Abstract:
The purpose of this study was to find out the appropriateness of the leadership style of the Central Rangelands Development Project, in Somalia. But as leader effectiveness can best be seen as something a manger produces from the situation by managing it appropriately, the idea of the situation became rather broad, and as a result, the study split the leadership situation into its components, then selected certain elements, so that each and every component could be evaluated independently.
In the research, both secondary data of the theoretical aspects, collected from the libraries, and practical aspects, collected from the literature of the organization studied – CRDP – were used as the frame of reference for the findings.
In particular, the study measured the appropriateness of the CRDP leadership against the situational demands of communication, delegation, compensation, pastoral commitment and cooperation with other institutions, also engaged in similar development programmes. A comparative analysis, developed from the collected data, related to these variables, was used against the current leadership performance.
The leadership variables – communication, delegation, compensation, pastoral commitment, and cooperation – that were measured were found mismatched by the style due to the following results, developed from the findings:
CRDP communications was found in effective, as required to motivate middle managers by keeping them constantly informed to carry out their tasks properly. In addition, effective lateral lines of communication were not formally promoted and combined with the vertical information flows.
The amount of authority delegated to the middle and lower operational mangers of the project was in commensurate to their responsibility needs and caused constraints in the implementation of the programmes.
CRDO employees were poorly compensated, and as a result, the purchasing power of their compensation was keeping up with the current consumer price index in the country.
The pastoral community did not contribute to the project field programmes, as required, as they were not properly educated and developed to assume greater responsibilities, and
The project did not full cooperate with other institutions also involved in similar activities to benefit from their infrastructural and expertise resources.