Environmental Fielders Contingency Theory

The behavioural approach has one major shortcoming, the two theories represent very different types of leader behaviour, yet both are shown to be effective in management. The most probable reason for this is that other variables, particularly those related to the type of tasks or the characteristics of the work group determine whether certain leadership behaviours will be effective (Reggio,2013). Task orientated leader might be better suited to one situation, whereas a relationship –orientated leader might be better in a different situation. Contingency theories go a step above behavioural theories. It recognizes that there is no one best style of leadership behaviour. Contingency theory is concerned with the ‘fit’ between environmental

Fielders’ model states that there is no one best style of leadership. Instead, a leader 's effectiveness is based on the situation. His work suggested that good leadership performance from a task orientated leader occurs in situations giving high and low situational control, whereas relationship-orientated leaders give optimum performance in situations involving moderate control (Hayward, 1996). He believed that the task based leader will focus less on the group than the relationship orientated leader, who will focus more on the group to the expense of the task (Riggio, 2013). To measure the leaders orientation he developed the ‘least preferred co-worker’ (LPC)

For the model to apply in the workplace other variables would have to be included (Hayward, 1996). This became apparent when the predictive ability was reviewed, the model showed support in half of the laboratory studies, but rather less in the field studies (Peters, Hartke & Pohlmann, 1985). Another criticism concerns individuals who scored near the middle of the LCP scale. One researcher divided the ratings into high, low, and medium scores and found that the middle LPC-leaders seemed to be effective in a range of situations (Kennedy, 1982). In sum Fiedlers contingency model was on the first detailed theories of leadership. It makes certain predictions about the situations in which certain types of leaders will be effective and has been a straightforward and widely used intervention for improving leader effectiveness (Ayman, Chemers, & Fiedler, 1995)(Riggio,