Examples Of Fiedler Contingency Model

FRED FIEDLER – FIEDLER CONTIGENCY MODEL
Submitted by: SANJANA MOITRA
Born on 13th July 1922, Fred Edward Fielder was one of the leading researchers in industrial and organizational psychology in the 20th century. He was business and management psychologist at the University of Washington and had studied the personality and characteristics of leaders. The very famous contingency modeling of leadership (Fiedler contingency model) was introduced by him in 1967 in which he provided an answer to the failings of the trait and behavioral theories and added to the understanding of the dynamics of leadership. The model emphasizes on the statement that there is no one best style of leadership. Instead, a leader's effectiveness is based on the situation.

Identifying the leadership style i.e. whether it is relationship-focused or task-focused leadership. 2. Identifying ones situation by asking these basic questions- Are leader-member relations good or poor? Is the task one is doing structured or unstructured, or one has little experience of solving similar problems? Does one have strong or weak power over the team? 3. Determine the most effective leadership style. This can be understood by using the following instance. Imagine that a person has just started working at a new company, replacing a much-loved leader who recently retired. This person is leading a team who views him with distrust (so Leader-Member Relations are poor). The task all are doing together is well defined (structured), and person’s position of power is high because he is the boss, and is therefore able to offer reward or punishment to the group. The most effective leader in this situation would be high LPC – that is, a leader who can focus on building relationships first. On the other hand, imagine that a new person is leading a team who likes and respects all (so Leader-Member relations are good). The project all are working on together is highly creative (unstructured) and person’s position of power is high since; again, he is in a management position of strength. In this situation a task-focused leadership style would be most

In addition to this, it is evinced by vast amount of empirical studies (~400) and has been tested extensively. The theory emphasizes on decreasing the expectations from the leaders and instead focusing on matching a leader to a suitable task. It is an important procedure during reorganization/management change because it takes into account the leadership profiles in an organization. There are also few criticisms of the Fiedler Contingency Model out of which the biggest is lack of flexibility. Fiedler believed that because natural leadership style is fixed, the most efficient way to control situations is to replace the leader. He didn't allow for flexibility in leaders. For example, if a low-LPC leader is in charge of a group (indicating good relations and doing unstructured tasks), and he/she has a weak position, then as per the model, the best way is to replace them with a high-LPC leader – instead of asking them to use a different leadership style. There is also a problem with the Least Preferred Co-Worker Scale – if a person falls near the middle of the scoring range then, it is difficult to say that which style of leader he is. One of the most cited criticism is "The Contingency Model: Criticisms and Suggestions," published in the Academy of Management Journal, Vol. 13, No. 3. The authors say that, even under the best circumstances, the LPC scale only has about a 50 percent reliable variance. This means that the LPC