LEADERSHIP - 2020/1

Module Overview

The module will provide students an insight of a wide range of leadership practices in the extant literature. The module will cover from the fundamental notions of leadership frameworks/concepts to contemporary views of leadership practices. The module offers a good number of theories and practices (including adopted real case studies in organisations) to allow students understand how importance the leadership style can make an impact to individual wellbeing as well as organisational performance. The module will consist of lectures and some workshops, in which students will be given opportunities to present their work and get actively involved in some team-based exercises.

Module provider

Surrey Business School

Module Leader

RIVERS Gary (SII DUFE)

Number of Credits: 15

ECTS Credits: 7.5

Framework: FHEQ Level 6

Module cap (Maximum number of students): N/A

Module Availability

Semester 1

Prerequisites / Co-requisites

NA

Module content

The module can be summarised into the following main areas:

1.    Introduction

• Definition: Ways of Conceptualising Leadership


• Description: Leadership and Management; Leadership and Power; Leadership and Coercion

2.    Approaches to Leadership

• Trait Approach


• Skills Approach


• Style Approach


• Situational Approach


• Contingency Theory


• Path-Goal Theory


• LMX Theory

3.     Types of Leadership style

• Transformational Leadership; Transactional Leadership; Servant Leadership; Paternalistic Leadership

4.     Issues in Leadership Research

For example: Leadership and Development; Leadership and Creativity; Leadership and Power; Leadership and Ethics

Group Presentations & Revision

Assessment pattern

Alternative Assessment

Students who fail to participate in the group presentation will be permitted a reassessment to recover the marks. This will involve a presentation to a member of the module team.

Assessment Strategy

The assessment strategy is designed to provide students with the opportunity to demonstrate the awareness and insight of leadership issues/ practices in organisations at an advanced level. Students are required to demonstrate knowledge of theory, research evidence and contemporary practice.


The module is assessed 30% by group presentation, and 70% by an examination.

Thus, the summative assessment for this module consists of:

30% group presentation

The group presentation which is scheduled in the last few weeks (likely from week 7 onwards) must highlight how a business leader managed various organisational issues within the chosen organisation. Each group needs to present at least one situation that your chosen leader managed successfully and at least one situation that your chosen leader failed to manage successfully. Each presenting group needs to use at least one theory/ approach of leadership discussed in class or covered in the core textbook to explain why and how your chosen leader managed the organisational issues successfully and unsuccessfully. Each group member is required to participate in the group’s presentation, and each group has to submit the hand-out of powerpoint presentation on SurreyLearn before the start of the group presentation.

70% Examination

The examination will be a case study. Based on the case study, students will be asked to give advice on how a business leader should do to manage organisational issues from leadership perspective. 

Formative assessment and feedback

This module adopts an enquiry based approach to feedback where the emphasis is on providing resources to students which allow them to identify their own strengths and weaknesses in order to develop learning strategies which will allow them to improve their performance. These resources include:

• Prior to the group presentation, lecture time will be spent on discussing the presentation and feedback process;


• A detailed marking scheme which provides guidance on how marks will be awarded for each element of assessment. This marking scheme has benefits for both staff and students; for staff it allows for consistency of marking between markers and for rapid and rigorous marking, for students it makes it absolutely clear what is expected of them. Students will receive a mark for each element of the assignment which they can reference to the marking scheme for details individual feedback;


• Generic feedback which explains what students did well and did less well overall. For example, time will be spent for each group in explaining the key learning issues from their presentation. Students will also received detailed generic feedback via SurreyLearn including a statistical breakdown of marks so that they can place their own performance into that of their cohort.

Marks and specific feedback will be returned to students within 3 weeks of submission or at the end of the semester.

Module aims

• To provide frameworks, concepts and tools to know how employees are managed by different leadership practices, and the extent to which these leadership practices have made an impact to individual wellbeing and organisational performance
• To develop analytical skill by providing an opportunity to discuss the strengths and weaknesses of the practical aspects of leadership approaches used in organisations
• To encourage critical thinking and an awareness of the different competencies and skills that are required for leaders to deal with issues in the workplace

Learning outcomes

Methods of Teaching / Learning

The learning and teaching strategy is designed to be in the form of lectures and workshops. The module will begin with lecture by the assigned faculty member for teaching frameworks, concepts and ideas of leadership research in the extant literature. Followed by that, the module will operate on the basis of workshop which involves discussions of lecture materials/case studies, and some small group exercises/activities. Some class time will be given for students to prepare their group workshop presentations. In order to improve student engagement and learning, all students are required to attend all presentations for their learning and development.

Further, in order to invite student’s participation/ active involvement in class, all students are required to read the assigned reading every week before each seminar. The students will be asked relevant questions in class regarding the assigned reading.

In addition, in order to enhance student’s learning experience, a number of real/adopted case studies will be used for discussion in class. For some classes, students will also be given chances to participate in group exercises/activities for practical reason. This module will also make use of the University’s virtual learning environment to support learning. For example, in order to encourage discussion within each group, the online discussion forum will be set up on SurreyLearn.

The learning and teaching methods include 150 hours: 1) Weekly taught and interactive sessions (3 hrs per week x 11 weeks = 33 hrs), and 2) Independent learning for reading, research, and group discussion & presentation (Personal-directed/ self-directed learning = 84 hrs, and Group-directed learning = 33 hrs). 

Indicated Lecture Hours (which may also include seminars, tutorials, workshops and other contact time) are approximate and may include in-class tests where one or more of these are an assessment on the module. In-class tests are scheduled/organised separately to taught content and will be published on to student personal timetables, where they apply to taken modules, as soon as they are finalised by central administration. This will usually be after the initial publication of the teaching timetable for the relevant semester.

Reading list

https://readinglists.surrey.ac.uk
Upon accessing the reading list, please search for the module using the module code: MAN3119

Please note that the information detailed within this record is accurate at the time of publishing and may be subject to change. This record contains information for the most up to date version of the programme / module for the 2020/1 academic year.