Abstract number : 020-0302

Leadership style investigation in Quinn ’s Competing values framework for Iranian automotive industry

1- Elmira Hajiaghazadeh Marandi, Islamic Azad University-South Tehran Branch, Gerami alley,

Choobi bridge, Enghelab avenue , Elmira.aghazadeh@gmail.com, 0098-21-44630490

2- Farshid Abdi, Islamic Azad University-South Tehran Branch, Gerami alley, Choobi bridge, Enghelab

avenue, farshidabdi@azad.ac.ir, 0098-21-77508894

POMS 22nd Annual Conference

Reno, Nevada, U.S.A.

April 29 to May 2, 2011

Abstract

Competing values framework (CVF) offers eight managerial roles for evaluating the effectiveness of the

managers. (Quinn & Rohrbaugh,1983). The eight roles of CVF are innovator, broker, producer, director,

coordinator, monitor, facilitator and mentor.

Competing values framework have been used as an instrument for measuring the leadership style of managers

from 1983. Since most of the researches about leadership style based on CVF has been done in Australia , a

western culture, this study seeks whether a leadership model (CVF) developed for western culture, is an

appropriate instrument for describing the managers’ leadership style in Iran automotive industry. We investigate

the perception of the managers’ own and their subordinates from their leadership style and the effect of

organizational position on choosing managerial roles.

Introduction

Researches carried out by Quinn (1988) and Denison et al. (1995) showed that there are eight managerial roles

which must be displayed if the managers are to be effective.(Quinn , 1988); (Denision et al, 1995); (Vilkinas &

Cartan,1997). Tricia vilkinas and Greg Cartan, by introducing the integrated competing values framework

(ICVF), proved that the Integrator role, as the ninth role, is a significant predictor of effectiveness. The current
study is planned to recognize if the managers display the nine managerial roles in different degrees and to

identify if there is a difference in their level of effectiveness. The managers’ self perception and those of their

subordinates were surveyed.

The competing values frame work

The Competing Values Framework has been named as one of the 40 most important frameworks in the history

of business. It has been studied and tested in organizations for more than 25 years by a group of thought leaders

from leading business schools and corporations. More than two decades of work on the Competing Values

Framework has produced a set of intervention processes, measurement devices, and change techniques that

capture a comprehensive view of the organization, its outcomes, and its leadership. (Quinn et al, 2006)

In Quinn ’s model there are two main dimensions for effective managers, a stability-flexibility aspect and an

external-internal focus aspect. These two dimensions create a four quadrant model, within each quadrant, are

positioned two managerial roles, totally eight roles as shown in figure 1. These eight roles, in the basis of CVF,

are Innovator, Broker, Producer, Director, Coordinator, Monitor, Facilitator and Mentor. (Quinn et al, 2006)

There are some behaviors related with displaying each of these roles as shown in figure 1.(Vilkinas &

Cartan,2001); (Vilkinas & Cartan,2006); (Quinn et al, 1996).

Quinn developed the CVF to explain the various managerial roles essential for personal effectiveness in

complex business. (Denison et al, 1995); (ONeill & Quinn , 1993); (Quinn et al, 1990); (Quinn , 1988); (Quinn

& Hart, 1993); (Hooijberg & Quinn , 1993).

 Figure1: Quinn ’s competing values frame work
Source: (Hooijberg et al, 2004)

Each quadrant of the framework represents one of four major models of organization (See figure 1) and

organizational forms derived from the literature. (See figure 2).

.
 Flexibility
organizational organizational
form: CLAN form: ADHOCRACY

orientation: COLLABORATE orientation: CREATE

Internal External
Focus Focus
organizational organizational
form: HIERARCHY form: MARKET

orientation: CONTROL orientation: COMPETE

Control

Figure 2: the organizational culture related to each quadrant.

Source: (Quinn et al, 2006)
In year 2001, Tricia Vilkinas Greg Cartan added the ninth role named Integrator role which is located centrally

in this model as figure 3. In this role managers gather the feedback from the environment as a guide to display

the most appropriate role in any particular situation. So as Vilkinas and Cartan mentioned in year 2001, this role

has two parts: critical observer and reflective learner. (Vilkinas & Cartan,2001)

Figure3: The Integrated competing values frame work

Source: (Vilkinas & Cartan, 2001)
This model was chosen as the basis of the current study because it recognizes the paradoxical dimensions of

managerial behavior which suggests that more effective managers generally display a more complex and varied

set of behaviors

Purpose of current study

The CVF and ICVF have been applied for some organizations in china and Australia previously (Vilkinas &

Cartan,2001); (Vilkinas & Cartan,2006); (Vilkinas et al, 2009), But it has not been used as an instrument for

identifying the roles that managers display in Iran (a Middle Eastern country) and in automotive industry, yet.

Iran Khodro automotive industry, as the most important car producing factory in Middle East, has been selected

for the investigation of its leadership style in managers’ own and their staffs’ perception.

Method

The subjects in this study were a sample of 308 middle managers of Iran khodro Industrial group, for self

perception in four different positions as senior manager(SM), manager(M), boss(B) and sub-boss (SB) and also

from three different operation scopes which are production(P), logistics(L) and staffs(S). For the subordinate

perception, 290 middle manager have been surveyed in three different positions as senior manager, manager,

and boss and in the same three operation scopes. A total of 212 middle managers in self perception and 149 of

them for the subordinates’ perception had responded. About 2% of the managers are female and the distribution

of them in each operation scope is as table 1 and in each position as table 2:

Hypothesis

The relevant hypothesis of the model is presented below:

H1: the mean of displaying each one of the nine roles and effectiveness for self and staffs’ perception s, are the

equal.
 Table 1: frequency of the respondent in each operation scope

Operation Valid Cumulative

Scope Frequency Percent Percent Percent

Valid L 77 36.3 36.3 36.3

P 94 44.3 44.3 80.7

S 41 19.3 19.3 100.0

Total 212 100.0 100.0

Table 2 : frequency of the respondent in each position

Position Valid Cumulative

Frequency Percent Percent Percent

Valid M 19 9.0 9.0 9.0

SB 117 55.2 55.2 64.2

SM 6 2.8 2.8 67.0

B 70 33.0 33.0 100.0

Total 212 100.0 100.0

Questionnaire

The questionnaire presented by Vilkinas and Cartan in 2001, which included a set of 16 questions measuring the

main eight roles, 6 questions measuring the Integrator role and 5 questions measuring the effectiveness, is used
in this research. Five measures of effectiveness taken from Denison et al questionnaire in year 1995.(Denison et

al,1995); (Vilkinas & Cartan,1997)

Responses were recorded on a 5 point Likert scale from 1 anchored by “completely disagree” to 5, anchored by

“completely agree.”

Because of the translation of the questionnaire into Farsi, the alpha coefficient has been calculated again and the

new result is 0.814 which is acceptable.

Data analysis

For the managerial roles scores, the two items associated with each role were averaged to give the score for that

role. Responses from all the staff of a particular manager were aggregated to produce a single score on each

item for each manager. The means of these staff responses make up the measures for each manager. Thus, each

manager had a score on each of the eight roles for their self and their subordinates’ perception. To analyze this

data, a t-tests was conducted for self and staff ratings on each of the nine roles and on effectiveness

Results

The results show that the middle managers are displaying the producer role more significant than others in self

and subordinates’ perception. (See Table 3).

Also male leaders are performing the producer and coordinator roles more than others in their own and their

staffs’ view. (See Table4 and 5).

The rank of the roles which Female managers are displaying is different and even opposite in self and staffs’

perception. (See Table 4 and 5).

 Table 3: displaying roles of the middle managers in self and subordinates perception

Rank of the displaying roles- Rank of the displaying roles-

subordinates perception self perception

Role
Std. Std.
Mean Rank Mean Rank
Deviation Deviation

3.9732 .81121 3 4.3113 .47672 5

Innovator

3.8893 .86572 7 4.0472 .58427 8

Broker

4.1409 .80135 1 4.5401 .44567 1

producer

3.8993 .96908 6 4.2972 .55408 6

Director

3.9966 .81476 2 4.3939 .47378 3

Coordinator

3.9128 .83571 4 3.9717 .57939 9

Monitor

3.9060 .92701 5 4.3255 .54444 4

facilitator

3.7685 .98042 9 4.4410 .51981 2

Mentor

3.8747 .77641 8 4.2327 .41061 7

Integrator

Effectiveness 3.7530 .87900 4.0245 .49160

 Table4: the mean and the standard deviation of the roles displayed and the effectiveness of each gender

SEX

f m

perception perception

Roles subordinates self subordinates self

Standard Standard Standard Standard

Mean Deviation Mean Deviation Mean Deviation Mean Deviation

innovator 3.75 1.77 4.38 .48 3.98 .80 4.31 .48

broker 3.75 1.77 3.50 .71 3.89 .86 4.06 .58

producer 4.25 .35 4.50 .41 4.14 .81 4.54 .45

director 3.50 .71 4.25 .50 3.90 .97 4.30 .56

coordinator 4.50 .71 3.88 .63 3.99 .82 4.40 .47

monitor 4.50 .71 3.88 .63 3.90 .84 3.97 .58

facilitator 4.50 .71 4.38 .95 3.90 .93 4.32 .54

mentor 3.50 .71 4.62 .48 3.77 .98 4.44 .52

integrator 4.00 .24 4.21 .50 3.87 .78 4.23 .41

effectiveness 4.00 1.41 3.90 .50 3.75 .88 4.03 .49

 Table5: the rank of the means for the roles in each gender

roles displaying rank- roles displaying rank-

self perception subordinates’ perception

Role male female male Female

Innovator 5 3 3 7

Broker 8 9 7 6

producer 1 2 1 4

Director 6 5 5 9

Coordinator 2 8 2 3

Monitor 9 7 4 2

facilitator 4 4 6 1

Mentor 3 1 9 8

Integrator 7 6 8 5

According to table 6 and table 7, the main role which has the biggest mean in all four positions, from both

perceptions, is the producer role.

Table 6: the mean and the standard deviation of the roles displayed and the effectiveness of each position
perception perception
position

position
role subordinates self subordinates self
Standard Standard Standard Standard
Mean Deviation Mean Deviation Mean Deviation Mean Deviation
producer 4.12 0.74 4.66 0.34 4.4 0.82 4.58 0.49
director 3.85 0.87 4.37 0.55 3.9 1.19 4.33 0.41
coordinator 3.95 0.83 4.58 0.38 4.2 0.91 4.42 0.38
monitor 3.98 0.84 4.18 0.56 4 0.61 3.92 0.38
M SM
facilitator 4.02 0.85 4.47 0.51 4.2 0.76 4.17 0.75
mentor 3.84 0.82 4.39 0.59 4 0.71 4.33 0.61
integrator 3.92 0.78 4.29 0.44 4.27 0.84 4.22 0.14
effectiveness 3.83 0.9 4.07 0.4 4.04 0.97 4.17 0.45
producer . . 4.57 0.45 4.14 0.84 4.45 0.45
director . . 4.3 0.56 3.93 1.02 4.27 0.56
coordinator . . 4.4 0.5 4.01 0.81 4.34 0.46
monitor . . 3.98 0.55 3.87 0.85 3.91 0.63
SB B
facilitator . . 4.37 0.51 3.82 0.97 4.23 0.58
mentor . . 4.45 0.54 3.71 1.08 4.44 0.47
integrator . . 4.24 0.4 3.83 0.77 4.21 0.45
effectiveness . . 4.01 0.54 3.69 0.86 4.02 0.43
 Table7: the rank of the means for the roles in each position

roles displaying rank- self perception roles displaying rank- subordinates’ perception

Role SM M B SB SM M B SB

Innovator 5 3 3 6 3 2 4 -

Broker 8 9 8 8 1 6 8 -

producer 1 1 1 1 2 1 1 -

Director 3 6 5 5 9 8 3 -

Coordinator 2 2 4 3 6 5 2 -

Monitor 9 8 9 9 7 4 5 -

facilitator 7 4 6 4 5 3 6 -

Mentor 4 5 2 2 8 9 9 -

Integrator 6 7 7 7 4 7 7 -

From the tables 8 and 9, it is driven that the producer role is more performing by the middle managers of all

three operation scopes, in self and subordinates perception.

 Table 8: the mean and the standard deviation of the roles displayed and the effectiveness of each operation

scope
scope

scope

scope
PERCEPTION PERCEPTION PERCEPTION
SUBORDIN SUBORDIN SUBORDI
Role ATES SELF ATES SELF NATES SELF
Deviation

Deviation

Deviation

Deviation

Deviation

Deviation
Standard

Standard

Standard

Standard

Standard

Standard
Mean

Mean

Mean

Mean

Mean

Mean
producer 4.03 0.83 4.47 0.48 4.2 0.8 4.61 0.43 4.21 0.62 4.5 0.39
production
logestics

director 3.68 0.9 4.18 0.64 4.02 1.1 4.42 0.48 4.02 0.72 4.23 0.48

stuff
coordinator 3.78 0.9 4.34 0.5 4.12 0.8 4.49 0.43 4.1 0.66 4.28 0.49
monitor 3.71 0.81 4.02 0.48 4.01 0.9 3.98 0.58 4.07 0.68 3.85 0.73
facilitator 3.89 0.94 4.3 0.57 3.89 1 4.36 0.52 4.02 0.78 4.3 0.57
mentor 3.63 0.92 4.55 0.48 3.82 1.1 4.39 0.53 3.93 0.75 4.37 0.55
integrator 3.73 0.84 4.22 0.39 3.94 0.8 4.26 0.43 4 0.63 4.2 0.4
effectiveness 3.46 0.88 4.01 0.54 3.87 0.9 4.08 0.47 4.09 0.74 3.94 0.42

Table 9: the rank of the means for the roles in each operation scope

roles displaying rank- self perception roles displaying rank- subordinates’ perception

Role L P S L P S

Innovator 5 6 2 6 2 5

Broker 8 8 8 8 6 2

producer 2 1 6 1 1 1

Director 7 3 1 7 4 6

Coordinator 3 2 5 3 3 3

Monitor 9 9 9 5 5 4

facilitator 4 5 4 2 8 7

Mentor 1 4 3 9 9 9

Integrator 6 7 7 4 7 8
For analyzing the data gathered from subordinates in comparison with the data gathered from the middle

managers’ themselves, a t- test was conducted on the 9 roles and the effectiveness. We assumed µx as the mean

of each role for self perception and µy as the mean of each role for the staffs’ perception, here are the

hypotheses:

H0:µx-µy=0
H1=µx-µy≠0

As the result showed in table 10, the significant coefficient in Levin’s test for the equality of the variances, is

equal to zero or less that 5%. So we reject the null hypothesis which is for the equality of the variances and then

we use the second line for our other hypothesis about the equality of the means for each role and effectiveness,

in self and subordinates perception. For all the roles except than monitor and broker, the significant coefficient

is equal to zero or less that 5%. So for all the other roles, we reject the null hypothesis which is about the

equality of means in self and subordinates perception. In other words we cannot reject the hypothesis that

claims the means of performance of the monitor and broker roles in self and subordinates perception for all the

middle managers are equal.

 Table 10: Independent Samples Test- between elf and subordinates perception

Levene's Test for Equality of Variances t-test for Equality of Means

Mean Difference
95%

Sig. (2-tailed)
Role Confidence

Difference
Std. Error
Sig Interval of the
F t df Difference
.
Lower Upper

innovator Equal variances assumed

28.285 0 5 359 0 0.34 0.07 0.20 0.47
Equal variances not assumed
4.6 219 0 0.34 0.07 0.19 0.48
broker Equal variances assumed
29.892 0 2.1 359 0.039 0.16 0.08 0.01 0.31
Equal variances not assumed
1.9 241 0.054 0.16 0.08 0.00 0.32
producer Equal variances assumed
39.851 0 6 359 0 0.40 0.07 0.27 0.53
Equal variances not assumed
5.5 212 0 0.40 0.07 0.26 0.54
director Equal variances assumed
38.686 0 4.9 359 0 0.40 0.08 0.24 0.56
Equal variances not assumed
4.5 216 0 0.40 0.09 0.22 0.57
coordinator Equal variances assumed
30.395 0 5.8 359 0 0.40 0.07 0.26 0.53
Equal variances not assumed
5.3 218 0 0.40 0.07 0.25 0.54
monitor Equal variances assumed
15.083 0 0.8 359 0.429 0.06 0.07 -0.09 0.21
Equal variances not assumed
0.7 245 0.457 0.06 0.08 -0.10 0.21
facilitator Equal variances assumed
29.778 0 5.4 359 0 0.42 0.08 0.27 0.57
Equal variances not assumed
5 219 0 0.42 0.08 0.25 0.59
mentor Equal variances assumed
50.333 0 8.4 359 0 0.67 0.08 0.52 0.83
Equal variances not assumed
7.7 207 0 0.67 0.09 0.50 0.85
integrator Equal variances assumed
51.09 0 5.7 359 0 0.36 0.06 0.23 0.48
Equal variances not assumed
5.1 206 0 0.36 0.07 0.22 0.50
effectiveness Equal variances assumed
64.754 0 3.7 359 0 0.27 0.07 0.13 0.41
Equal variances not assumed
3.4 213 0.001 0.27 0.08 0.11 0.43
Future research

All the studies about Quinn ’s competitive values framework have been done in a vague world. In comparison

with Likert’s 5- points or 7- point’s scales, Using linguistic variables and fuzzy numbers may help to the

respondents to express better their perception about performing each role. Comparing the rank of the roles

displayed by the managers in fuzzy and vague data, will be worth full.

In relation with each quadrant’s organizational culture, it is suggested that the next researchers find a way to

figure out a relation between the results of measuring each two roles in each quadrant and their related

organizational culture.

Refrences

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