ABSTRACT

In the last chapter we discussed the management of teams. With teams comes the idea of a team leader. A team leader is responsible for the performance of a group. Leadership has been the subject of much research. It is the subject of much literature (for example, Shakespeare: King Lear or Henry IV; Conrad in Heart of Darkness). Autobiographies of business leaders abound. However,

Leaders fascinate, but do we need them? Are good managers, or good administrators, a safer bet? If we do need leaders in public services, can we train them, or are they born? We look at leadership styles and myths. Leadership has a bearing on motivation. Vroom and Deci2 found that there could be a marked difference between the performance of otherwise matched pairs of employees. They discovered that competence was not sufficient to ensure high performance. People needed to be motivated to use their competence. In the period 1980-2000, there is evidence that many employees in publicly owned public service organizations were demotivated. Public service managers were exhorted to remotivate their staff. We look critically at theories about how this might be done and the role, if any, of leadership.