Trait Leadership

According to trait theory, leaders can be identified or categorized based on their personality qualities. Leaders and nonreaders can be distinguished by these characteristics. They are founded on the claim that leaders are not created; rather, they are born (Day & Antonakis, 2012). It is innate, not something that can be learned.

According to the trait theory, people who are born with particular traits are more likely to be good leaders than others who must work hard to develop them. Even though this approach is currently considered to be out of date, it had made people believe that leadership development is comprised of measuring the qualities of leaders, screening possible leaders to be from non-leaders, and finally training those with the potential of leadership qualities. More important to note is that trait theory of leadership mostly analyzes the social, physical as well as characters of a person to be considered a leader or one being referred to as a leader (Northouse, 2012). These features are collected from various leaders and compared to gain understanding as to what is common among them.

Examples of these traits are:

Knowledge of the business.

Tenacity. This is the ability to be firm or persistent in their course of action.

Innovative and creativeness. The world is fast changing and leaders must be innovative so as to stay ahead of the competition.

Charisma. They must be people who are admired or who can inspire others. This helps employees or those under them achieve their goals and, thus, the goals of the organization.

Emotional intelligence. Leaders must be emotionally intelligent to help them deal with those who are different from them emotionally.

Flexibility. Leaders must be dynamic and change with changes. The business world changes every day in regards to technology and other aspects of organization operations and, thus, requires those who can easily and quickly adapt to these changes.

Motivational skill. Employees must be motivated in order to show higher productivity or performance and this is why a leader must have the motivational skill.

Integrity and Honesty. Leaders must also be a person of higher integrity and truthful as well as faithful in all the transactions.

Confidence.

Energy.

Ability to influence others Good cognitive skills.

Behavioral

Leadership

This theory focuses on the behaviors of a leader. The behavior of leaders is said to be the best predictor of their influence as far as leadership is concerned and, thus, determines their success (Von Krogh, Nonaka & Rechsteiner, 2012). It believes in the assumption that leaders can be made, but not born. According to this theory, everyone can be a leader if trained well. No one is born a leader or with leadership skills. This theory is a leap from the trait theory, and it claims that capability of leadership can be learned, but not that some people have these abilities inherently. This suggestion opens the option of developing leaders as in contrast with the simple assessment of psychometrics. If one follows the trait theory, then it means that some people will never get a chance to lead because they were not born leaders. But according to this behavioral theory, everyone can get a chance to lead. One only needs to take time and learn the skills required for one to be in a leadership position.

Behavioral theory is also not a complicated way of assessing leaders (Von Krogh, Nonaka & Rechsteiner, 2012). A person just needs to evaluate someone’s behavior and the level of their leadership success. From a large data of behavior and success, one can draw a conclusion as to the behavior of those considered to be leaders or those who have the capacity to lead.

Some of the suggested behaviors of a leader are:

1. Conscientiousness. This is the behavior of a desire to do job well. Those who have the desire to do a task well or are vigilant as to how a work or a particular job is done, can be useful and successful leaders.

2. Leaders who are successful were also found to be efficient and organized.

3. Flexibility. Those who display a flexible behavior are more successful in leadership positions as they can adapt to different changes in their environment or the people they are dealing with while leading (Von Krogh, Nonaka & Rechsteiner, 2012).

4. Extroversion. This is the behavior that is associated with energy, being outgoing and talkative. It shows how one possesses social skills and can display them positively to accomplish a given tasks. Successful leaders tend to have this kind of behavior.

Contingency

Leadership

This theory asserts that the success and effectiveness of any leader depend on every situation they are facing. In other words, the theory claims that there is no best or definite way to lead an organization or people (Von Krogh, Nonaka & Rechsteiner, 2012). Every method or effectiveness depends on various factors some of which are not in the control of those entrusted with the leadership position. Some of the leader’s ability depends on factors such as technology, supplier and distributor relationship, the interest of consumers and even relationship with the government. This theory was created by Fred Fiedler in 1960. He was a scientist who specialized in personality studies and characters of leaders. He found out in his research that there is no best way or style of leadership, but instead the efficiency and effectiveness of leaders are based on the situation surrounding them. He came up with two factors that influence leadership. Those are situational favorableness and leadership style. In identifying the leadership style, he used a model called Fieldler. He claimed that every leadership style is fixed and can be measured by applying a scale called Least-Preferred Co-worker LPC scale. This scale asks people how they feel working with leaders and who they prefer working with. It has several factors that one uses to rate how they felt working with the other or leaders. These factors based on the scale of 1 to 8, 1 meaning unfavorable and 8 being the most favorable (Von Krogh, Nonaka & Rechsteiner, 2012). They are unfriendly on one side of the ratings and friendly on another one. Same to unpleasant to pleasant, rejecting to accepting, tense to relaxed, cold to warm, boring to interesting, incorporating to cooperating, hostile to supportive, guarded to open, insincere to sincere, inconsiderate to considerate, unkind to kind, un trustable to trustable, gloomy to cheerful, quarrelsome to harmonious. These rates are then added up to determine the best leader. One with the highest score is considered the most efficient leader. On the situational favorableness, he considered factors such as leader-member relationship and leadership position power.

Task-oriented leaders. That is one who can get a task done in an organized and coordinated manner.

Highly structured work environment enhances the effectiveness of leaders.

Skills

Leadership

Skills leadership theory tries to find out what makes one to be a good leader and also how he/she can be identified. This theory claims that leaders have some set of skills in their possession that they have acquired over time. The skills theory was developed in 1955 by a scientist and a research named Robert Katz. He studied executive officers and realized three common skills that they have. These are technical skills, human relations skills as well as conceptual skills (Yukl, 2012). In his research, he found out that higher level leaders need to have more of conceptual skills than any other skills. And again, hands on leaders needed more of technical skills than theoretical and other leadership skills.

Consequently, this theory asserts that for leaders to be effective and fruitful, they should have several other skills such as problem-solving ability, knowledge in the areas of their leadership, and also social judgment skills.

Some of these skills according to this theory are developed from one’s performance, career experience, and also the context of their work.

Skill theory acknowledges anyone can become a leader they only need to work towards developing the said skills that would help them in handling their leadership tasks.

1. Technical related to the field or leadership. This suggests that leaders must have some technical know-how in the field of their work. This would enable them to make good decisions and also give the organization the right direction.

2. Human-related skills. These are skills related to human resource management. Leaders must have some skills on how to manage people they are leading. This would help them in handling different personalities as well as promoting unity and cohesion in the workplace (Yukl, 2012). They will also be able to communicate effectively with other employees for the achievement of the organization goals.

3. Conceptual skills. These are skills that allow leaders to be creative and understand complicated issues related to management. They would be able to solve problems, understand a relationship between various ideas, concepts, and patterns. They will also be capable of formulating processes required for a better flow of work in the organization.

Situational Leadership

The theory was developed in 1969 by Paul Hersey and his colleague, Ken Blanchard. It is part of contingency theories of leadership.

It holds that leaders’ success and effectiveness are based on their behavior and the situational factors (Yukl, 2012).

This theory also asserts that leaders’ effectiveness is contingent on their ability to modify their management traits to the level of their employees and other subordinate staffs’ maturity or sophistication.

This leadership style combines directive behavior and supportive behavior.

Some of the leadership behavior based on the level of direction and support as suggested by this theory are:

Telling. This is where the leader shows high directive but low support for their employees.

Selling. This is a combination of higher support and directive to employees.

Participative. In this style, there is a low directive, but greater support of subordinate staff.

Delegating. In this style of situational leadership, employees have delegated work and the leaders’ shows low directive and also low support for them (Yukl, 2012). This is aimed at ensuring their independent in making decisions as well as reduction of supervisory role in their work.

This theory has also divided maturity level of employees and leaders into three categories.

These are higher maturity, moderate maturity, and low maturity.

The first category is of great maturity. Here, the leader is considered to be very capable and confident.

Moderate maturity is the second highest level. It is further divided into two categories, Moderate two and moderate three noted as M3 and M2.

In moderate three (M3), the leader or employee is capable, but not willing to do the job as required. In moderate two (M2), the leader or employee is unable to do the job, but confident.

Lastly, low maturity is the last in the level of maturity. It is marked by unable leaders who are also insecure.

Coaching leaders who help their subjects with personal development and are open to change.

Pacesetting leaders. They set a high expectation for their subordinates. They lead by example.

Democratic leaders. They engage their followers in a vote in all the decisions they are making. This uses the assumption that the employees’ opinion must be respected and, thus, they should be allowed to make their choices freely or express their views without fear.

References

Day, D. V., & Antonakis, J. (2012). The nature of leadership. New York: Sage.

Northouse, P. G. (2012). Leadership: Theory and practice. New York: Sage.

Von Krogh, G., Nonaka, I., & Rechsteiner, L. (2012). Leadership in organizational knowledge creation: a review and framework. Journal of Management Studies, 49(1), 240-277.

Yukl, G. (2012). Effective leadership behavior: What we know and what questions need more attention. The Academy of Management Perspectives, 26(4), 66-85.