(B) The Trait Approach Flashcards
One of the first systematic attempts to study leadership
the trait approach:
Stogdill first survey 8 traits that different in leaders and average group member
- intelligence
- alertness
- insight
- responsibility
- initiative
- persistence
- self-confidence
- sociability
Stogdill second survey found what? and what 10 important characteristics;
Found that personality and situational factors were equally important determinants of leadership (first thought only focus on situational factors)
- Achievement
- persistence
- risktaking and original problem-solving
- initative
- self-confidence
- responsibility
- cooperativeness
- tolerance
- influence
- sociability
Large study of Mann
- focus on personality factors, not situational factors
- personality traits could be used to distignuish leaders from followers by using six traits:
- intelligence
- masculinity
- adjustment
- dominance
- extraversion
- conservatism
Lord et al. reassessed Mann findings
found that intelligence, masculinity and dominance significantly related to how followers perceived leaders
also personality traits could be used to discriminate between leaders and non-leaders
Kirkpatrick and Lock six traits that differed leaders from non-leaders
-Drive
-Motivation
-Integrity
-Confidence
-Cognitive ability
-task knowledge
Traits can be innate, learned or both
Zaccaro found that
leadership traits associated with social intelligence
social intelligence:
people having capacities like social awareness, social acumen, self-monitoring and ability to choose and use the best response given situation and social enivroment
Zaccaro, Kemp and Bader included 11 most important social abilities for leadership
- cognitive abilities
- extraversion
- conscientiousnes
- emotional stability
- openness
- agreeableness
- motivation
- social intelligence
- self-monitoring
- emotional intelligence
- problem solving
Most common named traits of all researchers:
- intelligence
- self-confidence
- determination
- integrity
- sociability
Intelligence:
Leaders more intelligent than non-leaders
higher intelligence leads to strong verbal ability, perceptual ability and reasoning
also intelligenve should be much higher than followers, due to counterproductive impact of communication difficulties
Self-confidence
sure about your skills and competencies includes; -self-esteem -self-assurance -belief than one can make a difference
Determination
desire to get a job done includes: -initiative -persistence -dominance -drive
Integrity
Quality of honesty and trustworthiness which inspires confidence in others. includes; -loyalty -dependability -not being deceptive
sociability
concerns how far a leader tries to set up pleasant social relationships includes: -friendly -outgoing -courteous -tactful -diplomatic
Big five
5 factors that make up personality;
- Neuroticism: degree of being depressed, anxious, insecure, vulnerable and hostile
- Extraversion: degree of being social, assertive and positive
- Openness: degree of being informed, creative, insightful and curious
- Agreeableness: degree of being accepting, conforming, trusting and nurturing
- Conscientiousness: degree of being thoroug, organized, controlled, dependable and decisive
Importance Big five from high to low
extraversion - conscientiouness - openness - low neuroticism - Agreeableness (weak relation with leadership)
Emotional intelligence
persons’ ability to understand and use emotions and to use this knowledge to obtain a good relationship with oneself and others
-emotionals (affective domain) and thinking (cognitive domain) and interplay between these two. the higher leader’s emotional intelligence, the more effective they be
Strengths trait approach
- intuitively appealing, see leaders as special and giftes
- century of research to provide credibility
- deeper understanding of how leaders and its personality are related to the process of leadership
- benchmark for what needs to be looked for in being a leader
criticisms trait approach
- fails to give definitve list of leadership traits
- not take situation into account
- determination of most important trait is highly subjective
- fails to look at traits in relation with the leadership outcomes, like group and team outcomes in organizational setting
- not usefull for training and development of leadership, as no definite traits list, difficult to teach traits to person and traits mostly fixed psychological structures
LTQ
Leadership traits questionnaire quantifies the perception of leader and followers and measures traits of leader and gives specific strengths and weaknesses
this gives info on how leders sees himself and how others see him as a leader –> so where these opinions differ
