Contingency Leadership

Theories
Prepared by:
Group 4
Chong Kee Kee MLA 201005
Tien Rui Wen MHP 211011
Revathi A/P Rajendran MPP 201122
Laminu Aminu Song PCS 213049
Pang Kai Xuan MPP 201091

Lecturer: Dr. Jamilah Ahmad

 Introduction
What is contingency?

 Contingency

- A future event or circumstance that is

possible but cannot be predicted
with certainty.
 Introduction
Contingency theories

Situational
Fiedler’s Contingency Leadership Model – The Leadership
Model Hershey & Blanchard Continuum Model –
Tannenbaum & Schmidt

The Normative
Path-Goal Leadership Decision Model –
Model - House Vroom, Yetton, Jago
What is Fiedler’s Contingency Model?

Leadership styles Situation

variables

• Developed by Fred Fiedler in

1960s.
Relationship
between styles • Was designed to enable leaders to
and situation diagnose both leadership style
and organizational situations.

• Leadership styles are fixed.

 Fiedler’s Contingency Model
There are 2 factors:

Leadership style Situational

• Task-oriented
favourableness
Leadership style • Leader-member relations
• Relationship-oriented
• Task structure
• Leader’s position power
 Fiedler’s Contingency Model
You determine your style of leadership!
Least Preferred Co-Worker Scale (LPC)

Task-oriented Relationship-
leader oriented leader
 Fiedler’s Contingency Model
You determine your style of leadership!

Scoring:
57 or less = Low LPC (Task-motivated)

58-63 = Middle LPC (Socio-independent leaders, task or with how others

view them)

64 or above = High LPC (Relationships-motivated)

 Fiedler’s Contingency Model
Task-Oriented Leader
VS
• Focuses on getting the job done
• Defines the work and roles for each
team member, puts structures in place,
plans, organizes, and monitors
• Doesn’t really care relationship
building and goal emphasis
• Performance results
Relationship-Oriented Leader
• Focuses on building lasting
relationships with subordinates
• Concentrate on motivating,
supporting, and developing their
subordinates
• Promote collaboration and teamwork
• Welfare of subordinates is the top
priority
 Fiedler’s Contingency Model
Situational Favourableness

Leader-Member Task structure Leader’s position

Relations power

• Measures how much • Measures the task’s • Determined by the

your team trusts you performance level of authority
you display to
reward or punish
subordinates
Fiedler’s Contingency Model
Strengths

Provides a simple rule of The model is valuable in

thumb for identifying its predictive power and
which leaders are best usefulness in human
for which situations. resource planning

It takes the situation into Abundance of the

account in determining supporting empirical
the effectiveness of a research and case
leader studies
 Fiedler’s Contingency Model
Criticisms

LPC scores can fail to

Assessment of the
Lack of flexibility reflect the personality
situation is subjective
traits

Fails to give a convincing Doesn’t consider the

explanation on why
percentage of in-
leaders with certain
leadership styles match
between situations and
some situations unfavorable situations
 Application of
Fiedler’s Contingency Model

1. 2.
Can be applied in Helpful for personal
various teamwork development
contexts
 The Leadership
Continuum Model
1. Developed by Tannenbaun & Schmidt in 1958 and updated in year 1973.

2. The continuum presents a range of action related to the degree of authority used
by the manager and to the area of freedom available to non-managers in
decision making

3. The continuum between Boss-centered and subordinate centered situation

 Four main styles of leadership

Tells Consults

Sells Joins
 Factors in choosing leadership styles

Forces in Forces in Forces in Time pressure

Manager Subordinates situation

Belief in team Subordinates who Need for

Team has requisite immediate
member are independent,
knowledge, hold org.
participation and tolerant of ambiguity,
values & traditions,
decision under
confidence in competent, identify pressure mitigates
team works
capabilities of with organizational against
effectively
members goals participation
 Pro & Cons of the continuum model

Advantages
● Focus on decision making
criteria
● Value employee
development &
empowerment
● Present criteria for
involvement & delegation
Limitations
● Hard to determine the
effectiveness of outcome
● Subjective, no absolute
leadership styles
 Situational
Leadership (SL)
 Situational Leadership

 Situational Leadership could be understood as an adaptive leadership style.

 It could also be understood as the adjustment of a Leadership style to specific situations to
reflect employee needs.
 Proponents of SL

L-R: Daniel Goleman, Kennedy H. Blanchard & Paul Hersey

 Proponents of SL cont
The model for SL was created by Ken Blanchard and Paul Hersey in the late 1960’s, it
offers a leader some opportunities like:

 To analyse the needs of the situation you are dealing with.

 Then adopt the most appropriate leadership style.

Situational Leadership Model
 Leadership Model Cont…
• Task/Directive Behavior – the extent to which the leader tells the follower what to
do, how to do it, where it needs to be done and when it needs to be completed.
• Relationship/Supportive Behavior – the extent to which the leader engages in open dialog
with the follower, actively listens and provides recognition/reinforcement for task-related
progress.
 Four Styles of Leadership
Blanchard and Hersey came up styles as follows:

D1: Low Competence - Low Commitment

 S1 = Telling, Ddirecting or Guiding

D2: Low Competence – High Commitment

 S2 = Selling, coaching or explaining

D3: High Competence - Low Commitment

 S3 = Participating, facilitating or collaborating

D4: High Competence - High Commitment

 S4 = Delegating, empowering or monitoring
SL
 Path-Goal Theory

Involves leader Increase follower

Suggested that a
employing particular satisfaction and
leader should help
behaviors in specific motivate efforts
make clear the path 
situations
 Types of Leadership Behaviors
Directive leadership

• Leader who gives followers instructions about tasks

• What is expected + how to be done + deadline

• Clear standards of performance

• Makes rules and regulations clear​

 Supportive leadership

● Friendly and approachable leaders​

● Attending to well-being and human needs of followers​

● Make work pleasant for followers​

● Treat followers as equals & give respect ​

Participative leadership

● Invite followers to share in the decision

making

● Consult with followers

● Obtain their ideas and opinions

● Integrate their suggestions
 Achievement-oriented
leadership​
 Leaders who challenge followers to perform
at highest level

 Establish high standard of excellence and

seek continuous improvement​

 Show confidence that followers are capable

to accomplish goals​
 Types of Leadership Behaviors

Achievement-
Directive Supportive Participative
oriented
leadership​ leadership​ leadership
leadership​
​
 Strength

Provision of Useful Integration of

Theoretical Framework​ expextancy theory

● Effects of leadership behaviors ● Force audience to ask questions about

on followers' satisfaction and follower motivation​
work performance
● Address issues of motivation at the
● Inform leaders on ways to choose forefront of leaders' mind​
appropriate leadership style​
 Complexity
• Incorporate many different aspects of leadership,
confusing

• Broad scope of theory encompasses different interrelated

sets of assumptions​, difficult to be used ​
Limitations

One-way event
• Cause followers easily to become dependent upon leaders​

• Counterproductive because it fails to recognize full

abilities of followers​
 Question
Is Path-goal theory a good leadership
model to be used by university lecturers?
Why?
Contingency Leadership –
Prescriptive/Descriptive/
Normative
 TYPES OF LEADERSHIP MODEL
Prescriptive Leadership Descriptive Leadership
Style  Style 

● Guides the activities and ● placed higher value on the

behaviors of others toward
goals, opportunities, and
methods.
● Define the objective in progress
and whose main elements have
been developed before a strategy
commenced.
content of strategy formulation.
● accept that the decision making
environment can be
unpredictable so they prefer
spontaneous and not to stick
with a fixed and unchanging
plan.
 The normative Leadership Model 
● The Normative Decision Model

● Also deal with matching leader and situational requirements.

● Focus on decision-making styles – These styles are assumed to be

learnable

● Decisions adjustment depend on – quality requirement for the

decision –likelihood of employee acceptance.
 The Normative Decision styles

● Decide
- Leader make decision with little or no
subordinate input.

● Consult Individually
- Input from subordinates but leader make
- decision.

● Consult Group
- Consensus building
- Leader shares decision making with group
 The Normative Decision styles

● Facilitate
- Help define problems
- Leader seeking participation and concurrence
without pushing own ideas

● Delegate
- Leader gives total decision making authority to
employees.
 Conclusion

The challenge of leadership is to

Be strong, but not rude;
Be kind,but not weak;
Be bold, but not bully;
Be thoughtful, but not lazy
Be humble, but not timid;
Be proud, but not arrogant;
Have humor, but without folly.
Thank You!