Prestige Journal of Counselling Psychology, Vol. 6, No.
2, September 2023 ISSN: 2651-5687 (Print)
A publication of the Association for the Promotion of Innovation in Education (APIE) ISSN: 2651-5709 (Online)
Analysis of Principals’ Leadership Styles in Public and Private Secondary Schools in
Yenagoa, Bayelsa State: Implications for Counselling
Destiny Ebimie Anomietei
Department of Educational Psychology, Guidance and Counselling
Ignatius Ajuru University of Education
Port Harcourt, Rivers State
[email protected]Abstract
This study sought to determine if there is any difference in the leadership styles practiced
by principals of private and public schools in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State. A survey research
design was adopted. One research question was raised and three research hypotheses were
tested at 0.05 significant level. Fifty principals and two hundred teachers were selected
through the use of simple random sampling technique. Data was collected with the aid of
a structured questionnaire and were analyzed with simple percentage and t - statistics. The
findings revealed that the leadership style practiced by public and private secondary school
principals were very similar. The study also revealed that there was significant similarity
in the leadership styles of public and private school principals; significant similarity in
male and female principals’ leadership behaviour as perceived by their teachers; as well
as that of leadership behaviour exhibited by both public and private secondary school
principals. Based on the findings of the study, some implications for counselling were
highlighted. It was recommended, among others, that school principals should be
democratic and flexible in the adoption of leadership styles to suit different situations and
the school climate.
Keywords: principal, administration, private, public, schools
Introduction
Leadership is a complex phenomenon. It is a subject of concern among scholars, managers
and administrators. One reason for their concern is that the best way to bring about change
in an organization is to change the behaviour of the organization’s leader (Chen, 1990). In
secondary schools, the principals are the leaders and each has his/her characteristic
attitudes, values and behaviour. These attributes combined, spell the leadership style, which
has been described as “the behaviour pattern that a person exhibits when attempting to
influence the activities of others as perceived by others” (Hersey & Blanchard, 1982).
One of the unique and complex organizations in the world of education is schools. Schools
are called complex, because in these institutions there are a variety of resources that are
inter-related (Pauzi et al., 2013). School principals are under increasing pressure to ensure
that each and every student in their charge receives a high quality education and graduate
not only at the right time but ready to transit to college and the work place (Riddle, 2010).
This is different from the ways schools operated in the 20th century when a school was
successful as long as the majority of its students succeeded. Today’s 21st century schools
are asked to ensure that all students succeed. The change in focus from some students to all
students succeeding comes at the same time schools are facing tightening budgets,
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Analysis of Principals’ Leadership Styles in Public and Private Secondary Schools in Yenagoa, Bayelsa
Destiny Ebimie Anomietei
declining revenues, and scarce resources, and at a time when student’s needs are becoming
more complex.
In today’s school, the principal is no longer just a manager. He or she is also the
instructional leader of the school. Today, school leaders must redesign their school to align
instruction, school initiatives and scarce resources in order to prepare students for success.
School leaders must create schools that make it easy for students, teachers and counsellors
to succeed (Riddle, 2010). Leaders are expected to lead schools through the challenges
posed by an increasing complex environment, curriculum standards, achievement
benchmarks, programmatic requirements, and other policy directives that may generate
complicated and unpredictable requirements for schools (Marshall, 2014). Akomolafe
(2005) demonstrated that school leadership has both direct and indirect implications leading
to the student’s achievement. Similarly, Oyetunji (2006) hypothesizes that in an
organization like a school, the importance of leadership is reflected in every aspect of the
school like instructional practice, academic achievement, student’s discipline, counselling,
and school climate, to mention but a few. If the principal is a man of principles,
hardworking and honest, then one will demand the same from one’s teachers; and if the
head himself is idle and shirk–worker, then his team-mates will also be like him (Gobir,
2005).
Guidance and counselling in Nigerian secondary schools setting is gaining a new dawn as
the educational mission in Nigeria has expanded to include guidance and counselling
services in elementary, secondary and higher institutions. The school system is in a mobile
state of transition. This is an upward mobility from one class to another and one programme
to another. Points of transition are always points of conflict. These conflicts usually arise
due to change in environment. Every school administrator must brace up for the challenges
at these critical periods. It is at this juncture that guidance and counselling comes in handy
in the school. The school counsellor will in no small way help the school administrator, the
teachers and the students to overcome these difficulties and challenges, thereby leading to
the smooth administration of the school (Anomietei, 2016).
It is an established fact that the leadership style practiced in an organization is a critical
factor to success. The basic cause of inefficiency of an institution is lack in administration
or leadership and incompetency in its head (Akomolafe, 2005; Oyetunji, 2006;
Mehdinezhad & Sardarzah, 2016). In Bayelsa State, especially Yenagoa, school principal
leadership style has been a serious problem, with shortage of qualified managers. School
principal’s recruitment takes place randomly from school teachers. However, leading the
school with poor skills may lead to low school achievement which would affect all aspects
of the school activities, including counselling. It has been observed that private schools
tend to perform better than public schools. Even among the private schools, some still do
better than others. This scenario also plays out in the public schools. As pointed out by
Tony and Gorge (2006), principals in Africa face serious challenges because they are often
appointed on the basis of a successful record as teachers with an implicit assumption that
this provides a sufficient starting point for school leadership.
Numerous studies have been carried out on leadership in schools and other organizations
with varied results. For instance, Alam (2012) and Duze (2012) noted that the leadership
styles practiced in the various public and private schools were quite similar. Rajbhandari
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Prestige Journal of Counselling Psychology, Vol. 6, No. 2, September 2023 ISSN: 2651-5687 (Print)
A publication of the Association for the Promotion of Innovation in Education (APIE) ISSN: 2651-5709 (Online)
(2006) carried out studies in which they identified the major leadership styles as
democratic, laissez faire, translational, autocratic and transactional. Goleman (2000)
observed that the autocratic leadership style has a lot of advantages attached to it, especially
when a goal is to be met at the shortest possible time. Herrara (2010) carried out a study
which reported that teachers perceived that their principals had a high level of engagement
in intellectual stimulation and input, and low level engagement in culture, order, discipline,
resource and focus.
Findings by Naeemollah et al. (2010) showed that female managers exhibit or show
managerial behaviour better than men. Pingle (2006) stated that from the perspective of
teachers, principals displaying a higher level of leadership behaviour are more successful.
Manning (2004) showed that female principals pay more attention to the activities of
teachers and understand their expectations better than male principals. Abwalla (2014)
found out that the democratic leadership style was the most practiced leadership style in
general secondary schools.
Furthermore, Tandoh (2011) highlighted that whenever managers employed very strict
leadership behaviour, there was a decrease in the performance of employees. He
recommended that leaders should have a balanced leadership style to equally reflect much
interest in people to enhance employee performance for a competitive advantage. Day et
al. (2001) concluded that good leaders have clear sets of personal and educational values
which represent their moral purposes for the school. Abdulghani (2016) found out that
principals leadership style is strongly related to teachers’ job satisfaction. This study
therefore aimed to identify leadership styles practiced by principals in both public and
private secondary schools and to establish if there is any significant difference between
public and private schools in the practice of leadership styles in school administration; and
its implications for counselling.
Research question
1. What are the leadership styles practiced by public and private secondary school
principals in Yenagoa, Bayelsa state?
Hypotheses
Ho1: There is no significant difference in leadership styles of private and public
secondary school principals in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State.
Ho2: There is no significant difference in leadership behaviour of male and female
principals in private and public secondary schools in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State.
Ho3: There is no significant difference in principal’s leadership behaviour as
observed by teachers of public and private schools in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State.
Methodology
This study was conducted in Yenagoa, the Bayelsa State capital. With an estimated
population of about 352,285 persons, the local government has the largest population in
Bayelsa State (2006 population census). The predominant ethnic groups in the local
government area are Ijaw, Epie and Atissa. This study adopted the survey research design.
This design was considered appropriate because it collects data from a wide area by
selecting a representative sample of a large population. The target population includes all
male and female principals and teachers in public and private (government approved)
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Analysis of Principals’ Leadership Styles in Public and Private Secondary Schools in Yenagoa, Bayelsa
Destiny Ebimie Anomietei
secondary schools in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State. There are twelve public secondary schools
and eighty four government approved private secondary schools in Yenagoa local
government area. The sample size for this study was fifty (50) principals and two hundred
(200) teachers, giving a total sample size of two hundred and fifty (250) respondents. The
simple random sampling technique was adopted for this study.
Ethical wise, participants were informed of the purpose of the study and what was required
of them. Respondents who obliged participated voluntarily without any form of incentives.
Participants were told not to give their names in order to keep their responses anonymous.
The instrument for data collection for this study was a questionnaire. The questionnaire
was titled “Principals Leadership Style in School Administration Questionnaire
(PLSSAQ)”. The questionnaire had two sections, A and B. Section A focused on the
background information of the respondents such as name of school, school type, sex,
gender of school principal, age, highest educational attainment, years of teaching, as well
as if trained in school leadership. Section B measured variables of the three objectives in
three parts – I, II and III. Part I had six items, Part II had twenty-eight items, while Part III
had thirteen items. It was calibrated on a four point likert scale of Strongly Agree (SA),
Agree (A), Disagree (D) and Strongly Disagree (SD).
The validity of the instrument was verified by the use of face, content and construct
validation techniques by two lecturers of the Department of Educational Foundation, Niger
Delta University, Amassoma, Bayelsa state. The experts made some corrections and
suggestions which were incorporated into the final draft of the instrument used for the
survey. The reliability of the instrument was ascertained after development by using
Product Moment Correlation Coefficient from Split–half method. The reliability coefficient
was 0.78. The instrument for data collection was administered by the researcher and a
trained assistant to the targeted sample. All the administered copies of the questionnaire
were retrieved the same day thus ensuring 100% rate of return.
To answer the research question, the columns for Strongly Agree and Agree were merged
together to form a single column for Agree (SA + A) while Disagree and Strongly Disagree
were also merged together to form a single column for Disagree (SD + D). All options,
50% and above agreeing, was accepted. This applied to both public and private schools
data. To test the research hypotheses, t-test was used at a significant level of 0.05. If the
computed t - values are less than the critical table values, the null hypothesis would be
accepted and the alternative hypothesis rejected.
Presentation of results
Research question one (principals only): What are the leadership styles practiced by
public and private secondary school principals in Yenagoa, Bayelsa state?
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Prestige Journal of Counselling Psychology, Vol. 6, No. 2, September 2023 ISSN: 2651-5687 (Print)
A publication of the Association for the Promotion of Innovation in Education (APIE) ISSN: 2651-5709 (Online)
Table 1: Leadership styles practiced by public and private school principals in Yenagoa,
Bayelsa state (n=50).
Public schools Private schools
S/N Leadership Styles Agree Disagree Agree Disagree
f % f % f % f %
1 Democratic 16 100 - - 34 100 - -
2 Autocratic - - 16 100 28 82.4 06 17.6
3 Laissez Faire - - 16 100 17 50 17 50
4 Transactional 16 100 - - 34 100 - -
5 Transformational 16 100 - - 34 100 - -
6 Others (if any) 05 33.3 11 66.7 11 32.3 23 67.7
Public = 16; Private = 34
From the results in table 1, it is revealed that item 1(100%), item 4 (100%) and item 5
(100%) scored 50% and above agreeing in public secondary schools; while all items scored
50% and above agreeing in private secondary schools, and are accepted as the leadership
styles practiced by public and private secondary school principals in Bayelsa State.
Ho1: There is no significant difference in leadership styles of private and public secondary
school principals in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State.
Table 2: t - test analysis showing differences in leadership styles by public and private
secondary school principals (n = 50).
School N SD DF t - T- Level of Remark
principal cal. crit. significance
value value
Public 16 100 5.77 Not
Private 34 88.9 9.27 48 0.84 2.01 0.05 Significant
Total 50
As shown in table 2, the decision is that their leadership styles have no significant
difference, as the calculated t -value is 0.84, which is less than the critical table value of
2.01. The hypothesis of no difference in leadership styles is hereby accepted. This confirms
that there are similarities in the leadership styles practiced by principals in public and
private schools.
Ho2: There is no significant difference in leadership behaviour of male and female
principals in private and public secondary schools in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State.
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Analysis of Principals’ Leadership Styles in Public and Private Secondary Schools in Yenagoa, Bayelsa
Destiny Ebimie Anomietei
Table 3: Summary table of t - test analysis showing differences in leadership behaviour
of male and female principals in public and private secondary schools in Yenagoa,
Bayelsa state (n = 50).
Gender of N SD DF t - T- Level of Remark
principal cal. crit. significance
value value
Male 37 88.23 5.33 Not
Female 13 88.70 4.05 48 0.99 2.01 0.05 Significant
Total 50
As shown in table 3, the decision is that their leadership behaviour have no significant
difference, as the calculated t -value is 0.99, which is less than the critical table value of
2.01. The hypothesis of no significant difference in leadership behaviour is hereby
accepted. This shows that there are similarities in the leadership styles practiced by male
and female principals.
Ho3: There is no significant difference in principal’s leadership behaviour as observed
by teachers of public and private schools in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State.
Table 4: Summary table of t - test analysis showing differences in leadership behaviour
of public and private secondary school principals as observed by teachers (n = 200).
School N SD DF t- T- Level of Remark
teachers cal. crit. significance
value value
Public 79 73.5 4.47 Not
Private 121 65.0 3.83 198 0.71 1.96 0.05 Significant
Total 200
As shown in table 4, the decision is that their leadership behaviour are similar, as the
calculated t -value is 0.71, which is lower than the critical table value of 1.96. The
hypothesis of no difference in leadership behaviour is hereby accepted. This shows that
there are similarities in leadership behaviour by principals in public and private schools, as
perceived by the teachers.
Discussion of the findings
It can be inferred from the study that there is no difference in the leadership styles adopted
by public and private secondary school principals. It was observed that democratic,
transactional and transformational leadership styles are more practiced regularly by both
public and private secondary school principals. This is in line with previous studies by
Alam (2012), Duze (2012), Rajbhandari (2006) in which they noted that public schools
leaders tend to be more democratic when discharging their duties.
The testing of research hypotheses one, two and three showed that there was significant
similarity in the leadership styles of public and private school principals; significant
similarity in male and female principals’ behaviour as perceived by their teachers; as well
as that of leadership behaviour exhibited by both public and private secondary school
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Prestige Journal of Counselling Psychology, Vol. 6, No. 2, September 2023 ISSN: 2651-5687 (Print)
A publication of the Association for the Promotion of Innovation in Education (APIE) ISSN: 2651-5709 (Online)
principals. The findings confirmed that of Tandoh (2011), whose study specifically
identified the leadership behaviours exhibited by managers. It was recommended to have a
balanced leadership style to equally reflect much interest in people to enhance employee
performance for a competitive advantage.
Conclusion
It can be concluded from the study that public and private school principals’ leadership
styles are quite similar. Although, they may vary from one another in few aspects. The
study revealed that leadership styles of public and private secondary school principals in
Yenagoa, Bayelsa state are encouraging, and depicts transformational and transactionary
leadership. It can also be inferred from the study that teachers in public and private schools
have a good understanding and appraisal of the leadership qualities and behaviour of their
principals.
Implications for counselling
The findings of the study has the following implications for the school counsellor:
1. The school counsellor should endeavour to involve all members of the school,
academic, non-academic, management and students alike, when planning any counselling
activity in the school. This simply means being democratic in one’s approach to
counselling related activities.
2. An indifferent attitude to counselling activities by the school counsellor would not
yield much positive outcomes since it would be carried out lackadaisically, and without
enthusiasm.
3. The counsellor should make it a point of duty to always liaise with management
and teachers on critical issues involving the nature of his work. They should be initiated on
the modalities of the school, taking into consideration the school culture and environment.
4. The counsellor should encourage the school principal and his management team to
cultivate a democratic approach to school administration by having dialogues with teachers
and other school staff before implementation of new policies to avoid disputes.
5. An “open - door” policy should be adopted by the counsellor. This implies being
receptive to advice, criticism and new ideas. This also includes being friendly,
accommodating and ready to attend to prospective clients at all times.
6. Teachers tend to flow better with democratically minded principals, and as such the
counsellors should bear this in mind when discharging their professional duties.
Recommendations
Based on the findings of the study, the following recommendations are made:
1. School principals should employ the democratic leadership style more if they intend
to carry the academic and non-academic staff along in the day to day administration of the
school.
2. The autocratic leadership style, which is often dictatorial and a one-man show,
should be seldom used by principals, except in emergency situations in which targets need
to be met urgently.
3. Principals should endeavour to interact more with their academic and non-academic
personnel in order to build rapport, trust and unity between them. This would go a long way
in promoting administrative effectiveness and productivity.
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Analysis of Principals’ Leadership Styles in Public and Private Secondary Schools in Yenagoa, Bayelsa
Destiny Ebimie Anomietei
4. School principals should adapt their leadership styles to suit the school climate and
environment in which they find themselves. A leadership style that may work in such
situation is flexibility in approach which is the master key.
5. It is also recommended to have a balanced leadership style to equally reflect much
interest in people to enhance employee performance for a competitive advantage. Leaders
who show interest in their workers are deemed more effective.
6. Finally, all present and prospective secondary school principals should undergo an
intensive course on leadership styles, in order to help them manage and adapt to varying
situations that may arise in the course of discharging their administrative duties.
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