A Comparison of College Presidents Using Fiedler's Contingency Model

Abstract

References are generally made to the in higher education as if the term has uniform connotations, applicable to all situations. In the higher education literature, for example, apparently little regard is given to instances where differences may exist between a president as a leader of a university and as a leader of his administrative cabinet. Although both situations may be commonly held to signify leadership, a more precise distinction probably exists. In the case of the former, the president symbolically leads an organization composed of many varied groups; in the latter, he occupies a differentiated role with one or more specific groups in which interactions might be best characterized as a social process. Historically, the word has been ascribed different meanings by different people. The traditional viewpoint conceptualized leadership as behavior exhibited by certain individuals possessed with inborn traits or qualities.1 However, when the results of these studies were summarized, a confused picture of leader traits across different situations e1gnerged:2 no one personality trait appeared to be significantly related to all situations. Instead, research since the 1940s has indicated that different situa-