It Depends: Situations and Flexible Leadership

Leadership depends. It depends on the situation. At least that is what situational models of leadership suggest.

Situational (or Contingency) models suggest that the type of leadership a leader adopts should reflect the context. So a leader would consider the nature of the task, the culture and objectives of the organization, the people and resources available, and the general environment when selecting their approach to leadership.

Leaders can select aversive, directive, transactional, transformational or empowering leadership approaches.  Ideally these approaches match the situation. For example, aversive or directive leadership styles have been shown to be counter-productive when the objective is to develop innovative products and services.

Situational theories suggest that effective leaders assess the situation and match their approaches to the situation. There are some underlying assumptions about situational leadership.  First it assumes that leaders are self-aware, that they understand and explicitly choose an approach to leading.  Although I can’t…