Abstract
The subject of leadership has long captured the attention of behavioral scientists. In the 20th century, a leader’s effectiveness was studied from the standpoint of traits, namely, individual differences with regard to intelligence and personality variables (e.g., Lord, de Vader, & Alliger, 1986), behaviors (e.g., Fleishman, 1973), and the situation or context within which a leader functions (e.g., Fiedler, 1967; Fiedler & Chemers, 1974). The dependent variables for assessing the effectiveness of an intervention and the criteria for assessing the validity of predictors were largely twofold: performance and job satisfaction.
In the present century, the effects of traits, behaviors, and the situation or context on a leader’s effectiveness continue to be studied (e.g., DeRue, Nahrgang, Wellman, & Humphrey, 2011; Judge, Piccolo, & Ilies, 2004; Judge, Piccolo, & Kosalka, 2009). Two emerging research streams regarding individual differences are implicit or subconscious motives and narcissism. In this special issue, we feature two empirical studies that pursue these emerging areas of inquiry. The two studies comprise a diverse set of approaches that each advances our understanding of the leadership process and the character of those in leadership relationships.
The study by Delbecq et al. is not only unusual in that it is among the few empirical studies on CEOs, it is among the first to study their implicit motives in tandem with several different types of leadership. The results show that the implicit subconscious motive for power relates negatively to charismatic and instrumental leadership; the affiliation motive relates negatively to charismatic leadership; and the need for achievement relates positively to instrumental and participative leadership. Only charismatic leadership was shown to relate positively to follower motivation, performance, and teamwork.
Hoffman et al. explain how ethical scandals in business during the last decade have led researchers to examine the destructive potential of leadership. Contrary to their hypotheses, they found no significant relationship between a leader’s score on a measure of the trait narcissism and followers’ ratings of a leader’s effectiveness. However, a moderator variable, namely, the situation or context, was found to be important in this study. In organizational climates that are perceived by employees as highly ethical, a leader’s narcissistic behavior becomes highly salient to others.
The behavior of leaders, particularly ethical behavior, has become a dominant topic of interest (Brown, Treviño, & Harrison, 2005). A Type II error, the erroneous conclusion that an intervention is not effective or a predictor lacks criterion validity, occurs when a dependent variable or criterion lacks reliability and validity. Consequently, Yukl et al. developed a parsimonious and easy-to-administer ethical leadership questionnaire (ELQ) that is not confounded with other leader behaviors. Moreover, they report that the ELQ, after controlling for the effects of task-oriented, relationship-oriented, and change-oriented behaviors, explains additional variance in both leader– member exchange and overall leadership effectiveness that includes unit work performance.
Carsten and Uhl-Bien developed, tested, and found significant support for a theoretical model that reverses the lens in leadership and ethics research by showing that followers’, rather than leader’s, characteristics are associated with unethical behavior. Specifically, their results show that individuals with strong coproduction beliefs regarding leadership, who do not romanticize their leaders, are unlikely to displace responsibility for their own actions, and hence they are unlikely to support a leader’s unethical behavior.
As is shown by a criterion for validating Yukl et al.’s ELQ, job performance remains a criterion of great interest to researchers who study leadership. A theory of motivation that serves as a framework for leaders to use to set goals for increasing job performance is Locke and Latham’s goal setting theory (Latham & Locke, 2007; Locke & Latham, 2002, 2006). However, in a period of economic turbulence that characterizes the past 12 years, setting a specific high goal for a desired performance outcome many not be appropriate. Porter and Latham show that employee-learning goals are related to higher levels of department-level performance than are performance or “do your best” goals. This is the first study of learning goals in a field setting.
In the present century, the focus on the effect of leadership on job performance has been broadened to include creativity and the behaviors leaders can exhibit to increase the creativity of their employees. As McMahon and Ford noted, employee creativity is a key way for an organization to become and remain competitive. They have developed a measure of the extent to which leaders transfer useful cognitive frameworks for increasing an employee’s creativity. They labeled this measure, the leader heuristic transfer, and show that it has predictive validity for employee creativity.
In the middle to the latter part of the 20th century, researchers found that there is a reciprocal relationship between job performance and job satisfaction (Lawler, 1973; Locke & Latham, 2002). Related to the construct of job satisfaction is organizational commitment. Although leadership is an important factor that affects employee commitment to an organization, the literature on leadership and commitment has yet to be integrated. As a result, Jackson et al. conducted a meta-analysis on the strength of the relationships between these two variables. Transformational-charismatic leadership correlated significantly with affective commitment regardless of societal culture.
The psychological study of individuals encompasses three variables: (a) cognition, such as goal setting; (b) behaviors, namely, what people do such as engaging in ethical or unethical behavior; and (c) affect, that is, how they feel. Job satisfaction and organizational commitment are measures of affect.
Kelloway et al. cite research showing that a supervisor’s behavior has a greater effect on an employee’s mental well-being than factors such as stress, life, and work events. Consequently, they developed a measure of positive leader behaviors that predict both context-specific and context-free employee subjective well-being even when they controlled for transformational and abusive supervision. In a second study they report in their article, where respondents reported their feelings twice a week, positive leadership was shown to be related with employee positive but not negative affect.
In the present century, Luthans and his colleagues have expanded bottom-line performance measures to include employee health because of the ongoing exponential increase of health costs for organizations. Luthans et al. have also greatly expanded traditional measures of job satisfaction to that of a more global measure, subjective well-being. In their article included in this special issue, they show empirically what leaders can do to increase an organization’s psychological capital and the effect of doing so on employee relationships as well as their physical and mental health. Satisfactory relationships are necessary for fulfilling employee needs for security and affiliation.
A fear shared by many behavioral scientists is that because the majority of studies on leadership in the 20th century were conducted in the United States, the conclusions this research has yielded may be U.S.-centric. The situation or context, especially the societal setting and the values of the employees in a given society, may affect a leader’s effectiveness.
In their study of transformational leadership of employees in China and Canada, Wang and Gagne found that this leadership style is effective in both countries. This is largely due to the fact that transformational leadership fulfills universal needs for autonomy supportive behaviors. Moreover, collectivistic values were positively related to an employee’s autonomous work motivation.
In closing, we believe readers will find these studies intriguing and that these studies will stimulate considerable research.