The relationship between individual values and leadership styles: differantiation between the executives from different social and cultural environments

In this study, food retailer firms? managers are taken as a sample and the relationship between individual values and leadership styles of these managers is put forward by examining individual values and leadership styles of the managers and social factors influential on their individual values. The leadership styles examined in this thesis are transformational and transactional (Burns, 1978; Bass, 1985), relationship oriented leadership (Fiedler, 1967). Individual values researched in this study are derived from Rokeach (1969,1973) and Schwartz?s (1992,1999) studies and Schwartz?s Values Inventory (1992) is used to determine the individual values in the empirical phase. Factors having an impact on the individual values examined in this study are social (features of the managers? families and environments where they grew up), educational (main characteristics of institutions the managers were educated at) and organizational factors (main characteristics of organizations which the managers are working for). The features of environment where the managers lived between the age of 7 and 18, are examined in two dimensions; urban and rural areas. The educational institutions where the managers are educated are also examined in two dimensions. The first category consists of private schools which have education program in foreign language (especially english) and schools located in western countries (European and North American countries). The second category consists of public schools and schools located in eastern countries (Arabic and Asian countries). The categories constituting organizational factors in this study are national and international firms. Quantitaive methods are preferred for the empirical research phase of this study and t-Test and regression analysis are applied for the measurement. The quantitaive empirical research of the study was applied on 245 managers working as assistant manager, department manager, branch manager and the results of this research show that managers? organization and educational background has very significant impact on individual values and leadership styles whereas environment where the managers lived between the age of 7 and 18 has no impact on individual values. Characteristic of job of managers? parents has partial influence on individual values and leadership style preferences of managers. In addition to these, the empirical research results show that self-transcendence, collective work, opennes to change values are positively related to transformational leadership, self-transcendence, collective work, conservation values are predictors of relationship oriented leadership, besides self-enhancement and transactional leadership are positively related variables.