The leader of an accounting team failed to properly assign tasks to team members based on their qualifications. He assigned an important accounting task to an employee who had no experience in that area. Despite warnings from other employees, the leader did not acknowledge the employee's lack of experience, which led to an error. This damaged trust in the leader from the team. According to Fiedler's contingency theory, the leader's style was task-oriented but the situation was unfavorable due to poor relationships with employees and weak leadership authority. The leader's failure to consider employee skills and listen to concerns caused low performance from the team.

1. Leadership<br />The dynamic business world is impossible without proper and perspective leadership. There are few aspects that play a major role in determining the success of an organization such as technological advantage, perspective management, product branding, human resources and teamwork. Among all these factors teamwork plays pivotal role for a success and prosperity of any organization. The most important skill a leader must possess would be being able to set direction and vision for the organizational leadership role. In my view, better performance of any task for teamwork is associated with leader who is responsible for providing proper directions to his or her followers, has the ability to take charge and use his or her position power in order to coordinate and direct the work of his subordinates, design effective organizational processes, control activities, and meet organizational objectives. <br />In one of my jobs where I worked as an accountant, our leader did not allocate properly the performing tasks. As a result, the accounting team leader assigned tasks to one of my coworkers to perform, even though he knew that the employee does not meet the necessary qualifications and knowledge to implement them. Even though, our team leader knew the experience and knowledge of all of his followers, he did not judge properly the ability of one of my coworkers and in that manner allowed him to report the accounting data with an error in Account Receivable Department. The accounting leader failed to take into account that the person he assigned for that job never worked in that position before and he needed at least somebody to explain to him how to record entries in that section. As a result, because of the misunderstanding where to record of the accounting entry, the accountant did a mistake, which later reflected the journal, the general ledger and the Balance Sheet. Moreover leader said to his subordinates that exactly that person should perform that kind of work. In that moment some of his subordinates attempted to explain him that that person who leader assign to perform that task is not qualified for it and that he was not clear what exactly and how to do his tasks. Even though, the leader had clear task structure because he knew exactly how to organize his tasks and followed his plan in every step he should do and did not mention for the subordinate’s error to his manager, which in turn lead to delays for that year’s ending Balance Sheet, Income Statement and Retained Earnings. Recording accounting transactions on time and following the whole accounting process is in paramount importance for the success in every accounting department because at the end of the year the investors need the Balance Sheet and Income Statement in order to decide how much funds to invest in the future. <br />However, in the situation above, the leader of the team is the person who is responsible of all the tasks with Accounting Receivable Department. A theory of leadership suggests that a particular disposition maybe effective in one situation, but not in another. That theory is known as Fielder’s contingency theory of leadership. For example, in that case, the leader kept spreadsheets to follow and organize the accounting records in the properly manner, but he lacked the leader – member relation and did not listen to one of his subordinates in order to recognize the error. Moreover, the Leader said to his subordinates that he knows exactly what to implement and achieve his goals. One of my coworker attempts to explain to our leader that the person he assign to implement the recording of transactions to General Ledger never did that before and that he will need some training for that. But the leader just follow his own style without listen any of his subordinates. According to situation presented the Leader’s behavior is task –oriented with low relationship. He plans his short term goals and objectives. Also, the leader monitors his subordinates’ operations and performance. Leader member relations are important part for the success of any team. Also he did not pay attention of the special spreadsheet where the data is recorded with a wrong sum, even though he is been told from his subordinate that in the trial balance it is not match debits with credits. One of the main characteristics for every leader should be structure his or her tasks and relationship skills as a good communication, listening and teamwork. In the situation presented the Leader does not speak with the person of his team who is responsible for recording the data. The leader in the situation described is task oriented leader, because he has clear directions and explicit goals. The Leader’s relationship is low because he did not to empower his followers when making decisions and solving problems. The Leader implemented his tasks including short terms goals as kept a spreadsheets to track and analyze the daily tasks. Based on the situation above the leader has high task structure with low relationship.<br />The main reason to fail in his performance as the accounting team leader is that he does not create a positive atmosphere that will improve relationship and he does not pay attention to the skills and qualifications of his subordinates when he assigns tasks to them. According to Fiedler’s Contingency Theory, the behavior of the accounting team leader in the situation presented is characterized as using task oriented style in unfavorable situation. The leader fails to take into accounts the leader – member relations, which are very important in team related atmosphere. To be effective the whole team work and to drive to better results, subordinates should trust, respect and have a confidence with their leader. In the case above the leader lacked that confidence and respects from his subordinates because he did not listen his subordinate warning about the error in the trial balance, but in contrast he continued to follow his own task structure. From the situation presented the leader did not support his subordinates and that way he lost their trust and respect. Moreover, the Leader should provide training to the person without necessary qualifications and assign him into low level department in order to learn everything step by step in his future performance. The leader behavior is with low relationship because did not support his followers and did not attempt to develop their skills as providing the necessary training for that. <br />In addition, in the next day when everyone from the team including me understood that the leader did not punish the person who did the error, in contrast the leader allow him to keep working in the same department again with any training and qualifications to do so. According t Fiedler’s theory the leader’s position power in the situation presented is low because the leader has low authority over his subordinates because he lacks to evaluate what he have done and how and because employees have a little faith in his ability to make things better. The leader is task- oriented with clear goals, has a high degree of structure as keeping spreadsheets and attempts to record every accounting transaction on the right place. Although, he is task-oriented the situation is considered unfavorable, because the position power is low due to the fact that the leader did not plan properly who form his subordinates to perform that tasks in the Accounting Receivable Department. According to Fielder’s theory the leader of the team in this case it task oriented leader, who has clear and explicit goals how to manage his performance and provides clear directions to his subordinates. The leader fails to achieve high group performance because he lost his trust and respect from his subordinates in the moment when he assign one of his subordinates to perform task, which he never did before and did not has the necessary experience and qualifications to do so. Fiedler’s theory presents the leadership elements in terms of the three key elements, the quality of leader – member relations, task structure and position power. The situation presented is highly structured with poor relation and weak leader power position power. Combining the three situational characteristics from the situation presented above yield to the situation VI from Fiedler’s Classifications described as Intermediate situation where tasks are structured, but leader member relations are poor and leader’s position power is weak.<br />Based on the information presented, it will always be difficult for the people to accept leaders who lack demonstrated ability in the areas under their leadership, which in turn leads to distrust and losing the respect from his subordinates. To strengthen his positions and to be more decisive in his goals, the leader should have not only clear structured tasks, but also position power with authority amid his subordinates, good leader member’s relations where subordinates trust and respect their leaders and have a confidence in their leader in every moment of implementing tasks together.<br />