Does Blake and Mouton’s managerial grid work? the relationship between leadership type and organization performance in South Korea

The leadership and performance of organizations is a key research topic in the public administration field. Based on Blake and Mouton’s managerial grid, one of the most popular leadership theories in public administration, this study classifies principals’ leadership styles and examines the relationship between leadership type and students’ academic achievement. In this study, Korean education longitudinal data from 2005 to 2007 are analyzed. Using four models, we observe which factors affect academic achievement, while controlling for family and school factors. The finding is that authority-obedience management and team management have significant effects on academic achievement. This finding is consistent with previous research on Blake and Mouton’s managerial grid. However, leadership is not influential when controlling for family factors, which aligns with previous studies that reconfirm the idiosyncratic nature of the Korean setting. Therefore, we need to study how to boost the leadership qualities that can enhance organizational performance.