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Contingency Theory

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16 views

Contingency Theory

Uploaded by

hannyhosny
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Contingency Theory

leader–match theory (Fiedler & Chemers, 1974)


DESCRIPTION
• Contingency theory suggests that a leader’s effectiveness depends on how well
the leader’s style fits the context.
• Fiedler developed contingency theory by studying the styles of many different
leaders who worked in different contexts, primarily military organizations.
• Contingency theory is concerned with styles and situations. It provides the
framework for effectively matching the leader and the situation.
Leadership Styles

• Task-motivated leaders are concerned primarily with reaching a goal.

• Relationship-motivated leaders are concerned with developing close


interpersonal relationships.

• Fiedler developed the Least Preferred Coworker (LPC) scale. Leaders


who score high on this scale are described as relationship motivated, and
those who score low on the scale are identified as task motivated.
Situational Variables

• Contingency theory suggests that situations can be characterized in terms


of three factors:

1. leader–member relations.
2. task structure.
3. position power
Core of the theory
• Based on research findings, contingency theory posits that certain styles
are effective in certain situations. People who are task motivated (low
LPC score) will be effective in both very favorable and very
unfavorable situation that is, in situations that are going along very
smoothly or situations that are out of control. People who are relationship
motivated (high LPC score) are effective in moderately favorable
situation that is, in situations in which there is some degree of certainty
but things are neither completely under their control nor completely out of
their control.
Fiedler explanation
• A leader whose LPC style does not match a particular situation
experiences stress and anxiety.
• Under stress, the leader reverts to less mature ways of coping that were
learned in early development.
• The leader’s less mature coping style results in poor decision making,
which results in negative work outcomes.
STRENGTHS
• It is supported by a great deal of empirical research, many researchers
have tested it and found it to be a valid and reliable approach to explaining
how effective leadership can be achieved.
• Contingency theory has broadened our understanding of leadership by
forcing us to consider the impact of situations on leaders. Before
contingency theory was developed, leadership theories focused on
whether there was a single, best type of leadership (e.g., trait approach).
• Contingency theory is predictive and therefore provides useful
information about the type of leadership that is most likely to be effective
in certain contexts.
• This theory does not require that people be effective in all situations. So
often leaders in organizations feel the need to be all things to all people,
which may be asking too much of them. Contingency theory argues that
leaders should not expect to be able to lead in every situation.
• Contingency theory provides data on leaders’ styles that could be useful to
organizations in developing leadership profiles.
CRITICISMS
• Contingency theory has been criticized because it fails to explain fully why
people with certain leadership styles are more effective in some situations than
in others. Fiedler (1993) called this a “black box problem”.
• The LPC scale has been questioned because it does not seem valid on the
surface, it does not correlate well with other standard leadership measures
(Fiedler, 1993), and it is not easy to complete correctly.
• A final criticism of contingency theory is that it fails to explain adequately what
organizations should do when there is a mismatch between the leader and the
situation in the workplace.
APPLICATION
• It can be used to answer a host of questions about the leadership of individuals in various
types of organizations. For example, it can be used to explain why a person is ineffective
in a particular position even though the person is a conscientious, loyal, and hardworking
manager.
• The theory can be used to predict whether a person who has worked well in one position
in an organization will be equally effective if moved into a quite different position in the
same company.
• Contingency theory can point to changes that upper management might like to make in a
lower-level position in order to guarantee a good fit between an existing manager and a
particular work context.

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