Leadership

Chapter 2 - Trait Approach

Northouse, 5th edition

 Overview
 Great Man Theories
 Historical Shifts in Trait Perspective
 What Traits Differentiate Leaders
From Nonleaders?
 How Does the Trait Approach Work?
 Great Person Theories
Trait Approach: one of the first systematic
attempts to study leadership

“Great Man” Theories

(early 1900s)
– Focused on identifying
innate qualities and
characteristics possessed
by great social, political, &
military leaders
 Historical Shifts in Trait Perspective
Early 1900s 1930-50s 1970’s - Early 90s Today

Traits Interacting Revival of Critical Role of 5 Major

Great Man
With Situational Traits in Leader Leadership
Theories
Demands on Leaders Effectiveness Traits

•Research focused • Landmark Stogdill (1948) • Stogdill (1974) • Intelligence

on individual study - analyzed and
characteristics synthesized 124 trait studies
that universally - Leadership
differentiated reconceptualized
leaders as a relationship between
from nonleaders people in a social situation
• Mann (1959) reviewed 1,400
Innate Qualities findings of personality and
leadership in small groups
- Less emphasis on situations
- Suggested personality traits
could be used to discriminate
leaders from nonleaders
Situations
- Analyzed 163 new • Self-Confidence
studies • Determination
with 1948 study findings • Integrity
- Validated original study • Sociability
- 10 characteristics
positively identified with
leadership
• Lord, DeVader, & Alliger
(1986) meta-analysis
- Personality traits can be
used to differentiate
leaders/nonleaders
• Kirkpatrick & Locke (1991)
- 6 traits make up the
“Right Stuff” for leaders
Personality / Behaviors
 Leadership Traits
Studies of Leadership Traits and Characteristics
5-Factor Personality Model
& Leadership
Big Five Personality Factors
 5-Factor Personality Model & Leadership
Big Five & Leadership
Study using meta-analysis (Judge et al, 2002)
Results – a strong relationship between
personality traits and leadership
 Extraversion – factor most strongly associated with
leadership
– Most important trait of effective leaders
 Conscientiousness – 2nd most related factor
 Neuroticism & Openness – next most related
– Neuroticism negatively associated to leadership
 Agreeableness – only weakly related to leadership
How Does the Trait
Approach Work?
 Focus of Trait Approach
 Strengths
 Criticisms
 Application
 Focus of Trait Approach
Leader Personality
Assessments
Focuses  Organizations use
exclusively on personality assessments to
leader find “right” people
– Assumption - will increase
– What traits organizational effectiveness
leaders exhibit – Specify characteristics/traits
– Who has these for specific positions
traits  Personality assessment
measures for “fit”
 Strengths
 Intuitively appealing
 Highlights leadership
– Perception that
leaders are different in
component in the
that they possess leadership process
special traits – Deeper level
– People “need” to view understanding of how
leaders as gifted leader/personality
related to leadership
 Credibility due to a process
century of research
 Provides benchmarks
support
for what to look for in a
leader
 Criticisms
 Fails to delimit a
definitive list of
leadership traits
– Endless lists have
emerged
 Doesn’t take into
account situational
effects
– Leaders in one situation
may not be leaders in
another situation
 List of most important
leadership traits is
highly subjective
– Much subjective experience &
observations serve as basis
for identified leadership traits
 Research fails to look at
traits in relationship to
leadership outcomes
 Not useful for training &
development