ORGANIZATIONAL BEI-IAVIOR AND I:[IJMANPERFORMANCE 12, 62--82 (1974) Toward a Contingency Theory of Leadership Based upon the Consideration and Initiating Structure Literature 1 STEVEN KERR, CHESTER A. SCHRIESHEIM, CHARLES J. MIJRPttY, AND RALPH M. STOGDILL The Ohio State UniversiLy The Ohio State Leadership Studies have been criticized on grounds that they lack a conceptual base, and fail to take situational variables into ac- count. This article reviews the published literature involving the leader be- havior dimensions "Consideration" and "Initiating Structure," for the pur- pose of developing some situational propositions of leader effectiveness. Among the variables found by researchers to significantly moderate relation- ships between leader behavior predictors, and satisfaction and performance criteria are the following: subordinate need for information, job level, sub- ordinate expectations of leader behavior, perceived organizational inde- pendence, leader's similarity of attitudes and behavior to managerial style of higher management, leader upward influence; and characteristics of the task, including pressure and provision of intrinsic satisfaction. The article concludes by presenting ten situational propositions, and linking them to form two general postulates of leadership effectiveness. INTRODUCTION The Ohio State Leadership Studies comprise one of the most compre- hensive research programs in the fields of industrial psychology and or- ganizational behavior, and the leader behavior scales derived from these studies have been utilized by literally hundreds of researchers during the las~ quarter century. Through the years the Ohio State research has sus- tained its share of criticisms, perhaps the most serious of which is the contention that the studies fail to take situational variables into account (Korman, 1966; Bobbitt, Breinholt, Doktor & McNaul, Chap. 6, in press) and lack a conceptual base. Critics ha~e argued that the effect of the studies has been to support a behavioral theory in which optimality is achieved by combining high Consideration with high Initiating Structure, regardless of situation, in a way that is analogous to the 9-9 leadership style on the Managerial Grid (Blake, Mouton & Bidwell, 1962). There is some irony in these criticisms, in that a number of those who i The comments on earlier drafts of this paper by :R. J. House, J. G. Hunt, and R. N. Osborne are gratefully acknowledged. 62 Copyrigh~ O 1974 by Academic Press, Inc. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.