The Measure of a Leader: A Review of Theories About Leadership and a Methodology for Appraising Leader Effectiveness

By Robert I. Mann

What makes a great leader? Personality? A response to the demands of time and circumstance? Where is leadership located in modern organizations? Has it a place in the management of corporate enterprise? What contributes to a leaders control? These and many other questions are explores in the theoretical background of this work. An examination of twentieth century theories about the sources of personal powers, the social forces that enabled it, the psychological roots of leader relationships, the ingredients of leader style and quality, and the conduct identified as a leader behaviors is directed at identifying the measurable elements of this social phenomenon.

Three chapters document experimental attempts to analyse leader performance, recognizing form, style, and quality in quantifiable detail. The use of descriptive questionnaires as means of labeling leader performance and quantifying its characteristics provides definitive insights into the nature of this social phenomenon.

Finally a unique system for leader appraisal, the Leader Appraisal Questionnaire (LAQ), based upon sound theoretical principles and twenty years of experimental research with the questionnaire methodology, is detailed. This novel system, adaptable to all kinds of organizations and enterprises, provides a unique tool for leadership evaluation and development. Given that leadership is a primary consideration in all kinds o organizational pursuits, this book is a must for every major institutional ans corporate executive office, every government administration, institutions of higher learning and research, and any person who wishes to undertake and make success of a group enterprise.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Mar 26, 2013
• ISBN: 9781475967968

Robert I. Mann

Robert Mann’s engagement with leadership issues was a prime element in his career as a school teacher, secondary school principal, trainer of educational leaders, superintendent of schools, university professor, and consultant in organizational development. Augmenting this career was election to local government for twelve terms. Such involvement stimulated the writing of this book.

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Copyright © 2013 by Robert I. Mann.

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ISBN: 978-1-4759-6794-4 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4759-6795-1 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4759-6796-8 (ebk)

iUniverse rev. date: 03/12/2013

TABLE OF CONTENTS

FOREWORD

PART I: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

CHAPTER ONE: LEADER APPRAISAL – WHY AND HOW!

1.1 Why Appraise Leader Performance?

1.2 How Is Leader Performance To Be Appraised?

CHAPTER TWO: UNDERSTANDING WHAT LEADERSHIP IS

2.1 The Fundamental Nature of Leadership

2.2 Two Views of Organization

2.2.1 The Transcendent Formal Organization

2.2.2 Informal Organization – The Human Side of the Enterprise

2.3 The Locus of Leadership in Complex Organizations

2.3.1 Leadership – A Formal or Informal Element?

2.3.2 Leadership Defined by Organizational Structure

2.3.3 The Dictates of Formal Structure and Leader Effectiveness.

CHAPTER THREE: LEADER TRAIT THEORY

3.1 What Makes Leaders Effective?

3.2 The Role of Personality Traits in Leadership

3.2.1 The Basic Considerations of Leader Trait Theory

3.2.2 The Origins of Trait Theory

3.3 Leader Traits According to Modern Enthusiasts

3.3.1 Stephen Covey’s Teachings About Personal Effectiveness

3.3.2 Maxwell’s Laws of Leadership and Qualities of Leaders

3.3.3 The Importance of Traits to Leaders

3.4 Empirical Attempts at Uncovering Basic Leader Traits.

3.5 Traits, Intentions, and Performance.

3.6 Problems with the Trait Approach.

3.7 Leader Trait Theory, Conclusions.

CHAPTER FOUR: SITUATION AND LEADER EMPOWERMENT

4.1 The Social Forces and Circumstances Empowering Leaders

4.1.1 Do the Elements of his Situation Determine the Leader’s Effectiveness?

4.1.2 Social (Organizational) Climate

4.1.3 Motivational Needs

4.1.4 Group Maturity

4.1.5 The Motivational Dialectic

4.1.6 Structure; The Central Issue of Group Behaviour

4.1.7 Motivation and Leadership Strategy

4.1.8 Structure and Culture in Groups and Organizations

4.1.9 Some Summary Thoughts about ASituationist@ Arguments

4.1.10 Actual Cases of Leader Adaptation to ‘Situationist’ Imperatives

4.2 The Elements of Leadership

4.2.1 The Essence of the Phenomenon

4.2.2 Drayton Entertainment: A Case Study

4.2.2 The Integral Parts of the Social Mechanism

CHAPTER FIVE: SOCIAL CONTROL AND LEADERSHIP STYLE

5.1 Leadership as a Social Transaction

5.1.1 The Bond between Leader and Follower

5.1.2 Quality of Group Interaction

5.1.3 Sectors of Personality and Behaviour - Roots of Social Control

5.1.4 Good or Bad Leadership

5.1.5 Positive or Negative Leadership

5.1.6 Leaders and Social Control - Summary Considerations

5.2 Leadership Quality – Types of Social Control

5.2.1 Implications of Leadership Quality

5.2.2 Types of Social Control

5.2.3 Power

5.2.4 Authority

5.2.5 Charismatic Influence

5.2.6 The Reality of Social Control

5.3 Leader Style

5.3.1 Origins of the Concept of Style

5.3.2 Leadership Style Defined by Social Control

5.3.3 The Autocratic Leader

5.3.4 The Bureaucratic Leader

5.3.5 The Democratic Leader

5.3.6 The Charismatic Leader

5.3.7 The Laissez-Faire Leader

5.4 Leader Style – What Makes It Effective?

CHAPTER SIX: THE DELINEATION OF LEADER BEHAVIOUR

6.1 Identifying Leader Behaviour

6.2 Theory X and Theory Y

6.2.1 Theory X and Theory Y Assumptions

6.2.2 Theory X and Theory Y Leader Style and Dimensions of Behaviour

6.3 Contingency Theory

6.4 The Ohio State Studies

6.5 Path-Goal Leadership Theory

6.6 Managerial Grid Styles

6.6.1 Managerial Facades

6.6.2 Reddin’s Three-Dimensional Model

6.7 Situational Leadership Theory

6.8 Michigan State Studies

CHAPTER SEVEN: DESCRIBING LEADER BEHAVIOUR

7.1 The Problems of Definition

7.2 The Anatomy of Leadership Phenomena

7.3 The Identification of Leader Behaviour in the Anatomy of Leadership

7.4 Dimensions of Leader Behaviour

7.5 Leader Behaviour - Dimensions and Style

7.5.1 Interpersonal Dimension of Leader Behaviour

7.5.2 Organizing Dimension of Leader Behaviour

7.5.3 The Argument for an Adaptive (Competency) Dimension

7.5.4 The Leadership vs. Management Controversy

7.6 Indications for Leader Assessment

PART II: PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS OF RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT IN LEADERSHIP THEORY

CHAPTER EIGHT: OHIO STATE FOCUS ON LEADER BEHAVIOUR

8.1 What a Leader Does To Be a Leader

8.2 The Development of the Leader Behaviour Description Questionnaire

8.2.1 Composition of the LBDQ

8.2.2 Behaviour Dimensions

8.2.3 Matrix Presentation of LBDQ Scores

8.2.4 LBDQ Matrix Assessment of Leaders

8.2.5 Ideal LBDQ Scores

8.3 Are the Limitations of LBDQ Critical to its Value?

CHAPTER NINE: THE LBDQ AS A LEADER ASSESSMENT INSTRUMENT

9.1 Modification of the LBDQ in a Subsequent Study

9.2 Results of the London-Oxford County Assessment of Secondary School Principals:

9.3 The London-Oxford Study: Implications for the LBDQ as an Assessment Instrument

9.3.1 Mean Actual Scores Defining the LBDQ Quadrants

9.3.2 The Role of Ideal Scores

9.3.3 The Concept of Domain of Leader Effectiveness

9.3.4 The Domain of Ideal Leader Behaviour:

Does It Provide Measures of Effectiveness?

9.3.5 Developing Ideal Performance

Based Criteria (IPBC) of Effectiveness

CHAPTER TEN: CASE STUDIES: THE LBDQ AS A DIAGNOSTIC TOOL

10.1 Leader Assessment – A Choice of Standards:

10.2 A Follow-up Assessment Employing Both Actual Performance Comparative Criteria and Ideal Performance Based Criteria

10.3 The School Superintendent

10.4 The Principal in Difficulty

10.5 The Director of Nursing

10.6 The Humpty-Dumpty Factor

10.7 Principal PrRM, 1982

10.8 Is the LBDQ Adaptable to Traditional Leader Styles?

PART III: LEADER APPRAISAL

CHAPTER ELEVEN: THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE LEADER APPRAISAL QUESTIONNAIRE

11.1 Transforming the Questionnaire Technique:

11.2 The Rewording of Leader Behaviour Descriptors:

11.3 Aspects of Leadership Examined in the Leader Appraisal Questionnaire

11.3.1 Dimensions of Leader Behaviour

11.3.2 Converting Questionnaire Responses to Measures of Leader Behaviour

11.3.3 The Issue of Leader Control

11.3.4 Converting Questionnaire Responses to an

Indicator of Leader Control

11.3.5 The Leader=s Impact upon the Organization

11.3.6 Converting Questionnaire Responses to a

Measure of Leader Impact

11.4 Completing the Leader Appraisal Questionnaire:

CHAPTER TWELVE: PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL FOR LEADERS (PAL) – A COMPREHENSIVE EVALUATION

12.1 Leader Appraisal – Who Needs It?

12.2 The Basic Instrument of Performance Appraisal for Leaders (PAL)

12.3 Systematic Procedures of Performance Appraisal for Leaders (PAL)

12.3.1 The Pre-Appraisal Consultation

12.3.2 Administering the Leader Appraisal Questionnaire (LAQ)

12.3.3 Scoring the Questionnaires

12.3.4 Two Approaches to Performance Appraisal

12.4 The Summative Appraisal

12.4.1 The Importance of the Concept of Domain

12.4.2 Rating Dimensions of Behaviour and the Quality of Leader Control

12.4.3 Standards for Summative Appraisal - Leader Behaviour

12.4.4 Identifying the Quality of Leader Control

12.4.5 Evaluating the Leader’s Impact

12.4.6 Summative Appraisals - Graphic Presentation

12.5 Formative Appraisal

12.5.1 Interpretive Parameters for Formative Appraisal

12.5.2 The Dimension or Descriptor Set Profile - The Basic Tool of the Formative Process

12.6 Compiling the Appraisal Report:

12.7 The Critical Importance of the Formative Appraisal:

12.8 Accomplishments of the PAL System:

12.9 A Concluding Overview:

BIBLIOGRAPHY

APPENDICES

- THE LEADER APPRAISAL QUESTIONNAIRE

1. Leader Appraisal Questionnaire (Form M) – Interpersonal Behaviour Dimension Scale

2. Leader Appraisal Questionnaire (Form M) – Organizing Behaviour Dimension Scale

3. Leader Appraisal Questionnaire (Form M) – Strategic Behaviour Dimension Scale

4. Leader Appraisal Questionnaire – Quality (and Style) of Leadership Control Scale

5. Leader Appraisal Questionnaire – Impact of Leadership Scale

ILLUSTRATIONS

Location in Manuscript

Chapter Section

"Upon the king! Let us our lives, our souls,

Our debts, our careful wives,

Our children, and our sins, lay on the king!

We must bear all. O hard condition!

Twin-borne with greatness, subject to the breath

Of every fool, whose sense no more can feel

But his own wringing. What infinite heart’s ease

Must kings neglect that private men enjoy!

And what have kings that privates have not too,

Save ceremony, save general ceremony?

And what art thou, thou idle ceremony?

What kind of god art thou, that suffer’st more

Of mortal griefs than do thy worshipers?"

"O ceremony! Show me but thy worth.

What is thy soul of adoration?

Art thou aught else but place, degree, and form,

Creating awe and fear in other men?

Wherein thou art less happy, being feared,

Than they in fearing.

What drink’st thou oft, instead of homage sweet,

But poison’d flattery? O! Be sick, great greatness,

And bid thy ceremony give thee cure,

Think’st thou the fiery fever will go out

With titles blown from adulation?

Will it give place to flexure and low bending?

Can’st thou, when thou command’st the beggar’s knee,

Command the health of it? No, thou proud dream,

That play’st so subtly with a king’s repose."

"No, not all these, thrice-gorgeous ceremony,

Not all these, laid in bed majestical,

Can sleep so soundly as the wretched slave."

William Shakespeare (Henry V)

FOREWORD

My earliest intellectual activity, conditioned by a religious family life and its survival techniques in the dirty thirties, was the fascination with the manner in which one or two people could animate a whole group to projects of absolute economic necessity. Not unlike the highly successful, nineteenth century frontier communities founded by the Mormon people in western United States, our extended families in the successor Reorganized Latter Day Saint congregations endured those tough times by communal action. The spiritual force of being responsible for others and placing their interests ahead of one’s own dominated the actions of those who took the lead. I was intrigued, in spite of the sometimes imperious manner of such church leaders and the apparent informality of their ministerial anointing, at the bond they forged with others and the strong sense of cohesion within the spiritual community. Successful group action became identified in my mind with religious or spiritual commitment and a concept of leadership that was almost god-like.

With maturity, awareness came that group success was frequently not the result of altruistic dominance of principled leaders. Nor were effective organizations all directed toward such worthy goals. The years before World War II in Europe demonstrated that, to put it mildly, some of the most unworthy of considerations motivated powerful leaders and many organizations dedicated themselves to extremely destructive purposes. But, in spite of a broad spectrum of organizational precepts, worthy and otherwise, I was early taken with the presumption that common interpersonal mechanisms determine what constitutes leadership in human organization.

My early career in industry at Canadian Timken Ltd., which placed me as a lead hand for a team of inspectors who monitored the precision manufacturing processes of roller bearings, provided the first practical experience with a leadership role. And the importance of in-process appraisal was forcefully impressed upon me when the opportunity arose to compare the statistical quality control methods of Canadian Timken to the inspection methods of a well-known musical instrument manufacturer in Great Britain. I was astounded but enlightened by the results of the comparison. Production quality control at Timken resulted in a less than 0.72 percent rejection rate of assembled roller bearings before shipment to the automotive customers. At the musical instrument manufacturer, where no in-process inspection was in evidence, finished instruments were rejected as defective, before shipment to retail markets, at a rate in excess of 26 percent. More than one in four instruments was returned for reworking or disposal as trash. No wonder this manufacturer’s instruments were noted as the most expensive on the market! By far the most dominant factor in their highly-priced product was the unmonitored production process that was so wasteful of resources. These experiences prompted my conviction that success can be much more efficiently achieved in any organizational setting through in-process appraisal. That conviction is an important premise of this work.

It was never my intention to produce a comprehensive, philosophical statement about the conquests, glories, and triumphs of leadership; too much has been said about the phenomenon in the past century to be summed up and finalized in one small volume. My intention has been to narrow the broad field of leadership theory and research to a focus on the mechanisms which can be subjected to some form of measurement. Not only is it not, therefore, the ultimate statement about leadership; it is only an initial step at pursuing its study more empirically and less by speculation and conjecture. Ironically, the hope expressed by this work is to expand, by demonstrable evidence, the boundaries of these studies. The intent of the Theoretical Background, in the exploration of the extensive writings and speculative research, is to obtain a grasp of the common operative mechanisms and extend and develop those particular theoretical concepts into a rationale for appraising leader performance. Assessment or appraisal involves measurement. Hence, the focus on leadership theory is limited to exploring the variables distilled from the literature and to discovering in clinical research the most indicative elements of leadership for appraisal.

Forty years ago I began the intellectual voyage that was to culminate in the production of this work. The Ministry of Education of the Province of Ontario required that, to become a school principal, one should have a certification course that would equip the candidate with personal and professional leadership skills. The problem at the time, for a co-opted group of professionals from many fields, was to design training programs intended for educational leaders. But what exactly should that program contain? Each of the program team members commissioned to the task of which I, as a newly appointed secondary school principal, was one, had his or her own ideas about what personal skills or knowledge was essential. The variety of ideas was amazing and consensus difficult to obtain. But Principals’ Courses were created based on a broad range of leadership theories and a consensus built upon a selection of best guesses. This was the starting point from which my search for the essentials of leadership commenced.

Early on in this odyssey Dr. George Phills and Dr. Mario Faveri, two clinical psychologists with whom I was associated in consulting work, contributed immensely to an understanding of individual personality and group behaviour. The work of this group of professionals provided the founding principles for the construction and interpretation of early assessment instruments which revealed so much about the anatomy of leader phenomena.

In preparation for the writing of this book, statistical analyses and anomalies in repeated attempts at appraisal techniques prompted the development of significant ideas which furthered our understanding of leadership. Notable among these are the following concepts:

 –  the positive or negative quality of leader control by which leaders achieve follower compliance or commitment;

 –  levels of personal experience that shape the communication process and influence the dynamics of groups;

 –  an analysis of what characterizes leader behaviour which gave definition to three categories of leader action;

 –  the concept of domain of leader behaviour, a way of looking at a leader’s performance to gauge how much leader behaviour is essential for effectiveness;

 –  the recognition that the value of leader performance is a relative measure judged against the varying levels of need, competence, and commitment of a group or organization as well as the complexities of its value structure, resources, and external stresses furthering or frustrating its success;

 –  and the concept of ideal performance based criteria as benchmarks for the appraisal of leaders.

These notions are advanced in the development of the thesis of this work to clarify the underlying strategy of a successful method of appraising leadership in the broadest range of contexts imaginable.

A word about words! Words, especially those loaded with value judgements, have a way of waxing and waning in significant cycles. Often, a word or idea takes on a positive or negative value because of cultural context. A case in point is bureaucracy. When the works of Max Weber were newly published in the early decades of the twentieth century, bureaucracy was an ideal to be pursued. Its very positive meaning encapsulated organizing principles to maximize rational decision-making and administrative efficiency in organizations. Bureaucracy, according to Weber, is the most efficient form of administrative organization, because experts with much experience are best qualified to make technically correct decisions, and because disciplined performance governed by abstract rules and coordinated by an authoritative hierarchy fosters a rational and consistent pursuit of objectives. But this ideal concept crumbled in the face of considerably less than ideal human beings giving substance and their own personal motivations to the performance of organizations. Bureaucracy, as the word is used at the time of this writing, is more often used as a derogatory term to fling at some of the worst aspects of human organization. Something similar has happened to the title consultant as more and more persons appropriate it, sometimes without sufficiently justifying expertise, to claim the rewards of giving considered advice.

The subject, however, with which this book deals requires us to employ the words administration, management, and leadership. In many contexts those words have taken on a rough sense of equivalency. They are not equivalent, however. There exist systematic differences that are quite significant. But the value loading of certain segments of our contemporary society, which treasures the pre-eminence of the bottom line and the tough direction of capable bosses, has ignited something of a love affair with the words manager and management. In some subtle way, the egalitarian notions of North American society are subverted by the encouragement of a management vs. labour mentality, creating barriers between the leaders, presumably some new concept of royalty or class, and the led, the ordinary worker. Witness the overhaul of the Ontario public education system in the late 1990’s. Principal teachers, the same positions for which some thirty years previously it was our task to design leadership development programs, were removed from association with the Ontario Teachers’ Federation so that they could assume their appropriate role as managers of their educational units. Presumably, they should no longer be involved in the work of teaching, but were to direct the situation in which the process was to be undertaken to better the outcomes of those who performed the basic tasks. Now they could oversee and be decisive about those who did teach; they would manage units of the education system. As has been not infrequently noted in this case, such value loading of words can be a disruptive and divisive force which places a barrier between leaders and the led, when what is most needed for the most efficient and effective operation of a school system, or any other enterprise for that matter, is harmony and commitment to unity of purpose!

Such linguistic value loading has ascribed to administration something of the derogation of bureaucratic behaviour arising from a lack of commitment to the goals of an enterprise. Leadership, per se, is popularly viewed ambivalently, assuming critical importance with organizations in trouble, but being relegated to something of a frill in times of prosperous performance. In these times, it is fashionable to ascribe the credit for successful performance and positive results to good management. It is ironic that the ubiquitous university MBA (Master of Business Administration) programs are popularly regarded as the best preparation for management personnel. Management has a very distinct meaning which has to do with market evaluation, controlling and coordinating processes, decision-making, assembly and direction of resources, prioritizing and timing of performance variables, product or service delivery, and a host of other strategic details which predicate the success or failure of an enterprise. But an individual managing a multi-unit real estate complex from a home office can be an excellent manager in the truest sense of the word. Leadership, while being inclusive of the concept of management, means something more. The appropriate place for management in the lexicon of leadership theory has been identified in this work as roughly parallel to the prime importance of the strategic dimension of leader behaviour in the anatomy of this social phenomenon. In the latter sections of this book, the leadership appraisal of a general manager (the love affair is ever present) who is highly rated in the adaptation of his competencies to a Conservation Authority is a case in point. He was an exceptionally good manager. But one of his skill areas was lacking in a significant ingredient that could gain for him the recognition of great leadership. Consequently, in this work, I have meticulously striven to avoid the value loadings that popular usage have placed on these significant concepts. It is to be hoped that the exercise was fruitful in making consistent and meaningful distinctions.

And why should this work be directed to the appraisal of leaders? Because, quite aside from the obvious value of an appraisal, when properly used, of being capable of enhancing the probability for success of enterprises, this active pursuit has taught us more about the nature of leadership than any amount of intellectual reflection. And a very active pursuit it has been. That process owes a great deal to the co-operation of uncounted numbers of leaders in the field who volunteered or were volunteered to be the guinea pigs for the first phases of developing assessment instruments. The conceptual contributions of my colleagues, Dr. Mario Faveri and Dr. George Phills, and of my long-suffering wife and family who listened patiently to various readings of wordy first drafts of this work must be acknowledged with my deepest appreciation.

Robert I. Mann

February 2013

THE MEASURE OF A LEADER

by Robert I. Mann

PART I

THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

CHAPTER ONE:

LEADER APPRAISAL – WHY AND HOW?

CHAPTER TWO:

UNDERSTANDING WHAT LEADERSHIP IS

CHAPTER THREE:

LEADER TRAIT THEORY

CHAPTER FOUR:

SITUATION AND LEADER EMPOWERMENT

CHAPTER FIVE:

SOCIAL CONTROL AND LEADERSHIP STYLE

CHAPTER SIX:

THE DELINEATION OF LEADER BEHAVIOUR

CHAPTER SEVEN:

DESCRIBING LEADER BEHAVIOUR

"Whether a man is burdened by power or enjoys power; whether he is trapped by responsibility or is made free by it; whether he is moved by other people and outer forces or moves them – this is the essence of leadership."

Theodore H. White

"Facts must be correct; theories must be fruitful. A ‘fact’, if incorrect, is useless – it is not a fact; but an incorrect theory may be even more useful than a correct one if it is more fruitful in leading the way to new facts."

Hans Selye (Dream to Discovery; On Being a Scientist)

"There’s nothing more practical than a good theory."

Leonid Brezhnev

"Men make history, and not the other way around. In periods when there is no leadership, society stands still. Progress occurs when courageous, skilful leaders seize the opportunity to change things for the better."

Harry S. Truman

"The quality of his being one with the people, of having no artificial or natural barriers between him and them, made it possible for him to be a leader without ever being or thinking of being a dictator."

Francis Perkins (of Franklin D. Roosevelt)

CHAPTER ONE

LEADER APPRAISAL – WHY AND HOW!

1.1 Why Appraise Leader Performance?

There you are, stalled at the side of the road, steam coming from underneath the hood, the engine seized up and refusing to turn another revolution, spouse and kids helplessly stranded in unsafe conditions miles from any modern conveniences. You, the driver, peer tentatively and unknowingly at the now-silent engine trying to remember when the last time was that your car had a complete check-up, the engine tuned, or just a lube and oil change. But you’ve always taken the view that if your car gets the parents to work, the kids to school, the family to its vacation cottage at the lake, and back safely without incident, its continuing to operate is a good enough test of its performance. The bottom line is that it keeps on going.

You contemplate having left the main highway about fifty miles back and having traversed the rugged but beautifully scenic Muskoka country-side with only another twenty-five miles to get to your idyllic retreat on a crystal clear inland lake. The likelihood of your arriving at your destination before nightfall grows dimmer with the fading light of sunset, and you anticipate the cost, not only in dollars, but in personal discomfort and risk at trying to contact someone for alternate transportation and mechanical help to put humpty-dumpty back together again. Is now the time for that all-points check-up?

But what was the alternative? In the busy life of the family, it is easy to forget that the continued efficiency and safety of the car depends upon a number of "checks’’; – regularly checking the air pressure of the tires, changing the oil and oil filter cartridge, re-lubricating the moving parts of the whole vehicle, regularly providing for engine tune-ups, not to mention protecting the metal surfaces of the body from corrosives by washing and polishing. But time is money! And you could not spare the time to indulge in all that preventative maintenance stuff. You have been quite happy to drive the thing to the limits of its endurance and leave the lubrication, oil change, and thirty-nine point performance checks until it breaks down. Right!

As the last rays of sunlight disappear behind the western ridge of evergreens, you note in the soft glow of twilight your spouse comforting the little ones, your teenage son disappearing over that knoll behind you in search of the repair garage you spotted just a couple of miles back, and you begin to question your reliance on the test, only, of the bottom line. It is bad enough to have the engine overheat and seize up, as it has done now; but it might have been the disaster of brakes failing on a hill or steering letting go in fast and heavy traffic. Your automobile having failed to meet this ultimate test, you have learned an important lesson. Assessed in resources and human terms, total breakdown is invariably more expensive than regular maintenance and assessment of needed replacements to prevent it. Given that wear and tear’’ takes a continual toll on complex mechanisms, it is ridiculous to lose the entire value of a vehicle, even temporarily, from the lack of consistent attention to its efficient operation. Being able to operate or not, the bottom line" measure, is the test of greatest expense and poorest value.

But, wait a minute, you say. That’s not me! No way! No one who has a grain of sense in his head would be so reckless as to let this kind of ‘bottom line’ thinking prejudice the safety of his family or the financial viability of his family’s assets. Those of us who care just don’t wait for a break-down or accident to inspect and do appropriate maintenance on our vehicles.

If we insist that this bottom line style of protecting our families and personal assets is dangerous and inappropriate, why do we accept it with respect to the performance of the organizations that determine the quality of life in our culture? It would seem that for many, given the distracting array of pressing issues besetting modern organizations, neither time nor sufficient resources are available for such frills as in-process assessments or performance appraisals. They may be extremely important for some in determining the health and efficiency of organizations; but many a harassed manager may ask, Who cares about the performance appraisals as long as the bottom line is in the black? That, too, is a reasonable test of performance until the bottom line – however it may be defined, slips below the margin that represents satisfaction. And what then? Is the organization left in the analogous position at the side of the road, steam coming from underneath the hood, the engine seized up and refusing to turn another revolution?

Business firms, manufacturing plants, financial institutions, military organizations, schools, colleges, universities, government departments, service industries or clubs, and volunteer groups fit our vehicle analogy to a T. The people who constitute them, in spite of their individuality and idiosyncrasies, must be committed to sharing in the achievement of common purposes, just like all the parts of the automobile must perform their functions in coordination to accomplish the purpose of the car. But group enterprises are more complex than automobiles. We must be aware that they are composed, not only of material parts, but also of sentient human beings who have ideas of their own about how or why the organization should run. What if the only test of the effectiveness of an organization is some bottom line and it fails in achievement?

Then, the search for who is accountable. What function failed in performance that caused the enterprise to fail? Was it accounting, was it product design, was it sales? Was marketing not doing its job? Did management not foresee a change in market conditions? A list of places to look, as long as the list you can devise of all the subordinate functions in the organization, may be reviewed to determine what went wrong. But when the bottom line goes completely negative, the game is over. This kind of appraisal is often nothing more than a post mortem.

It is far better to keep the health, efficiency, and effectiveness of an enterprise under systematic review. This allows adjustments to be made to avert a negative "bottom line’’. The principal of entropy; that is, the observation that if you are not doing something to improve performance, deterioration resulting from inertia is an ever present factor to address. ¹ And that notion, in and of itself, should trigger a performance appraisal program to ensure optimum performance of all functions. Wise caretakers of prosperous ventures don’t wait for break-downs. They assure regular inspections of the supporting parts of their organizations so that all are performing as they should. That is why performance appraisal of subordinate members of many modern firms is so common. But, is that the only or most important thing to do to promote organizational health? Does a performance appraisal plan, focussed on the subordinate parts of an enterprise, like a preventative maintenance program on only the suspension, wheels, and running gear of the family automobile, ensure the best prospects for the entire organization?

Each member of an enterprise makes a singular contribution to the good of the whole. And the value of that contribution is proportional to each member’s influence on group success. For instance, in a firm employing fifty people, with each one sharing equally in responsibility, one could argue that one subordinate person’s efforts impact on two per cent (2%) of the firm’s potential. But, in most cases, responsibility for organizational success is not equally shared.

Take a supervisor, foreman, or the manager of a whole operation. A supervisor who has authority over four others may have twenty-five per cent (25%) or more of the credit for operational success. Is not that the argument owners hear when setting rates of compensation? In assessing accountability for success or failure, is not the boss, because of control and influence over the productivity of others, one person out of fifty, at least fifty per cent responsible for what happens? Some would argue that the boss is totally, one hundred per cent, responsible. The mathematics may be too simplistic, but the principle is clear. Why, when it comes to in-process performance appraisal, are subordinates who are each accountable for the least proportionate share of corporate achievement often subjected to the most extensive per person evaluation? In spite of extensive personnel evaluation programs, too often the boss receives only a results-oriented assessment at the end of the corporate fiscal year; and the organization still does not learn, from a pre-emptive point of view, how well he, the most important functionary, is doing his job from day to day. When do we measure the value of his, or her, performance? At the end of the fiscal year! If so, it may be a bottom line assessment again! When all the subordinate appraisals have been done and the results are in, the enterprise is still at risk of ending up at the side of the road, steam coming from underneath the hood, the engine seized up and refusing to turn another revolution.

The success or failure of enterprises, whether business firms, manufacturing plants, financial institutions, military organizations, schools, colleges, universities, government departments, or volunteer groups, depends more upon the effectiveness and quality of certain essential people than on any other part of the organization. Those people, committed to adapting the organization to changing conditions, redefining its mission, planning and designing roles and processes, making decisions about general operations, or setting the standards or objectives for the performance of subordinate staff, hold to a disproportionately high degree the key to the success or failure of their respective units. Are we not talking about the role of leadership?

If traditional, widely-held notions mean anything, leadership may be regarded as the engine of the organization and the central nervous system of the body corporate. If the engine is not working the vehicle will not run in spite of checking the air pressure of tires and rust proofing the body. A human body may be possessed of finely tuned muscles and be well nourished, but if the central nervous system falters, it ceases to function. Continual examination and maintenance of proper functioning is necessary for all machines and organisms, but most important are the primary functions upon which the total complex depends.

Provincial school inspectors in Ontario, Canada once held strongly to a universal maxim, As goes the principal, so goes the school. They acknowledged the fact, but too often, unfortunately, did little about the need that was implied. And like them, observers of business, industry, government, and politics have long insisted that successful organizational performance is directly related to and dependent upon the quality and effectiveness of its leadership. To ensure the health of the business, on-going appraisal and supervision of the salespeople of a retail firm is unquestionably valuable. But, in the long run, if supervisory effectiveness is an unknown and top management continues aloof and unexamined, the direction and appraisal of the workforce will be of limited relative value. Because of their disproportionately greater liability for advancing the success of an enterprise, the effectiveness of the top people should be the most important and primary concern.

Is this an argument suggesting that the personnel to be targeted in performance appraisal programs should be altered? Yes and no! The point, here, is not that the inspections and simulation exercises used to assess the combat readiness of troops in a military unit should be reduced in quality or frequency so that more attention can be given to testing their commanders, or that any of the processes put in place to evaluate performance of those subordinate members should be eliminated. Subordinates have appropriate roles requiring performance evaluation of the functions they perform. But where should our priorities direct a major focus? For instance, for the sake of the effectiveness of that combat unit, do we review the readiness of its commander to make decisions and give prompt direction under conditions of severe battle stress? Many crack military groups do! But if the evaluation of the troops is rigorously and continuously maintained while we ignore the performance capability of its officers, a whole efficient unit, in times of crisis, can be placed in jeopardy by undetected deficiencies of its commanders. To assure the health and viability of any organization, leader effectiveness is the key!

Why assess leadership? Surely, the most important function should receive the most rigorous inspection. If any appraisal process, other than the summary finality of the bottom line, is to be employed for pro-active maintenance of efficiency and effectiveness, the most central process of an enterprise demands first priority. The rest of the story of an organization’s ultimate victory or defeat will be fallout from the primary focus on leadership performance.

1.2 How Is Leader Performance To Be Appraised?

To many in the world of finance and business, the answer to this question is obvious. If a company continues to be prosperous or an enterprise achieves financial success in its ventures, then it stands to reason that the leadership of the organization is effective and valuable. No one cares to challenge such an assessment given the undisputed achievement of entrepreneurial success.

On the other hand, this approach to determining the quality of leadership in an organization is subject to a number of logical pitfalls, some of which could be fatal. For example, if we reason from the relative success of an organization that its leadership is effective, then we can feel confident in this conclusion only when that success is above and beyond question; that is, the degree of success is very high when compared to some reasonable standard of measure and that standard of measure is directly related to the aspirations of the enterprise under the leader’s charge.

To examine in greater detail this proposition popularly espoused by many in business and finance, it may be revealing for us to look at some hypothetical cases. If a business firm, whose purpose is to make a profit for the owners by manufacturing and installing attractive, efficient, and highly styled kitchen cupboards and appliances for residential units, makes an annual profit large enough to promote substantial growth over a period of years, one might argue that the company obviously has effective leadership. Given those results, the conclusion seems reasonable! Likewise, if a high school dedicated to the academic education of teenage students achieves an extremely high rate of university acceptances for its graduates over a period of years, one might deduce that the school has a very effective principal. That seems like a reasonable conclusion. A charitable organization has achieved its objective in fund raising and accomplished the objects for which it was established every year for three years. It is a likely premise that the executive director is highly effective in the leadership of this charitable institution.

On the other hand, were we to enlarge the scope of our examination of these success stories and, as a consequence, notice that there may be other matters of substance to account for the achievements can we still be so conclusive about the superior effectiveness of the leader in each case? For instance, had we learned that the high profits of the kitchen firm could be explained in terms of its being the only such firm in a quickly growing but small community, and that its biggest problem is meeting the demand for its product, can we be assured that the guy at the helm is an extraordinarily good boss? Had we known that the academic high school with the high number of graduates obtaining university acceptance drew its students from a high-end socioeconomic neighbourhood where university and college educated parents encourage their offspring to pursue higher education, can we be confident we have a measure of the principal’s capability? The fact that the charitable foundation that always meets its funding targets is the beneficiary of some wealthy individuals and corporations having a stake in the outcome of its operations might make us pause before jumping to conclusions about the executive director. Given these scenarios, are we likely to be getting a measure of leadership effectiveness by making judgements based solely on the level of organizational success?

Consider the opposite of these outcomes. The major industry of a one industry town downsizes or relocates, resulting in many more people moving away than are moving in and the demand for new housing deteriorates. Is it reasonable to conclude that the leadership of a failing kitchen firm in that locale is not so good or is at fault? Is the lack of success, then, a measure of leader effectiveness? Should the effectiveness of the secondary school principal, who struggles to educate underprivileged youth in a ghetto district and university acceptance happens only in the most exceptional cases, be judged in terms of university admission rates? What deficits in primary training and intellectual background does he cope with in that environment? And if a charity has a record, nearly half of the time, of falling short of its hopes in funding and is unable to give the full support that its needy clients require, does that indicate only mediocre leadership on the part of the executive director?

You may be able to answer in the affirmative to every one of the questions posed above; but can you do so with a high degree of assurance? The answer to that question will probably be that it depends upon the circumstances. That is to say, in each case, you have to take into consideration the whole array of circumstantial factors, both those which are inherent to the enterprise’s organizational structure and those which are external influences upon its operations, to determine what directly contributes to the success or lack of success of an organization. To look at particular cases, even hypothetical ones, is to begin to recognize that there are many factors, independent of leader effectiveness, to explain the level of success or failure in endeavours of various kinds. The achievements of any organization are dependent upon a multitude of variables, and effectiveness of leadership may be a prime one but it is not the only one. A leader may be ineffectual, but because of the impact of other very fortunate circumstances, the venture he heads prospers. A leader may be great, but because of very adverse circumstances, his enterprise fails. When one considers the many factors other than leadership which contribute to the prosperity of a venture, the conclusion is inescapable. Theoretically, at least, we may assert that assessing the accomplishments of an organization, in terms of its defined purposes, is not a direct measure of the effectiveness of its leader.

To do so is like saying the way to determine a man’s height is to measure the length of the shadow he casts on a sunny day, giving no consideration to any other circumstances of that measurement. Using this method we might conclude that a dwarf whose shadow was gauged late in the afternoon was taller than a seven-foot basketball player whose shadow was measured at noon. Sounds silly does it not; because there are