Group Leadership

Carron has already stressed the importance of leadership in developing team cohesion (see post 'Group Cohesion'), and it’s also an extremely important factor in team success.  The leader of a group will ‘influence other members of their sporting organisation regarding the selection and attainment of that group’s goals’ (Chandler et al, 2007), in other words they influence the behaviour, and direction and intensity of their efforts.  So, what is it that makes a good leader?  Every leader has a different style of leadership, but they all possess certain characteristics making them respected.  A leader must have good communication skills, confidence, motivated, decisive, determined, and respect for other team members.  This therefore poses the question ‘are you born a leader’?

There are many theories considering leadership in sport, and the debate of state vs. trait has arisen once again.  Initially, research was focused on trait theories, as it was believed that people were born with characteristics that made them good leaders (such as the ones mentioned above) and they would be successful in every situation. But what are the chances of someone being able to lead a team in any given situation, and if it were true why isn’t everyone who has these qualities a leader?  Alternatively, behaviourists (or social learning) believe that leadership is a learnt quality through observation and reciprocation.  The interactionist approach combines both trait and social approaches.  It states that even though leaders are born certain trait making them an ideal leader, they also learn how to be successful from others. 

Not all leaders are successful, simply because they’re not compatible with the team, especially if they’re prescribed leaders.  Carron identified two types of leaders (1981): prescribed and emergent.  A prescribed leader is someone appointed to the position (for example, England football team manager), and an emergent leader is selected by the group once they have proven themselves.  The benefits of having a prescribed leader is that they usually have recognised experience and authority and are able to offer an alternative opinion viewing the situation objectively.  However, the leader may not know the group that well and they may find it difficult to be accepted if they’re disliked or viewed as a threat.  An emergent leader on the other hand will more popular and have the respect of the group already.  Being popular may be a downfall though as it may mean they’re not the best leader, and after a while they may become disliked once they have a position of authority. 

Styles of leadership can be measured on continuums based on their ‘decision making style (autocratic vs. democratic)… and leadership orientation (task-oriented vs. person-oriented)’ (Chandler et al, 2007).  Autocratic leaders make decisions independently without consulting the team and focus on the task, which is beneficial when a decision is needed urgently or the team is large in number.  Democratic leaders on the other hand listen to the opinions of the group and make decisions based on this.  Similar to autocratic leaders, task-oriented leaders are focussed on being successful at the task and display a good knowledge of the sport.  Person-oriented leaders however are concerned more with the well-being of the team and getting the best from each member.  All of these styles of leadership are successful in different situations dependent on the team.  For example, autocratic leadership would be needed if taking a group rock climbing because the situation is dangerous.

Fiedler believed that the type of leadership needed was dependent upon the favourableness of the situation.  Favourableness is measured by leader-member relations, task structure, and leaders position power (MindTools, n.d.).  In a favourable situation the leader would have a strong position in the team, the task would be well structured, and the leader would have a positive and trusting relationship with team members.  In an unfavourable situation the leaders position would be weak, the task structure would be vague, and the relations between leader and team members would be hostile.  Fiedler stated that autocratic task-oriented leaders are best suited to both favourable and unfavourable situations, and democratic person-oriented leaders are best suited to moderately favourable situations.  This is known as Fiedlers Contingency Theory.  It also uses a measure of personality which predisposes a person to have a task or person oriented leadership style, meaning they can only lead in certain situations, which is not necessarily correct as leaders can change for the situation. 

The other most widely used model of leadership is Chelladurai’s Multi-Dimensional Theory (1978).  He categorised the factors that affect leadership into three antecedents: situational characteristics, leader characteristics and member characteristics. 

These antecedents would then determine a further three things from the leader: required behaviour, actual behaviour and preferred behaviour.  Required behaviour is what the leader must do in a certain situation, actual behaviour is what they actually do (determined by their characteristics and experience in a similar situation), and preferred behaviour is how the team desire the leader to behave.  If all of these conditions occur at the same time then performance will increase.  The diagram below explains how the antecedents influence the leaders behaviour, and the consequences that follow:

Picture taken from: http://sportpsychmovies.wikispaces.com/A+League+of+Their+Own+-+MultiDimensional++Model+of+Leadership+in+Sport

So, let’s conclude.  There are many factors which determine successful leadership, not only the leaders traits but also their experience, leadership style (Fiedler), the situation and the characteristics of the group (Chelladurai).  We’ve also found that certain types of leadership are more successful in specific situations dependant on the task and leader-group relations.  For example, a dictator would be more successful when the team aren’t entirely sure what they’re doing and show little respect for their leader.  Finally, we’ve found that performance is best when the leader can act in a way that is both desired by the group and needed by the situation.

Bibliography

Gill, A. (2012) Cohesion and Development [Presentation] Sport Psychology, HND Sport Coaching, Chesterfield College, December.

References Leadership

 

123HelpMe.com (n.d.) Leadership in Sports [online] available from: http://www.123helpme.com/view.asp?id=148576 [Accessed 29^th December]

Chandler, T., Cronin, M., Vamplew, W. (2007) Sport and Physical Education: The Key Concepts (2^nd Ed.) Routledge: Oxon

 

MindTools (n.d.) Fiedler’s Contingency Model [online] http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/fiedler.htm[Accessed 29th December]