is crude. Nevertheless, it indicated a rough distribution of leadership
across the eight PL types in the two samples. The results are also
listed inTable 6.1(see the columns headed ‘‘Distribution of actual
leaders’’). The results show that the distribution of actual leaders in
the private conglomerate across the eight PL types was similar to
the ideal leader distribution found in Niu’s ( 2006 ) study. Indeed, the
chi-square test reveals that the two distributions were not significantly
different (chi-square¼2.28,p>.05). For example, in Niu’s ( 2006 )
study Type 5 Selfless benefactor (aBC) was the most frequently chosen
ideal leader (48.3%), which was followed by Type 1 Authentic (ABC)
(26.0%). In the conglomerate sample, the largest group of leaders
was also Type 5 Selfless benefactor (49.1%), followed by Type 1
Authentic (18.0%). The distribution of actual leaders in the school
sample (i.e. principals) followed a somewhat different pattern. The
chi-square test comparing the distributions of actual leaders for the
school sample to those for the firm sample was statistically significant
(chi-square¼8.46,p<.05), as was the test comparing the school
sample to Niu’s ( 2006 ) ideal leader distributions (chi-square¼16.06,
p<.05). The results inTable 6.1show that about two-thirds of
the principals were classified as Type 5 Selfless benefactor (aBC)
(64.9%) with Type 7 Ideological as a distant second (abC) (10.0%).
Only 6.4% of the principals were classified as Type 1 Authentic (ABC).
These findings show that organizational context has a strong influence
on the emergence of different types of paternalistic leadership.
Authoritarian leadership is more prevalent in private firms than in
public primary schools.
We further examined the effects of PL types on the followers’
satisfaction with, and trust in, the leader in both the private firm and
school samples. In the school sample, satisfaction in the supervisor
was measured by nine items using the six-point Likert scale (a¼.97;
a sample item was ‘‘I am satisfied with the effort the principal has
made for the school’’), whereas in the firm sample, satisfaction in the
supervisor was measured by a single item that indicates the extent to
which the respondents were satisfied with their direct supervisor on a
hundred-point scale (ranging from 0 to 100). In both samples, trust in
the leader was measured using seven items (a¼.92 and .93 for school-
teachers and firm employees, respectively; a sample item is ‘‘my super-
visor and I share our ideas, feelings and expectations with each
other’’). Our general expectation was that Type 5 Selfless benefactor
Paternalistic leadership in Chinese organizations 189