HPS204 Lecture Notes - Lecture 10: Brainstorming, Production Blocking, Groupthink
HPS204 WEEK 10
Leadership and Group Decision Making
Be able to compare and contrast the major approaches to leadership;
Great person theory attributes effective leadership to innate or acquired individual
characteristics. Situational perspectives of leadership maintain that anyone can be a good
leader in the right situation. For example, Winston Churchill was elected to government
during WWII, despite being argumentative, and opinionated, and then voted out after the
war. He was an effective leader during the war, but not after. Similarly, children in groups
may have different leaders in academic tasks versus physical tasks.
The three leadership perspectives proposed by Lippitt and White (1943) include autocratic
leaders (organised activities, gave orders, were aloof and focused exclusively on the task at
hand), democratic leaders (called for suggestions, discussed plans and behaved like
ordinary club members), and Laissez-faire leaders (left the group to its own devices and
generally intervened minimally. The most effective style was democratic, which had high
liking for the leading, and high productivity regardless of whether the leader was there.
Contingency theories consider the leadership effectiveness of particular behaviours or
behavioural styles to be contingent on the nature of the leadership situation. Fiedler used
the least preferred co-worker scale (LPC) to measure leadership style. The scores were
obtained by getting the participant to rate the person they find the most difficult to work
with on a number of dimensions, such as pleasantness, and intrigue. A high LPC score
indicated a relationship- leadership style, because the respondent felt favourably inclined
towards a co-worked even if they were not performing well, and a low LPS score indicated a
task-orientated leadership style because the respondent was harsh on a poorly performing
co-worker. Situational control referred to how much control effective task performance
required, i.e. the control of factors such as member relations, task structure etc. Low LPC
leaders (task-orientated) perform well when situational control is either low (group needs a
directive leader to get things done), or high (group is doing well, so no need to worry). High
LPC leaders (relationship-orientated) perform better when situational control lays between
the extremes.
Leadership can be explained as a product of interaction among group members by
transactional leadership theory. This is an approach to leadership that focuses on the
transaction of resources between leaders and followers. Following this, Hollander (1958)
proposed the concept of idiosyncrasy credit: group rewards good leaders with allowing
them to be relatively eccentric, which is also proposed to be integral in effective leadership.
Leader-member exchange (LMX) theory proposes that effective leadership rests on the
ability of the leader to develop good-quality personalised exchange relationships with
individual members.
Transformational leaders have three key characteristics: individualised consideration
(attention to followers’ needs, abilities and aspirations, in order to help raise aspirations,
improve abilities, and satisfy needs), intellectual stimulation (challenging followers’ basic
thinking, assumptions, and practices to help them develop newer and better mindsets and
practices), and charismatic/inspiring leadership (providing the energy, reasoning, and sense
of urgency that transforms followers). A contemporary challenge for this theory was to fill in
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
Be able to compare and contrast the major approaches to leadership; Great person theory attributes effective leadership to innate or acquired individual characteristics. Situational perspectives of leadership maintain that anyone can be a good leader in the right situation. For example, winston churchill was elected to government during wwii, despite being argumentative, and opinionated, and then voted out after the war. He was an effective leader during the war, but not after. Similarly, children in groups may have different leaders in academic tasks versus physical tasks. The most effective style was democratic, which had high liking for the leading, and high productivity regardless of whether the leader was there. Contingency theories consider the leadership effectiveness of particular behaviours or behavioural styles to be contingent on the nature of the leadership situation. Fiedler used the least preferred co-worker scale (lpc) to measure leadership style.
