A LEADER'S ABILITY TO DIFFERENTIATE, THE SUBORDINATE'S PERCEPTION OF THE LEADER, AND THE SUBORDINATE'S PERFORMANCE.

This article explores the possibility that a leader behaves differently to different subordinates. Furthermore, a number of authors have suggested that it is an over-simplification to regard an effective leader as having a general unitary style of behavior. Supervisory styles are examined and analyzed according to intrapersonal and interpersonal differentiations. Results of the study have indicated that: (1) high Least-Preferred Co-worker (LPC) scoring supervisors are highly discriminating in judgments about their subordinates; and (2) a supervisor's differentiation moderates the behavior and the subordinate's rating of his own performance. Moreover, the failure to support the hypothesis is confronted with methodological problems: (1) self-ratings of performance were used; and (2) the rank-order correlations provide the basic data in the analysis are based upon only five people per group.