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As a result various approaches or theories have been developed.
These are as follows:
1. Trail Approach
2. Likert's Approach
3. Managerial Grid Approach
4. Path Goal Approach
5. Contingency Approach
6. Continuum Approach
7. Eclectic Approach
1. Trait Approach
Between 1930 and 1950, the trait approach lo leadership study was popular. This theory determines the personal characteristics of successful leaders to predict leadership ability in others. This approach was based on the "great man" hypothesis, holding that leaders are born not made various research studies have given various trails for leadership. An analysis of all such researches has been presented by Stogdill. According to him trait theorists have suggested following characteristics of a good leader-
(a) Physical traits such as height, health, vigour, appearance etc.
(b) Intelligence and ability traits such as ability to comprehend, conceptualise, plan etc.
© Personality traits such as tolerance of ambiguity.
(d) Task related traits such as achievement, drive initiative, persistence etc.
(e) Social traits such as cooperativeness, administrative ability interpersonal skill etc.
This approach gives an indication that leader should have certain personal characteristics. This helps management to develop such qualities through training and development programmes. This theory is very simple and still continues to be used along with other theories. Bill, this theory is criticised on various grounds. The list of traits is not uniform. It is difficult to list all trails in even one effective leader. Further, it does not consider the whole environment of leadership of which trail may be one factor. Moreover, no generalisation can be drawn about various traits for leadership as there were considerable variations in traits established by various researches. It is also known what unique combination of traits makes a leader effective and in what proportion these trails should be possessed. Perhaps the underlying assumption to the trail theory has been that leaders are born, not made. Although research has proved that while this is not the case, many people still believe that there are certain inborn traits that make a person a good leader.
2. Likert's System 1-4 Approach
Rensis Likert and his associates have studied the patterns and style of managers for three decades and have developed a behavioural theory of leadership. Rensis Likert regards leadership as the central and most component of management. In his view, organisational effectiveness significantly depends on the manner in which managers provided leadership to their subordinate group. According to his view, the most effective way lo lead people is to involve them in decision making as a group build an effective communication system and create a supportive environment that provides employees oppori unities to seek the fulfilment of their personal and group needs and realise their sense of personal worth.
Likert classified leadership styles in four categories, or, what he calls four systems:
(i) System 1—Exploitative.
(ii) System 2—Benevolent authoritative.
(iii) System 3—Consultative.
(iv) System 4—Participative-group.
System 1—Exploitative authoritative leaders are highly production oriented, display no confidence in their subordinates, provides them no influence in decision making use fear, threat, punishment and occasional rewards to enforce compliance and engage mainly in downward communication.
System 2—Benevolent authoritative leadership style has condescending confidence and trust in subordinates, such as a master has in his servant, sometimes seeks and uses their ideas, use rewards and some punishment to get out performance, allows some delegation in decision making exercises close supervision, and permits some upward communication.
System 3-Consultative leaders display substantial confidence in their subordinates and consult them before making decisions but make decision themselves.
System 4—Participative-group leaders emphasise group decision-making, group goals and performance, seek and use ideas of their subordinates, create an environment of mutual support, trust and confidence and set high performance goals. Likert is a strong proponent of this kind of leadership. Il is based on four basic principles: (i) overlapping group form of structure with each work-group linked with the rest of the organisation, (ii) supportive relationship, (iii) group decision-making and group methods of supervision, and (iv) high performance goals. According to Likert, managers using System 4 achieve greater success in achieving high levels of performance and enhancing the morale and satisfaction of employees.
3. Managerial Grid Approach
This approach is considered to be the most widely known of all leadership theories. This approach was developed by Blake and Mouton. This approach focuses on various blends of leadership styles. The grid has been style as well as a device of managerial training. The two dimensions of the grid show, "concern for production" and "concern for people" indicating the extent of concern for production and/or people. Although 81 possible combinations of the leadership styles are possible with varying mixes of concern for production and people, Blake and Mouton emphasised five of them, four in the corners and one in the middle. These five styles are:
Style 1,1, Impoverished Management.
Style 1,9, Country Club Management.
Style 9,1, Production Oriented Management.
Style 9, 9, Team Management.
Style 5, 5, Mid of the Road Management.
Style 1,1, i.e., impoverished management shows very little concern for production and people. The leader lets things drift. He neither satisfies production requirements nor employee needs.
Style 1, 9, i.e., country club management aims at keeping the employees happy and shows little concern for production. Such a leader thinks that if he takes care of employees, production will lakes care of itself. Unfortunately, happy workers are not necessarily highly productive.
Style 9,1, i.e., production oriented management shows maximum concern for production and minimum concern for people. He is authoritarian and demands compliance by using mainly threats and coercion. He causes employees' alienation from the organisation.
Style 5,5, i.e., mid of the road management emphasises both production as well as employee need satisfaction but not maximally. They involve people in decision-making and provide an environment for employee need satisfaction, though they do not optimise on and of these dimensions.
Style 9,9, i.e., team management is close to Likert's System 4. Such leaders place maximum emphasis on production as well as people. They integrate the individual and group goals with organisational goals. Thus they optimise on dimensions-employee involvement and need satisfaction as well as production. Blake and Mouton strongly suggest this position for all-round welfare. It is team approach that makes managers effective leaders.
4. Path-goal Approach
It is one of the situational theories of leadership. This approach was initially developed by House and later extended by House and Mitchell. It emphasis that leaders can optimise organisational effectiveness by influencing the path-goal perceptions of subordinates and their need satisfaction. This approach is based on inferences drawn from the expectancy theory of motivation under which people arc assumed lo have- needs and to want to work in a way that accomplishes goals thai satisfy those needs. Thus, this approach is based on the situation rather than on a single kind of leadership.
The theory proposes that a leader's effectiveness depends on his ability: (/) to provide opportunity for employee need satisfaction, (ii) to help and guide them in fulfilling their needs, and (iii) lo make need satisfaction contingent on their performance effectiveness. In other words, employees will work to their maximum capacity and make their optimum contribution to the achievement of organisational goals only when they perceive that their own need satisfaction is dependent on their effective performance.
5. Contingency Approach
Fred E. Fiedler was the first to develop a situational theory of leadership. This approach emphasises thai a leader's behaviour required for effective group performance depends on the favourableness of the situation. The important situational factors are as follows:
(i) Leader's personal relationship with group members. (ii) Formal authority of the leader. (iii) Degree of task-structure.
Situations are favourable if all the three dimensions are high if the leader is generally accepted by his followers, if the task is structured and if - great deal of authority is formally attributed to the leader's position, the situation is very favourable. The theory demonstrates that task-oriented leaders tend to perform best in group situation that are either unfavourable to the leader and human relations oriented leaders tend to perform best in situations that are intermediate in favourableness. Leadership effectiveness depends upon the various elements in the group environment. Thus the effectiveness of the group performance can be affected by changing the leadership style for the situation in accordance with the described relationships. This also helps in designing the selection and training programmes for managers to be suitable for given situations.
This theory has been the subject of much controversy. The date and statistical tests used by Fiedler arc said to be inappropriate and invalid. It also does not explain the relative effectiveness of leadership under different situations. The theory is in the nature of empirical generalisations.
6. Continuum Approach
This is also an important behavioural theory of leadership developed by Tannenbauni, and Schmidt. They have identified seven styles of leadership on a continuum hypothesising that the effectiveness of one or the other leadership style depends on situation. These leadership styles very on the dimensions of area of freedom for managers, and area of freedom for non-managers (subordinates). In other words, they vary from a high degree of leader-centered behaviour to a high degree of subordinate centeredness. The possible leadership styles are:
(1) Manager able to make decision which non-managers accept.
(2) Manager must "sell" decision before gaining acceptance.
(3) Manager presents decision but must respond.
(4) Manager presents tentative decision subject to change after non-manager inputs.
(5) Manager defines limits within which non-managers make decisions.
(6) Manager present problem, gets inputs from non-managers, and then decides.
(7) Manager and non-managers jointly make decision within limits defined by organisational constraints.
According to this theory, effectiveness of any one of these styles depends on the situation and personality of the manager. The manager should consider the following situational factors when deciding about the appropriateness of his leadership behaviour:
(a) Forces in the manager itself;
(b) Forces in the subordinates; and x
© Forces in the situation.
Forces in the manager consist of the manager's Value system confidence in subordinates, own leadership inclinations and feelings of security in an uncertain situation.
Forces in the subordinates include their need for independence readiness to assume responsibility for decision making, tolerance, for ambiguity (or strangeness), interest in problem at hand, understanding and identification with the goals of the organisation knowledge and experience to deal with the problem and learned expectation of sharing in the decision-making process.
Forces in the situation include the type of organisation, group effectiveness, the complexity of the problem itself pressure of time on the situation etc.
No doubt, Tannenbaum and Schmidt have developed a practical guideline for managers in choosing their leadership styles. An important contribution of their approach is the recognition that no particular leadership style is effective in all situations. A manager should change his leadership behaviour according to the forces in the situation in which he is operating. It may be observed that the maximum freedom that Tannenbaum and Schmidt, recognise for the managers is that he is able "to make decisions which non managers accept." It is conceivable that there may be situations particularly crisis or emergency situations, or when he is dealing with a recalcitrant subordinate or group of subordinates that he may find it more effective to act autocratically, make decisions and enforce compliance by using even punitive or coercive methods, rather than make only those decision that his subordinates accept.
7. Eclectic Approach
Sanford has developed the eclectic approach to leadership. According to this approach, leadership depends upon traits of leader, situational variable and the types of followers. As such, these three factors should be integrated to study leadership pattern. Since there is nothing new in the theory, this has not acquired any importance.
