Application Of Path And Goal Leadership Theory In Wesfarmers

Path and Goal Leadership Styles

Discuss about the Integrative Management and Organisational Behaviour.

Path and goal theory is one of the conspicuous leadership theory invented in the end of 20^th century. The theory got developed on the basis of the work psychologist Martin G. Evance (1970). The theory is articulating the application of a specific psychological approach can be cause of motivation to many people. The involvement of leader to find out the path of progress can inspire the subordinate in different way. Wesfarmers is prominent conglomerate of Australia the Company is applying Path and goal leadership style in the organization. This essay will make attempt to analyse the nature of application of the theory that exhibited by the company in its real life business environment, but the explanation will be based on the secondary data.  As we know that Path and goal theory substantiates that the desirable behaviour of the subordinates influenced by the behaviour exhibited by the leader (Chemers, 2014). This essay is an attempt to identify the vicarious approach in the cardinal cause of influence.  

Path and goal leadership theory is the implementation of the strategic thinking of leadership along with pragmatic representation of problem solving skill. In this approach the manager or the leader helps his subordinate to find out the right path to solve the problem in a specific situation. With the help of this process the leader is also serving the goal of the organization. The notion of leading from the front is getting articulated in this theory. The leader is leading his subordinate from the front line when he is the first person to encounter the problem directly (Vroom and Jago, 2007). The leader only can advice other when he is confronting the problem and conceiving the solution personally. In this leadership approach the leader acts like a guru or mentor to his subordinate. In this approach leadership is a cardinal influencer behind productivity. The empathetic stance of the leader helps the strategic attainment of the group.  Moreover, analyzing the leadership style that is adopted by  Wesfarmers, it is observed that the business organization emphasizes upon following and adopting the Path-Goal Theory Model and this facilitates the leaders of the company to select specific behaviours that are capable of meeting the needs of the employees and leads to the development of a workplace environment that guides the employees through their path in achieving their daily work activities and indivual goals which ultimately leads to the successful achievement of the overall goals of the organization. Thus, there are three processes involved in this model that is adopted by the leaders of the Wesfarmers and they are:

• Determining the characteristics of the employees and the environment.
• Selecting an appropriate leadership style that best suits the needs of the employees and also the organization (House and Mitchell, 2006).
• Focusing upon the motivating factors that prove to be beneficial in assisting employees to succeed in their work.

Leadership Styles

The above discussed process can be illustrated with the help of the following figure:

[Source: Self]

The ways in which the path-goal model is adopted by the company can be illustrated as follows:

[Source: House and Mitchell, 2006]

In context to the path-goal theory, it is observed that leaders at Wsfarmers tend to play the following roles:

Goal Achievement	They provide the required support and guidance to the employees so that the employees can achieve their goals.
Overcoming challenges	The leaders facilitate the employees with the required resources that prove to be beneficial on efficiently managing the work related issues.
Offering incentives	The leaders tend to recognize the efforts of the employees and best efforts are also rewarded in both monetary and non-monetary terms at Wsfarmers.

Supportive leadership: Vicarious attitude of the leader is the major significance in this style. In this style the leader can understand the problem of a particular team member to face certain situation and consider the best interest of him and help him to tackle the situation to overcome the problem. Through the leader is helping the organization towards the strategic attainment. Wesfarmers is a leading conglomerate of Australia. At the same time it is a biggest employer of the country. The company has employed 205,000 staffs in the various businesses under their canopy. It has diversified its business in different sectors retail is one of them.  The company is owner of two different retail brand of departmental stores Kmart and Target. Target Australia Pty is the leading mid price departmental store in country. There are 308 Target store in all across the continent. The leadership strategy of these store controlled by the Wesfarmers.  This conglomerate follows a vertical culture in its leadership strategy. Richard Goyder is the Managing Director of Wesfarmers Ltd. Goyder is well known and a celebrated business leader of the continent and famous for his reflective leadership. The application of supportive leadership has been witnessed in Target Australia in his inspiration. Target has employed 2400 people in its 308 stores. In these outlets people are working in different category (Dale and Fox, 2008). There are some entry level positions for lesser experienced candidates. The people are working in these designation harbours a propensity to getting aberrant in context of their work. The immediate supervisor of these personnel remains empathetic for their situation and offers their helping hand to take them out from their imminent jeopardy. But any attainment demands a competent direction behind.

Directive leadership: This leadership style is applicable at the when the goal of the enterprise is not we structured. The leader communicates his expectation to the subordinate and ask him move to attain that. The prime trait of this type of this leadership is that it helps to clear confusion from the subordinates. Confusion may get generated to working personnel if the goal is not properly structure goal (Clark, Hartline, and Jones, 2008). The practical application of this type of leadership is getting witnessed Target Australia Pty. Ltd. The person who got employed as an entry level worker in these outlet harbours an initial confusion regarding the job responsibility. The situation becomes burdensome for the immediate supervisor of the frontline staffs because he is the responsible person for the productivity of his immediate subordinates. In this situation he took the responsibility to make these people to understand their goal. Collaborative contribution to the leadership can make the leader’s position more concurrent.

Leadership Variables

Participative leadership: In this type of leadership the leader invites participation of the subordinate for the decision making process. An attitude of cooperation gets emerged in the atmosphere that lead the whole enterprise move towards the desirable direction for the entire member in the group. Member involvement is the cardinal trait of this leadership. Group can ask for the valuable input only from an experienced person. There it can be said this approach of leadership is applicable only the time when the group is equipped by well experienced members. It can be the example of diversified leadership. In this type of leadership example the soul decision maker of the group cannot get involved in any centralised decision making process rather he doe’s value and appreciates the cognitive ability of the other members of the group (Hermann, 2005). Wesfarmers does practice this type of leadership for the decision making for the different subsidiaries as well as the conglomerate itself. Richer Goyder the MD is getting accompanied by Michael Chaney Non-executive Chairman, Terry Bowen Finance Director, and the decision taken by Mr.Goyder has been design with the help of these members of the group. It can be considered as application of participative leadership. Motivation can get generated to the neophyte by adopting some other way too.

Achievement oriented leadership: In this type of leadership style the leader set a target in front of the team member and motivate them to attain that. The urge of attainment is the most major impetuous that works behind success of this leadership style. This style is effective to cast out the attitude of lack of motivation from subordinates mind (Vigoda-Gadot, 2007). The prominent mid price range retail division of Wesfarmers Target Australia Pty. Ltd is practicing this type of leadership style in their own business. The initial joined staff of the retail division couldn’t envisage any immediate tangible success of their performance the supervisor of the division allot the responsibility of these staffs on the basis of the desirable attainment from their side. The endeavour ended with a degree of tangible success end of the day

Employee Traits	It has been observed that the leaders at Wesfarmers emphasize upon identifying the specific needs of the employees and on the basis of their specific needs, both the training programs are offered and their efforts are rewarded.
Environment	The leaders at Wsfarmers emphasize upon adopting open communication system where the employees can directly discuss their issues and concern. Moreover, the leaders also emphasize upon developing a knowledge sharing culture that is again characterized with trust and mutual respect among the employees and also between the management and the employees.

Conclusion:

This essay has demonstrated the attainment of the strategic success of the group through the empathetic approach of the leader. From the perspective of conventional leadership approach Path goal theory is a path breaking enterprise got developed on the basis of the study on human psychology. The practicality of the theory has been substantiating its claim of effectiveness. Some time the leadership styles based on this theory getting applied in the demand of the situation. It has been discussed in the aforesaid example that the leading Australian conglomerate Wesfarmers is using this approach of leadership style in the regular business practice. These examples are competent to prove that the theory is worthy serve the present requirement of business leadership irrespective of country and continent.

Reference:

Chemers, M., 2014. An integrative theory of leadership. Psychology Press.

Vroom, V.H. and Jago, A.G., 2007. The role of the situation in leadership. American psychologist, 62(1), p.17.

Dale, K. and Fox, M.L., 2008. Leadership style and organizational commitment: Mediating effect of role stress. Journal of Managerial Issues, pp.109-130.

Clark, R.A., Hartline, M.D. and Jones, K.C., 2008. The effects of leadership style on hotel employees’ commitment to service quality. Cornell Hospitality Quarterly.

Hermann, M.G., 2005. Assessing leadership style: A trait analysis. The psychological assessment of political leaders, pp.178-212.

Vigoda-Gadot, E., 2007. Leadership style, organizational politics, and employees’ performance: An empirical examination of two competing models. Personnel Review, 36(5), pp.661-683.

House, R. and Mitchell, T. (2006). Path-goal theory of leadership. Seattle: University of Washington.