Following is an example of how the life cycle theory applies to a leadership situation:

• A man has just been hired as a salesperson in a men’s clothing store. At first, this individual is extremely immature—that is, unable to solve task-related problems independently. According to the life cycle theory, the appropriate style for leading this salesperson at his level of maturity is high-task/low-relationships—that is, the leader should tell the salesperson exactly what should be done and how to do it. The salesperson should be shown how to make change and charge sales and how to handle merchandise returns. The leader should also begin laying the groundwork for developing a personal relationship with the salesperson. Too much relationship behavior at this point, however, should be avoided because it can easily be misinterpreted as permissiveness.

• As time passes and the salesperson gains some job-related maturity, the appropriate style for leading him would be high-task/high-relationships. Although the salesperson’s maturity has increased somewhat, the leader still needs to watch him closely because he requires guidance and direction at times. The main difference between this leadership style and the first one is the amount of relationship behavior displayed by the leader. Building on the groundwork laid during the period of the first leadership style, the leader can now start to encourage an atmosphere of mutual trust, respect, and friendliness between the salesperson and her.

• As more time passes and the salesperson’s maturity level increases still further, the appropriate style for leading this individual will become high relationships/low task. The leader can now deemphasize task behavior because the salesperson is of above-average maturity in his job and is capable of independently solving most job-related problems. The leader would continue to develop a relationship with her follower.

• Once the salesperson’s maturity level reaches its maximum, the appropriate style for leading him is low task/low relationships. Again, the leader deemphasizes task behavior because the follower is thoroughly familiar with the job. Now, however, the leader can also deemphasize relationship behavior because she has fully established a good working relationship with the follower. At this point, task behavior is seldom needed, and relationship behavior is used primarily to nurture the good working rapport that has developed between the leader and the follower. The salesperson, then, is left to do his job without close supervision, knowing that he has a positive working relationship with a leader who can be approached for guidance whenever necessary.

The life cycle approach more than likely owes its acceptance to its intuitive appeal. Although at first glance it appears to be a useful leadership concept, managers should bear in mind that little scientific investigation has been conducted to verify its worth, and therefore it should be applied with caution.²⁴

One strategy, proposed by Fred Fiedler, for overcoming these obstacles is changing the organizational situation to fit the leader’s style, rather than changing the leader’s style to fit the organizational situation.²⁶ Applying this idea to the life cycle theory of leadership, an organization may find it easier to shift leaders to situations appropriate for their leadership styles than to expect those leaders to change styles as situations change. After all, it would probably take three to five years to train a manager to effectively use a concept such as life cycle theory, whereas changing the situation that the leader faces can be done quickly simply by exercising organizational authority.

According to Fiedler’s contingency theory of leadership, leader–member relations,²⁷ task structure, and the position power of the leader are the three primary factors that should be considered when moving leaders into situations appropriate for their leadership styles:

• Leader–member relations is the degree to which the leader feels accepted by the followers.

• Task structure is the degree to which the goals—the work to be done—and other situational factors are outlined clearly.

• Position power is determined by the extent to which the leader has control over the rewards and punishments followers receive.

How these three factors can be arranged in eight different combinations, called octants, is presented in Table 13.1.

Figure 13.4 shows how effective leadership varies among the eight octants. From an organizational viewpoint, this figure implies that management should attempt to match permissive, passive, and considerate leaders with situations reflecting the middle of the continuum, containing the octants 4, 5, 6, and 7. It also implies that management should try to match controlling, active, and structuring leaders with the extremes of this continuum.

Fiedler suggests some actions that can be taken to modify the leadership situation. They are as follows:²⁸

1. In some organizations, we can change the individual’s task assignment. We may assign to one leader the structured tasks that have implicit or explicit instructions telling him what to do and how to do it, and we may assign to another the tasks that are nebulous and vague. The former are the typical production tasks; the latter are exemplified by committee work, by the development of policy, and by tasks that require creativity.

2. We can change the leader’s position power. We not only can give him a higher rank and corresponding recognition, but we also can modify his position power by giving him subordinates who are equal to him in rank and prestige or subordinates who are two or three ranks below him. We can give him subordinates who are experts in their specialties or subordinates who depend on the leader for guidance and instruction. The leader can give the final say in all decisions affecting his group, or we can require that he make decisions in consultation with his subordinates, or even that he obtain their concurrence. We can channel all directives, communications, and information about organizational plans through the leader alone, giving him expert power, or we can provide these communications concurrently to all his subordinates.

3. We can change the leader–member relations in this group. The leader can work with groups whose members are very similar to him in attitude, opinion, technical background, race, and cultural background, or we can assign him subordinates with whom he differs in any one or several of these important aspects. Finally, we can assign the leader to a group in which the members have a tradition of getting along well with their supervisors or to a group that has a history and tradition of conflict.

Fiedler’s work certainly helps destroy the myths about one best leadership style and that leaders are born, not made. Further, his work supports the theory that almost every manager in an organization can be a successful leader if placed in a situation appropriate to that person’s leadership style. This matching of leadership style to the situation, of course, assumes that someone in the organization has the ability to assess the characteristics of the organization’s leaders and other important organizational variables and then to bring the two together accordingly.

Fiedler’s model, like all theoretical models, also has its limitations; even though it may not provide concrete answers, it does emphasize the importance of situational variables in determining leadership effectiveness. As noted earlier, it may actually be easier to change the leadership situation or move the leader to a more favorable situation than to try to change the leader’s style.²⁹

According to the path–goal theory of leadership, leaders exhibit four primary types of behavior:

1. Directive behavior—Directive behavior is aimed at telling followers what to do and how to do it. The leader indicates what performance goals exist and precisely what must be done to achieve them.

2. Supportive behavior—Supportive behavior is aimed at being friendly with followers and showing interest in them as human beings. Through supportive behavior, the leader demonstrates sensitivity to the personal needs of followers.

3. Participative behavior—Participative behavior is aimed at seeking suggestions from followers regarding business operations to the extent that followers are involved in making important organizational decisions. Followers often help determine the rewards that will be available to them in the organization and what they must do to earn those rewards.

4. Achievement behavior—Achievement behavior is aimed at setting challenging goals for followers to reach and expressing and demonstrating confidence that they will measure up to the challenge. This leader behavior focuses on making goals difficult enough that employees will find achieving them challenging, but not so difficult that employees will view them as impossible and give up trying to achieve them.

As with other situational theories of leadership, the path–goal theory proposes that leaders will be successful if they appropriately match these four types of behavior to the situations they face. For example, if inexperienced followers do not have a thorough understanding of a job, a manager may appropriately use more directive behavior to develop this understanding and ensure that serious job-related problems are avoided. For more experienced followers, who have a more complete understanding of a job, directive behavior would probably be inappropriate and might create interpersonal problems between leader and followers.

If jobs are highly structured, with little room for employee interpretation of how the work should be done, directive behavior is less appropriate than when much room is provided for employees to determine how the work gets done. When followers are deriving much personal satisfaction and encouragement from work and enjoy the support of other members of their work group, supportive behavior by the leader is not as important as it is when followers are gaining little or no satisfaction from their work or from personal relationships in the work group.

The primary focus of the path–goal theory of leadership is on how leaders can increase employee effort and productivity by clarifying performance goals and the path to be taken to achieve those goals. This theory of leadership has gained increasing acceptance in recent years. In fact, research suggests that the path–goal theory is highly promising for enhancing employee commitment to achieving organizational goals and thereby increasing the probability that organizations will be successful. It should be pointed out, however, that the research done on this model has been conducted mostly on its parts rather than on the complete model.³²