Leadership VS Manager:

The words “leader” and “manager” are among the most commonly used words in business and are often
used interchangeably. But have you ever wondered what the terms actually mean? 

Basis for
Leader Manager
Comparison
A leader is a person who A manager is a person who manages the
Meaning influences his subordinates to organisation and is responsible for planning,
achieve a specified goal. direction, coordination and control
Approach Sets Direction Plans details
Attribute Foresightedness Mind
Subordinate Followers Employees
Style Transformational Transactional
Decision Facilitates decision Makes decision
Aim Growth and development. Attainment of the required result.
Focus People Process and Procedure
Change Leaders promotes change. Mangers react to change.
Conflict Uses conflict as an asset Avoid conflict
People Aligns people Organizes people
Strives For effectiveness For efficiency

Managerial Grid Model of Leadership:

Developed by R. R. Blake and J. S. Mouton, the Managerial Grid Model helps Managers to
analyze their own leadership styles through a technique known as grid training.

Also, Managers can identify how they with respect to their concern for production and people
with the Managerial Grid Model.

The two dimensions of leadership, viz. concern for people on ‘vertical’ axis and concern for
production on ‘horizontal’ axis have been demonstrated by R. R. Blake and J. S. Mouton in the
form of Managerial Grid Model.

They identified five basic leadership styles of practicing managers representing various
combinations of the aforesaid two dimensions as shown in the following figure;

Managerial Grid Model is based on two behavioral dimensions:

 1. Concern for people: This is the degree to which a leader considers the needs of team
members, their interests, and areas of personal development when deciding how best to
accomplish a task.
2. Concern for production: This is the degree to which a leader emphasizes concrete
objectives, organizational efficiency, and high productivity when deciding how best to
accomplish a task.

As shown in the figure, the model is represented as a grid with concern for production as the X-
axis and concern for people as the Y-axis; each axis ranges from 1 (Low) to 9 (high).

The five resulting leadership styles are as follows:

The five resulting leadership styles are as follows:

1. Impoverished Management (1, 1): Managers with this approach are low on both the
dimensions and exercise minimum effort to get the work done from subordinates. The
leader has low concern for employee satisfaction and work deadlines and as a result
disharmony and disorganization prevail within the organization. The leaders are termed
ineffective wherein their action is merely aimed at preserving job and seniority.
2. Task management (9, 1): Also called dictatorial or perish style. Here leaders are more
concerned about production and have less concern for people. The style is based on
theory X of McGregor. The employees’ needs are not taken care of and they are simply a
 means to an end. The leader believes that efficiency can result only through proper
organization of work systems and through elimination of people wherever possible. Such
a style can definitely increase the output of organization in short run but due to the strict
policies and procedures, high labour turnover is inevitable.
3. Middle-of-the-Road (5, 5): This is basically a compromising style wherein the leader
tries to maintain a balance between goals of company and the needs of people. The leader
does not push the boundaries of achievement resulting in average performance for
organization. Here neither employee nor production needs are fully met.
4. Country Club (1, 9): This is a collegial style characterized by low task and high people
orientation where the leader gives thoughtful attention to the needs of people thus
providing them with a friendly and comfortable environment. The leader feels that such a
treatment with employees will lead to self-motivation and will find people working hard
on their own. However, a low focus on tasks can hamper production and lead to
questionable results.
5. Team Management (9, 9): Characterized by high people and task focus, the style is
based on the theory Y of McGregor and has been termed as most effective style
according to Blake and Mouton. The leader feels that empowerment, commitment, trust,
and respect are the key elements in creating a team atmosphere which will automatically
result in high employee satisfaction and production.

Advantages of Blake and Mouton’s Managerial Grid

The Managerial or Leadership Grid is used to help managers analyze their own leadership styles
through a technique known as grid training. This is done by administering a questionnaire that
helps managers identify how they stand with respect to their concern for production and people.
The training is aimed at basically helping leaders reach to the ideal state of 9, 9.

Limitations of Blake and Mouton’s Managerial Grid

The model ignores the importance of internal and external limits, matter and scenario. Also,
there are some more aspects of leadership that can be covered but are not.

Fiedler contingency model:

Definition: Fred Fiedler was the first amongst all the leadership theorists to talk about the
situational variables. According to him, the effectiveness of the leadership style depends on the
situation. Thus, he along with his associates identified the situational variables and studied about
their relationship with the appropriateness of leadership styles.

fiedler’s contingency model is comprised of three elements, Viz, Leadership styles, situational
variables and the relationship between styles and situation. Let’s study these in detail:

1. Leadership Style:
2. Situational Variables: and
3. Relation Between Styles and Situations

1. Leadership Style: According to Fiedler, the leadership style depends on two

dimensions, task-oriented and human-relations oriented. The task-oriented leader is
primarily concerned with the task performance and the accomplishment of task goals. He
gets satisfied with the accomplishment of task performance. While, the manager
concerned with human relations lay more emphasis on developing the interpersonal
relationship with his subordinates. In order to understand the attitude of a leader, Fiedler
developed a “Least Preferred Co-worker Scale (LPC)”, wherein the leaders are asked
to rate a person on a scale ranging from lowest (1) to highest (8) on several parameters to
identify the worker with whom they least like to work. Certain parameters on the LPC
scale are: pleasant/unpleasant, friendly/unfriendly, tense/relaxed, supportive/hostile,
cooperative/uncooperative, quarrelsome/harmonious, etc. The leaders with high LPC
scores are said to be relationship-oriented whereas the ones with the low LPC scores are
considered as task-oriented.

2. Situational Variables:

According to Fiedler, a leader’s behavior is dependent upon the favorability of the leadership
situation. Three factors work together to determine how favorable a situation is to a leader. These
are:

 Leader-member relations - The degree of confidence, trust, and respect employees had
for their leader, rated as either good or poor.
 Task structure - The degree to which job assignments were formalized and structured,
rated as either high or low.
 Position power – the degree of influence a leader had over activities such as hiring,
firing, discipline, promotions, and salary increases, rated as either strong or weak.
 1. Relation between Styles and Situations: This is the last element of Fiedler’s
contingency model, wherein he talks about the relationship between the situation and the
appropriateness of leadership style. According to him, the leadership effectiveness
depends on the situation, as one style favoring one situation may not necessarily be
appropriate in any other situation. Thus, it is the situation that gives an opportunity to the
leader to influence his subordinates through the right kind of leadership style.

Thus, Fiedler’s contingency model posits that the situation decides the style of leadership and
influences the behavior of a manager.

Transformational leadership

Transformational leadership is a theory of leadership where a leader works with teams to identify
needed change, creating a vision to guide the change through inspiration, and executing the change in
tandem with committed members of a group;[1] it is an integral part of the Full Range Leadership Model.
Transformational leadership serves to enhance the motivation, morale, and job performance of followers
through a variety of mechanisms; these include connecting the follower's sense of identity and self to a
project and to the collective identity of the organization; being a role model for followers in order to
inspire them and to raise their interest in the project; challenging followers to take greater ownership for
their work, and understanding the strengths and weaknesses of followers, allowing the leader to align
followers with tasks that enhance their performance.

There are 4 components to transformational leadership, sometimes referred to as the 4 I's:

 Idealized Influence (II) – the leader serves as an ideal role model for followers; the
leader "walks the talk," and is admired for this. A transformational leader embodies the
qualities that he/she wants in his/her team. In this case, the followers see the leader as a
model to emulate. For the followers, it is easy to believe and trust in a transformational
leader.
 Inspirational Motivation (IM) – Transformational leaders have the ability to inspire and
motivate followers through having a vision and presenting that vision. Combined, these
first two I's are what constitute the transformational leader's charisma. A transformational
leader manages to inspire the followers easily with clarity. The transformational leader
convinces the followers with simple and easy-to-understand words as well as with their
own image.
 Individualized Consideration (IC) – Transformational leaders demonstrate genuine
concern for the needs and feelings of followers and help them self-actualize. This
personal attention to each follower assists in developing trust among the organization's
members and their authority figure(s). For example, the transformational leader can point
out the problems of a member working in a group. From this perspective, the leader can
work towards training and developing a follower who is having difficulties in a job. This
is an important element because teams are able to rely on and work together so decisions
can be made more quickly, the transformational leader increases their buy-in[8]
 Intellectual Stimulation (IS) – the leader challenges followers to be innovative and
creative, they encourage their followers to challenge the status quo. A common
misunderstanding is that transformational leaders are "soft," but the truth is that they
constantly challenge followers to higher levels of performance