Role of Leadership Style in Performance Improvement

Most of top 500 MNC broadly follows this model for performance appraisal of their
employees.
Top performers (A)

: Employees who achieves > 150% of set target.

No. of top performers are Approx. 10% of total employees .

Just Performers (B)

: Employees who achieves > 149-100% of set target.

No. of just performers are Approx. 70% of total employees .

Under Performers (C) : Employees who achieves < 100% of set target.
No. of under performers are Approx. 20% of total employees .
Always there will be a continuous flow of employees from category A to B , B to C
based on lack of motivation level, new challenging tasks , lack of adequate Skill upgradation etc.
At the same time , there will be an attempt in the employees to shift from category
C to B , B to A based on improved motivation level & adequate Skill up-gradation
etc.

A true leader need to carefully access , monitor and organize the target, training
need, new responsibility, Promotion for the employees to utilize the maximum
potential of the employees.

Leadership may be driven by Task Orientation or by Relationship Orientation.

Depending upon the teams status ( Skill set and willingness) , a leader has to take
appropriate role to achieve the desired result. The following Diagram explains
FOUR styles of leadership which are broadly in practice .
Participatory Style : Leader keeps himself in same level with the other employees,
maintaining high level of relationship but gives low importance to the task.
Delegator Style : Leader keeps himself away from other employees, maintaining
low level of relationship and gives low importance to the task. Delegates the task
without even proper supervision.
Selling Style : Leader keeps himself among the team, maintaining high level of
relationship but gives high importance to the task. Delegates the task with
required level of supervision.
Telling Style : Leader keeps himself top of the team, maintaining low level of
relationship but gives high importance to the task. Extremely commanding or like a
dictator .

In few cases Telling style of leadership , which is high in task but low in
relationship, is very much needed and mostly used e.g. Military / Police where
commander will just tell the troop what to do and when to do .
In few other cases Participatory style of leadership , which is high in relationship
and leader remains among the team members e.g. a teacher . Leader explains to
the team why to do and how to do.
A Good Leader need to first identify the SKILL & WILL level of his team members.
Based on the analysis of Skill & Will ( 1 -> Adequate , 0 -> Not Adequate ) there
may be four different sets of characters in the teamevery set will have a
different level of professional maturity , which are termed as M1 , M2 , M3 and M4.
The leadership style suits best as per the following chart :
Employee's
Maturity
Level

Skill

Will

Type of Employee

M1

No worth, neither having S1 ( Telling Style), S2

skill nor willingness

M2

New in the field but full of S2 ( Selling Style), S1

enthusiasm , needs
training

M3

working longer time in S3 ( Participatory

same job role , knows the Style) , S4
skill but became
stereotyped.

M4

Top Performer

Best Suitable
Leadership style

S4 ( Delegation Style),
S3

To maintain a great level of positive motivation among the employees , a good

Leader will try to show path to more and more people in M3 group to reach to M4
level. Once an employee reaches M4 level, a leader needs to bring him to M2 level
either by raising the challenge or by offering new area of work. A leader will always
try to increase the employees in M2 category.
Success of true leadership is lying in continuous reviewing the maturity level of
employees, attempt in shifting the maturity level of employees and accordingly in
adopting the best suitable leadership style it is a very dynamic role play
and needs a very systematic approach in real life practice.

Author : Sudip Sen, M.Sc. (Tech), PGDBA (Marketing)

Country Manager (Regional Sales)
Pepperl + Fuchs (India ) Pvt Ltd., Bangalore.
Email : sudip1965@rediffmail.com ; Website : www.sudipsen.webs.com