So I decided to take the Style Questionnaire on page 93 in our text (Northouse, 2013) to see how I ranked in my leadership behaviors – was I more task oriented or relationship oriented?
Before I go into the results, let me first state that I am not in a formal management position, however, I am considered to be in a “leadership” position. I do not have anyone formally reporting to me, but my position on our team is that of a lead employee. Some of my “lead-type” job duties are to mentor new employees, provide guidance and oversight on projects when necessary, to establish standards and best practices, and to assist with overall development and adoption of our core product platform.
With that said, my task behavior ranked in at 41, and my personal behavior ranked in at 44; both in the “high” range according to the questionnaire. In digesting the results, I really thought my task behavior would rank higher, but not necessarily more than, my relationship behavior. However, I was pleased to see that the results are pretty close to one another, and that both values fall in the “high” range of the behavior scale (Northouse, 2013, p. 94). I have always thought that setting and instilling a supportive work environment first would allow for a task-oriented work environment to naturally come second.
Research findings from the studies of The Ohio State University and the University of Michigan have proved to be somewhat inconclusive with regard to which behavior/orientation produces the best leader; in most cases, the situation dictates which behavior/orientation is best (Northouse, 2013, pp. 77-78). It is my opinion that having a balanced orientation towards task and relationship behaviors allows the leader to adjust their orientation based on the situation and their followers development needs relatively easily.
My scores do show that I have room for improvement. What would be really interesting is to have my co-workers fill out the questionnaire and find some statistical value in the scores. Perhaps I am being to generous with myself, or perhaps not enough; hopefully it’s the latter.
References
Northouse, P. G. (2013). Leadership – Theory and Practice – Sixth Edition. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, Inc.