The Value Based Leadership Theory

БОЛЬШАЯ ЛЕНИНГРАДСКАЯ БИБЛИОТЕКА - РЕФЕРАТЫ - The Value Based Leadership Theory

The Value Based Leadership Theory

Managers do things right

Leaders do the right things…

Value Based Leadership Theory

Moscow 1999

“Leaders are dealers in hope” Bonaparte Napoleon

“We will build a winning tradition” Vince Lombardi to the Green

Bay Packers

Consider the above quotations. These statements of leaders reflect

commitment to a value position. In this paper I am going to describe a

brand new theory of leadership, developed by Professor House - the Value

Based Leadership Theory. I will also present a preliminary test of several

hypotheses derived from Value Based Theory. The tests of hypotheses are

based on data descriptive of 25 relationships between chief executives and

their immediate subordinates. As a concrete example, I am going to present

the results of the real interviews, which took plase in Russia in 1999

among the CEOs. In the process of testing these hypotheses I replicate the

study of charismatic leadership in the U. S. presidency conducted by House,

Spangler & Woycke (1991) using a sample of chief executive officers and

different measurement methods. What I am trying to prove in this paper is

the following: It was considered to think that managers are always the

leadres in the organization. This opinion was proved to be wrong. According

to the first research which appaered in press in the end of 70-s: manager

is the position, and leader is the person who leads others to the desired

result. According to the personal trends and characteristics, managers

should be leaders, and they are, but not always. The question of leadership

is a very interesting topic for me, personally.

I am deeply interested in the question of leadership, and I do think,

that this question and the existing theories have a long life to live.

Leadership is a real fact, which has already been proved. You can be a born

leader, but you also can create the leader in yourself. You can manage to

influence, motivate and enable others. You can succeed, because there is

nothing impossible for a human being. Especially, if he is intelligent on

the one hand and really wishes to achieve something on the other.

A BRIEF HISTORICAL REVIEW

During the period between the mid-seventies and the present time a

number of theories have been introduced into the leadership literature.

These new theories and the empirical research findings constitute a

paradigm shift in the study of leadership. The theories to which I refer

are the 1976 Theory of Charismatic Leadership (House, 1977), the

Attributional Theory of Charisma (Conger & Kanungo, 1987), and the

Transformational Theory (Burns, 1978; Bass, 1985), and Visionary Theories

of Leadership (Bennis & Nanus, 1985; Sashkin, 1988; Kousnes & Posner,

1987).

I believe these theories are all of a common genre. They attempt to

explain how leaders are able to lead organizations to attain outstanding

accomplishments such as the founding and growing of successful

entrepreneurial firms, corporate turnarounds in the face of overwhelming

competition, military victories in the face of superior forces, leadership

of successful social movements and movements for independence from colonial

rule or political tyranny. They also attempt to explain how certain

leaders are able to achieve extraordinary levels of follower motivation,

admiration, respect, trust, commitment, dedication, loyalty, and

performance.

The dependent variables of earlier theories are follower expectations,

satisfaction, and normal levels of performance. The dependent variables of

the more recent theories include a number of affective consequences such as

followers’ emotional attachment to leaders; followers’ emotional and

motivational arousal, and thus enhancement of follower valences and values

with respect to the missions articulated by leaders; followers’ trust and

confidence in leaders; and values that are of major importance to the

followers. These more recent theories also address the effect of leaders

on several follower conditions not addressed in earlier theories, such as

followers' self-worth and self-efficacy perceptions, and identification

with the leader’s vision.

Earlier theories describe leader behavior that are theoretically

instrumental to follower performance and satisfy follower needs for

support, generally referred to as task-and person-oriented leader behaviors

(Fleishman & Harris, 1962; Katz & Kahn, 1952; Likert, 1961; Feidler, 1967;

House, 1971, House, 1996). In contrast, the more recent theories stress

the infusion of values into organizations and work through leader behaviors

that are symbolic, inspirational and emotion arousing.

Earlier theories take follower attitudes,