uation. The first are situational characteristics, the environment in which the leader must perform, the second are leader characteristics, the experience, personal qualities and skills of the leader, and the third are member characteristics, the motivation, skill and experience levels of group members (Chelladurai and Madella, 2006). The situational characteristics and member characteristics have a required behaviour to ensure maximum group performance, they also have a preferred behaviour to ensure the satisfaction of group members, if the leaders actual behaviour matches both the required behaviour and preferred behaviour of the situation the consequence is maximum group performance and satisfaction. However, if the group are not performing and achieving goals or are not satisfied or both, then the leader is able to amend their actual behaviour to improve this. Leaders able to monitor performance and satisfaction, and understand what is required to amend the situation will achieve optimum group performance in Chelladurai’s model.
The one limitation of Chealldurai’s model is that it assumes the leader is in a position of complete positional power over the group, and can implement any leadership style of their choosing without constraints. Positional power is the authority and influence a leader has over a group, if the leader has positional power, they will be able to implement the leadership style they best see fit for the situation. Positional power cannot be measured or quantified, making it highly ambiguous and hard for a leader to understand whether they have it or how then can gain it. It becomes the responsibility of the organisation to have policies in place to provide leaders with some positional power, usually by establishing a clear hierarchal structure. By establishing a hierarchy, the leader is perceived by the group to be able to make demands and expect compliance from them giving the leader legitimate power (French and Raven, 1959). Secondly, by providing the leader with the ability to reward compliance and punish non compliance from the group, the leader has reward and coercive power (French and Raven, 1959). To obtain complete power over the group the leader must gain the trust and belief of the group that they are capable of success, by ensuring the group are both satisfied and meeting performance goals.
The importance of establishing a hierarchy became evident during the planning stage of the outdoor management course for the red team, the coordinators within the team assumed leadership roles but were unable to gain positional power due to the team being a peer group (Pettinger, 2007). The leaders selected had little authority and influence over the group as everyone was perceived to have the same rank, status and occupation, hence the leaders had none of French and Ravens five bases of power (Pettinger, 2007). The result was leaders with no positional power over the group, so could not direct the group with the method of leadership required for the situation. The task had significant constraints, particularly a short time frame and a large group size, for this situation Chelladurai recommends an autocratic leadership style would be most favourable (Chelladurai and Madella, 2006). The leaders attempted an autocratic leadership style, setting individual tasks for the group, however due to the poor leader member relations and lack of positional power the leadership structure quickly became a democracy. The product was an extremely unproductive workforce initially because of the time spent discussing how was best to approach the task. Because of how the leaders were perceived by the group there was little mutual trust, respect or confidence that the leaders were making the correct decisio