The general belief of situational leadership theories is that leaders are products of real situations rather than gifts of nature. These theories mainly focus on task requirements, peers’ expectations, and behavior, employees’ characteristics, expectations and behavior, organizational culture and policies, etc.
This theory focuses on the followers. Successful leadership is achieved by selecting the right leadership style contingent on the followers’ maturity level.
The term maturity refers to the ability and willingness of people to take responsibility for directing their behavior.
Maturity has two components—job and psychological maturities. Hersey and Blanchard considered a leader’s task and relationship behavior, either high or low, and then combined them into four specific leadership styles.
These styles are described as telling (high task-low relationship) and delegating (low task-low relationship).
Another component of the theory is defining four stages of maturity of subordinates:
- M1: people are neither competent nor confident),
- M2: people are motivated but currently lack appropriate skills),
- M3: people are able but unwilling to do what the leader wants) and
- M4: people are both able and willing to do what is asked of them).
In short, this theory states that the right style should align with the level or subordinates’ maturity level.