Trait leadership is defined as integrated patterns of personal characteristics that reflect a range of individual differences and foster consistent leader effectiveness across a variety of group and organizational situations. [1] [2]
The theory is developed from early leadership research which focused primarily on finding a group of heritable attributes that differentiate leaders from nonleaders. Leader effectiveness refers to the amount of influence a leader has on individual or group performance, followers’ satisfaction, and overall effectiveness. [3] [4] Many scholars have argued that leadership is unique to only a select number of individuals, and that these individuals possess certain immutable traits that cannot be developed. [5] Although this perspective has been criticized immensely over the past century, scholars still continue to study the effects of personality traits on leader effectiveness. Research has demonstrated that successful leaders differ from other people and possess certain core personality traits that significantly contribute to their success. Understanding the importance of these core personality traits that predict leader effectiveness can help organizations with their leader selection, training, and development practices. [3]
The emergence of the concept of trait leadership can be traced back to Thomas Carlyle's "great man" theory, which stated that "The History of the World [...] was the Biography of Great Men". [6] Subsequent commentators interpreted this view to conclude that the forces of extraordinary leadership [lower-alpha 1] shape history. [8] Influenced by Carlyle, Francis Galton in Hereditary Genius took this idea further. Galton found that leadership was a unique property of extraordinary individuals and suggested that the traits that leaders possessed were immutable and could not be developed. [5] Throughout the early 1900s, the study of leadership focused on traits. Cowley commented that the approach to the research of leadership has usually been and should always be through the study of traits. [9] Many theorists, influenced by Carlyle and Galton, believed that trait leadership depended on the personal qualities of the leader, however, they did not assume that leadership only resides within a select number of people. [10] This trait perspective of leadership was widely accepted until the late 1940s and early 1950s, when researchers began to deem personality traits insufficient in predicting leader effectiveness. [11] [12]
In 1948, Stogdill stated that leadership exists between persons in a social situation, and that persons who are leaders in one situation may not necessarily be leaders in other situations. [11] This statement has been cited ubiquitously as sounding the death knell for trait-leadership theory. Furthermore, scholars commented that any trait's effect on leadership behavior will always depend on the situation. [13] [14] Subsequently, leadership stopped being characterized by individual differences, and instead both behavioral and situational analyses of leadership took over. These analyses began to dominate the field of leadership research. [15] During this period of widespread rejection, several dominant theories took the place of trait leadership theory, including Fiedler's contingency model, [16] Blake and Mouton's managerial grid, [17] Hersey and Blanchard's situational leadership model, [18] and transformational and transactional leadership models. [19] [20] [21]
Despite the growing criticisms of trait leadership, the purported basis for the rejection of trait-leadership models began to encounter strong challenges in the 1980s. [22] [23] Zaccaro pointed out that even Stogdill's 1948 review, although cited as evidence against leader traits, contained conclusions supporting that individual differences could still be predictors of leader effectiveness. With an increasing number of empirical studies directly supporting trait leadership, [10] [24] traits have reemerged in the lexicon of the scientific research into leadership. In recent years, the research about leader traits has made some progress in identifying a list of personality traits that are highly predictive of leader effectiveness. Additionally, to account for the arguments for situational leadership, researchers have used the round-robin design methodology to test whether certain individuals emerge as leaders across multiple situations. [22] Scholars have also proposed new ways of studying the relationship of certain traits to leader effectiveness. For instance, many[ quantify ] suggest the integration of trait and behavioral theories to understand how traits relate to leader effectiveness. [3] Furthermore, scholars have expanded their focus and have proposed looking at more malleable traits (ones susceptible to development) in addition to the traditional dispositional traits as predictors of leader effectiveness. [25] Context is only now beginning to be examined as a contributor to leaders' success and failure. Productive narcissistic CEOs like Steven Jobs of Apple and Jack Welch of GE have demonstrated a gift for creating innovation, whereas leaders with idealized traits prove more successful in more stable environments requiring less innovation and creativity. [26]
Cultural fit and leadership value can be determined by evaluating an individual's own behavior, perceptions of their employees and peers, and the direct objective results of their organization, and then comparing these findings against the needs of the company. [27]
The investigations of leader traits are always by no means exhaustive. [2] In recent years, several studies have made comprehensive reviews about leader traits that have been historically studied. [3] [25] [8] [2] There are many ways that traits related to leadership can be categorized; however, the two most recent categorizations have organized traits into (1) demographic vs. task competence vs. interpersonal and (2) distal (trait-like) vs. proximal (state-like):
Based on a recent review of the trait leadership literature, Derue et al stated that most leader traits can be organized into three categories: demographic, task competence, and interpersonal attributes. [3] For the demographics category, gender has by far received the most attention in terms of leadership; however, most scholars have found that male and female leaders are both equally effective. Task competence relates to how individuals approach the execution and performance of tasks. [28] Hoffman et al grouped intelligence, conscientiousness, openness to experience, and emotional stability into this category. Lastly, interpersonal attributes are related to how a leader approaches social interactions. According to Hoffman et al, Extraversion and Agreeableness should be grouped into this category. [25]
Recent research has shifted from focusing solely on distal (dispositional/trait-like) characteristics of leaders to more proximal (malleable/state-like) individual differences often in the form of knowledge and skills. [25] The hope is that emergence of proximal traits in trait leadership theory will help researchers elucidate the old question whether leaders are born or made. Proximal individual differences suggest that the characteristics that distinguish effective leaders from non-effective leaders are not necessarily stable through the life-span, implying that these traits may be able to be developed. Hoffman et al examined the effects of distal vs. proximal traits on leader effectiveness. They found that distal individual differences of achievement motivation, energy, flexibility, dominance, honesty/integrity, self-confidence, creativity, and charisma were strongly correlated with leader effectiveness. Additionally, they found that the proximal individual differences of interpersonal skills, oral communication, written communication, management skills, problem solving skills, and decision making were also strongly correlated with leader effectiveness. Their results suggested that on average, distal and proximal individual differences have a similar relationship with effective leadership. [25]
Zaccaro et al created a model to understand leader traits and their influence on leader effectiveness/performance. [1] This model, shown in figure 1, [1] is based on other models of leader traits and leader effectiveness/performance. [29] [30] and rests on two basic premises about leader traits. The first premise is that leadership emerges from the combined influence of multiple traits as opposed to emerging from the independent assessment of traits. Zaccaro argued that effective leadership is derived from an integrated set of cognitive abilities, social capabilities, and dispositional tendencies, with each set of traits adding to the influence of the other. The second premise is that leader traits differ in their proximal influence on leadership. [31] This model is a multistage one in which certain distal attributes (i.e. dispositional attributes, cognitive abilities, and motives/values) serve as precursors for the development of proximal personal characteristics (i.e. social skills, problem solving skills and expertise knowledge). [30] [32] [33] [34] [35] [36] [37] Adopting this categorization approach and based on several comprehensive reviews/meta-analysis of trait leadership in recent years, [3] [25] [8] [2] we tried to make an inclusive list of leader traits (Table 1). However, the investigations of leader traits are always by no means exhaustive. [2]
Extraversion (Distal - Dispositional) | One dimension of Big-Five Personality Model; represents the tendency to be sociable, assertive, active, and to experience positive affects, such as energy and zeal. In Judge et al meta-analysis, Extraversion was significantly positive related to leadership (r = .31). [10] |
Agreeableness (Distal - Dispositional) | One dimension of Big-Five Personality Model; refers to the tendency to be trusting, compliant, caring, and gentle. The relationship between Agreeableness and leadership is still ambiguous. In Judge et al meta-analysis, Agreeableness was not significantly related to leadership (r = .08). [10] |
Conscientiousness (Distal - Dispositional) | One dimension of Big-Five Personality Model; it comprises two related facets, namely achievement and dependability. In Judge et al meta-analysis, Conscientiousness was significantly positively related to leadership (r = .28). [10] |
Openness (Distal - Dispositional) | One dimension of Big-Five Personality Model; the disposition to be imaginative, nonconforming, unconventional, and autonomous. In Judge et al meta-analysis, Openness was found to be significantly positively related with leadership (r = .24). [10] |
Neuroticism (Distal - Dispositional) | One dimension of Big-Five Personality Model; represents the tendency to exhibit poor emotional adjustment and experience negative affects, such as anxiety, insecurity, and hostility. In Judge et al meta-analysis, Neuroticism was significantly negatively correlated with leadership (r = -.24). [10] |
Honesty/integrity (Distal - Dispositional) | Defined as the correspondence between work and deed, and as being truthful and non deceitful. [38] Honesty/integrity was found to be positively related to leadership effectiveness of others and surrounding factors (r = .29). [25] |
Charisma (Distal - Dispositional) | Charismatic leaders are able to influence followers by articulating a compelling vision for the future, arousing commitment to organizational objectives and inspiring commitment and a sense of self-efficacy among followers. It has a significant influence on leadership (r = .57). [25] |
Intelligence (Distal - Cognitive Abilities) | Intelligence is regarded as the most important trait in psychology. It has been identified as one of the most critical traits that must be possessed by all leaders. [24] |
Creativity (Distal - Cognitive Abilities) | Creativity has been proposed as an important component of effective leadership. A significant relationship was found between creativity and leader effectiveness (r = .31). [25] |
Achievement motivation (Distal - Motive/Value) | The motivation to achieve has been proved to have significant relationship with leader effectiveness (r = .23). [10] |
Need for power (Distal - Motive/Value) | Characterized by the satisfaction leaders derive from exerting influence over the attitudes and behaviors of others. Need for power has a positive relationship with leader effectiveness. [39] |
Oral/written communication (Proximal - Social Skills) | Oral and written communication skills are found to be significantly correlated with leader effectiveness. [25] |
Interpersonal skills (Proximal - Social Skills) | Including a broad range of skills associated with un understanding of human behavior and the dynamics of groups, [38] [40] interpersonal skills were found to be significantly correlated with leader effectiveness. [25] |
General problem solving (Proximal - Problem Solving) | General problem solving skills were found to be one of the factors most strongly correlated with leader effectiveness. [25] |
Decision making (Proximal - Problem Solving) | Decision skills were also found to be one of the factors most strongly correlated with leader effectiveness. [25] |
Technical knowledge (Proximal - Expertise Knowledge) | Technical knowledge includes methods, processes, and equipment for conducting the specialized activities of the managers’ organizational unit. [40] It has been proved to be positively correlated with leader effectiveness. [15] |
Management skills (Proximal - Expertise Knowledge) | Given that leaders’ key responsibilities involve coordinating the work of multiple constituents, the ability to manage is likely crucial to leader effectiveness. This relationship has also been proved significant. [25] |
Multiple models have been proposed to explain the relationship of traits to leader effectiveness. Recently, integrated trait leadership models were put forward by summarizing the historical findings and reconciling the conflict between traits and other factors such as situations in determining effective leadership. [3] [8] [2] In addition to Zaccaro's Model of Leader Attributes and Leader Performance described in the previous section, two other models have emerged in recent trait leadership literature. The Leader Trait Emergence Effectiveness (LTEE) Model, created by Judge, Piccolo, & Kosalka in 2009, combines the behavioral genetics and evolutionary psychology theories of how personality traits are developed into a model that explains leader emergence and effectiveness. Additionally, this model separates objective and subjective leader effectiveness into different criterion. The authors created this model to be broad and flexible as to diverge from how the relationship between traits and leadership had been studied in past research. [8] Another model that has emerged in the trait leadership literature is the Integrated Model of Leader Traits, Behaviors, and Effectiveness. [3] This model combines traits and behaviors in predicting leader effectiveness and tested the mediation effect of leader behaviors on the relationship between leader traits and effectiveness. The authors found that some types of leader behaviors mediated the effect between traits and leader effectiveness. [3] The results of a Derue et al study supported an integrated trait-behavioral model that can be used in future research. [3]
Although there has been an increased focus by researchers on trait leadership, this theory remains one of the most criticized theories of leadership. Over the years, many reviewers of trait leadership theory have commented that this approach to leadership is "too simplistic", [41] and "futile". [42] Additionally, scholars have noted that trait leadership theory usually only focuses on how leader effectiveness is perceived by followers [23] rather than a leader's actual effectiveness. [8] Because the process through which personality predicts the actual effectiveness of leaders has been relatively unexplored. [43] these scholars have concluded that personality currently has low explanatory and predictive power over job performance and cannot help organizations select leaders who will be effective. [44] Furthermore, Derue et al found that leader behaviors are more predictive of leader effectiveness than are traits. [3]
Another criticism of trait leadership is its silence on the influence of the situational context surrounding leaders. [43] Stogdill found that persons who are leaders in one situation may not be leaders in another situation. [11] Complementing this situational theory of leadership, Murphy wrote that leadership does not reside in the person, and it usually requires examining the whole situation. [45] In addition to situational leadership theory, there has been growing support for other leadership theories such as transformational, transactional, charismatic, and authentic leadership theories. These theories have gained popularity because they are more normative than the trait and behavioral leadership theories. [46]
Previously, studies failed to uncover a trait or group of traits that are consistently associated with leadership emergence or help differentiate leaders from followers, [22] but more recent research supports a link between narcissism and the emergence of leadership. [47] [48] Additionally, trait leadership's focus on a small set of personality traits and neglect of more malleable traits such as social skills and problem solving skills has received considerable criticism. Lastly, trait leadership often fails to consider the integration of multiple traits when studying the effects of traits on leader effectiveness. [2]
Given the recent increase in evidence and support of trait leadership theory, [43] scholars have suggested a variety of strategies for human resource departments within organizations. Companies should use personality traits as selection tools for identifying emerging leaders. [43] These companies, however, should be aware of the individual traits that predict success in leader effectiveness as well as the traits that could be detrimental to leader effectiveness. For example, while Derue et al found that individuals who are high in Conscientiousness, Extraversion, and Agreeableness are predicted to be more likely to be perceived as successful in leadership positions, [3] Judge et al wrote that individuals who are high in narcissism are more likely to be a liability in certain jobs. Narcissism is just one example of a personality trait that should be explored further by HR practitioners to ensure they are not placing individuals with certain traits in the wrong positions. [49]
Complementing the suggestion that personality traits should be used as selection tools, it was found that the Big Five Personality traits were more strongly related to leadership than intelligence. This finding suggests that selecting leaders based on their personality is more important than selecting them based on intelligence. If organizations select leaders based on intelligence, it is recommended that these individuals be placed in leadership positions when the stress level is low and the individual has the ability to be directive. [10]
Another way in which HR practitioners can use the research on trait leadership is for leadership development programs. Although inherent personality traits (distal/trait-like) are relatively immune to leadership development, Zaccaro suggested that proximal traits (state-like) will be more malleable and susceptible to leadership development programs. Companies should use different types of development interventions to stretch the existing capabilities of their leaders. [2]
There is also evidence to suggest that Americans have an Extrovert Ideal, which dictates that people, most times unconsciously, favor the traits of extroverted individuals and suppress the qualities unique to introverts. [50] Susan Cain's research points to a transition sometime around the turn of the century during which we stopped evaluating our leaders based on character and began judging them instead based on personality. While both extroverted and introverted leaders have been shown to be effective, we have a general proclivity towards extroverted traits, which when evaluating trait leadership, could skew our perception of what's that important.
Industrial and organizational psychology "focuses the lens of psychological science on a key aspect of human life, namely, their work lives. In general, the goals of I-O psychology are to better understand and optimize the effectiveness, health, and well-being of both individuals and organizations." It is an applied discipline within psychology and is an international profession. I-O psychology is also known as occupational psychology in the United Kingdom, organisational psychology in Australia and New Zealand, and work and organizational (WO) psychology throughout Europe and Brazil. Industrial, work, and organizational (IWO) psychology is the broader, more global term for the science and profession.
Emotional intelligence (EI) is defined as the ability to perceive, use, understand, manage, and handle emotions. People with high emotional intelligence can recognize their own emotions and those of others, use emotional information to guide thinking and behavior, discern between different feelings and label them appropriately, and adjust emotions to adapt to environments.
Leadership, both as a research area and as a practical skill, encompasses the ability of an individual, group, or organization to "lead", influence, or guide other individuals, teams, or entire organizations.
In psychology, trait theory is an approach to the study of human personality. Trait theorists are primarily interested in the measurement of traits, which can be defined as habitual patterns of behavior, thought, and emotion. According to this perspective, traits are aspects of personality that are relatively stable over time, differ across individuals, are relatively consistent over situations, and influence behaviour. Traits are in contrast to states, which are more transitory dispositions.
Organizational behavior or organisational behaviour is the "study of human behavior in organizational settings, the interface between human behavior and the organization, and the organization itself". Organizational behavioral research can be categorized in at least three ways:
The Big Five personality traits, sometimes known as "the five-factor model of personality" or "OCEAN model", are a grouping of five unique characteristics used to study personality.
Political psychology is an interdisciplinary academic field, dedicated to understanding politics, politicians and political behavior from a psychological perspective, and psychological processes using socio-political perspectives. The relationship between politics and psychology is considered bidirectional, with psychology being used as a lens for understanding politics and politics being used as a lens for understanding psychology. As an interdisciplinary field, political psychology borrows from a wide range of disciplines, including: anthropology, economics, history, international relations, journalism, media, philosophy, political science, psychology, and sociology.
A contingency theory is an organizational theory that claims that there is no best way to organize a corporation, to lead a company, or to make decisions. Instead, the optimal course of action is contingent (dependent) upon the internal and external situation. Contingent leaders are flexible in choosing and adapting to succinct strategies to suit change in situation at a particular period in time in the running of the organization.
Transformational leadership is a theory of leadership where a leader works with teams or followers beyond their immediate self-interests to identify needed change, creating a vision to guide the change through influence, inspiration, and executing the change in tandem with committed members of a group; This change in self-interests elevates the follower's levels of maturity and ideals, as well as their concerns for the achievement. It is an integral part of the Full Range Leadership Model. Transformational leadership is when leader behaviors influence followers and inspire them to perform beyond their perceived capabilities. Transformational leadership inspires people to achieve unexpected or remarkable results. It gives workers autonomy over specific jobs, as well as the authority to make decisions once they have been trained. This induces a positive change in the followers attitudes and the organization as a whole. Transformational leaders typically perform four distinct behaviors, also known as the four Is. These behaviors are inspirational motivation, idealized influence, intellectual stimulation, and individualized consideration.
Job performance assesses whether a person performs a job well. Job performance, studied academically as part of industrial and organizational psychology, also forms a part of human resources management. Performance is an important criterion for organizational outcomes and success. John P. Campbell describes job performance as an individual-level variable, or something a single person does. This differentiates it from more encompassing constructs such as organizational performance or national performance, which are higher-level variables.
Goal orientation, or achievement orientation, is an "individual disposition towards developing or validating one's ability in achievement settings". In general, an individual can be said to be mastery or performance oriented, based on whether one's goal is to develop one's ability or to demonstrate one's ability, respectively. A mastery orientation is also sometimes referred to as a learning orientation.
Multiteam systems (MTSs) are "two or more teams that interface directly and interdependently in response to environmental contingencies toward the accomplishment of collective goals. MTS boundaries are defined by virtue of the fact that all teams within the system, while pursuing different proximal goals, share at least one common distal goal; and in doing so, exhibit input, process and outcome interdependence with at least one other team in the system". Multiteam systems describe collections of teams that work toward a common goal. MTSs are often conceptualized as larger than a single team, but smaller than the organization within which they are embedded. In fact, MTSs often traverse organizations such that teams embedded within the same MTS may hail from multiple organizations. These systems of teams can be conceptualized as a special type of social network. In particular, MTSs are social networks whose boundaries are based on the shared interdependence of all members toward the accomplishment of a higher-order network-level goal. Multiteam systems are different from teams, because they are composed of multiple teams that must coordinate and collaborate. In MTSs, component teams each pursue proximal team goals and at the same time, work toward the larger system level goal. Because of this dual focus on team goals and systems goals, there are many situations where interventions aimed at improving the internal cohesion of teams will come at a cost to the larger goal. The past decade has witnessed an explosion of interest in the social sciences in understanding multiteam systems. MTSs are thought to explain the dynamics that arise in the public sector such as Provincial Reconstruction Teams, and in the private sector with strategic alliances.
Leader development is defined as the "expansion of a person's capacity to be effective in leadership roles and processes". These roles and processes are ones that aid in setting direction, creating alignment and maintaining commitment in groups of people sharing common work. Most organizational leadership research and educational programs have focused on developing individual-based knowledge, skills, and abilities associated with formal leadership roles of individuals. Leader development therefore results by investing in human capital.
Core self-evaluations (CSE) represent a stable personality trait which encompasses an individual's subconscious, fundamental evaluations about themselves, their own abilities and their own control. People who have high core self-evaluations will think positively of themselves and be confident in their own abilities. Conversely, people with low core self-evaluations will have a negative appraisal of themselves and will lack confidence. The concept of core self-evaluations was first examined by Judge, Locke, and Durham (1997) and involves four personality dimensions: locus of control, neuroticism, generalized self-efficacy, and self-esteem. The trait developed as a dispositional predictor of job satisfaction, but has expanded to predict a variety of other outcomes. Core self-evaluations are particularly important because they represent a personality trait which will remain consistent over time. Furthermore, the way in which people appraise themselves using core self-evaluations has the ability to predict positive work outcomes, specifically, job satisfaction and job performance. These relationships have inspired increasing amounts of research on core self-evaluations and suggest valuable implications about the importance this trait may have for organizations.
Substitutes for leadership theory is a leadership theory first developed by Steven Kerr and John M. Jermier and published in Organizational Behavior and Human Performance in December 1978.
Team composition refers to the overall mix of characteristics among people in a team, which is a unit of two or more individuals who interact interdependently to achieve a common objective. It is based on the attributes among individuals that comprise the team, in addition to their main objective.
Shared leadership is a leadership style that broadly distributes leadership responsibility, such that people within a team and organization lead each other. It has frequently been compared to horizontal leadership, distributed leadership, and collective leadership and is most contrasted with more traditional "vertical" or "hierarchical" leadership that resides predominantly with an individual instead of a group.
The task-relationship model is defined by Donelson Forsyth as "a descriptive model of leadership which maintains that most leadership behaviors can be classified as performance maintenance or relationship maintenances". Task-oriented and relationship-oriented leadership are two models which are often compared, as they are known to produce varying outcomes under different circumstances. Task-oriented leadership is a behavioral approach in which the leader focuses on the tasks that need to be performed in order to meet certain goals, or to achieve a certain performance standard. Relationship-oriented leadership is a behavioral approach in which the leader focuses on the satisfaction, motivation and the general well-being of the team members.
Adaptive performance in the work environment refers to adjusting to and understanding change in the workplace. An employee who is versatile is valued and important in the success of an organization. Employers seek employees with high adaptability, due to the positive outcomes that follow, such as excellent work performance, work attitude, and ability to handle stress. Employees, who display high adaptive performance in an organization, tend to have more advantages in career opportunities unlike employees who are not adaptable to change. In previous literature, Pulakos and colleagues established eight dimensions of adaptive performance.
Trait activation theory is based on a specific model of job performance, and can be considered an elaborated or extended view of personality-job fit. Specifically, it is how an individual expresses their traits when exposed to situational cues related to those traits. These situational cues may stem from organization, social, and/or task cues. These cues can activate personality traits that are related to job tasks and organizational expectations that the organization values. These cues may also elicit trait-related behaviors that are not directly related to job performance.