Scar

    ILLEGITIMATE KING OF THE PRIDE LANDS LEADER OF THE HYENAS

Scar is Simba’s uncle and is third in line to be king after his brother Mufassa and Simba. Scar is manipulative and dishonest, he is jealous of his brother’s power and the fact that Simba will one day become king and have power over him and the Pride Lands. Scar’s desire for power leads him to murder Mufassa and make a vulnerable Simba believe that he is to blame and drives him away, allowing Scar to falsely claim power as a Positional Leader. Once in power he uses his title and position as king to force the lions to follow him, demonstrating that he has no morals or integrity and that without his title he would have no influence over the lions because they are less gullible than the hyenas (Maxwell 2007).

Scar’s leadership style is Transactional as he forms an unnatural alliance with the hyenas and promises food and entry into the Pride Lands in return for them to work for him. He then uses the Hyenas to complete his evil plans and to hide behind them against the lions. He had no interest in the hyenas as individuals and needed the hyenas to follow him to give him power, as he would have limited influence alone against the less gullible Lions, therefore Scar and the hyenas are interdependent (Maxwell 2007).

To be a successful leader, Scar needed to adopt Transformational leadership approaches and initially he was able to present an inspirational vision to the hyenas, but then failed to present and achieve a  realistic strategy to achieve it (Mullins 2007). He failed to encourage personal growth in his subordinates, demonstrated by the fact that he kept Zazu in a cage, denying him the opportunity to fulfil his full potential as an administrator of the Pride Lands. According to Adair, inspirational leaders connect with the led, they appreciate the abilities of the followers and through trust, they "unlock the powers in others" (Mullins 2007, p383).  Scar was only interested in maintaining absolute power, focusing on achieving short term goals to benefit himself and not leading by example. The Pride Lands deteriorate due to his lack of competency and inability to build and maintain environments, despite this he was still unwilling to sacrifice his power for the greater good of the Pride Lands. When Simba returned to claim his position as the true king, he continued to use deception when he announced that Simba was responsible for Mufassa’s death. Scar showed the hyenas that he was untrustworthy when they overheard him blaming them for all the problems in the Pride Lands. 

Adair's Action- centred leadership states that effective leaders are able to meet 3 areas of need; task need (achieving the task), team maintenance, and individual needs (of group members). Action in one area will affect the other areas, Scar was unable to meet any of the required areas so failure was inevitable (Mullins 2007). Initially, the hyenas perceive Scar as on their level with no power, referring to him as "no one important" (Lion King 1994), but view Mufassa as very powerful. Scar then wins the hyenas’ over with a motivational speech and directs them on exactly what the task is and what their roles are. Throughout the film Scar shows disrespect for the hyenas and views them as generally incompetent, with no emotional bond or interest in them as individuals (Doyle and Smith 2012).

According to McGregor's Management Theory, it is the manager's perception of what motivates their team that affects the manager's behaviour. Theory Y assumes that workers take responsibility and are motivated to fulfill the goals they are given, seek and accept responsibility, do not need much direction and consider work as a natural part of life. Theory X leaders believe that subordinates dislike work and this encourages an authoritarian approach in leadership (Mindtools 2013).  Scar's behaviour reflects the assumptions of Theory X because he uses control, force and threats to coerce the lions into following his leadership, he also uses bribes to persuade the hyenas to follow him, otherwise they would have no incentive to work for him as he has no real charisma and influence on his own. Scar shows he is an authoritarian leader because the focus of power is centralised with him, he takes control of all the decision making and delegates the tasks to his subordinates; forcing the female lions to do all the hunting, whilst participating very little himself. 

Contingency Theory:

According to Path-Goal Theory the follower's motivation is influenced by the extent to which the leader is able to satisfy their expectations. It identifies 4 types of leader behaviour; supportive (relations orientated), directive (task orientated), achievement orientated, participative, also follower characteristics and task characteristics. Where the task is taxing, the theory states that supportive leadership can increase follower's expectations of a successful outcome and motivation to complete the task (Changing Minds 2013).  However, Scar's leadership behaviour was directive as he issued the orders and forced the subordinates to follow his rules, but this didn't work because the task of obtaining food and maintaining the Pride Lands was not easy and required more of a supportive approach. Directive leaders also need to emphasize the rewards to motivate the followers to complete the task, but the rewards were not delivered, showing that Scar's leadership behaviour was inappropriate for the type and level of task .

According to Readiness of Followers theory, the motivation of the hyenas to follow Scar is high but their readiness is moderate (Mullins 2007) because they lack intelligence and ability to do the tasks he requires, as demonstrated when they fail to kill Simba and allow him to escape. Scar acknowledges that they are "thick" (Lion King 1994) during his motivational speech but implies that with his direction even they can meet their goals. The model states that the leader needs to continually adapt the leadership style according to the follower's changing level of readiness. Hersey and Blanchard (Mullins 2007) suggest 4 types of leadership behaviour, building on Path- Goal theory of directive (telling them how to get the job done) and supportive behaviour (listening to followers, encouragement):

• Telling (high directive, low support)
• Selling (high directive, high supporting)
• Participating (low directive, high supportive)
• Delegating (low directive, low supportive)

The most appropriate leadership behaviour would have been selling; with a high level of direction (task behaviour) and high support (relationship behaviour). Scar would have needed to use different approaches with the lions and hyenas because they had different abilities. He achieved a high level of direction regarding the tasks when the hyenas were willing to work for him, but provided no relational support which they required. By the end, all of the followers had very low readiness to follow Scar and despite using a telling approach, he still failed to make the followers work for him. This was because there was no incentive or reward for the followers, suggesting the reward is as important to the followers as the leadership behaviour (Mullins 2007). 

This is consistent with French and Raven's 5 forms of Power theory, that states that a leader's level of influence is based on the follower's perception of the power the leader possesses, these are; reward power, coercive, legitimate, referent and expert power. Scar's main sources of power were from creating the perception that he had the ability to obtain food rewards for the hyenas and also coercive power based on his subordinates' fear that he could punish them (Mullins 2007). Scar's leadership failed firstly because the lion's knew that he had no legitimate, referent or expert power, and the hyenas recognised that he had no reward power because he could not provide food. By the end he  had also lost his coercive power when Simba regained his position as king and the hyenas destroyed him.