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2.2 Contingency theories of leadership style (Fred Fiedler)
According to Fiedler (cited in Bolden, Gosling, Marturano & Dennison, 2003)., there is no single characteristic or trait that will create a successful leadership style. Rather, he argues that situations actually shape a general leadership style of a manager. Bolden, Gosling, Marturano and Dennison (2003) have observed that within an environment with repetitive tasks, the most effective leadership style might be a directive one, while a participative leadership style might be required in a dynamic environment. Being an effective leader means to control important specific situations. Taking into account these situations, Fiedler presented three situational components that are considered essential for an effective leadership: leader-member relations, task-structure and position power.
A. Leader-member relations, which focuses on the relationships between the leader and his/her followers (Verkerk, 1990).
B. Task structure refers to the degree of structuring the working environment (highly or fairly structured).
C. Position power which refers to the amount of authority of a manager (Bolden, Gosling, Marturano & Dennison, 2003).
Fiedler developed the least-preferred co-worker (LPC)
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questionnaire in order to measure leadership style which has 18 pairs of contrasting adjectives (see Figure 1). Figure 1 from “A theory of Leadership Effectiveness” by Professor F.E. Fiedler. © 1967. Reproduced with permission from Professor F.E. Fiedler. 2.2.1 Jeff Bezos in correspondence with Fred Fiedler theory - Low LPCs (task-orientated) For anyone familiar with the contingency theory developed by Fiedler, it is clear that Bezos is a task orientated leader or a transactional one, as some people name the task-oriented leaders. Such a leader focuses on rigorous standards being less interested in the relationships with followers and their opinions. It is an effective style for achieving operational goals and outcomes and creating business opportunities that thrive in the era of global competition. The example provided Bezos has LPCs characteristics in conducting Amazon.com (http://www.adviseamerica.com/jeff-bezos-leadership-style/ ). 1.
Bezos believes in the value of customer satisfaction and this is the Amazon.com main objective. A huge number of measurable goals are used to track the rate of how Amazon performs and wishes to perform. Not surprisingly, an astonishing eighty percent of those goals are related to the satisfaction of the customer. Bezos primarily concern is improving the performance of the organization and customer service. Personnel issues are given secondary importance and attention. As Stone has emphasized (2013), Kim Rachmeler , who worked for Amazon.com for more than a decade, affirm that “This is not somebody who takes pleasure at tearing someone a new a--hole. He is not that kind of person. Jeff doesn’t tolerate
stupidity”. 2. As far as the customer satisfaction is concerned, Bezos always keeps an empty chair during staff meetings. His gesture aims to remind employees of the importance of the customer service. 3. The leadership style employed by Bezos has been generally described as eccentric. His eccentric leadership style is usually exemplified by the use the use of drones in delivering services.
Almost twenty years ago, an individual named Jeff Bezos had a vision. He saw financial potential with the growth of the internet. He wanted to change the ways of retail commerce in a way that had never been done before. Amazon began as a vision and was born in Jef...
The situational leadership theory states that leaders use different styles and strategies depending on the situation. There are two models that support this theory. The Fiedler’s Contingency Model of Leadership Effectiveness states that an “effective leadership occurs only when there is an ideal match between the leader’s style and the group’s work situation” (pg
Rost, J.C. (1991). Leaders and Followers are the People in this Relationship. In Wren, J.T. (Ed.). (1995). The Leader’s Companion (pp. 189-192). New York: Simon & Schuster.
Amazon is best known for their kindle, fast shipping, and selling various products (Smith). With Amazon being such a large corporation, professionalism, academics, character, and engagement are crucial parts of the success of the company. Professionalism: Amazon has grown to become the largest internet-based retailer in the world by total sales. It began as primarily an online bookstore and soon began to sell more and more electronics and then over time began to sell pretty much anything. In 1998, Amazon earned about $0.6 billion, which held steady growth from 1998-2006 (“Amazon.com”).
Jeff Bezo’s began Amazon in his garage in July 1995 with three Sun workstations setting on wooden doors for tables and extension cords running from everywhere (Academy of Achievement, 2010). Right from the beginning he was a visionary leaving his well paying job as a senior vice president with D. E. Shaw to begin Amazon.com (Academy of Achievement, 2010). Being the visionary that he is he saw an opportunity prompted by the huge growth rate of internet use in a single year and ran with it never looking back. Jeff realized that the internet had “no real commerce to speak of” so he began researching possible businesses (Academy of Achievement, 2010). “After reviewing 20 mail order businesses and deciding which could be conducted more efficiently over the internet than by traditional means he decided on books” (Academy of Achievement, 2010). He thought books were perfect because attempting to send huge catalogs for all the available books would be expensive and cumbersome, but an online resource database that was easy to navigate would provide customers with easy access and a single point from which to shop. “In 30 days, with no press, Amazon had sold books in all 50 states and 45 foreign countries, obviously by the success of Amazon he was right (Academy of Achievement, 2010). In a case study written by Javad Kargar called “Amazon.com in 2003” he stated that “Amazon's online store was a big hit, with about $5 million in the first year of operations” (2004). This huge success so quickly would have confirmed for Jeff that his idea was viable and drove him to continue to strive for more. Jeff Bezo’s charismatic-visionary leadership is the key to his and Amazon’s success.
Launched by Jeff Bezos, the Amazon.com website started in 1995 and is today considered as one of the most prominent retail website on the internet with a record turnover of US$ 14.87 billion in 2007. Jeff Bezos’s intention was to create an internet based company with the most dedicated product portfolio on the internet where customers could find anything they might want. Amazon’s success is based on technology, services and products (Jens et al., 2003).
Customer service is paramount at Amazon and Bezos consistently reminds employees that their focus needs to consider the impact and feeling of the consumer. He is known to be an outside the box thinking daring to be bold and go against the norm. Utilizing drones to reduce delivery times while minimizing costs display Bezos focus on customers and stakeholders (Amazon Prime Air, n.d.). Bezos is a task-oriented transactional leader, who Brad Stone in his book “The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon”, described Bezos as a micromanager who does not value the opinion of his employees (Stone, 2013). These individuals excel in achieving goals and positive outcomes but need improvement in human relations. Bezos tends to be bold and brash and not warm and fuzzy, and empathy is a critical component to others buying into your vision (Schwartz, 2015). He often becomes frustrated at his employees and berates them publicly; an unusual approach for an individual who built an amazing company. A company built on fear and stress looks beautiful from the outside but internally could quickly collapse if Bezos does not address his communications approach. Corporate culture is vital to the long-term future of business and Bezos needs to recognize how he leads the internal customer will translate over to the external consumer. Managing through fear and
Bezos’ vision and mission statement for Amazon is “Our vision is to be earth 's most customer centric company; to build a place where people can come to find and discover anything they might want to buy online.” For the most part, this vison has been achieved, Amazon is the “top revenue maker in online retail worldwide” and is geared towards giving consumers the ability to find what they want on their marketplace site. In 2014, Amazon’s mission statement was changed “To be Earth’s most customer-centric company, where customers can find and discover anything they might want to buy online, and endeavors to offer its customers the lowest possible prices.” This was due to Amazon’s expansion of their range of consumers from only customers to customers,
Fiedler’ model is considered the first highly visible theory to present the contingency approach. It stated that effective groups depend on a proper match between a leader’s style of interacting with subordinates and the degree to which the situation gives control and influence to the leader (Fiedler, 1967). Fiedler argued that the leadership style could be indentified by taking a Least Preferred Co-worker (LPC) questionnaire he designed. When evaluating a least enjoyed co-worker, a relationship oriented leader scores high in LPC, while a task oriented leader scores low. Fiedler identified three contingency or situational dimensions: leader-member relations, task structure, and position power. A leader will have more control if he has better leader-member relations, high structured job, and stronger position power. The task-oriented leaders perform best in situations of high and low control, while relationship-oriented leaders perform best in moderate control situations. Feedler views an individual’s leadership style as fixed. To assure leader effectiveness, either situation needs to change to fit the leader or the leader needs to be replaced to fit the situation. But in reality, a leader can not use a homogeneous style to treat all their followers in a similar fashion in their work unit (Robbins & Judge, 2011, p. 382).
Amazon is one of the largest brands in the world, reporting $23.18 billion in sales last quarter. They operate with a customer-first mentality. This is clear in their mission statement, which is as follows: “We seek to be Earth’s most customer-centric company for four primary customer sets: consumers, sellers, enterprises, and content creators (Amazon).” Amazon’s CEO, Jeff Bezos seeks to bring the highest quality products and most efficient services to their customers. According to critics of Amazon, Bezos’ goals have lent themselves to a
I find this to be very accurate, both in relation to my Leadership Assessment Quiz and Power Orientation test results as well as my own personal stance on leadership and power. Power is defined as “a person, group, or nation having great influence or control over others,” (Moore, 1996, p. 837), whereas leadership is seen as the ability of one who leads or inspires. The notable difference between the two, being “control” and “inspire.”
A usual work day at Amazon is busy with non-stop problem-solving and process improvement. The pace is quick and the work challenging. Organizational discipline, time-management skills and the ability to dive into something without a clear solution, in order to determine the best way forward are necessary qualities for a successful employee. Bezos has often been criticized for his unusual leadership style but more often praised on his ingenuity in the growth of Amazon. His leadership style is said to be unconventional, and sometimes ruthless. With a clear focus on where he is going, he micromanages his team. He has a history of managing his team in an autocratic manner within a closed systems approach. Open systems theory
When Amazon.com first began in 1995, as strictly a book retailer, Bezos knew he had discovered an excellent company. After all, a physical bookstore cannot stock anywhere close to the number of books Amazon can offer online. Within a year, the company had a customer base of approximately 340,000 consumers and daily site visits were huge as well. But Bezos wanted to expand the company to offer music and DVDs, because he realized there was little or no barrier of entry. In the next years Amazon would emerge as a marketplace, expanding the company globally offering products from toys to kitchenware. Because of the relatively cheap prices Amazon was offering and also the growing number of online shoppers, the company was doing tremendous amounts of sales and creating profits.
Amazon’s also tried to spearhead the industry by introducing the customer-pleasing traits in terms of the technology, order fulfillment and retailing strategies categori...
...adership Practices in Relation to Productivity and Morale." In D. Cartwright and A. Zander, Group Dynamics: Research and Theory, 2nd ed. (Elmsford, NY: Row, Paterson, 1960)