Leadership: Definition, Traits and Emotional Intelligence

Leadership Defined

• Leadership involves influencing a group towards achieving a shared vision or goals.
• Effective organizations require both strong leadership to challenge the status quo and management to oversee day-to-day operations.

Summarizing Trait Theories of Leadership

• Trait theories focus on identifying personal qualities that differentiate leaders from non-leaders, such as personality, social, physical, or intellectual attributes.
• Individuals who are extroverted, conscientious, and open to new experiences have an advantage in leadership roles.
• Extroversion is a strong predictor of motivation to lead and leader emergence.
• Proactive leaders are effective during transitions, fostering follower identification and engagement.
• Moderate scores on Dark Triad traits can be optimal for leadership effectiveness.
• Self-awareness and self-regulation skills help leaders control the effects of Dark Triad traits.

Emotional Intelligence (EI) and Leadership

• Emotional intelligence, particularly empathy, is an important trait for effective leadership.
• Leaders with high EI can better understand and manage the emotions of their followers.
• Traits can predict leadership emergence more effectively than distinguishing between effective and ineffective leaders.

Identifying Behavioral Theories of Leadership

• Behavioral theories suggest that leadership can be taught, focusing on specific behaviors that differentiate leaders from non-leaders.
• The Ohio State Studies narrowed leadership behavior to initiating structure (organizing work) and consideration (building trust and respect).
• Initiating structure is more strongly related to group and organization productivity.
• Consideration increases job satisfaction, motivation, and respect among followers.
• Factors like emotions and situational contexts influence whether leaders engage in these behaviors.

Ethics of Nudging

• Nudging is a subtle technique used to alter decision-making to achieve desirable outcomes.
• Transparency, co-creation, and constructive framing aid managers overcome negative perceptions of nudging.

Contrast Contingency Theories of Leadership

• Contingency theories emphasize that leadership effectiveness depends on the situation
• Fiedler contingency model: group performance depends on matching a leader's style to the degree of situational control.
• Situational Leadership Theory (SLT): the appropriate leadership style depends on followers' readiness to accomplish a specific task. Styles include telling/directing, selling/coaching, participating/supporting, and delegating.
• Leader-participation model: leadership behavior relates to subordinate participation in decision making.
• Shared leadership theory: leadership roles are distributed across followers.

Follower Contingency Theories

• Followership theory places emphasis on the effects that the followers have to allow leadership to succeed.
• “Managing up": expands to focus on the skills managers use to influence followers applied to leaders themselves.

Leading in Times of Crisis

• Charismatic leadership can be visionary in a crisis times, by starting with establishing a vision and then making a plea for action
• Charismatic leadership can be crisis-responsive by starting with a plea for action and then justifying this action by communicating its effective results.

Describe Positive Leadership Styles and Relationships

• Leader-Member Exchange (LMX) theory states that the leaders and followers have a unique, one-on-one relationship that varies with each follower, which affects relationship quantity.
• Charismatic leadership theory is based on the fact the people see leaders who have charisma are seen as individuals who inspire through words, ideas and behaviors.
• Full-range leadership model shows that the leadership style is on a continuum that varies from ineffective to effective

Positive Leadership Styles

• Authentic leaders who tend to be self aware or know who there are will strongly predict outcome.
• (Un)ethical leaders lead by example and use ethical or unethical ways to use power and treat others.
• Servant Leadership is marked by going outside of own self interest and focusing on other people's personal growth.

Discuss the Roles of Leaders in Creating Ethical Organizations

• An individual's willingness to take chances that another will come through even if there is a time constraint, is related to trust between individuals.
• Leaders can develop trust by having: integrity, benevolence, competence, and ability.

Identify the Challenges and Opportunities to Our Understanding of Leadership

• Attribution theory of leadership is simply an attribute that people make about other individuals.
• Leaders can display the correct actions can be more important to how they are viewed, instead of actually focus on completing those actions.
• Neutralizes - attributes that make it impossible for leader behavior to make any difference to follower outcomes.
• Substitutes attributes, such as experience and training, that can replace the need for a leader's support or ability to create structure.