This summer, I decided to stay in State College and get a summer job. An opportunity presented itself at Designer’s Denn, a spa and hair salon. The spa is split up into three distinct parts: the hair salon, the nail salon, and the massage/esthetics spa. The owner of the spa, Melinda, has hired two managers, one for the spa and one for the salon. The nail technicians fall under the leadership of the spa manager. I was hired as the Spa Hostess, and therefore under the tutelage of the spa manager, Dori.
Dori was the Spa Manager and had the responsibility of making sure the spa was always in pristine condition and also keeping all products fully stocked. She also had the responsibility of doing any hiring and firing, employee evaluations, and timekeeping. Although I only worked at Designer’s Denn for the months of May, June, July, and August, I loved working at the spa and my boss played a large part in that. Her leadership was effective and made the entire spa feel connected. All of the employees had a wide variety of skills, abilities, and educational level, but Dori worked with us all to make sure we were on the same page.
Dori specifically reminds me of the situational approach to leadership, as discussed in Lesson 5, a few weeks ago. One reason I immediately thought of Dori as I read the situational leadership lesson is because of her adaptability. The situational approach to leadership calls for different situations requiring different kinds of leadership (Penn State World Campus 2013). For effective leadership, a leader must alternate styles to fit the demands.
An example of this can be seen in this diagram, found at 1000ventures.com: 
. Four managerial styles are listed here, and have been carried out by Dori over my 4 months at Designer’s Denn. For example, the supporting managerial style is suggested as a way to praise, listen, and facilitate. In certain situations, a more supportive role was necessary. This supporting style was seen best in her interactions with employees and customers. In certain instances, Dori was called in to help a situation if there was a customer service complaint or if something needed to be changed with a service. Another type of leadership style is coaching. This style requires a leader to both direct and support. This is the type of leadership style Dori often exhibited with me during my first month at Designer’s Denn. This was the training period, and Dori was training me on what was and was not normal practice at the spa. A third type of leadership style is empowering. In this leadership style, leaders turn over responsibility for day-to-day decision-making to subordinates. From June until August, I became the full time spa hostess and became second in command at the spa. Once I came in at noon, the spa was fully under my control. Dori would stay at Designer’s Denn but work in the office, not the spa, from 12pm-3pm. From 3pm-8pm, the Designer’s Denn spa was completely under my control. A fourth type of leadership is directing. This is structure, control, and supervise. This is the leadership style that was displayed by Dori during my first week on the job, when I had absolutely no idea what I was doing. This was necessary because I had low competence but had an interesting in learning what I was supposed to do and what was the norm at Designer’s Denn.
Essentially the situational approach requires a leader to match his or her styles to the competence and commitment of followers (Penn State World Campus 2013). In the case of Designer’s Denn, I was a follower and based upon my level of competency, Dori’s actions changed to help me grow and become an effective employee.
Works Cited:
Penn State World Campus (2013). PSYCH 485 Lesson 5: Style Approach. Retrieved on April 6, 2013. <https://courses.worldcampus.psu.edu/sp13/psych485/003/content/05_lesson/04_topic/01_page.html>
Situational Approach to Leadership. 1000ventures.com. Retrieved on April 6, 2013 from <http://www.1000ventures.com/design_elements/selfmade/leadership_situational_styles_6x4.png>