Hersey and Blanchard’s Situational Leadership Model – In A Remote Setting

Throughout my internship, I have noticed that there is one leadership theory that sticks out as the most applicable, and that is Hersey and Blanchard’s Situational Leadership Model. Paul Hersey and Kenneth Blanchard developed this model, which is an individualistic, flexible approach based on the interaction between three things: the amount of guidance a leader gives (task oriented behavior), the amount of “socioemotional” support a leader gives, and the “performance readiness level that followers display when executing a specific task. This allows leaders to better understand the relationship between the level of performance readiness of their followers and the most effective leadership style, and the main emphasis is on the behavior of a leader in relation to followers concerning a particular task. It argues that there is no single best leadership style or way to influence people, but that a leader’s style should adjust to followers’ task specific level of performance readiness. Thus, I began to see many similarities between my supervisors or “leaders”, Sam and Hassan, and the types of leaders this model describes.

First, my supervisors explained in the very beginning of the internship that they want to do whatever they can to make this as beneficial and educational for us as possible – they truly wanted to learn the most about each of us as they could in order to train and teach us in the most effective method possible. Since each of the interns had different skills and areas of expertise (for example, one intern has more knowledge with tech and IT which others had more with marketing and branding), our supervisors tailored their leadership style to each of our style’s of work and what we were best at. Since they were able to gain an in-depth understanding of each of our levels of performance readiness in different areas, they could decipher what style of leadership would serve both us and them the best. Furthermore, they both gave a lot more “socioemotional” support than I was expecting. For example, today we had a work training and as they were wrapping up, they explained how they are always here to help us with anything we need in our careers later on down the line, whether that be a letter of recommendation or a job referral. They genuinely are invested in our success not only with their company this summer, but in our careers as a whole. So, after analzying this theory further and its focus on a flexible, more individual-centric approach, I was able to discern that my supervisors often demonstrated this type of leadership style throughout these past few months.