Effects of Instructional and Situational Leadership on Teachers’ Job Performance in Secondary Schools of District Mastung: An Analysis of the Mediating Role of Katz’s Three-Skill Model

Abstract

This quantitative study examined the relationship between the leadership styles (instructional and situational) of school principals and teachers’ job performance in secondary schools in District Mastung, Balochistan. The specific focus of this study was to determine the mediating role of teachers’ technical, human, and conceptual skills (Katz’s three-skill model). A sample of 350 teachers was selected from government schools of District Mastung through stratified random sampling. The research instrument was a self-administered questionnaire derived from several validated scales, including the PIMRS (Hallinger & Murphy, 1985) for instructional leadership, Hersey and Blanchard (1969) for situational leadership, and the TJPSQ (Amin et al., 2013) for teachers’ job performance, an internal consistency of the instrument was acceptable, which was tested with Cronbach's Alpha (α = .714). SPSS-26 and PROCESS Macro (Model 4) were used to analyze the data. Descriptive analysis showed that school principals are largely using instructional (Mean=4.18) and situational (Mean=3.90) leadership. Regression analysis results revealed that leadership styles have a direct positive effect on teachers’ job performance; however, when Katz’s three-skill model was included as a mediator, the combined effect was significantly increased. Bootstrapping results suggest that technical, interpersonal, and especially conceptual skills play a key mediating role in strengthening the relationship between leadership styles and teachers’ job performance. The indirect effect of conceptual skills individually was found to be the most significant. This study concludes that effective leadership alone is not enough to improve school performance; it is also essential to develop teachers’ professional skills. It is recommended that the Department of Education conduct training programs and workshops to enhance teachers' skills, thereby aligning the quality of education in rural areas with modern requirements.