The first comprehensive contingency model for leadership was developed by Fred Fiedler.12 The Fiedler contingency model proposed that effective group performance depended on properly matching the leader’s style and the amount of control and influence in the situation. The model was based on the premise that a certain leadership style would be most effective in different types of situations. The keys were:

1. define those leadership styles and the different types of situations, and then

2. identify the appropriate combinations of style and situation.

Fiedler proposed that a key factor in leadership success was an individual’s basic leadership style, either task oriented or relationship oriented. To measure a leader’s style, Fiedler developed the least-preferred coworker (LPC) questionnaire. This questionnaire contained 18 pairs of contrasting adjectives—for example, pleasant–unpleasant, cold–warm, boring–interesting, or friendly–unfriendly. Respondents were asked to think of all the coworkers they had ever had and to describe that one person they least enjoyed working with by rating him or her on a scale of 1 to 8 for each of the sets of adjectives (the 8 always described the positive adjective out of the pair and the 1 always described the negative adjective out of the pair).

If the leader described the least preferred coworker in relatively positive terms (in other words, a “high” LPC score—a score of 64 or above), then the respondent was primarily interested in good personal relations with coworkers and the style would be described as relationship oriented. In contrast, if you saw the least preferred coworker in relatively unfavorable terms (a low LPC score—a score of 57 or below), you were primarily interested in productivity and getting the job done; thus, your style would be labeled as task oriented. Fiedler did acknowledge that a small number of people might fall in between these two extremes and not have a cut-and-dried leadership style. One other important point is that Fiedler assumed a person’s leadership style was fixed regardless of the situation. In other words, if you were a relationship-oriented leader, you’d always be one, and the same for task-oriented.

After an individual’s leadership style had been assessed through the LPC, it was time to evaluate the situation in order to be able to match the leader with the situation. Fiedler’s research uncovered three contingency dimensions that defined the key situational factors in leader effectiveness. These were:

• 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.

Each leadership situation was evaluated in terms of these three contingency variables, which when combined produced eight possible situations that were either favorable or unfavorable for the leader. (See the bottom of the chart in Exhibit 13–2). Situations I, II, and III were classified as highly favorable for the leader. Situations IV, V, and VI were moderately favorable for the leader. And situations VII and VIII were described as highly unfavorable for the leader.

Exhibit 13–2

The Fiedler Model

Once Fiedler had described the leader variables and the situational variables, he had everything he needed to define the specific contingencies for leadership effectiveness. To do so, he studied 1,200 groups where he compared relationship-oriented versus task-oriented leadership styles in each of the eight situational categories. He concluded that task-oriented leaders performed better in very favorable situations and in very unfavorable situations. (See the top of Exhibit 13–2, where performance is shown on the vertical axis and situation favorableness is shown on the horizontal axis.) On the other hand, relationship-oriented leaders performed better in moderately favorable situations.

Because Fiedler treated an individual’s leadership style as fixed, there were only two ways to improve leader effectiveness. First, you could bring in a new leader whose style better fit the situation. For instance, if the group situation was highly unfavorable but was led by a relationship-oriented leader, the group’s performance could be improved by replacing that person with a task-oriented leader. The second alternative was to change the situation to fit the leader. This could be done by restructuring tasks; by increasing or decreasing the power that the leader had over factors such as salary increases, promotions, and disciplinary actions; or by improving the leader-member relations. Research testing the overall validity of Fiedler’s model has shown considerable evidence to support the model.13 However, his theory wasn’t without criticisms. The major one is that it’s probably unrealistic to assume that a person can’t change his or her leadership style to fit the situation. Effective leaders can, and do, change their styles. Another is that the LPC wasn’t very practical. Finally, the situation variables were difficult to assess.14 Despite its shortcomings, the Fiedler model showed that effective leadership style needed to reflect situational factors.