the elements that are attributed to the leader by employees and other associates. These two aspects, measured by separate sub-factors of the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (MLQ), represent the interactional nature of id ealized influence: it is embodied both in the leaders behaviour and in attributions that are made concerning the leader by employees. Conceptually, transformational leaders are charismatic and employees seek to identify with the leader and emulate them. Transformational leaders inspire employees with challenge and persuasion, and provide both meaning and understanding. They intellectually stimulate and expand the employees use of their own abilities. Finally, transformational leaders are individually considerate, and provide the employees with support, mentoring, and coaching. Each of these components can be measured with the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (MLQ), which will be discussed in the Methodology Chapter. Together, the five main dimensions of transformational leadership are interdependent; they must co-exist; and they are believed to represent the most effective leadership attitudes and behaviours (Gellis, 2001; Moolenaar et al., 2010; Hall et al., 2008; Pieterse, et al., 2010 and Leithwood and Sun 2012). Descriptions of the components of transformational leadership are presented in the following subsections. 2.2.3.2.1 Idealized Influence Attributed (IIA) Idealized influence attributed is defined as the socialized charisma of the leader: whether the leader is perceived as being confident and powerful, and whether the leader is viewed as focusing on higher-order ideals and ethics. Leaders who exhibit idealized influence attributed are providing a role model that employees seek to emulate (Bono and Judge, 2004; Simic, 1998; Stone, et al., 2003 and Ho et al., 2009). On the other side, employees view their leaders as having extraordinary capabilities, persistence, and determination, and they feel admiration, loyalty, and respect for the leaders (Bass, 1985). Idealized influence leaders or charismatic leaders are highly motivated to influence their employees. Their employees trust their judgments and have faith in them. Such leaders can transform the established order, and instil pride, faith, and respect. They have a gift for seeing what is really important and a sense of a vision which is effectively articulated (Avolio and Bass, 1988). Further, it has been noted that individuals who are under charismatic leadership are hig