Leadership

PSYCH 485 blog

Servant Leadership

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Several key words stand out to me when I read about servant leadership. Empowerment, altruism, empathy and ethics are the words I am referring to. The reason these words stand out is because they seem to be the opposite of the actions and characteristics we first think of when considering leaders. After all, how often do we see leaders giving power away to subordinates, putting them first and considering what it would be like to walk in their shoes, or even leading by example and simply doing the right thing when no one is actually looking? In my experience, it is rare to see these circumstances occur with leaders. Leadership is a process whereby an individual influences a group of individuals to achieve a common goal (Northouse, 2013). Power is the capacity to produce effect on others (House, 1984), or potential to influence others (Bass, 1990). Influence involves changing a target agent’s attitudes, values, beliefs, or behaviors as a result of influence tactics (PSU WC, L.7, p.3). The purpose of this discussion is to point out how servant leadership defies common beliefs when it comes to leadership, power, and influence.

Leadership is a process that occurs in groups, involves influence and has a common goal (Northouse, 2013). So by incorporating the word leadership into servanthood, we would expect the title to ring true. To a certain degree I concur. It is in from the perspective of what goal is being achieved that I disagree. The outcomes of servant leadership are follower performance and growth, organizational performance, and societal impact (Northouse, 2013). While I may concede that a common denominator of many leadership theories involves organizational performance, I do feel that servant leadership separates itself on the perspective of follower performance and societal impact. Servant leader’s behaviors focus directly on recognizing followers’ contributions and helping them realize their true potential. Servant leaders look at the big picture. Servant leaders don’t just concern themselves with the mission at hand, but how their actions have a community and societal impact. Northouse (2013) cites Mother Teresa and Southwest Airlines as examples in this area and I couldn’t agree more.

When it comes to power, there are five (5) ways individuals can influence others, through expert power, referent power, legitimate power, reward power, and coercive power (French and Raven, 1959). I guess if you wanted to push the issue, servant leaders could be experts in their field but as far as them being referent, holding rank, bribery, or utilizing trickery I don’t see how French and Raven’s (1959) types apply. In my opinion, servant leadership does not adhere to these titles. Servant leaders are not concerned with power. Servant leadership involves self-sacrifice. Servant leadership involves putting yourself last. Servant leaders want to see their followers grow. Most impressively, servant leaders share their power. Servant leaders empower their followers to make decisions on their own, and to be self-sufficient (Northouse, 2013).

To influence another is to create change in another’s actions. To influence another we have to deploy certain tactics. While some well-known tactics consist of rational persuasion, inspirational appeals, consultation, ingratiation, personal appeals, exchange, coalition tactics, pressure, and legitimizing (PSU WC, L.7, p.7), I am writing to suggest that servant leadership differs here as well. Servant leaders influence by putting their character out there for everyone to see. Unfortunately I have experienced more bad tactics than good in this area. Pressure is the over abundant tactic that immediately come to mind. All too often I have seen threats or nagging being deployed in an effort to accomplish a goal. This does not appear to be the case with servant leadership. Servant leaders influence others by setting the right example, and being honest and fair. Servant leaders are ethical. Their tactics are that of high moral character, altruism, and humanism. And, servant leaders influence by simply being empathetic to the needs of their followers.

Not only do I think that servant leadership defies common beliefs when it comes to leadership, power, and influence but I think it also challenges every-day conceptions about it not working in that it actually does seem to work. When performing to its full potential, servant leadership can produce excellent outcomes. In the area of follower performance and growth, self-actualization should result. As for organizational performance, organizational citizenship behaviors (Ehrhart, 2004; Liden, Wayne, et al., 2008; Neubert, Kacmar, Carlson, Chonko, & Roberts, 2008; Walumbwa et al., 2010) and team effectiveness (Hu and Liden, 2011) are increased. And lastly, servant leadership should have a positive impact on society. What other leadership style can accomplish all of this while not holding true to established leadership norms?

References:

Bass, B. M., (1990). Bass and Stogdill’s Handbook of Leadership. 3rd ed. New York: Free Press.

Ehrhart, M. G. (2004). Leadership and procedural justice climate as antecedents of unit-level organizational citizenship behavior. Personnel Psychology, 57, 61-94.

French, J. & Raven, B. H. (1959). The bases of social power. In D. Cartwright (Ed.), Studies of Social Power. Ann Arbor, MI: Institute for Social Research.

House, R. J. (1984). Power in Organizations: A Social Psychological Perspective. Unpublished manuscript, University of Toronto.

Hu, J., & Liden, R. C. (2011). Antecedents of team potency and team effectiveness: An examination of goal and process clarity and servant leadership. Journal of Applied Psychology, 96(4), 851-862.

Liden, R. C., Wayne, S.J., Zhao, H., & Henderson, D. (2008). Servant leadership: Development of a multidimensional measure and multi-level assessment. Leadership Quarterly, 19, 161-177.

Neubert, M. J., Kacmar, K. M., Carlson, D. S., Chonko, L. B., & Roberts, J. A. (2008). Regulatory focus as a mediator of the influence of initiating structure and servant leadership on employee behavior. Journal of Applied Psychology, 93, 1220-1233.

Northouse, P. G. (2013). Leadership: Theory and Practice (6th ed.). Los Angeles: Sage Publications.

Pennsylvania State University, World Campus (2013). Psych 485 Lesson 7: Power and Influence, Pages 3, 7. Retrieved fromhttps://courses.worldcampus.psu.edu/sp14/psych485/001/content/07_lesson/01_page.html

Walumbwa, F. O., Hartnell, C. A., & Oke, A. (2010). Servant leadership, procedural justice climate, service climate, employee attitudes, and organizational citizenship behavior: A cross-level investigation. Journal of Applied Psychology, 95, 517-529.

Go Team (leaders)

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team leadership 1 - CopyFinally, an easy to follow, real world, and practical application of leadership. I am referring to team leadership with this statement. Team leadership has also become one of the most popular and rapidly growing areas of leadership theory and research (Northouse, 2013). Personally, and this is not to suggest any one theory is wrong, but I have found that leadership theories tend to focus on hind sight observation or aspects of leadership training. What we do not see is an abundant focus on the team involved and the goal to be accomplished. After all, how often do we hear the phrase, there is no I in team when we are trying to get something done. Basically, I have found that leadership theories strive to train leaders, answer questions based on how to identify a good leader, determine what leader best fits certain situations, and even determine how leaders can improve follower interaction, or channel motivation. With the team approach we see a focus on what needs to be done and how to get it done, not necessarily on who the boss is. Team leadership makes good sense because it doesn’t only address what decisions should be made, but it also outlines what action should be taken to stay on track.

With team leadership, no per se leadership training is necessary outside of the scope of the model being followed and the leadership present can even be shared. By shared I mean distributed leadership which involves the sharing of influence by team members who step forward when situations warrant providing the leadership necessary and then who in turn step back to allow others to lead (Northouse, 2013). Additionally, teams can be comprised of individuals of the same rank and the leader can be picked from within. By picking a leader from within it seems natural that the leader would be more likely to have the respect of the followers. This is one aspect we may not always find with a position that has been officially bestowed through rank or appointment. I translate all of this to mean that team leadership occurs at the functioning level where it belongs. After all, who can say they enjoy taking orders from the leader who simply delegates and spends most of their time absent or on the golf course.

When I consider the concept of team leadership, I am reminded of the KISS acronym which came about from the U.S. Navy as a design principle and is short for Keep It Simple Stupid (Dalzell & Victor, 2007). In contrast to the keeping it simple concept of team leadership, the psychodynamic approach to leadership comes to mind. The psychodynamic approach involves in depth analysis of a leaders rooted personality which once diagnosed cannot be easily changed anyway. Who has time for psychoanalysis when the demands of life are happening in the now? Don’t get me wrong, it is certainly advisable to learn about why we act the way we do, or to put it another way, what makes us tick and it certainly doesn’t hurt to analyze leaders as part of history so we can learn from their mistakes.

As a naysayer, one could point out how team leadership does not provide for any of the skills training a member could need due to potential changes in the leader-follower dynamics. But are these leadership skills really needed with a team leadership model that provides such clear and concise frame work to follow. With Kogler-Hill’s (2013) team leadership model, specific frame work is provided to take the guess work out of whatever leadership dilemma the team is facing. It is this mental road map that helps the leader (or any team member who is providing leadership) diagnose team problems and take appropriate action to correct the problem (Northouse, 2013).

team leadership 2 - CopyAdditionally, I am well aware that such collaborative relationships do not thrive in autocratic environments where creative group thinking is frowned upon. So no, I do not see team leadership thriving in North Korea but does anyone reading this really enjoy being part of that kind of work environment anyway. Where I do see team leadership thriving however, is in business town America where there appears to be a trend toward work teams on a culturally diverse and global basis. Another reason I feel good about the idea of team leadership is that of partnership. When everyone in the team takes stock in the project they are all naturally concerned about the outcome and want to achieve the goal. Additionally, research has suggested that the use of teams has led to greater productivity, a more effective use of resources, better decisions and problem solving, better-quality products and services, and greater innovations and creativity (Parker, 1990). What more do you need in support of team leadership than that? I will even go as far as challenging anyone reading this to support another theory that can be so universally applied and at the same time reports such positive findings.

References:

Dalzell, T., Victor, T. (2007). The Concise New Partridge Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English. Taylor & Francis.

Kogler-Hill, S. (2013). Team Leadership. In P. G. Northouse (2013), Leadership: Theory and practice (6th ed., pp. 287–318). Los Angeles: Sage Publications

Northhouse, P. G. (2013). Leadership: Theory and Practice (6th ed.). Los Angeles: Sage Publications.

Parker, G. M. (1990). Team players and teamwork. San Franscisco: Jossey-Bass.

Developing in-group relationships

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How do leaders get subordinates to accomplish organizational goals? Depending on who needs to know, this could end up being a million dollar question if answered successfully. Some of the ways I have seen leaders influencing followers involved threats, intimidation, punishment, coercion, positive incentives and even rewards but not usually the latter two. Regardless of the incentive, the bottom line still has to involve the task being completed. I also think that we could agree that there are obviously better ways than others to accomplish this. Personally, for me, any approach that allows for mutual respect and kindness between the leader and the follower is exemplar. Here, I would like to focus on the leader-member exchange (LMX) theory. According to Northouse (2013), the theory works in two ways: it describes leadership, and it prescribes leadership. It is the leadership making principle of this prescriptive aspect that I feel applies here. More so, it is understanding the importance of the leadership making according to Graen and Uhl-Bien (1991) that I feel can help achieve organizational goals in the most harmonious way.

As for other theories, some examine the leader, the follower and/or the situation. As examples, the trait approach examines the personality and character traits possessed by the leader, servant leadership focuses on putting the followers needs first, and situational leadership analyses the (yes, you probably guessed it) nature of the situation. As for the LMX theory, the underlying concept is for the leader to achieve a high quality exchange with all subordinates (Northouse, 2013). Descriptively, the leader member relationship exists as in-groups and out-groups. Goals can be accomplished by both, but in-group members may go the extra mile whereas out-group members don’t. If it further helps to increase understanding, in-group members are described as being more dependable, highly involved and receive more concern from the leaders and out-group members will seldom receive additional responsibilities because they tend to operate strictly within prescribed organizational roles (Northouse, 2013). The key, I believe, is to put as much emphasis on quality relationships with all subordinates so that favoritism or biases do not creep in. This way, leaders strive to develop all subordinates as in-group members. In line with this belief, I would like to further explain leadership making as a prescriptive aspect of the LMX theory.

Leadership making is a prescriptive approach to leadership emphasizing that a leader should develop high-quality exchanges with all of the leader’s subordinates rather than just a few (Northouse, 2013). This is where we find the Graen and Uhl-Bien (1991) model which suggests that leadership making develops progressively overt time in three phases being the stranger phase, the acquaintance phase, and the mature partnership phase. Throughout each phase the leader member relationship develops until a true goal oriented, high quality partnership marked by in-group attributes is obtained. In the stranger phase low quality exchanges occur, similar to those of out-group members primarily based on prescribed roles (Northouse, 2013). In the acquaintance phase new personal and professional interaction is tested with a greater focus on group goals. In the mature partnership the relationship is more reciprocal in nature when it comes to the needs of the leader and member based on the greater good of all involved to include the organization.

Positive relationships between the leader and the follower are critical. In the end, if a leader and follower do not have a mutual relationship of trust, respect, and obligation they may still accomplish goals out of necessity but they certainly will not be loyal at heart to each other, their counterparts, or the organization. And while this out-group interaction may still get the job done, it does not make for a healthy or ideal work environment. In my opinion, I think it is not enough to understand the descriptive aspects of the LMX theory but that it is much more important to understanding the leadership making aspects and to strive for in-group dyads among all subordinates in order to accomplish a harmonious relationship and productive work environment which is needed just about everywhere in the business world.

References:
Graen, G. G., & Uhl-Bien, M. (1991). The Transformation of Professionals into Self-Managing and Partially Self-Designing Contributors: Toward a Theory of Leadership-Making. Journal of Management Systems, 3:3, pp. 25-39.

Northouse, P. G. (2013). Leadership: Theory and Practice (6th ed.). Los Angeles: Sage Publications.

Filed Under: LMX

Situational Approach: Application is Key.

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There are many ways to describe a leader. The trait approach labels leaders through their own personal makeup, the style approach examines their conduct, and with the skills approach we try to understand the potency of their abilities. They are all great for analyzing a leader but do they really help. Can they change a bad situation and make it better. Can they help to make an ineffective leader effective? Can they help to make an unproductive employee productive? These are the important questions that need answering in the real world. As a leader, it is not enough to simply know what personalities you have, it is not enough to simply understand your behavior, and it is not enough to simply understand your competency level. Proper application is the key to changing real world situations and it is situational leadership that helps us accomplish this.

Situational leadership stresses that leadership is composed of both a directive and supportive dimension, and that each has to be applied appropriately in a given situation (Northouse, 2013). The directive dimension deals with task behavior and the supportive dimension deals with relationship behavior but understanding the difference between the two is not enough. A leader must apply the concepts properly to be effective. The leadership style must be matched to the developmental level of the subordinate. Blanchard et al. (1985), differentiates style into four categories: delegating, supporting, coaching, and directing, and the developmental level of the subordinate into degrees of competence and commitment. If a leader finds that the employee lacks job knowledge but is motivated he can focus on directing. Conversely, if a leader finds that the employee is competent but lacks desire he can focus on being supportive. It should also be noted that the application is not static and can be changed for each respective employee depending on the need at the time.

Now that makes great sense to me. Match your leadership style with the nature of a given situation in order to be an effective leader. Said another way, effective leaders are those who can recognize what employees need and then adapt their own style to meet these needs (Northouse, 2013). In support of this concept, Hersey and Blanchard (1993) reported that the situational approach has been a factor in training programs of more than 400 of the fortune 500 companies. And while I do not work for a fortune 500 company, I have still seen this concept being taught in applicable leadership books, Supervision of Police Personnel by Iannone, et. al (2008) is but one example. It is not enough for leaders to simply understand themselves, a leader must properly apply his style to be effective and this concept not alloy makes sense but it seems to have caught on through the situational approach to leadership.

References:

Blanchard, K., Zigarmi, P., Zigarmi, D. (1985). Leadership and the One Minute Manager: Increasing Effectiveness through Situational Leadership. New York: Willow Morrow.
Hersey, P., Blanchard, K., (1993). Management of Organizational Behavior: Utilizing Human Resources. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall.
Iannone, N. F., Iannone, M. D., Bernstein, J. (2008). Supervision of Police Personnel (7th ed.). Upper Saddle River: Prentice Hall.
Northhouse, P. G. (2013). Leadership: Theory and Practice (6th ed.). Los Angeles: Sage Publications.

Psychodynamic Approach

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Defining and studying leadership is not as straight forward as it may initially seem to most people. The mere definition of leadership has evolved over time and still today it varies slightly depending on whom you ask. Just to be clear though regarding the modern concept of leadership, certain components should be present. Those components are that leadership is a process, leadership involves influence, leadership occurs in groups, and leadership involves common goals (Northouse, 2013). As for studying leadership, it doesn’t get any easier. Some of the different approaches involve examining the leader’s traits, style, or the situation involved just to name a few. Others are not as simple to comprehend. I am referring to one in particular and that is the psychodynamic approach. When I consider this approach, I immediately conjure up images involving repressed memories and the stereotypical leather couch.
The underlying concept of the psychodynamic approach is that of personality (Northouse, 2013). For me, it is easy to understand that leaders should possess certain traits, that certain styles work better than others, and that the situation certainly should come into play. Maybe it is because these concepts can be taught and have the ability to be applied accordingly. The psychodynamic approach however makes no assumption about good traits or best style and does not attempt to match a style to followers (Northouse, 2013). Additionally, and this is where it gets even more interesting, two assumptions are important to understand when considering the psychodynamic approach to studying leadership. They are that the personality characteristics of individuals are deeply ingrained and very difficult to change in a significant way, and that people have motives and feelings that are buried in the unconscious (Northouse, 2013).
So does this mean that when it comes to evaluating leaders we should follow the proverbial rule and not judge them until we have walked a mile in their shoes, maybe? We can examine the traits a leader possesses, we can examine his or her style, we can examine the context of the situation, and we can examine the interaction between the leader and his or her followers but until we have examined the family upbringing, personal backgrounds, emotions, and drives have we really identified who the leader is or what makes him or her act the way he or she does. Not according to the psychodynamic approach anyway. Our personalities, feeling and motives penetrate deep into our core and may not always be obvious to see and understand. I guess this all means that professional psychoanalysis should be a mandatory prerequisite not only for leaders but also for their follows as well. Not only is it important for each respective leader to have an understanding of his or her own psychology to be effective , but it is just as important for the leader to have an understanding of each of his or her followers as well (PSU WC, L.3, p.3). Given this approach, it would seem to me that we may just run into a shortage of leather couches.
References:
Northhouse, P. G. (2013). Leadership: Theory and Practice (6th ed.). Los Angeles: Sage Publications.
Pennsylvania State University, World Campus (2013). Psych 485 Lesson 3: Psychodynamic Approach, Page 3. Retrieved from https://courses.worldcampus.psu.edu/sp14/psych485/001/content/03_lesson/03_page.html

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