8 Recommendations for Enhancing Leadership Styles in Woolworths Limited

The Woolworths supermarket chain faces challenges in entering the convenience stores sector and setting up online operations for food sales due to a lack of leadership skills. To improve performance, the company should adopt an incentive method that guides employee performance, empowering staff members to take necessary steps to achieve their jobs. The study focuses on exploring different leadership styles, including situational, transformational, and transactional leadership. It emphasizes the importance of understanding the relationships between these leadership styles, organizational commitment, job satisfaction, and individual well-being.

Running head: ANALYZING THE LEADERSHIP ISSUES IN WOOLWORTHS LIMITED
Analyzing the leadership issues in Woolworths Limited- impacts of lack of leadership skills on
level of employee motivation
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:

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ANALYZING THE LEADERSHIP ISSUES IN WOOLWORTHS LIMITED
Table of Contents
1.0 Introduction................................................................................................................................2
2.0 Background of the organization.................................................................................................2
3.0 Research aims and objectives....................................................................................................3
4.0 Research questions.....................................................................................................................4
5.0 Literature review........................................................................................................................5
5.1 Identification of Leadership Issues that impact the level of employee motivation...............5
5.2 Effective leadership style would affect the performance of the employee............................6
5.3 Relationship between leadership style and employee performance into retail sector.........10
5.4 Possible solutions to improve employee motivation using motivational theories...............11
6.0 Research methodology.............................................................................................................12
7.0 Findings...................................................................................................................................13
8.0 Conclusion and Recommendations..........................................................................................14
8.1 Conclusion...........................................................................................................................14
8.2 Recommendations................................................................................................................15
References......................................................................................................................................16

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ANALYZING THE LEADERSHIP ISSUES IN WOOLWORTHS LIMITED
1.0 Introduction
The research study is based on analyzing the leadership issues in Woolworths Limited.
Woolworths Australia is one of the largest supermarket chains within Australia which are
providing fresh food to people. This supermarket of Australia is owned by Woolworth Limited.
Vann, Coleman and Simpson (2014) stated that leadership skill would encompass the capability
of an individual to lead the workers and entire organization. A better leadership would help an
organization to grow in the market with increasing into profitability as well as productivity. A
leader helps to set direction, build a vision and create of something innovative to meet its
organizational goals (Clarke 2013). Leadership should map where the organization need to go to
win a high value in the marketplace. The leader should set direction, use of management skills to
inspire and motivate people to go towards right direction for gaining of profitability.
This study analyzed the leadership issues in the supermarket and evaluated of new strategies
to improve its marketing leadership position in the Australian marketplace. This provides an
analysis of the contemporary position of Woolworths due to which its leadership position is
affected and forecasted its performance in Australia with recommendations to improve it in the
future.
2.0 Background of the organization
Woolworths has it’s headquarter in New South Wales, Australia and it is operated as a
retailer throughout the supermarket, merchandise stores and petrol stations. Their retail products
are consisted of fresh food, beverages, petroleum, grocery and others. As this supermarket is
mainly based on food products, therefore health of the customers is the main concern of

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ANALYZING THE LEADERSHIP ISSUES IN WOOLWORTHS LIMITED
Woolworths. Therefore, leadership skills is required to take right decisions concerning on health
of people. One of the main competitors of Woolworth is Coles. However, it is shown that Coles
consists of 37 percent of the market share of Australia where Woolworths consists of 43 percent.
Therefore, in order to gain more market share, Woolworths should require a great leader who
would take proper decisions and inspire others to gain organizational goals
(Woolworthsgroup.com.au, 2015). From few years, Woolworths was facing management issues
such as lack of leadership skills to regain a sustainable sales momentum. Good leader should win
customer trust and greater share into shopping basket.
Figure 1: Logo of Woolworths Limited
(Source: Woolworthsgroup.com.au, 2015)
3.0 Research aims and objectives
Retail sector are competitive especially the supermarket and to gain a competitive
advantage into the marketplace the retail organization needs of good leader helps to gain market
share and implement of new strategy. The aim of this research is to analyze the leadership
practices and aspects into Woolworths Limited. A study on the leadership issues is conducted
into a specific organization and country, Woolworths Limited as well as Australia respectively.
Mostly, the study is analyzed the impacts of lack of leadership skills on level of employee

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ANALYZING THE LEADERSHIP ISSUES IN WOOLWORTHS LIMITED
motivation into Woolworths Limited. This research study provides a critique as well as
application of the current theories of leadership. It also develops of leadership concepts and also
theories to analyze the selected research topic. The aim is to evaluate of recent leadership
theories which are developed by the researchers. This study is mainly about the effect of the
leadership style on the performance of employee. Following are the research objectives:
 To identify of leadership issues that impact the level of employee motivation
 To explore of relationships between leadership style as well as employee performance
 To analyze the significance of the leadership style into performance of employee
 To develop of leadership model that shows a relationship among leadership style as well
as employee performance
 To provide solution to the identified leadership issues and provide proper
recommendations for future
4.0 Research questions
Following are the research questions for this particular research study:
1. How much an effective leadership style would affect the performance of the employee?
2. What are the leadership issues which impact employee motivation within the business
operations of Woolworths Limited?
3. What is a relationship between leadership style and employee performance into retail
sector?
4. What are the possible solutions to improve the leadership style of leaders?

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ANALYZING THE LEADERSHIP ISSUES IN WOOLWORTHS LIMITED
5.0 Literature review
5.1 Identification of Leadership Issues that impact the level of employee motivation
Aydin, Sarier and Uysal (2013) stated that a leaderships is a process which can direct and
influence the behaviour of the others towards accomplishment of gaols. () suggested that a leader
should deal with organizational changes and focused on long term goals achievement. CEO of
Woolworths, Bradford Banducci was being criticised for its poor trading performance. The
supermarket is delayed into entering of convenience stores sector as well as set up of their online
operations in selling of food. Du et al. (2013) demonstrated that there are challenges into retail
industry due to streamlining the management team. Arnold et al. (2015) believed that an
innovative marketing strategy will help Woolworths to proper into competitive market. It helps
to enable of faster decisions throughout streamlined structures where the colleagues are
empowering under the leadership roles. Collaboration among the team members also help into
achieving of competitive advantage. Sometimes, the senior business leaders are caused delay in
responding with the solutions which becomes out of date (Nanjundeswaraswamy and Swamy
2014). The main challenges that a store manager faces when they are successful into managing
of stores include of managing a higher employer rate of turnover, delivery of quality services for
the customers, increase into profit margin and reduction of inventory shrinkage. Leadership
consists of many aspects like worker motivation, strategic planning and change management
(Anderson and Sun 2017). In an attempt to cover all those aspects of the leadership in this single
research will result into a poor research study.
Keskes (2014) stated that most of the retail organizations are required of strong leadership
style which would stimulate the performance of employee. The retail organization, such as
Woolworths Limited faces problems such as poor innovation, lower productivity and inability to

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Influence
LEADERSHIP
Leader-follower Organizational
objectives
Change People
ANALYZING THE LEADERSHIP ISSUES IN WOOLWORTHS LIMITED
achieve the performance targets. Those all identified problems are happened due to lack of
strategic leadership style of the leaders (Choudhary, Akhtar and Zaheer 2013). It will affect the
performance of the employee as they are not motivated towards their work and organizational
goals. Therefore, there is a requirement of effective leader those can lead people to become more
effective in the work. Leadership theories will help to understand the concept more accurately.
Figure 2: Key elements of leadership
(Source: Choudhary, Akhtar and Zaheer 2013, pp-437)
5.2 Effective leadership style would affect the performance of the employee
The research work is being designed to study the impact of the leadership style on the
performance of the employee within Woolworths Limited. In order to achieve of objectives as
well as goals, there should be a higher relationship among the leader as well as workers.
Therefore, productivity should be increased within the supermarket which is based on higher
performance of employee dependent on leadership style. Roueche, Baker and Rose (2014)

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ANALYZING THE LEADERSHIP ISSUES IN WOOLWORTHS LIMITED
categorized of various leadership style which is explained on scale to range from automatic
throughout democratic to show the degree of authority as well as decision makers to make the
power of leaders as well as employees. Ejere and Abasilim (2013) demonstrated that leadership
style is involved of all the members of team to identify of required goals and develop strategies
for reaching the organizational goals. This particular research study is explored to
transformational and transactional leadership style and it discusses the impact of the employee
towards the leaders and their performance into the retail sector in Australia.
Transformational leadership: In this type of leadership, the leaders are motivated the
employees to exceed the expectations. The leader leads the employees by offering an
organizational vision. The leaders of Woolworths Limited have lack of transformational
leadership style that would affect the employee motivation and performance. Dumdum, Lowe
and Avolio (2013) introduced that transformational leader should modify the attitudes of the
employees. According to Shahhosseini, Silong and Ismaill (2013), transformational leaders
should help the followers to gain organizational goals. The followers are encouraged by
influencing the beliefs, attitudes, behaviour as well as organizational values. The employees are
developed of trust as well as respect towards the leader and it wills to display of unexpected
behaviour to execute the expectations of leader.
Transactional leadership: Breevaart et al. (2014) mentioned that this leadership style is
that when the leaders are concerned on the achieving of the goals. The employees are rewarded
to accomplish of the tasks. The leaders are more concerned towards the finish of the task and the
employee’s performance. Both positive as well as negative reinforcements are to be achieved
required results. Tyssen, Wald and Spieth (2014) criticized two of the dimensions for this type of
leadership style such as contingent reward as well as expectation of management. Odumeru and

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ANALYZING THE LEADERSHIP ISSUES IN WOOLWORTHS LIMITED
Ogbonna (2013) stated that contingent reward is that the leaders use of rewards as well as
promotion to give required results from the followers. Management expectation means the
leaders are taking of correct actions when there is no control over the situations. The leaders
should have anticipation behaviour.
Laissez faire leadership: The leaders should avoid of making decisions. They are
unwilling to take of proper actions and avoid of the situations. The leaders are not providing
feedback to the followers (Avolio and Yammarino 2013). The employees are not satisfied,
unproductive as well as incompetent in the work. Therefore, they are not motivated to work.

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Transformational
leadership style
Inspirational motivation
Idealized influence
Transactional leadership
style
Contingent reward
Management expectation
Laissez faire leadership
style
Effectiveness
Extra effort
Job satisfaction
Subordinate perception of manage
behaviour
Subordinate self-perceived outcomes
ANALYZING THE LEADERSHIP ISSUES IN WOOLWORTHS LIMITED
Figure 3: Theoretical model of leadership style
(Source: Tyssen, Wald and Spieth 2014, pp-370)

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ANALYZING THE LEADERSHIP ISSUES IN WOOLWORTHS LIMITED
5.3 Relationship between leadership style and employee performance into retail
sector
McCleskey (2014) stated that there is a relationship between leadership style as well as
employee performance. Van Knippenberg and Sitkin (2013) argued that in another study it is
seen that there is a positive correlation among the leadership style as well as employee
performance that leads to job satisfaction. The retail manager of Woolworths should have
leadership qualities so that they can gain as well as achieve the organizational outcomes. The
leadership style influences the employee performance both internally and also externally (Tseng
2017). Transformational leadership style results into willingness of the employees towards the
desired organizational goals. While observing the employee performance and their job
satisfaction in context of the leadership, some of the predictions are being derived.
Transformational leaders should foster towards the job satisfaction due to sense of ownerships
(Birasnav 2014). They encourage the freedom of the employees and teach them their
responsibilities.
Northouse (2015) analyzed that the leaders encourage the development of the employees,
therefore the employees feel that their leaders are take care of them. In case of the
transformational leaders, the reward system is not good. Therefore, the employees think that
transactional leaders are better in this case as they provide a good reward and incentive system.
Price and Weiss (2013) argued that the managers are more satisfied to those managers who are
supportive. The employees are expected of good guidance and support from their supervisor,
when it helps them to take any decisions. From the entire study, it is analyzed that the employee

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ANALYZING THE LEADERSHIP ISSUES IN WOOLWORTHS LIMITED
retention is higher in case of transactional leadership as comparison to the transformational
leadership (Antonakis and House 2014). This transformational leadership style helps the
employees to develop their skills by increasing of job satisfaction as well as organizational
commitment. Therefore, most of the employees like the transactional leaders.
5.4 Possible solutions to improve employee motivation using motivational theories
McGregor Theory X and theory Y is the best human motivation and management
theories. This particular theory is applied by the managers in development of motivational
factors used to motivate the employees towards their work. Lussier and Achua (2015) stated that
theory X is analyzed the importance of the supervision, external rewards as well as penalties.
According to this theory, the employees of Woolworths Limited should provide with financial
incentives so that they should be motivated to work. As under this theory, it is assumed that the
employees are lazy and they are not interested to work (Turnnidge and Côté 2016). Therefore,
rewards as well as punishments are the best thing to motivate the workers. Based on this theory,
the employees are not wish to work and take work related responsibility. On the other hand,
theory Y is analyzed on the motivational role for satisfaction towards the job and encourages the
employees to do their respective tasks without supervision. People are happy to work and they
are already motivated towards their work (Roueche, Baker and Rose 2014). Therefore, there is
no need of rewards as well as punishments of employees as they are already willing to work.
According to this theory, the employees can achieve their goals by focused on efforts on the
organizational objectives.
Herzberg’s hygiene model is another motivational theory which is based on two factors
and therefore it is also a two factor theory. From the findings of this factor, it is analyzed that job
are related to both satisfaction as well as dis-satisfaction (Shahhosseini, Silong and Ismaill

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ANALYZING THE LEADERSHIP ISSUES IN WOOLWORTHS LIMITED
2013). The goal of this particular theory is to eliminate the factors of dissatisfaction and create of
situations towards job satisfaction. The hygiene factors are included of fixing of poor as well as
obstructive policies of the company. It provides of effective as well as supportive supervision.
The factors create of supporting culture towards respect and dignity of the workers. The other
Herzberg factors are related to job enrichment which provides more satisfaction to the workers
(Tyssen, Wald and Spieth 2014). It provides an opportunity to achieve organizational goals,
recognition of contributions of workers, provider of responsibilities to the team members and
providing of opportunities to gain competitive advantage throughout interior promotions.
6.0 Research methodology
This particular research study is based on secondary data collection method. Choudhary,
Akhtar and Zaheer (2013) guided that the researchers state that descriptive research method is
suitable for this study as the information and data are gathered about the present existing
condition of the leadership issues within the retail sector, Woolworths Limited. The case studies
based on Woolworths are used to collect and investigate the information about the impact of the
leadership style on the employee motivation and job satisfaction (Avolio and Yammarino 2013).
The purpose of this study is to describe the situation of the organization where and why
leadership issues are faced by the management. It exists at time of study and explores of specific
phenomenon on the performance of the employees as well as organization. Leadership style
provides a significant effect into the business as it affects from the senior towards top
management level employees (Roueche, Baker and Rose 2014). It creates an organizational
culture which would influence the employee’s performance in terms to meet with the deadlines
of work.

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ANALYZING THE LEADERSHIP ISSUES IN WOOLWORTHS LIMITED
The researcher is used of different types of methods on leadership to engage the leaders
in the research. Collaborative learning helps to enable the participants to take part into the
research study. As leadership is a complex and critical phenomenon, therefore it consists of
various dimensions (Vann, Coleman and Simpson 2014). Various journal articles and case study
on selected organization is used to gather information on the leadership styles used in the retail
sector. Different leadership theories such as McGregor Theory X and theory Y and Herzberg’s
hygiene model are used to find solutions for the identified leadership issues.
7.0 Findings
From the entire research study, it is found that leadership skill would include the potential
of an individual to provide of direct guide to the workers as well as entire retail organization. A
better leadership would assist a group to grow up within the marketplace with growing into
productivity as well as efficiency. The main leadership issues that a retail manager faces when
they are winning into organization management comprise of managing an advanced employer
rate of turnover, release of quality services for the customers, enlarge into profit margin as well
as lessening of inventory reduction. Productivity should be improved within the supermarket
which is found on superior performance of employee dependent relative on the various
leadership styles. The employees are required to develop of belief as well as esteem towards the
leader and it wills to present of unpredicted behaviour to implement the expectations of leader.
The employees are accepted a good leadership as well as support from their manger and also
supervisor, when it helps them to obtain any decisions. From the entire study, it is analyzed that
the employee retention is higher in case of transactional leadership as comparison to the
transformational leadership.

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ANALYZING THE LEADERSHIP ISSUES IN WOOLWORTHS LIMITED
Management anticipation means the leaders are taking of accurate actions when there is
no manage over the situations. The leaders should have expectation behaviour. According to the
Theory X and theory Y, the employees of Woolworths Limited should offer with financial
incentives so that they should be stimulated to work. As under this theory, it is supposed that the
employees are lazy as well as they are not attracted to work. On the other hand, Herzberg
hygienic factor, it provides a chance to accomplish of the organizational goals, appreciation of
assistances of the workers, supplier of responsibilities to the workers as well as staffs and
provided of opportunities to increase of competitive advantage all through the internal
promotions.
8.0 Conclusion and Recommendations
8.1 Conclusion
It is concluded that a successful working environment is characterized by an open
communication at all the levels. An effective manager should always motivate as well as inspire
the staffs on individual basis. The management of Woolworths should identify the requirements
of their employees and identify the motivational factors. The supermarket is delayed into
entering of convenience stores sector as well as set up of their online operations in selling of
food due to lack of leadership skills. The management of the supermarket should start an
incentive method in which the performance of employees is guided. The staff members should
have authority to take possible steps to empower their jobs. Different leaders have different
leadership style. The leaders should have authority to take possible decisions regarding the sake
of the organization. The study is being focused on explore of different leadership styles into
Woolworths to stimulate the performance of employees. It includes of execution of various

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ANALYZING THE LEADERSHIP ISSUES IN WOOLWORTHS LIMITED
duties, meeting the work deadlines and achievement of organizational goals. From the research
methodology, it is observed that secondary data analysis method is used to gather data and
information. The data provides that each planner should come up with different strategies and
plans that will strategically position within highly competitive and complex business
environments.
8.2 Recommendations
Following are some of the recommendations that are suggested to implement a good
leadership style into Woolworths Limited:
Implement of transactional leadership: Woolworths should empower towards
transactional leadership style to motivate their employees. The leaders are concerned on the
achieving of the goals. The employees are being rewarded through incentive methods to
accomplish of the tasks. The leaders are more concerned towards the finish of the task as well as
best performance of employees. Proper leadership style should help to motivate the employees in
their job.
More employee empowerment: There should be an increase into employee empowerment
by development of the teams and measurement of power as well as authority to the employees.
Therefore, the employees should ignite of the potentials; feel part of the organization and provide
of maximum performance into the organizations.

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ANALYZING THE LEADERSHIP ISSUES IN WOOLWORTHS LIMITED
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