EMERGENT LEADERSHIP IN SMALL, DECISION-MAKING GROUPS1
WALTER H. CROCKETT
Kansas State College
T is a common observation in the analysis
I of organized groups that the designated
leaders of a group are not always the real
leaders, or, to use Whyte's term (10), the
"operational leaders." Frequently other indi-
viduals than those "officially" named as group
leaders serve in the leadership capacity. Such
individuals may be termed emergent leaders.
This paper analyzes conditions associated
with the presence of emergent leaders in on-
going groups, and with their acceptance by
other group members.
In our society small groups which persist
over a period of time exist within a larger
social organization. They exist for some pur-
pose, e.g., to facilitate the attainment of goals
which are more easily achieved by joint deci-
sion of the members than by independent
action. From the interaction among group
members a differentiation of roles develops.
Individual members, because of special abil-
ities, training, or interest, perform limited
functions instead of sharing equally in the
variety of actions occurring within the group.
The particular roles which develop in a given
group will probably depend, among other
things, upon the goals of that group, the cul-
tural practices current in the segment of so-
ciety from which the members are drawn, and
the manner in which the group's activities fit
in with the goals of the larger social organiza-
tion.
Leaders in such organized, differentiated
groups have special functions, namely those
concerned with eliciting participation from
group members, integrating this participation
into a coherent pattern, and keeping the ac-
tivity directed toward solutions to the group's
problems.
In decision-making conferences, the group's
1
This study is part of a larger series of investigations added to the leader's job. Such mediation may
undertaken by the Conference Research project at the interfere with performance of the other leader-
University of Michigan, under the direction of Professor
D. G. Marquis, and sponsored by the office of Naval ship activities. In extreme cases, cliques, with
Research. Thanks are due to the project staff, and in more or less clearly defined leaders, may
particular to Drs. H. Guetzkow and R. W. Heyns, as develop.
well as to Drs. L. Berkowitz, B. White, and Mr. J.
O'Brien, who have been especially helpful throughout
the study.
378
goal is most frequently the solution by discus-
sion of problems faced in the operation of
larger organizations. Ultimate goals must be
decided upon, information must be communi-
cated to all members of the group, disagree-
ments must be ironed out, and a decision satis-
factory to the majority of the members must
be achieved. In such groups, the kinds of be-
haviors required of leaders in maintaining a
problem-centered orientation in the group
should center around areas such as setting
goals, proposing problems, seeking informa-
tion and elaboration from others, summarizing,
and proposing solutions. While the leader may
also spend considerable time in presenting
information or in elaborating on a point made
by someone else, such activity is less central
to his performance as a leader (5).
We shall assume that performance of the
leader's functions is essential to the progress
of the group. That is, if a leader fails to per-
form these leadership functions, and if the
group is to progress toward its goals, then
some other member or members must take
over performance of the functions. Such are
the individuals already termed "emergent
leaders." We propose the following hypotheses
about conditions in which emergent leaders
will be found in ongoing groups:
1. Emergent leaders will occur more often
in groups where the official leader does not
perform the leadership functions. This hy-
pothesis rests on the assumption that perfor-
mance of such functions will be centered in one
or a few group members, rather than being
spread widely through the group.
2. Emergent leaders will be found more
often hi groups where divergent interests are
present. If two or more points of view are
represented in the group, then the task of
mediating between the different viewpoints is
3. Emergent leaders will have a relatively
high position in the larger organization, and a
 EMERGENT LEADERSHIP IN SMALL, DECISION-MAKING GROUPS
relatively large amount of experience with
problems facing the group. Other things equal,
position and experience should serve to
"legitimize" leadership activity by the indi-
vidual and to make him more acceptable as
leader to the other members.
4. Emergent leaders (a) will express a rela-
tively high degree of self-oriented needs in their
behavior, and (b) will occupy positions in the
larger organization that are relatively greatly
affected by the decisions reached in the con-
ference. This hypothesis is based on the as-
sumption that the emergent leader must be
motivated to perform the leadership functions.
Following Lewis (7), we expect such motiva-
tion to reflect, broadly, ego-involvement in the
discussion, exemplified by a preponderance of
self-oriented needs in the individual's behavior,
or task involvement, resulting from the indi-
vidual's expectation that he will be involved
in the ultimate execution of the decisions.
5. Emergent leaders will be more highly
valued by the group than other members. In
making this hypothesis we assume that be-
havior which facilitates problem solution will
be perceived as such by other members and
will be valued highly.
METHOD
Sample
During the years 1948 through 1950, a research team
from the ONR-sponsored Conference Research Project
of the University of Michigan observed conferences in
72 business, government, and industrial organizations.
Other reports of the project findings and of methodology
appear elsewhere (1, 4, 6, 8).
The conference groups studied met five require-
ments: (a) Meetings took place in conjunction with
administrative and operational processes. (6) Meetings
were decision-making in character, (c) the groups were
composed of not less than five and not more than seven-
teen members, (d) Participants had worked with each
of the other members in previous meetings, (e) No more
than two groups were observed in any one organization.
A great many observations were made during the
conferences. The present study uses only those measure-
ments specifically relevant to our hypotheses.
Leadership Functions
A set of problem-solving categories developed by
Heyns (5) was used in observing these conferences. One
observer coded each unit of behavior into one of the
following categories1.
Goal setting: establishing or suggesting goals or
objectives, both procedural and content; concerned
with ends to be attained.
Problem proposing: presenting a problem, either in
379
content or procedure; concerned with means to ends or
goals.
Information seeking: seeking to obtain information
of an objective, factual, or technical nature; the infor-
mation sought came from the area of fact on which the
group decision was to be based.
Information giving: providing objective, factual, or
technical information, either in the subject area or with
respect to procedure.
Solution proposing: indicating solutions to problems;
suggesting means to ends.
Development seeking: attempting to obtain clarifi-
cation of previous contributions, to determine what was
intended by a previous contribution, what its implica-
tions were, what inferences were permissible.
Development giving: elaborating, making explicit,
enlarging on previous contributions.
Opposing: opposition, resistance to, or disagreement
with a suggestion, solution, interpretation, etc.
Supporting: indicating agreement or approval of a
suggestion or solution proposal.
Summarizing: summarizing the group's progress to
date.
Non-problem directed: Irrelevancies of a tangential
sort, including statements which have no reference to
the subject matter of the conference nor to the group
procedure. (Behaviors in this category will not be dis-
cussed in the following material.)
Reliability statistics for these observations and
others used in this study are reported in other publica-
tions (4, 5, 6, 8). For all measures used in the present
study, reliability coefficients were over .70.
We have assumed above that leadership activity in
discussion groups centers around the categories of goal
setting, problem proposing, information seeking, solu-
tion proposing, development seeking, and summarizing.
We expect leaders to perform relatively less develop-
ment giving, information giving, opposing, and sup-
porting.
Support for this conception is provided by the fact
that designated leaders of groups in the present study
performed a higher proportion of the acts in the first
set of categories than in the second set. Over all the
conferences, designated leaders performed 62% of the
summarizing, 50% of the goal setting, 47% of the de-
velopment seeking, 41% of the information seeking,
40% of the solution proposing, and 37% of the problem
proposing. They performed only 31% of the supporting,
26% of the development giving, 26% of the opposing,
and 24% of the information giving.
Identifying Emergent Leaders
A leader was defined as "a group member who di-
rects the group's behavior. He generally sets the
groups' goals, summarizes contributions of others, and
seeks out contributions by others."
On the postconference rating sheet, observers indi-
cated which of the group members was the designated
leader of the group. Following this, they were asked to
identify the "real" leaders of group, i.e., the individuals
who had performed according to the definition quoted
above. If he considered the designated leader to be a
real leader, the observer placed his name in both spaces.
In addition, any other member whose behavior, the
380 WALTER H. CROCKETT

observer believed, fell within the definition of leadership
was placed in the "real leader" category.
In 44 of the 72 conferences observers agreed that one
or more members in addition to the designated leader
had performed a leadership role. One emergent leader
was identified in 31 groups, two were identified in 12
conferences, and one conference was characterized by
three such leaders.
At the outset it was evident that emergent leaders
had a far higher participation rate than members in
general. Therefore, it was necessary to determine
whether their actions were characterized, in addition,
by high performance of the leadership functions.
Toward this end, the behavior of those identified as
emergent leaders was compared with that of others
who had high participation rates but were not classed
as emergent leaders.
If all members of a group participated equally in the
discussion, each member might be expected to contrib-
ute 1007^% of the participations. For example, in a
conference with 10 members, if all participated equally
each would contribute 10% of the remarks. It was arbi-
trarily decided to consider all persons who contributed
more than 150/.2V% of the remarks to be "high par-
ticipators" relative to other group members. In confer-
ences of 10 members, then, those who contributed 15%
or more of the total remarks were called "high partici-
pators."
Of the 57 emergent leaders, 33 were also high par-
ticipators, while 24 were not. Forty-seven individuals
met the criterion for high participators, but were not
identified by the observers as emergent leaders. Twenty-
four of these were in groups which included one or more
emergent leaders.
The comparison between emergent leaders and high
participators was made by calculating, for each confer-
TABLE 1
PROPORTION OF EMERGENT LEADERS AND HIGH
PARTICIPATORS WHO CONTRIBUTED MORE THAN
THE MEDIAN PROPORTION OP THE PROBLEM-
SOLVING CATEGORIES t
ence group in which individuals of either type were
present, the proportion of total behaviors in each cate-
gory that were contributed by emergent leaders or by
high participators who were not emergent leaders. For
each problem-solving category the distribution of these
proportions was dichotomized at the median and a
contingency table formed comparing emergent leaders
and high participators with regard to the proportion of
acts performed within that category.
Table 1 indicates that emergent leaders performed
significantly more acts than other high participators in
the categories of problem proposing and information
seeking, and significantly less development giving.
Other differences, though not statistically significant,
are in the direction predicted.
Divergence of Opinion
Divergence of opinion in the conferences was ascer-
tained in two ways. The first was a rating by observers
of the congruence of motivation in the group. Congru-
ence of motivation was defined as "the extent to which
the members had the same goals and means for reaching
the goals with respect to the groups' problems." Cues
utilized by observers included statements during the
discussion that there was agreement or disagreement,
presence or absence of opposing remarks in the confer-
ence, and presence or absence of ego-oriented behavior.
Each of the four observers rated the group on this di-
mension immediately after the conference. Observers'
ratings were pooled, and the mean rating was used as
the group's position on the dimension.
Secondly, the observers rated each group as to the
presence or absence of cliques. Cliques were defined as
"subgroups of persons who somewhat consistently sup-
port each other and commonly oppose outsiders in
conflicts running across problems areas." Cues for
identifying cliques included the behavioral cues of sup-
port for each other and opposition to outsiders implied
in the definition, and remarks during the meeting that
certain of the group members stick together. Thirty-one
of the conferences had one or more cliques, while 41 had
none.

Categories Emergent High Par- Position in the Organization, and Expertness

Leaders, % ticipators, %
(N = 57) (N = 47) with Problems
Before the meeting the designated leader of the
Goal setting 56 43 conference ranked all participants as to their position
Problem proposing** 60 32 in the larger organization, and their expertness with
Information seeking* 56 38 regard to the problems to be discussed.
Information giving 43 53
Solution proposing 56 43 Motivation to Perform the Leader's Role
Development seeking 46 53
Development giving* 42 61 To measure ego involvement, one observer coded
Opposing 53 47 each unit of behavior during the conference as to
Supporting 51 49 whether it represented the expression of self-oriented
Summarizing 30 21 needs on the part of the member (4). Group members
were ranked at the end of the meeting with regard to
* = Difference significant at .OS level of confidence. the amount of self-oriented motivation reflected in
•* = Difference significant at .01 level of confidence.
t The chi-square test of significance was used in all compari-
their behavior.
sons. However, since the total number of subjects in the two Involvement in the task was measured by asking
groups differed, data are presented in terms of proportions, members of the group to indicate in a postconference
rather than as actual frequencies, in the interests of reading rating scale the extent of their stake in the outcome of
comprehension. the meeting.
 EMERGENT LEADERSHIP IN SMALL, DECISION-MAKING GROUPS 381

Acceptance by Other Group Members TABLE 3

Acceptance by others was ascertained by a modified RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN DEVELOPMENT OF EMERGENT
sociometric technique in which each member ranked all LEADERS AND CONGRUENCE OF MOTIVATION
others in terms of their "neededness" in the conference. IN THE CONFERENCE GROUPS
An individual's score on this variable was obtained by
summing and averaging ratings given him by other Congruence of Motivation
members, Group
Above Below
median median Total
RESULTS
Conditions Under Which Emergent Leaders With emergent leader 17 27 44
Were Present Without emergent leader 19 9 28
Total 36 36 72
Failure of designated leader to perform leader-
ship functions. Five of the problem-solving Chi square = 5.80; t < .03.
categories were combined to indicate per-
TABLE 4
formance by the designated leader of leader-
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN DEVELOPMENT OF EMERGENT
ship functions: goal setting, solution proposing, LEADERS AND PRESENCE OF CLIQUES IN THE
problem proposing, information seeking, and CONFERENCE GROUPS
development seeking. The category "sum-
marizing" was eliminated because very few Conference Contains
participations were so coded. Since no hy- Uroup
pothesis was advanced as to which functions No 1 or more
cliques cliques Total
were more essential to the leadership role,
they were weighted equally. With emergent leader 21 23 44
For each conference group the percentage Without emergent leader 20 8 28
of the total behavior in each category that the Total 41 31 72
designated leader performed was ascertained. Chi square - 3.92; f < .05.
These percentages were summed and divided
by five. Thus, the final figure represented the designated leader performed relatively few
average proportion of behaviors in the five acts in these problem-solving categories
categories that the designated leader per- (Table 2).
formed. Groups were ranked according to the Divergence of interest among group members.
degree of performance of these behaviors by Groups were ranked according to the observers'
the designated leader, and were divided at the ratings on congruence of motivation, and split
median. Emergent leaders were identified sig- at the median. Those conferences with ratings
nificantly more often in conferences where the above the median were termed "high" on con-
gruence of motivation, those below, "low."
TABLE 2 Table 3 indicates that groups with one or
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN DEVELOPMENT or EMERGENT more emergent leaders were more often below
LEADERS AND PERFORMANCE BY DESIGNATED LEADER
or FUNCTIONS OF GOAL SETTING, INFORMATION the median in congruence of motivation than
SEEKING, DEVELOPMENT SEEKING, SOLUTION were those without emergent leaders.
PROPOSING, AND PROBLEM PROPOSING Conferences were also divided into two
groups on the basis of whether or not cliques
Designated Leader Perform- were present. Table 4 shows that emergent
ance of Leadership
Function leaders were more likely to develop in groups
Group where cliques were present than in those which
High Low did not have cliques.
perform- perform- Total Note that in the 36 groups where congruence
ance ance
of motivation was high (Table 3) and the 41
With emergent leaders 14 30 44 groups in which there were no cliques (Table
Without emergent lead- 22 6 28 4), emergent leaders were identified approxi-
ers mately half the tune. The statistical signifi-
Total 36 36 72 cance in the tables is provided by the marked
Chi square = 14.96; p < .01. tendency for emergent leadership to be asso-
382 WALTER H. CROCKETT
dated with low congruence of motivation and
the presence of one or more cliques.
Organizational Characteristics of Emergent
Leaders
Rank in the organization. It was possible to
determine from the leader's ratings the rank
of members in the larger organization, and
then to ascertain whether the emergent leader's
rank was above or below the median for his
conference. The probability that any one con-
ference member would have a rank above the
median may be considered to be .50 and the
sign test (3) may be used to determine the
probability that emergent leaders by chance
alone would be so consistently above or below
the median. Thirty-six emergent leaders were
above the median rank of their conference,
while 18 were below.2 The probability that
this distribution would be found by chance
alone is less than .03.8
Expertness. A similar analysis was made of
the relative expertness of emergent leaders.
Thirty-two emergent leaders were ranked
above the median of their group on this vari-
able while 17 were ranked below the median.
This deviation from theoretical chance (.50)
is statistically significant (p = .05).
Motivation of Emergent Leaders
Self-oriented needs. Observers rated 44 emer-
gent leaders above the median of their group
on self-oriented needs, while 12 ranked below
the median. Continuing the same kind of sta-
tistical analysis, this difference is highly sig-
nificant (p < .01).
Stake in outcome of the meeting. Thirty-six
emergent leaders' judgments of their stake in
the outcome of the meeting exceeded the
median estimate of their own group, while 17
were below the median. This difference is also
significant (p = .03)
Reception of Emergent Leaders by Other Con-
ference Members
Two tests were made of the hypothesis that
others would rate emergent leaders as "needed"
2
In the following comparison, the total N's vary
because of the failure of some respondents to complete
all items of the questionnaires.
8
Since the direction of the difference was predicted,
a one-tailed test of significance was used in estimating
the probabilities.
in the group. The first involved the designated
leader's ranking of emergent leaders compared
with his rankings of others in the group. Forty-
four of the emergent leaders were ranked by
the designated leader of their conference as
more needed in the group than the majority
of the other group members, while only nine
were ranked as less needed. This difference is
significant at the .01 level of confidence.
Secondly, in each conference the neededness
ratings for each member were summed and
averaged. In 52 cases the emergent leaders
were ranked as more needed than the average
of other group members, while six were ranked
as less needed than the average. This difference
is significant (p < .01).
DISCUSSION
As we have indicated above, failure of the
designated leader of a group to perform the
functions central to the leader's role was asso-
ciated, in this sample, with the presence of
emergent leaders in that group. This "gap
filling" by particular members is hi disagree-
ment with one of Heyns's findings (5). When
the designated leader in the Heyns experiment
failed to perform the leadership functions,
these functions were distributed among a num-
ber of group members rather than being cen-
tralized in one or a few. It is likely that the
discrepancy between our results and Heyns's
resulted from differences in the backgrounds
of the groups studied. In the Heyns experi-
ment the groups, drawn from college classes,
met only once. The groups in our study had
met together for months or years before the
field observations were made. Their activities
were embedded in the role relationships of a
larger social organization. It is likely that a
greater role differentiation had developed hi
the field groups and, when the designated
leader failed to perform the leadership func-
tions, a clearer delineation of emergent leaders
had appeared.
SUMMARY
Analysis was made of emergent leaders in
decision-making conferences in 72 business
and government organizations. The results
were:
1. Emergent leaders were present in con-
ferences where the designated chairmen per-
formed relatively few acts in the areas of goal
 EMERGENT LEADERSHIP IN SMALL, DECISION-MAKING GROUPS
setting, information seeking, development
seeking, solution proposing, and problem
proposing.
2. Emergent leaders were present in con-
ferences where there were cliques, and where
there was low congruence of motivation.
3. Emergent leaders had relatively high
rank and expertness in the larger organization,
compared with others in the same group.
4. Emergent leaders had high personal mo-
tivation, as measured by stake in the outcome
of the meeting and the expression of self-
oriented needs in behavior.
5. Emergent leaders were rated high by
other members with regard to being needed
in the group.
These results fit into a general theory of
leadership in small groups, which holds that
(a) there are certain functions hi groups which
contribute to progress toward a collective goal,
and which tend to be performed by one or a
few individuals. These may be labeled "leader-
ship functions." To the extent that the official
leader of a group fails to perform these leader-
ship functions, one or a few other members will
perform them in his stead, (b) Since small
groups exist in the context of larger organiza-
tions, other things equal, there is a tendency
for those of higher status in relevant larger
organizations to perform these functions, (c)
Other things equal, those members who are
most strongly motivated to perform the leader-
ship functions will be those who take over the
leader's role, (d) Those members who perform
383
the leadership functions, and thus aid in prog-
ress toward achievement of the group's goals,
will be more highly valued than other members
of the group.
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