Victor H.

Vroom
 Introduction
Victor Vroom is a business school professor at the Yale School of
Management, who was born on 9 August 1932 in Montreal, Canada.
He holds a PhD from University of Michigan.
 He served as an assistant professor of phsycology at the University of
Pennsylvania
 Professor of psychology and industrial administration at the Carnegie-
Mellon’s Graduate School of Administration.
 School of Management was founded in 1976.
He is an authority on the psychological analysis of behavior in
organisations, particularly on leadership and decision making.
Been a consultant to a number of corporations such as GE and American
Express.
 Publications
 Work and Motivation
 Leadership and Decision Making
 The new leadership
 Theories

 Expectancy Theory

 Leadership and decision making

 EXPECTANCY THEORY
Vroom's theory assumes that behavior results from
conscious choices among alternatives whose purpose it
is to maximize pleasure and minimize pain.

key elements:
 Expectancy (E)
 Instrumentality (I)
 Valence (V)
 EXPECTANCY THEORY
EXPECTATIONS

 There is a positive correlation between efforts and

performance,
 Favourable performance will result in a desirable reward,
 The reward will satisfy an important need,
 The desire to satisfy the need is strong enough to make
the effort worthwhile.
 EXPECTANCY

Definition: Employees have different expectations and

levels of confidence about what they are capable of
doing. Management must discover what resources,
training, or supervision the employees need.
 Factors contributing to employee's expectancy
perceptions:

 the level of confidence in the skills required for the task

 the quality of the materials and equipment
 the availability of pertinent information
 Instrumentality.
Definition: The perception of employees whether they
will actually receive what they desire, even if it has
been promised by a manager.

Instrumentality may range from a probability of 1.0 to

0.0
 VALENCE
Definition: Refers to the emotional orientations which
people hold with respect to outcomes [rewards]. The
depth of the want of an employee for extrinsic or intrinsic
rewards.
 The three conditions are:

 the person does not believe that he/she can

successfully perform the required task
 the person believes that successful task
performance will not be associated with
positively valent outcomes
 the person believes that outcomes associated
with successful task completion will be
negatively valent (have no value for that person)
 Yetton Model of Leadership
Decision Making
Vroom’s second major model, as developed with
Philip Yetton, shows how different leadership
styles can be effectively harnessed in solving
different types of problems. In his doctoral
dissertation, Vroom had examined the positive
effects that participation in decision-making
could have on attitudes and motivation. At the
same time he had observed that personality
characteristic might reduce or increase the
impact of participation.
 The following list from Leadership and
Decision-Making shows the types of
management decision methods for group
problems.

• Authority decisions
• Consultative decision
• Group decision
 The Vroom / Yetton model has been progressively
developed by its original authors, and by Vroom and
Jago, since its inception. Further factor examined
include:

• the extent to which participation benefits the organization

by offering development opportunities for participants

• the influence of a manager’s position in the organization

hierarchy on their problem handling style

• the style adopted by women managers.

 Relevance of these Theories

The Vroom / Yetton model of leadership and decision-

making, however, was at the heights of its fame a
quarter of a century ago and management thinking has
been changed since then.

Some critics would also claim that today’s different

business environment produces different influences on
managers, and makes the model less relevant than
before. Vroom himself is not oblivious to change and
development, and has actually used it to justify the
relevance of his work.
 Achievements & Honors
 Distinguished Scientific Contributions Award, Society of Industrial
and Organizational
 Psychology, 1998
 Fellow, American Psychological Association
 Fellow, American Psychological Society
 Fellow, The Academy of Management
 Excellence in Teaching Award from the Yale SOM Alumni
Association, 1994
 President, Society of Industrial and Organizational Psychology,
1980-1981
 James McKeen Cattell Award, American Psychological Association,
1970
 Fulbright Lecturer in United Kingdom, 1967-1968
 McKinsey Foundation Research Design Competition Winner, 1967
 Ford Foundation Faculty Fellowship, 1961-1962
 Ford Foundation Doctoral Dissertation Competition Winner, 1958-
1959