Fiedler's Contingency Theory

This report covers Fiedler's contingency theory of leadership and its application in different organizational contexts. It discusses the assumptions, views, and critiques of the theory. It also explores the usefulness and relevance of the theory in today's workplace. Examples of its application in different workplaces are provided, along with recommendations for effective leadership.

FIEDLER'S CONTINGENCY
THEORY

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................3
Brief background of the theory ..............................................................................................3
State the assumption of fielder leadership theory ..................................................................4
Explain other views and critiques about the theory................................................................5
Determine how useful and relevant the theory is in today’s workplace.................................5
Determines example of how the theory is applicable or not in different workplace today in
positive or negative views .....................................................................................................6
Your recommendation on key finding of the report and highlight the future usefulness or
applicability of the theory.......................................................................................................7
Recommendations:.................................................................................................................7
CONCLUSION ...............................................................................................................................8
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................9

INTRODUCTION
This report covers Fiedler's leadership theory which is a management theory helped in the
workplaces in order to direct all the employees towards a particular direction to achieve
organisational objectives (Shao, Feng and Hu, 2016). This report cover that how fiedler's theory
of leadership is used in different organisational context (Suharyanto and Lestari, 2020), the
assumptions of the theory, views and critiques in different organisational events,
recommendation in fiedler's contingency theory in order to achieve organisational objectives
(Sofijanova and et.al., 2016). It defines that leaders can be effective to different organisational
situations (Ayman and Lauritsen, 2018).
MAIN BODY
Brief background of the theory
Fiedler's contingency model is coined by Fred Fiedler who was a psychologist in mid
1960's it was in the field of management. This is theory determines the role and effectiveness of
the leader in an organisation (Vance, 2020). Feidler's believed that leadership styles are learned
from experiences which are difficult to change according to the situations (Shao, Feng and Hu,
2016). Fiedler's leadership theories coined round that the leadership style is fixed. In feidler's
leadership style thee are two leadership styles these are leadership style n situational
adorableness. This theory revolves around defining that how leaders in the workplaces can
improve the efficiencies while performing different organisational activities. It helps to the
leaders to formulate best decisions that suits different organisational events (Sofijanova and et.al.,
2016). Its is the situational theory which defines that leader in an organisation leader through
experiences and thus which results in difficulty to change the behaviour of the leaders. Fiedler's
leadership theory revolves around the personality of the leaders and degree to which the leaders
in the workplaces behaves of different situation in the workplace. It min focuses on the
behaviour of leaders in different business events that how the leader motivates and encourage the
employees in the workplace. The way leader interacts with the employees influences them to
work efficiently (Bello, 2015). This model states that it is segmented in two factors which are
leadership style and situational favourableness.
Leadership styles

It involves determining the leadership styles of the leaders that how much a leader
interacts with the employees in the workplace. Leader measures effectiveness of the leaders in
the work-place with relation to the interaction of the leaders with the employees, effectiveness in
order to accomplish different assigned task (Yazdanmehr, Ramezani and Aghdassi, 2020). The
scale is called as the least preferred co workers scale. Leaders with high Least preferred co
worker scale are highly efficient or vice versa. Leader makes this scale by own in order to
calculate the efficiencies (Singh and Ramdeo, 2020). Task oriented leaders score less in LPC as
all they focuses to complete specific task while building relationship with employees in the
organisation (Turner and Baker, 2018). Whereas leaders who score more in the scale are more
oriented to building relationship with the employees as they focus on completing the building
employee relationship and engagement, they believe that when employees re fully satisfied in the
organisation it helps to increase the efficiencies of the work in the organisation (Boehe, 2016).
Situational favourableness
Situation favourableness to different particular situation depends factors such as:
Leader member relations: Leaders member relations is defined by the relationship between the
leaders and employees for accomplishing organisational objectives (O'Higgins and Thevissen,
2017). When there is good relationship between leaders and employees it helps to develop
effective communication which further adds to achieve productivity and efficiency for achieving
organizational objectives (Suharyanto and Lestari, 2020).
Task structure: Task structure is defined by the structure of task, it should be framed easy by
avoiding unnecessary complication and steps to maintain the order of performing the task
(Gürlek and Çemberci, 2020). Leaders develops the structure of the task in order to implement
the goals and objectives of the organisation (Matthews, Daigle and Houston, 2018).
Leader's position power: It is defined by the amount of power a leaders uses to directs its
employees, leaders also set punishments and rewards in accordance to the performances of the
employees (Bratton, 2020).
State the assumption of fielder leadership theory
The basic assumption in fiedler's leadership theory is s follows:
 It cannot change in accordance to different organisational situations, thus leaders
behaviour is fixed and does not changes to different situation.
 Leaders behaviour remain fixed in different organisational situations.

 Business environment is dynamic (Vance, 2020).
Explain other views and critiques about the theory
The views and critiques about the theory are as:
It is found that fiedler's contingency theory does not go well to different organisational situations
where leaders are unable to adapt to changes in accordance to business events (Jiang, Bohle and
Roche , 2019). Least preferred co-worker (LPC) falls short to address the personality traits of the
leaders. The theory does not completely defines the companion of low LPC and high LPC
(Olanrewaju and et.al., 2020). The other critiques of contingency fiedler's theory that it opposes
to the basic assumption that experienced leaders are better than any experiences and intelligent
leaders (Yazdanmehr, Ramezani and Aghdassi, 2020).
Determine how useful and relevant the theory is in today’s workplace
Fiedler's Contingency theory defines the role of different leaders in the workplace, it determines
that how different leaders in the workplaces learns through different organisational experiences and
learnings and directs and guides employees in order to acquire organisational objectives (Conger, 2015).
Different benefits of fiedler's contingency theory is discussed below:
Decision making
Fiedler's contingency helps the leaders to formulate decision regarding different business events.
Where leaders makes decision regarding for strategic planning to implement these organisational
objectives (Eggleton, 2020).
Critical thinking
With the helps of contingency fiedler's theory it determines different styles and theories which
gives a basis of the leaders in order to critically think of different business events ( Beqiri, Dauti and
Mazreku, 2019).
Problem solving abilities
Leaders in the workplaces can find different solutions for the identified organizational problems.
Leaders through different experiences analyses the organisational situations and challenges which helps
in developing the solution by responding to different organization events (Harrison, 2017).
Communication
Leaders makes team where they assign different duties ad roles to the employees in the
organisation. Whee leaders effective communication of the employees in the organisation. Through the
helps of friedler contingency determines the communication of leaders with the employees in the
workplace, where h communication with employees are good or poor (Uhl-Bien and Arena, 2018).

Determines example of how the theory is applicable or not in different workplace today in
positive or negative views
Marks and Spencer uses the fiedler's contingency theory for implementing different
leadership approaches in the organisation (Nkolimwa, Jani and Dominic, 2020). Marks and Spencer
is an multinational organisation based out of UK, which renders consumer durable goods and
services. The goods and services of marks and Spencer involves apparels, food product, banking
services. In order to achieve organisational efficiencies in the global market (Fiedler, 2015). It
recruits highly talented employees in the workforce, the major job of the organisation is to
maintain the workforce of the employees, managers in the workplace deploys leaders in order to
control and monitors the performances of the employees (Ivanoska, Markovic and Sardzoska, 2019).
Where leaders follows fiedler's contingency approaches in order direct the employees in the
organisation towards particular direction to achieve organisational objectives (Bax, 2019).
Marks and Spencer practices fiedler's contingency theory in the following ways:
Leaders in the Marks and Spencer follows both relationship management and task
oriented leadership style in order to accomplish organisational objectives. Relationship
management helps to build a strong relationship between both leaders and employees in the
organisation. Employee relationship helps to develop employee engagement in organisation
which increases employee contribution in the organisation (Mokhtar and et.al., 2019). Where
employees feels satisfied in the organisation they are more likely to retain in the organisation
contributing to achieve organisational objective (Johnson, 2021). Whereas, work oriented
leadership styles helps to accomplish organisational objectives with easy accomplishment of
different task. Managers in Marks and Spencer deploy leaders to each team. Leaders following
the task oriented leadership approaches helps delegates different task to each individuals in the
workplace in order to meet the deadlines and standards of the task. Leaders also keeps incentives
and punishments systems in order to motivate employees to work better (Noor, Som and
Mohamad, 2018). Practising the theory in the workplaces determines that how effectively leaders
contributes for accomplishing organisational goals (Harrison, 2018). Leaders in Marks and
Spencer coordinates the group goals by achieving productivity in the performances. Following
fiedler's contingency theory shapes the behaviour of leader in a way which best suits different
business events. Where leaders formulates strategic decision and planning in order to different

business events. These decision helps to organisational activities in the systematic manner to
accomplish organisational objectives.
The negative impacts of fiedler's contingency theory in Marks and Spencer are as:
The major demerit of following fiedler's contingency theory is that it lacks flexibility in
leaders behaviour to different organisational situation. Where leaders following fiedler's
contingency theory are not able to new challenges in the business environment (Caulfield, 2018).
Where leaders learns from experiences, it becomes difficult to adapt to the changes in the
business environment (Safonov, Maslennikov and Lenska, 2018). Leaders with low LPC are highly
task oriented which lacks the employee engagement in the organisation in order and losses the
focuses to the employees from the work as employees feels demotivated that they are not valued
in the organisation, this increases the employee attrition in the workplace, whereas leaders with
high LPC supports to achieve employee relationship and engagement but fails to achieve
organisational goals and task in the workplace (Lepeyko and Ya, 2016).
Your recommendation on key finding of the report and highlight the future usefulness or
applicability of the theory.
Recommendations:
Fiedler's contingency model shows that a leader's effectiveness depends upon the quality
of interaction of employee orientation and three more variables which are related to the
followers, the tasks and the organization (Oc., 2018). The three additional variables are leader
member relations, task structure and leader position power. There are various recommendations
in order to become a good leader are-
 Be Assertive: An individual who possess the traits of being assertive, are very much
confident about their abilities. An assertive individual is confident and eliminates the
arrogance as a factor. A person who is confident in themselves will easily gain trust of
their colleagues and hence this inspires trust in your colleagues. An assertive leader has a
quality of directing and supporting the team effectively (Kim, 2019).
 Have integrity: A leader must abide by all the principles that guide their personality and
character. A leader who possess integrity as a skill can not compromised. One must
ensure the consistency of delivering high quality work along with following all the steps
in the procedures (Luu, Dinh and Qian, 2019).

 Emotional Intelligence: Emotional Intelligence is related to the level of understanding
one possess for their team and how they think. Emotional Intelligence is directly linked
with empathy. This helps an individual to relate to people in different situations and offer
solutions to the problems. This quality helps an individual to maintain a balance of their
emotions and hence leads to a better communicator (Rüzgar, 2018).
 Task Delegation: Task delegation is a strong recommendation for every leader. As
delegation of tasks creates a sense of responsibility and motivation in the subordinates.
Further one must closely supervise the team when the tasks are being performed and later
leaving them to complete the task on their own (Mendez, 2020). This shows that the team
requires less direction and support which empowers a team and builds their trust in their
leaders. Delegation also provides up the leader with extra time to indulge in important
tasks.
 Creativity: Creativity refers to the innovation which further has impact on growth and
development. Innovation is the crucial need of the present scenario. Organisations look
for individuals who can build new ideas which will result in better changes. Innovation
and creativity promotes effectiveness and efficiency in productivity. Thus, creativity as a
trait is highly recommended for a leader (Noekent and Kurniawan, 2020).
CONCLUSION
Fiedler's contingency theories are needed by the leader in order to achieve organisational
objectives. Fiedler's contingency approach helps the leader to conduct functioning and monitoring of
different business activities. It determines that how a leader should conduct direct the employees in a
particular direction to achieve the business success. It involves task oriented and employee relationship
building both ensures that how a leader should effectively communicate to the employees in the
workplace, it also defines that fiedler's leadership model is directly based on the leadership approaches
which depends on changing business environmental situations.

REFERENCES
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