Several investigations have indicated that a leader behaves flexibly in different situations, but these studies have not necessarily provided much explanation for why this is so. In this study, using 1576 male first-line supervisors, four hypotheses were tested to examine the emerging process of a leader's behavior. The findings suggested that a leader will judge the favorableness of his workunit, then establish his primary management objective deemed suitable for his own circumstances. In the process of trying to accomplish his management objective, the sample tended to choose behaviors which are seen as most instrumental. The variety in a leader's behavior seem to come from the differences in management objectives.