Leadership Challenges and Theoretical Frameworks: A Case Study Report

This report analyzes a case study involving a manufacturing company in Singapore, where the project manager's leadership style significantly impacted team performance and morale. The initial lack of clear goals and roles led to conflicts and inefficiency, while the subsequent rigid, production-focused approach, implemented after a warning from top management, resulted in increased injuries and decreased effectiveness. The report applies two theoretical frameworks: the behavioral approach, which examines the leader's impact on employee performance by balancing people and production concerns, and the team leadership theory, which emphasizes distributed leadership and trust. The analysis highlights the shortcomings of both leadership styles and suggests improvements, emphasizing the need for a more balanced approach that fosters trust, participation, and clear communication to enhance team efficiency and mitigate negative consequences for stakeholders. The report concludes by discussing the external and internal environmental factors that influenced the situation.

PART 1:
I worked in the manufacturing company of the Singapore for two months in order to get some
experience during my holiday breaks. The company was used to manufacture engineered
products and the company had expertise in die casting of the aluminum, molding of the plastic
injection and the stamping of deep drawn metal. The company was opening a new plant near the
existing one, and I was appointed as the assistant manager of the project manager who was
looking for the new project. The team was made which was led by the project manager, but he
didn't have great qualities of leadership like he didn’t clearly define the goals and roles to the
team. The team members were well trained and efficient. There were commitment and team
spirit among the team members. The team members knew very well that how the weaknesses of
the employees can be converted into the strengths. But they were not getting the complete
support from the project manager. The project manager took the things very lightly and relied on
the top management completely, and because of this, the conflicts started rising among the team
members as the goals were not clear and there was chaos among the team as they didn't know
who will perform which task. They were not getting proper orders in order to execute the things.
Being an individual, I was so much annoyed as there were conflict and chaos among the team
members. The time and resources were getting wasted. The project manager was not doing
anything in order to improve the functioning of the team. The top managers conducted a meeting
when they came to know about the behavior of project manager. During the meeting, the
manager was given the warning to perform his job well otherwise he would be terminated. The
project manager took the warning so seriously that he started treating his employees and the team
like machines and he used to supervise them very closely. The team members were not supposed
to take any single decision without consulting the project manager. The procedures, rules, and

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standards became very rigid, and because of this, the team was not able to work efficiently and
effectively. The number of injuries and accidents increased at the site because the team was
working more than the desired number of hours. As a result, the company incurred losses and
were blamed about the safety of the team.
PART 2:
The two theoretical frameworks which have been used in order to analyze the above-given
situation are as follows:
 Behavioral approach-
This approach mainly focuses on the leader’s behavior and how the employee’s performance
gets impacted by the behavior of the leader (Chemers, M. 2014. This approach shows that how
the leader balances his behavior towards people and production in order to increase efficiency
and effectiveness. The behavioral approach also states that the leader encourages his team to
participate in the decision-making process in order to build a good relation with them and the
employees feel encouraged and motivated and this result in maximizing the productivity (Chiu et
al., 2016).
The good point of the project manager who has been treated as the protagonist for this case is
that he was production centered after the warning was given to him. As he had very rigid rules
and procedures for the team, he had closed supervision, concerned about the work and
maximizing the profits in order to increase the business value. This increased the productivity to
some extent. The bad point of the protagonist of this case is that he was not maintaining a
balance between the relationship and task behavior. The team was treated as machines, and the
orders were imposed on them. As a result, they were forced to work more than the desired hours,

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and this reduced their efficiency. The problem could have been solved if there was the
establishment of the comfortable environment of working and the trust was developed among the
team and the protagonist. The team should have been a given a chance to participate in the
decision-making process in order to show their skills and capabilities. The problem was that the
efficiency was minimized among the team members, the protagonist should have immediately
taken action in order to balance the relationship and task behavior. The problem had impacted
some stakeholders in unfavorable consequences but was favorable to others as the behavior of
the protagonist was production centered, and the productivity was increased to some extent
which was better than before. The external and internal environment were affecting the
stakeholders and protagonist because the resources were getting wasted and there was a
continuous pressure from the top management in order to complete the project timely and
effectively.
 Team leadership theory-
The team leadership theory states the maximization of the effectiveness of the team through
distributed and shared leadership which has no conflict and have more trust among the team and
the leader (Miner, J. B. 2015). The leadership theory includes two types of interventions i.e.
internal and external. The internal includes participative decision making, clarification of the
goals, mentoring, building trust and commitment, etc. The external includes sharing of
information, negotiation, etc. The theory states that the effective leader is the one who observes
and monitors his team, decides whether the intervention of the task and role is required or not
(Hoch et al., 2014).
The bad point of the protagonist (project manager) was that he never led his team in order to
build trust as he didn't want to develop a relationship with the team and there was distributed and

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shared leadership among the team because they were frustrated by the project manager's attitude.
It was very important for the project manager to take the good decision in order to improve the
functioning of the team and this would have increased the effectiveness and productivity to a
great extent. The problem could have been solved if the protagonist showed the true skills of the
leader by clearly identifying the roles, treated the team members as humans and tried to build a
positive relation with them. This would have increased the efficiency of the team members. The
problem impacted the stakeholders in unfavorable consequences to some extent as the employees
were getting injured due to long working hours as this incurred losses to the company. The
external and internal environment were affecting the protagonist and stakeholders because the
time and money were getting wasted and the losses were incurred as the employees were getting
injured and the protagonist was not getting a support of the top management and his team.

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REFERENCES
Chemers, M. (2014). An integrative theory of leadership. Psychology Press.
Chiu, C. C., Owens, B. P., & Tesluk, P. E. (2016). Initiating and Utilizing Shared Leadership in
Teams: The Role of Leader Humility, Team Proactive Personality, and Team Performance
Capability. The Journal of applied psychology.
Hoch, J. E., & Kozlowski, S. W. (2014). Leading virtual teams: Hierarchical leadership,
structural supports, and shared team leadership. Journal of applied psychology, 99(3), 390.
Miner, J. B. (2015). Organizational behavior 1: Essential theories of motivation and leadership.
Routledge.