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Critically Evaluate The Application of Leadership Theories To A Leader in An Organisational Context
Critically Evaluate The Application of Leadership Theories To A Leader in An Organisational Context
organisation.
R1801D4405723
Ogbonna Ifeanyichukwu Charles
02 September, 2018
Contents
Introduction.................................................................................................................................................. 3
References .............................................................................................................................................. 25
Introduction
observed phenomena. The word's origin (from the Greek thorós, a spectator), stresses
the fact that all theories are mental models of the perceived reality.” Not all established
theories were successfully implemented and same goes for some implementations that
cannot be proven theoretically. Stoner, et.al. (2003) proposed that theory is an astute
knowledge people based on what they have come across or experienced. Based on the
this perceptive, mastery of the culture around the theories is required to perfectly
evaluate theoretical thoughts. Culture depends a lot on generation and location, and
due to this, things change with time and place and what was accepted at a location in
particular time might not be acceptable in another place and the same time or vice
versa. And from Ackoff (1974) an action allowable at one location might be frowned at in
culture that shows rights and wrongs, good and bad, and the kind of idea to be
discussing with or sharing with the workers in the organization (Watson, 1994; Dawson,
1996).
Before the industrial revolution, there were no many organizations and so there were no
many management. This was based on the fact that apart from the church, military,
trading, farming and some small construction, there were no much that required
management. The owners of the enterprise handles tasks like planning coordination,
controlling amongst other activities. All these changed with the rise of the industrial
revolution. With the invent of new methods of productions, organizations started
growing bigger and with more staff. This started going to the extent the owner of the
investment or just one person cannot handle these tasks. This led to them having to
depend on others to get these tasks done and with this, there were need for the theories
of management. With the industrial revolution in the twentieth century, scholars have
structures. A variety of theories has been developed since then and have been tested,
Even though leadership and management complement one another, most people
cannot find a clear line between both and still have some gray area in separation of both
of them. A couple of definitions of management and leadership are quickly cited to help
clear this obscurity. Weijrich and Koontz (1993) defined management as organizing,
objectives. On the other hand, leadership is more about inspiring and motivating and so,
does not require an explicit authorization. Weijrich and Koontz (1993) described
managers as administrators who mainly develop plans and oversee the development of
the organization and also allocate resources. On the contrary, leaders basic task is to
transform the personality of the individuals and that of the organization. Leadership can
be seen as the successful relationship between and a leader and their followers. And
owing to this, managers can be classified as either good or bad leaders. In this modern
era, it makes sense that organizations understand the theories of leadership to help
then react quickly and appropriately to the changes within and outside the organizations
very crucial for the organization’s survival and also meeting up with the vision of the
organization.
operations currently for the research and clinical programs of its School of Medicine,
Institute of Human Virology Center for International Health Education and Biosecurity
(CIHEB) in Kenya, Nigeria, Rwanda, Tanzania, and Zambia, with registration application
in-process in Haiti. Across all countries, UMB has strong relationships with local
healthcare institutions, and health information systems. UMB CIHEB’s Nigeria country
office is staffed and led by Nigerian health experts who have been trained and
research, and targeted health systems solutions, including for adopting point of service
laboratory technology, health care governance, and monitoring and evaluation. This
activity of the organization means that there is a management theory been practiced in
the organization.
A couple of leadership and management theories are defined, discussed and evaluated
transactional theories. Theories were selected based on their randomly and based on
the theories practiced in the organization. The processes from MGIC Nigeria were used
to cite examples for some of the practices and used to critically evaluate the theories.
This analysis will start by taking a look at the definitions of management then the
evaluation of the management theories, then leadership will be defined and then
Main analysis
Definition of management
Perception is a key to how individuals define and interpret ideas or theories. Scholars
from a variety of fields and locations have tried to define management in variable ways.
constant innovation in all areas of the firm; (3) partnership – the wholesale
participation of and gain sharing with all people connected with the organization;
(4) leadership that loves change (instead of fighting it) and instils and shares an
inspiring vision; and (5) control by means of simple support systems aimed at
Peter tries to portray management as some key activities that people in management
will be performing to keep the organization going forward and that includes the external
Here Kroontz and Weihrich are defining management in terms of the environment, they
are proposing mostly of the managers making the work environment conducive for the
Fayol’s definition of management represents how managers make people to get the
work done at that time. People are made to work mostly by command.
functions ... The five essential managerial functions (are): planning, organizing, staffing,
Kroontz and O’Donnel proposal as the definition of management had five managerial
functions which includes staffing, directing, leading and controlling which are directly
talking about the relationship of the management to workers and how they get the job
done.
‘Management is a social process ... the process consists of ... planning, control,
We can see that the definitions of management changed overtime, initial definitions of
management from Fayol sees management as commanding but from the definition from
Brech, it has to do with motivation. In Koontz and O’Donnell’s definition, they mentioned
leading and directing as part of the activities of management and this is pointing out the
shift in the paradigm of management from commanding to motivation and leading the
Classical management
Classical management theory emanated towards the end of the nineteenth and the
management are
management, Taylor whose main objective was to optimize production by increasing the
and increasing the wage of workers. Taylor proposed using the empirical methods to
create harmony between tasks and train workers to do tasks in a certain way.
Taylor’s thinking was that the only method of increasing the efficiency of doing a work
can only be found out by an empirical study of the processes involved in doing the work.
This process will involve replacing the already known ways of performing a task with
of each of many alterations of how to implement a certain task, the best way of doing
the task will be selected based on the time and how it works in harmony with other tasks
to increase production. This method is then taken as the standard way of performing
this task and will continue to be used until a better way replaces it.
The main concept of scientific management was the task allocation and has probably
been the most criticized concept of the scientific management theory. This is the idea of
splitting tasks into smaller tasks to be able to find an optimized way of performing a
task. And this would also include ordering the process of performing the tasks. This can
be seen in the support department of the MGIC, the call center agents have specific
tasks to do and have an order in which they do the task. Task are shared in this
department with precision, the agents are told what to do starting from their first
Taylor's scientific management theory inspired a lot of other preceding theorists, like
Frank and Lillian Gilbreth, and, later, Henry Gantt, who also preferred scientific methods
to arrive at the best process of performing a task. (Nelson, 1992) Taylor’s work was
initially appreciated by theorists, economists and politicians in the USA and Great
Britain. Like all theories, Taylor’s scientific management theory has its critics. After a
couple of decades from its inception, the theory was out of favour.
John Maurice Clark notes that science is constantly multiplying the rate of
standardization and scientific management tries to replace the tricky expertise of the
Frederick W. Taylor has made a unique place for himself in history as one who
bridged the gap between science and industry, between theory and practice. The
world owes him at least undying fame for his accomplishment in replacing
guesswork by science and thereby adding immensely to the wealth and welfare
of all mankind. Someday even labor may canonize him as a patron saint. (Fisher
1925, p.61)
One of the recurrent critics of Taylor’s scientific management theory is its observed non-
which will remove the ability of the worker to rationalize to increase the efficiency of
production. The thinking and planning is done by engineers and management leaving
certain duration. In the theory, job satisfaction of the worker was neglected based on the
assumptions that the increased payment will be enough motivation for the worker.
Although, structured work procedures have been perceived to enhance quality, facilitate
Ralston (2014) argued against scientific management theory saying that based on the
fact that empirical process will determine the best possible way of performing a task in
view of getting optimum efficiency. They argue that adopting this practice neglects the
skills of the workers while projecting standardised methods and this will prevent the
worker from appreciating their day to day functions in the organization. And this also,
prevents the worker from utilizing their thinking faculty and may be finding an easier and
As the front-runners of the scientific management were working on finding out how best
running an organization and this school of thought can also be referred to as the
father of administrative management theory was a French industrialist and the chief
architect of his organization. Chester Barnard and Colnel Lyndrall Urwick who was a
management expert from Britain are other well-known advocates of the theory.
Fayol in his book ‘Industrial and General Management’ stated that the tasks of an
organization can be divided into six groups which are technical, commercial, financial,
tasks, he proposed that the main tasks of a manager includes planning, organizing,
commanding, coordinating and controlling. Fayol stated that the management technique
scalar chain, order, equity stability of tenure of personnel, initiative including common
bonds as the overall protocol for management practice. He also emphasized on logic,
rationality and consistency. And as it can be seen, while Taylor worked from low to
upper levels of the organization, Fayol was doing the opposite with the ideology of
centering management.
Chester I Barnard who was President of New Jersey Bell Telephone and other
prominent positions in public service has a tremendous impact on the theory and
practice of management for about fifty years following his concept revealed in his writing
‘the functions of the executive”. According to him, one of the crucial responsibilities of
the manager is to advocate for collaborative action aimed at achieving the mission of
the organization. Harmonizing benefits received by the employee and their input and
Colonel L Urwick a renowned U.K. based executive and management consultant in his
book ‘the elements of administration’ tried to bring together the ideologies and
propositions of the early management theorists which included Taylor, Fayol, Mooney,
Railey amongst others. A new school of thought known as the management process
school which was inspired by Fayol, Harold Koontz and Cyril O’Donnell postulated the
are assumed to be applied generally and globally, meaning that managers carry out
similar tasks regardless of the hierarchy and culture hence affirming universal approach
Bureaucracy theory
Over the years, businesses expand and become more complicated with many levels of
middle and lower management for coordinating effort of the employees leading to the
German socialist and scientist Max Weber is a theory of management that constitute of
the classical thought of management and adapted with Taylor’s theory of scientific
management and Fayol’s theory of administration. Max Weber proposed a set of rules
to present a basis for harmonizing the efforts of the groups. The circumstances around
the workplace has molded these three theories in the same term that made them the
Weber (1978, p.973) argues that “Bureaucracy develops the more perfectly the more it
love, hatred, and all purely personal, irrational and emotional elements which escape
notable by eight rules having written work, rules, authority and reward as the most
important ones. A good number of these rules are still being practiced in big present-
day organizations globally (Grey, 2005; Horner, 1997). In MGIC Nigeria, this can be
seen to be the case in some departments like the support department of the
organization, the call center agents have a mode of doing things and have a specific
response to a particular type of issue. The also follow a strict reporting line and abide by
the reporting line while escalating the issues even when they might know the person or
the department to contact directly to sort out whatever the case might be. Nonetheless,
there are critics of the theory on the basis of its inability to accommodate people in
argues that the specified fixed roles, the hierarchical structure and stringently abiding by
the same rules can result to a lot of angst. A call center agent might get agitated when
an issue is reported to the next line supervisor and it takes more time than required due
to all the protocols the issue will follow before getting solved. Schumpeter (1950) puts
forward that most innovative personnel can be made to be redundant and unused by
planning and specialization of work that is strictly controlled and governed. In the survey
that is been conducted by the MGIC, data collection in the field is monitored by the call
center agents, they interact with the people who are on the field and have good
recommendations for how to make their work better but due to the long reporting line
which they are obliged to abide by, some of this suggestions or recommendations might
get to the party that can take decision when something has already gone wrong and this
brings unfulfilling feelings to the agents. It also makes them feel as if their opinion is not
required.
Academics suggests that the awareness of the surrounding of the organization help to
for see innovative ideas and also aid in the ease of communication between the clients
and customers (Saxenian, 1996; Gompers, Lerner, and Scharfstein, 2005). But in
within the organization than outside and this results to lack of knowledge of the
innovative ecosystem due to lack of link between the implementers of the actions and
Leadership
goal and work together to get the objective of the group completed. There are many
theories about leadership. Some of these theories are going to be critically evaluated
below.
Trait approach
Trait leadership approach according to (Scouller 2011) tries to determine the personality
change makes for leadership qualities and this includes achievements, intelligence,
demography, self-confidence, economic background, physical appearance, personality,
demography amongst others. Stephenson (2004) stated that academics over the years
have always argued the fact “leaders are born or made”. Different studies have shown
that prosperous leaders have distinct traits and are not the same with the other
individuals. This theory argues that people follow a leader based on some traits that the
leader possess. This theory focuses mostly on the personality of the leader and not the
task that the leader is going to perform. Some of the traits mentioned in this theory are
23).
Trait leadership approach like most theories has some critics. One of the arguments
against it is that it is more focused on the personality of the individual and not how
efficient the person is or the ability to get the job done. Alan Bryman (2013) has argued
that, trait leadership has low clarifying personal traits and low prediction power over
Moreover, the predictable nature of leader’s behaviour is less effective and their traits
do not necessarily effective and consistent in all situations and cases (McCleskey &
Allen, 2014)
Jenkins identified emergent traits which are mainly the traits that are inherited and self-
confidence and effectiveness traits which can be learnt and also be acquired by
experience as the two main traits of leadership (Ekvall & Arvonen, 1991). This proposes
that even though there are traits of leadership that can be learnt, the leader still has to
possessed by a leader even though a great amount of studies has been conducted in
this regard (Northouse, 2013). Cole and Kelly (2016) argued against this theory for it not
been able to pinpoint the traits distinguishing leaders from the followers.
Behavioural approach
Derue et al., (2011) said that the arguments against the trait leadership approach led to
born out of shift in ideology from the trait leadership approach. This is a shift in what
people look at when they see a leader. It started looking at the main behaviour and
actions of a leader rather than that the personal qualities possessed by the leader. The
behaviour of the leader towards the people who is leading is a very important aspect of
this approach and the approach is mainly about the interaction between leaders and the
followers. Good attitude from leaders are seen to affect the confidence of the followers
and otherwise will make them not to be fit as leaders. It can be argued that the
behavioural approach did not factor in some variables like different scenarios owing that
Time is another factor that is argued to not be considered by this approach, a behaviour
at a point in time used to tackle a situation might in later or earlier time not be suitable
Contingency approach
This theory is based on contingency model created by Fred Fielder created fielder in
1960s by examining the nature and characteristics of the leader. The model suggests
that the effectiveness of a leader is based on the leadership approach chosen and the
circumstances (Fielder, 1967). It focuses on the leader’s ability to direct, the work to be
done, the control the leader has over his followers and the nature of the leader. This
theory lists task and relationship motivated styles of leadership. This model proposes
that the effectiveness of the leader is based on the leader knowledge to identify the
style of leadership based on the current task that he wants to take and also his ability to
direct his followers to get the task completed. In MGIC, we work mostly with government
MGIC and there is no one method of working with them, so while working on some
projects, the person of contact will have to change a leadership style based on the
followers assigned to the person by ministry, while a couple of them might need a
motivational approach to get the job done, others will need a reward system to be able
to perform tasks given to them owing to the fact that the person of contact is directly not
The contingency theory argues that there is no single leadership style that will fit for all
situations. Most times, change in the organization is not only the when the leadership
changes the mode and the state of operations, the workers also change in attitude and
behavioural theory that argues that there is no single mode of leading and also stating
the leadership styles vary depending on the situation at hand. The concept of situation
is very critical to this theory with three factors: leader-member relations, task structure
and the position power. The acceptability of the situations in an organization is based on
and their followers and propounds that the followers has a critical responsibility in
explaining the association. The theory propounds that the choice of the leadership
qualities are fixed, scholars have criticized this theory of lack of flexibility.
Transformational approach
modification in people and the civil community. Optimally, this transformation in the
subordinates in a lot of ways. One way of doing this is linking the personality of the
Burns proposed the ideas of transforming and transactional leadership and from his
point of view, transforming approach brings about a huge transformation in the life of
individuals and systems. It changes how employees see things, the order of importance
they place things, what they expect and aspire. According to Burns (1978) the
leader motivates the employees by using a method that the employee will get
Contrarily, the transformational leaders are involved with the followers which
encourages them to put in their optimal commitment and loyalty to fulfill the mission of
the organization. The transformational leaders are more inclined to the advancing
individual qualities of each follower and not focusing so much on the organizational
framework. Transformational leaders support their followers to be more innovative
(Robbins and Coulter, 2007). This can be seen in the IT department MGIC. The leaders
in the department tries to make the followers more innovative and to be able to think for
themselves. This might be due to the nature of their work which is highly collaborative.
The leaders at higher levels in MGIC try to work with this theory, due to the amount of
responsibilities they are faced with, they are currently motivating people in their teams
to work hard and this help influence the followers to want to achieve the aim of the
The transformational leaders raise the motivation and morality of both the follower and
the leader (House & Shamir, 1993). Transformational leaders are said to interact with
the followers bearing in mind the objectives and goals that share. Bass argues that a
transformational leader tries to get the followers to change their priority by exceeding
personal interests to greater needs which is in alignment with the Maslow (1954) higher
In this approach, the followers and leaders set aside their self-interests for the that of
the group. And in this case the leader it tasked with focusing on the interests of the
followers and contributions with the aim of transforming them to leaders by inspiring
them (House & Aditya, 1997). The leader at this point can be said to be motivating the
followers to focus on achieving the aims of the group while the leader tries to find out
the needs of the individual follower and tries to find a way for them to meet these needs
by motivation and also trying to make them leaders to help motivate others around.
The transformational leaders are though of by their ability to find out the need for a
transformation, get others to buy in to the idea of the change, develop a perception that
controls the transformation and implement the transformation (MacGregor Bums, 2003).
A leader in this case will treat each follower independently and strive to establish their
awareness, integrity and expertise by making their work challenging and important. This
leader produces a vision with followers passionate to achieve it. The can be seen as
visionary leaders that create an improved environment of the followers and tries to
transcend them to focus more on the goals of the group (MacGregor Bums, 2003). The
Director of Health programs in MGIC Nigeria, tries to implement this principle in her
actions, owing to the fact that there are different ways of motivating different people, she
tries to motivate each individual at a time rather than trying influence a group at a time.
This has helped her shape her directorate and get people passionate to perform any
Transactional approach
Transactional leadership happens when a leader trades a valuable thing with a follower
and these exchanges are based on the leader specifying things that the actions the
follower will take in order to get the reward. The goal is to enter a contract to get
something done rather that create a relationship between the leader and the follower,
and even though the follower got the job done, it cannot be said that based on that the
follower now understands that vision of the leader and now wants to work towards it.
transformational leadership tries to put the leader and follower in the position of a
mutual relationship that they motivate each other. Working with government agencies
has led to MGIC applying this approach of leadership. While working with other
agencies and having their staff assigned to a leader in MGIC to manage, it becomes a
bit tricky to get them to perform some operations. So, most times, the leader in this case
will have to come up with some reward system that will get them into some sort of
contract that they only get the reward upon completing the specified action. This has
immensely been helpful in the organization especially working with staff of other
between the leader and their subordinate is based on a set of arrangements between
them (House & Shamir, 1993). This approach is based on the reciprocity where the
leader and the follower are under the influence of each other.
(Bass, 1985; Bass & Avolio, 1994) argues that for a transformational leader to be
effective, they may have to show some form of transactional leadership behaviours and
Conclusion
Critically evaluating the theories of management and leadership theories from various
approaches shows that the culture of the organization plays an important role in the
organization succeeding in a theory and culture as we know has a lot to do with time.
Owing to this, some theories are known to have helped some organizations grow but if
the same theory is applied recently, it tends to bring about a huge failure. The theorists
in the early twentieth century implemented a lot of scientific management theories not
paying so much attention to human needs and focusing more on increased productivity
and more profit. With time, nature of organizations changed, organizations become
bigger and more people are needed to help supervise and direct the actions of the
organizations. This resulted in change of the structure of organizations and a need for
Another thing to point out about this evaluation is that most organizations combine a
couple of theories to get the job done. Depending on the type of task been performed,
the amount or the complexity of the skill needed to perform the task, the level of the
show that there is not management and leadership theory that is all encompassing. For
jobs that requires high level of thinking and complex skills to complete, one can clearly
see that classical management theory will not be a good choice in this type scenario
while classical management theory can be applied in tasks that very simple and straight
forward.
the top to bottom management style, whereas employees started to follow charismatic
leaders who are respectful, trustful, knowledgeable, and influential rather than traditional
managers who tend to apply a dull roles and policies apart from employees’ needs.
Those new leaders induced researchers to study their characteristics which result in two
leader encourages followers to participate their thoughts and ideas, and works hand in
hand with the followers in order to motivate them and unify their objectives with the
organization’s goal. Transformational leader are model for their followers in which they
respectfully follow his orders to fulfil an extraordinary objectives. However, the followers’
trustful and loyalty to the leaders can be immorally abused to achieve unethical
personal ends.
internal and external environment that effectively control the organizational structure,
organization. The organizational and individual culture vary according to time and
organization one day, they essentially considered a major reason of collapsing different
Finally, increased in the knowledge of the employees has hindered the top to bottom
management style. Employees tend to work well with charismatic leaders who respect,
trust and influence them rather than the usual managers that always want to implement
protocols that are not in line with the needs of the employees. Transformational leaders
are more of mentors to their followers and this helps to make them respect and follow
him, his orders and directives to achieve exceptional objectives. But there is a change
that offensive act towards the someone who is following a leader trustfully and loyally
surrounding the organization internally and externally which absolutely controls the
organization and the personality of its individuals. Organizational culture can be said to
change with time and place, so a theory that led to a great success in an organization in
a particular place and time can lead to a major disaster in another organization in a
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