As the name of the approach implies, the situational approach focuses on leadership in situations. The premise of the theory is that different situations demand different kinds of leadership. From this perspective, to be an effective leader requires that a person adapt his or her style to the demands of different situations. To determine what is needed in a particular situation, a leader must evaluate her or his followers and assess how competent and committed they are to perform a given goal. (Northhouse, 2016, pg.93)
As a store manager, it was important to train everyone so they knew how to positively influence the quarterly profit that the store was producing. The position’s that were often monitored were the commissioned sales positions and how these sales were generated by each employee. It was my responsibility to train and maintain a positive marginal profit. If my coworkers didn’t help the profit goals, I would have to train who was struggling. The way I trained each employee was very similar to the situational approach and how I determined who needed more help than others. In a given situation, the first task for a leader is to determine the nature of the situation. Questions such as the following must be addressed: What goal are followers being asked to achieve? How complex is the goal? Are the followers sufficiently skilled to accomplish the goal? Do they have the desire to complete the job once they start it? (Northhouse, 2016, pg.96)
After these questions are answered I will have a blueprint of who I could consider firing due to a consistent behavior or considering a written/verbal warning. This will give me an understanding if I should start looking for new employment opportunities for this position. The next step would be incorporating a coaching session if I see a chance of improvement. We could practice sales pitches and how we deliver these techniques to the customer or we could completely reconstruct how the employee interacts with customers. There could also be customer complaints that could be specific to the employee’s performance that might not be sales related such as the use of their cell phone and not being accessible by the customer. Each situation would require a different type of approach to leadership and there isn’t one way to handle all situations.
References
Northouse, P. G. (2016). Leadership: Theory and Practice. Los Angeles: Sage Publications.