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Snapshots of GreatLeadership

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LEADERSHIP: Research and Practice Series A James MacGregor Burns Academy of Leadership Collaboration

SERIES EDITORS

Georgia Sorenson, Ph.D, Research Professor in Leadership Studies, Univer-

sity of Maryland and Founder of the James MacGregor Burns Academy

of Leadership and the International Leadership Association

Ronald E. Riggio, Ph.D, is the Henry R. Kravis Professor of Leadership and

Organizational Psychology and former Director of the Kravis Leader-

ship Institute at Claremont McKenna College

Bligh-Riggio (Eds.), Exploring Distance in Leader-Follower Relationships:When Near is Far and Far is Near 

Howell, J. P., Snapshots of Great Leadership

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Snapshotsof Great

Leadership

 Jon P. HowellProfessor Emeritus, New Mexico State University 

College of Business

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First published 2013by Routledge711 Tird Avenue, New York, NY 10017

Simultaneously published in the UK by Routledge27 Church Road, Hove, East Sussex BN3 2FA 

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business 

© 2013 aylor & Francis

Te right of Jon P. Howell to be identied as author of this work has been asserted by him inaccordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyrights, Designs, and Patents Act 1988.

 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in anyform or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented,including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system,

 without permission in writing from the publishers.

Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks,and are used only for identication and explanation without intent to infringe.

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data 

Howell, Jon P.Snapshots of great leadership / Jon P. Howell.p. cm — (Leadership: research and practice ; v. 2)1. Leadershi—Case studies. I. itle.HM1261.H69 2012303.3’4—dc232012005619

ISBN: 978-0-415-62482-4 (hbk)ISBN: 978-0-415-87217-1 (pbk)ISBN: 978-0-203-10321-0 (ebk)

ypeset in Garamond and Optimaby EvS Communication Networx, Inc.

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To my sweetheart, Julie.

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vii

Contents

Series Foreword .............................................................................................. xi

Preface .......................................................................................................... xiii

 Acknowledgments .......................................................................................... xv 

References and Source Material for this Book  .......................................... xvii

 About the Author ......................................................................................... x ix 

Part I

Teoretical Basis of Leadership ................................................1

 1 Teories of Leadership ..........................................................................3

Part IISnapshots of Great Leadership ...............................................33

 2 Steve Jobs CEO and Cofounder of Apple Inc. ..................................35 

3  Anita Roddick Founder and CEO of Te Body Shop.......................41

 4 Ernest Shackleton Antarctic Explorer ..............................................45

 5 Mother eresa Servant of the Poor ...................................................51

 6  Abraham Lincoln 16th President of the United States .....................56

 7 Pat Summitt Women’s Basketball Coach .........................................63

 8 Leymah Gbowee Liberian Leader of Women in PeacebuildingNetwork .............................................................................................. 68

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 9 Nelson Mandela Human Rights Leader and President of South

 Africa ...................................................................................................74

 10 Geronimo Apache Native American War Leader .............................83

 11  Winston Churchill British Prime Minister, Wartime Leader,and Statesman .....................................................................................89

 12  Vince Lombardi Professional Football Coach ................................ 97

 13 Napoleon Bonaparte French Military and Political Leader ...........103

 14 Mary Kay Ash  Founder and CEO of Mary Kay Cosmetics.............109

 15 Nicolas Hayek Swiss Watch Executive ...........................................114

 16 César Chávez American Labor Leader ...........................................121

 17 Konosuke Matsushita Japanese Industrial Leader .........................129

 18 Bill Wilson Cofounder and Leader of Alcoholics Anonymous ......136 19 Mark Zuckerberg Facebook Creator and CEO ..............................144

 20 Martin Luther King, Jr. American Civil Rights Leader .................152

 21 George Washington First President of the United States ...............160

 22 Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva President of Brazil .................................168

 23 Mohandas Gandhi Indian Political and Spiritual Leader .............176

 24 Sitting Bull Sioux War Chief..........................................................184

 25 Indra Nooyi CEO of PepsiCo Inc...................................................195

 26 Horatio Nelson Vice Admiral of the British Royal Navy .............. 200

Part III

Snapshots of Bad Leadership ................................................211 27  Adolf Hitler Chancellor of Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945 .......213

viii ◾  Contents

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Contents ◾  ix

 28  Albert Dunlap Corporate Executive ..............................................225

 29 Idi Amin President of Uganda from 1971 to 1979 .........................233

 30 David Koresh Religious Cult Leader............................................. 240

 31 Kenneth Lay CEO of Enron Corporation ..................................... 248

Index  ............................................................................................................ 257

able

  1.1 Matrix of Great Leadership and Leadership Teories ...................... 26

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xi

Series Foreword

Leadership is a very popular topic, with hundreds of research articles and dozens

of scholarly books published each year. Much of this scholarship, however, is

focused narrowly on business leadership. Our intent with this new book series,

Leadership: Research and Practice , is to expand the boundaries and includescholarly work from the wide range of disciplines and professions that study and

practice leadership. In addition to business leadership, you will see authored and

edited books from political science, the humanities, psychology, sociology, the

arts, and importantly, the professions. We will publish scholarly collections, but

also practical guidebooks that are soundly based in research. We are very pleased to present one of the rst books of the series, Jon P.

Howell’s Snapshots of Great Leadership. Tere is a long history of presenting storiesof leaders and their great challenges as a way of illustrating leadership theories

and concepts, and it remains a favorite approach in teaching about leadership.

In fact, this is the way that the study of leadership began many centuries ago,

 with stories of the exploits and qualities of mythic leaders from Greece and the

Orient. Jon Howell continues this tradition, and updates it, with this exceptional

collection of stories of great leaders, some well known, others less so. Tese cases

of leaders and leadership are indeed brief snapshots, but each is clearly embedded

 within leadership theory, so this book is readable, practical, and scholarly.

 While Snapshots   contains stories of great historical leaders (e.g., Churchill,Gandhi, Lincoln), there are more contemporary leaders included such as Mary

Kay Ash and Mark Zuckerberg, and some who are relatively unknown. In

addition to the great leaders who championed positive social change and led

nations to greatness, there are snapshots of bad leaders and leadership (e.g.,

Hitler, Idi Amin). Tis suggests that we can learn a great deal from the good

and successful leaders, but also learn what we, as followers of leaders, and leadersourselves, must avoid.

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 While we fully expect Snapshots of Great Leadership  to appeal to scholars

and to anyone interested in the serious study of leaders and leadership, we alsoanticipate that this book will make its way into many classrooms. It is an ideal

reader or casebook for any course that touches on leadership, and students will

nd it an exciting way to learn about leadership theories and applications. Te

Editors would like to thank Jon Howell for being one of the rst authors of

our book series, starting it off in such ne fashion, and Anne Duffy, our Editor

at aylor & Francis, for her extraordinary efforts to bring this book series to

fruition.

Georgia SorensonUniversity of Maryland

Ronald E. Riggio

Claremont McKenna College

xii ◾  Series Foreword 

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xiii

Preface

Te idea for this book has a long history. I have taught leadership in universityclasses and conducted research on leadership for over 30 years and I have managed

private business organizations for over 40 years. I used several different leadership

textbooks in my teaching, including a book I coauthored with Dan Costley titled

Understanding Behaviors for Effective Leadership (2nd ed., 2006, Pearson PrenticeHall). Most leadership textbooks focus on leadership theories and the research

that supports them while our text addressed leadership behavior patterns—what

leaders really do to inuence followers toward effective performance. In our book

and in several other texts, brief descriptions of real leaders in action were included

to demonstrate how the leaders enacted the leader behaviors and theories. Whenusing these textbooks in class, I noticed that most students remembered the real

leader action descriptions more vividly and accurately than the leadership theories

or behavior patterns. Students repeatedly mentioned the real leader examples in

class discussions and when answering essay questions on examinations.

I nally realized that the majority of students were learning about leadership

in a different manner than most leadership professors taught. Professors usually

describe different leadership theories or behavior patterns and the research

supporting them, occasionally followed by real life examples of leaders whoexemplify the theories or behaviors. But most students learning about leadership

seemed to begin with the stories of real leaders in action. Tese stories grabbed

their attention and sparked their interest in learning about leadership behaviors

or theories that help explain the real leaders’ success. Tis realization, after many

years of teaching leadership, resulted in this book with its focus on stories of great

leadership.

Tis book may be most useful as a supplement to be used with other leadership

textbooks in a college or university level leadership class. Te main core of this

book is contained in Chapters 2‒26  that provide descriptions (Snapshots) ofindividuals who demonstrated great leadership. Te Snapshots describe how the

leaders inuenced their followers to achieve amazing feats—such as building

an international organization to successfully serve the poorest of the poor, or

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creating and running an incredibly successful high-tech business organization,

or preserving a nation from being permanently split apart by a disastrous civil war, or developing and leading a long lasting organization to successfully help

individuals overcome addiction. Tese Snapshots also include descriptions of the

leaders’ background, other life experiences, and the environmental context in

 which they worked. Tis contextual information often helps explain the leaders’

behavior and why they had such amazing effects on followers and others.

Tis book also includes in Chapter 1 brief descriptions of major leadership

theories that are described in detail in most leadership textbooks. A matrix (able 

1.1)  is provided following the theory descriptions to indicate which theories

address aspects of the leaders’ behavior in each Snapshot. In addition, after eachSnapshot is a brief description of how that leader’s behavior and characteristics

reect the different leadership theories in Chapter 1.  Tis is designed to help

students connect the actions of real outstanding leaders with existing leadership

theories. I expect that instructors will use the Snapshots as cases to introduce a

specic leadership theory or behavior pattern. Te cases may be discussed and

analyzed by students in class with the instructor’s guidance—explaining how

the leaders enacted the leadership theories. Tis might be followed by a lecture or

reading assignment with a more thorough explanation of the theory or behaviorpattern the instructor prefers to emphasize. After several guided sessions, lectures

and reading assignments, students should begin to connect the leaders’ actions

 with leadership theories on their own. Tis will begin to make the theories “come

alive” as real descriptions and prescriptions of outstanding leadership.

 Also included in Chapters 27‒31  are ve Snapshots of bad leadership.

Tese leaders are sometimes judged by scholars or historians as immoral or evil

(examples are Adolf Hitler or Idi Amin) or simply incompetent (examples are

Ken Lay or Al Dunlap). Tese bad leaders also had very strong inuence on their

followers, but the outcomes were disastrous for followers and many others. TeSnapshots of bad leadership are also related to leadership theories and are useful

for students to compare with great leaders to facilitate their understanding of

how leaders can go wrong.

For leadership students who are using a separate leadership textbook, the

theory descriptions may be repetitious and unnecessary. However, there may

be theories described in this book that are not covered in some textbooks. For

readers who are not reading this book for a college or university class and who

have no interest in leadership theories, Chapter 1 can be skipped. Some readers

may simply learn best about leadership from real life examples, rather than from

abstract theories.

 Jon P. Howell

New Mexico State University 

xiv ◾  Preface

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xv

Acknowledgments

Numerous individuals provided invaluable assistance in completing this book.First and foremost, my wife Julie was irreplaceable as an editor and advisor

throughout the project. My colleague Peter Dorfman provided advice regarding

my choice of leaders to be included. My editor at aylor and Francis, Anne Duffy,

 was supportive throughout the project. And numerous experts gave valuable

time and effort to reviewing earlier versions of the manuscript and providing

important feedback for the book. Tese reviewers are listed below:

Ronald E. Riggio, Henry R. Kravis Professor of Leadership and

Organizational Psychology, Claremont McKenna CollegeSharon Clinebell, Assistant Dean, University of Northern Colorado

 James Weber, College of Business, St. Cloud State University 

Georgia J. Sorensen, James MacGregor Burns Academy of Leadership,

University of Maryland

Don Jung, Yonsei University, Korea 

 Jagdeep Chhokar, formerly Indian Institute of Management

Leanne Atwater, University of Houston

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xvii

References and Source Material for this Book

I used two types of source material for this book. For the leadership theories, I

made extensive use of my class notes from over 30 years of teaching leadership. Of

course, my teaching reected a myriad of leadership books and journal articles I

have read over the years, but the actual copy for this book was written from my

own understanding and teaching of these theories over the years. No copy was

taken from other sources.

For the descriptions of great leadership, I consulted biographies, journalarticles, and web-based sources that addressed different aspects of the leaders’

lives. My strategy in researching and writing the leadership descriptions was to

rst consult web-based sources to obtain general information about a leader.

I then consulted what appeared to be the best sources cited in those web

articles and followed the reference trail to nd biographies that were widely

cited as outstanding sources for each leader. Once I had read and made notes

on each leader, I wrote the description reecting my own interpretation of the

leader’s actions and how they related to theories of leadership. Tese leadership

descriptions and interpretations are my own and are not taken directly from anysingle source. No authors’ quotations or written copy was taken from any of

the references used for this book. Te only quotations used are brief sayings or

statements by the leaders themselves or their followers. All sources used are cited

in the references at the end of each chapter.

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xix

About the Author

 Jon P. Howell is Professor Emeritus of management in the College of Business atNew Mexico State University (NMSU). He received his MBA from the University

of Chicago and his Ph.D. from the University of California at Irvine. He taught

and conducted research on leadership for 31 years and was previously the Bank

of America Distinguished Professor of Management. He received awards for

excellence in teaching and research at NMSU. Professor Howell has published a

leadership textbook titled Understanding Behaviors for Effective Leadership (2ndedition, 2006, Pearson Prentice Hall) as well as numerous book chapters and

articles in the Academy of Management Journal, Academy of Management Review,

Leadership Quarterly, Organizational Dynamics, Journal of Management, Journalof International Business Studies, Journal of World Business, and other journals.He has received awards for his research from the Society of Industrial and

Organizational Psychology, Academy of Management, the Center for Creative

Leadership, and the Global Leadership Advancement Center. He served on the

editorial board for Leadership Quarterly and  Journal of World Business. He is acountry co-investigator on the Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior

Effectiveness (GLOBE) Project which was led by the late Robert House of the

 Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania. His primary research interestsare leadership and followership, substitutes for leadership, and leadership across

cultures.

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Part I 

Theoretical Basisof Leadership

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3

Chapter 1

Theories of Leadership

Tis is a book of stories. Most of the stories describe great leaders who accom-

plished amazing feats such as creating, preserving, or changing a nation or indus-

try, or saving a group of people from exploitation or annihilation. A few of these

stories describe bad leaders who brought destruction or death to scores of people.In retrospect, the disastrous effects of these bad leaders are no less astounding

than the incredible accomplishments of the great leaders. Although the goals of

these individuals were often quite different, the leadership processes they used

 were frequently similar. In relating stories of these leaders, I have described who

they were, what they accomplished, and how they did it. I have referred to exist-

ing leadership theories to help explain their leadership tactics and behavior as

 well as their effects on others. Te use of these leadership theories will hopefully

make the leaders’ impressive effects more understandable and will clarify how the

theories relate to leadership in action.Scholars have developed theories of leadership to help understand and explain

how leaders affect the organizations and people they lead. Organizations are sim-

ply groups of people working together in a cooperative and coordinated effort to

achieve some goals. Based on research, leadership theories generally focus on spe-

cic leader characteristics and/or behavior patterns that are important in shaping

societies and organizations over time. Different scholars have focused on separate

leader characteristics and behaviors, resulting in numerous distinct leadership

theories being proposed and researched. Te most popular theories are describedin well-accepted leadership textbooks, and these theories are briey summarized

in this chapter. For students of leadership, this chapter may repeat information

they previously studied. For the reader without this background, this chapter

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4 ◾  Theoretical Basis of Leadership

may provide a framework to help the reader understand how the great and bad

leaders described in this book shaped and changed the societies and organiza-tions they led.

 A denition of leadership seems appropriate at this point to give readers an

idea of what is described in this book. Leadership is an inuence process, usually

(but not always) carried out by one person. Te leader inuences a group, who

view the inuence as legitimate, toward the achievement of some goal or goals.

Te leader may utilize many different strategies to inuence followers’ efforts

toward goal achievement. She might describe a desirable vision of the future

that includes a mission with inspirational goals to be achieved, she might offer

rewards to followers when they achieve the goals, or she might encourage follow-ers to participate with her in setting desirable goals and strategies as a means of

gaining followers’ ownership of the goals and their commitment to achieve them.

Tese are all examples of leaders inuencing followers to achieve goals, which is

the essence of leadership. Snapshots of Great Leadership describes how differentleaders used these and other strategies to lead their followers in achieving out-

standing results.

Trait Theories

Trough much of the 20th century, most people believed that great leaders were

born, not made. We now know that leadership is complex and not simply the

result of one or more personal characteristics of an individual. Over 100 years of

research on personal characteristics of leaders (often called leadership traits ) failedto demonstrate that any single trait or set of traits make a person a great leader.

Leadership traits are characteristics of an individual that do not change from sit-

uation to situation, such as intelligence, assertiveness, or physical attractiveness.Literally hundreds of studies were carried out on scores of different traits and

many traits were identied that may help an individual become an effective leaderin specic situations . However, the key traits for one situation may be different foranother situation. Te following set of categories summarizes the mass of trait

research and encompasses the most important leadership traits found in research. 

Determination 

and drive   encompass traits such as initiative, energy, asser-tiveness, perseverance, masculinity, and occasionally dominance. Individuals

 with these traits work long hours, pursue goals with a high degree of energy andperseverance, are often ambitious and competitive, and may dominate others.

Cognitive capacity  includes intelligence, analytical and verbal ability, behavioralexibility, and good judgment. Individuals with strong cognitive capacity are

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6 ◾  Theoretical Basis of Leadership

respect, and cooperation needed from others for effective group or organizational

performance.

Early Behavioral and Contingency Theories

In the 1950s, several university based research programs began to focus on iden-

tifying the most effective behavior patterns of leaders. At rst, these programs

sought to identify one or two behavior patterns that characterized all effective

leaders. Tis was later described as the “one best way” approach to leadership

effectiveness. After numerous investigations, they identied two behavior pat-

terns that seemed especially important. Te different researchers used several

labels for these two behaviors. One was called consideration, relationship orien-tation, concern for people, or supportive leader behavior and included showing aconcerned and caring attitude toward followers, being friendly, encouraging fol-

lowers’ feelings of personal worth, and supporting efforts to develop their capa-

bilities. Te second leader behavior pattern was called initiating structure, taskorientation, concern for production, or directive leader behavior  and emphasized

a focus on task accomplishment by clarifying followers’ roles and the leader’sexpectations of followers. Tis often included goal setting or setting performance

standards, assigning tasks, scheduling, and explaining rules and procedures.

Tese two leadership behavior patterns became the basis of several leadership

theories developed over the next 25 years.

The Leadership Grid

One such theory that became popular with consultants was the Managerial Grid,

later renamed the Leadership Grid, which was developed by Robert Blake and Jane Mouton. Tis model includes the two leader behavior patterns described

above in a two dimensional coordinate system that provides a grid-like represen-

tation of different levels of concern for people and concern for production. Concernfor production is represented on the horizontal axis and concern for people is on

the vertical axis. Five distinct leadership styles were described by Grid develop-

ers, depending on the amount of each leader behavior a leader demonstrates in

her/his behavior.

Consultants who emphasize the Grid use questionnaires to obtain scores foreach leader on the two behavior patterns, allowing leaders to plot their own posi-

tion on the Grid. Working with the consultants, leaders presumably determine

how they can adapt their style to improve their leadership effectiveness. Grid

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Theories of Leadership ◾  7

developers maintain that Team Leadership, which describes leaders who are high

on both concern for people and concern for production, is the most effectivestyle. Despite its popularity with consultants, research shows no single leadership

style is best for all situations. Grid developers recently acknowledged this and

describe some leaders as shifting styles over time, but maintain that most leaders

have a single dominant style. Te Grid developers do not describe different situ-

ations as requiring different leadership styles.

The Contingency Theory of Leadership

 Another leadership theory that was developed about the same time emphasized

the same two leader behavior patterns. Te Contingency Teory of Leadership,

developed by Fred Fiedler, labeled these two behaviors task oriented  and relation-ship oriented leadership and included a unique questionnaire for measuring thesebehavior patterns. It was more complex and realistic than the Grid theory, in

that it specied that the most effective combination of the two leader behavior

patterns must t the situation to be most effective. No single level of task and/or

relationship oriented leadership was effective for all situations.

Fiedler described three important situational characteristics that determined which combination of the two behavior patterns was optimal. Tese situational

characteristics were the leader’s power   to control rewards and punishments forfollowers, the quality of the relationship between the leader and her followers (thatis, are followers friendly and cooperative with the leader), and the clarity of taskstructure  for followers (that is, are the task goals, procedures, and measures oftheir performance clearly specied). Fiedler rated situations as high or low on

each of these three factors. Te three were then combined to classify a situation

as favorable or unfavorable for the leader. If the situation reected high leader

power, good leader-member relations, and high task structure, then the situation was considered highly favorable to the leader. A moderately favorable situation

might include a poor leader-member relationship, high position power, and high

task structure or some other combination of high and low scores on the situ-

ational factors. A very unfavorable situation had a poor leader-member relation-

ship, low leader power, and low task structure.

Te Contingency Teory predicted that a leader’s style was either task ori-

ented or relationship oriented. A leader could not be both task and relationship

oriented, although Fiedler later added a socio-independent   leadership style that was apparently medium on both leader behaviors. ask oriented leaders were

predicted to be most effective in highly favorable or highly unfavorable situa-

tions. Relationship oriented leaders were most effective in moderately favorable

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8 ◾  Theoretical Basis of Leadership

situations. Socio-independent leaders were predicted to be effective in very favor-

able situations.Fiedler and his associates believe that leaders have a predominant style and

attempts to change this style are unrealistic. Tey suggest that if a leader is inef-

fective, his style does not match the situation and he should be moved to another

situation that is more appropriate. If this is not possible, the leader’s situation

could be modied to t the leader’s style. A training program was developed

to teach leaders how to assess their own style and the situation, and to modify

the situation to improve their effectiveness. Te Contingency Teory has been

researched extensively with conicting results, but it has many advocates among

practicing leaders.

The Situational Leadership Theory 

Te Situational Leadership Teory, developed by Paul Hersey and Ken Blanchard,

also emphasized the same two leadership patterns which they recently renamed

directive and supportive  leadership. Teir model is presented in a two dimensionalcoordinate system similar to the Leadership Grid. However, the Situational

Leadership Teory asserts that the most effective leadership style must match thesituation. In this sense, it is similar to the Contingency Teory, but Hersey and

Blanchard describe a very different situational factor as important for the leader

to consider. Tey point to the followers’ maturity and readiness to perform as thekey factor the leader must evaluate as she adjusts her leadership style. Followers

 with a low level of maturity and readiness are described as unable and unwilling

to work on their own, requiring a telling leadership style that is highly directive with little supportiveness. Followers who are high in maturity and readiness are

both willing and able to work on their own and require a delegating   leadership

style, with little direction or support by the leader. Followers who are in betweenlow and high on maturity and readiness, require different combinations of direc-

tive and supportive leadership. Although the Situational Leadership Teory has

been popular with consultants, perhaps because it is easy to understand, it has

not received strong support from researchers.

Directive and supportive leadership are basic behaviors for leadership and

most great leaders reect one or both of these behaviors in some form. When the

United Farm Workers Union members were threatened and exploited by grow-

ers, the great labor leader, Cesar Chavez, became highly directive with union

members to organize a quick response. He also developed a credit union for

union members, participated in picket lines and marches, and provided strike

funding and other activities that reected his supportive leadership. Steve Jobs