BUSINESS AND LEADERSHIP
The Leadership Attributes Associated with Successful Leaders
A discussion on leadership research to identify and understand traits and behaviors
After a decade of studying leadership theories, attributes associated with individual leaders, the following traits and skills tend to be consistent across each study:
- Personality Traits
- Needs and Motives
- Values
- Skills
- Competencies
The article will explore the validity of traits as a predictor for success.
Personality Traits
Specific personality traits commonly discussed in research studies cover the following:
Self Confidence
Considered to include related themes such as self-esteem and self-efficacy. Leaders with higher levels of self-confidence are:
- More Likely to seek responsibility
- Look for and Act on Problems
- Expect more of subordinates
- Gain respect and confidence of subordinated
High Energy and Stress Tolerance
Trait research shows that energy levels, physical stamina, and stress tolerance are associated with effectiveness. They are relevant in situations such as:
- Dealing with punitive followers
- Dealing with stressful situations
- Calm and supportive of staff under pressure
- Confront and Deal with Problems
Power Motivation
Someone with a high need for power enjoys influencing people and events. They are more likely to seek positions of authority, pointing to a strong relationship between the need for power and career advancement.
Need for power is categories as socialized power and personalized power with the following characteristics:
- Socialized power
- More emotionally mature
- Focused on organization goals
- Building teams
- Organizational commitment
- Personalized power
- Personal success is important
- Surround themselves by agreement
- Create conflict
- Dominate subordinates to keep them dependent
Narcissism
Narcissism is a personality syndrome with several traits associated with effective leadership such as a strong need for esteem, attention, and status.
The characteristics of these leaders are:
- Self-absorbed
- Have personalized power focus
- Pursue of grandiose projects for the sake of their own reputation and image
- Cling to power, with no succession planning
- Defensive — blame others when problems arise
- Make decisions on impulse without adequate research
There are some benefits where leaders with these attributes will mobilize and lead bold projects and strongly deal with severe threats.
Emotional Maturity
The term emotional maturity encompasses a number of motives and values. Characteristics of an emotionally mature person include:
- Awareness of strengths and weakness
- A high degree of self-control
- Care and consideration for staff
- Better relationship with peers, subordinates, and staff
- Focused on personal development
- Linked with socialized power focus for effectiveness
Research shows that emotional maturity is linked to managerial effectiveness and advancement.
Internal Locus of Control
People with a strong locus of control orientation believe they can control situations and outcomes through action. People with a low orientation believe events are random, by chance or fate and their actions have little or no effect.
Research shows a correlation with ‘Internal’ and managerial effectiveness, with the following characteristics
- More likely to take action
- Seek out and act on problems
- Future orientated and planners
Research also shows there is a stronger relationship to the effectiveness of dynamic firms where the requirement for product innovation is high.
Personal Integrity
Integrity in the context of business behavior is in line with espoused values, that a person is honest, ethical, and trustworthy. Characteristics of high integrity in leaders include:
- Takes responsibility for actions
- Keeps their promises
- Maintains confidence of peers, superiors, and subordinates
- Acts in line with declarations and values
Low integrity is linked to career derailment while high Integrity linked to growth and advancement
Achievement Orientation
Achievement orientation is grounded in personal needs. There is some debate as to its impact on effectiveness, but most studies do find a link between high achievement orientation and effectiveness.
Those with high achievement orientations more likely to:
- Take responsibility
- Set challenging goals
- Plan and take actions
- Have a strong concern for task
Effectiveness linked to power orientation, achievement orientation is more effective if grounded in socialized power orientation.
That said, it may be destructive, counterproductive if driven by personalized power orientation.
Need for Affiliation
People with a high need for affiliation feel great satisfaction from being liked and accepted.
There is a low correlation between a high need for affiliation and managerial effectiveness. People with a high need for affiliation tend to:
- Be more concerned about relationships and tasks
- Dispense rewards to seek approval
- Avoid necessary but unpopular decisions
Low need for affiliation:
- Are prepared to take tough decisions
- Focus on tasks
Too low a need for affiliation can be negative as it can cause individuals to fail to develop interpersonal skills.
Link to Big 5 Personality Types
There is some debate on the link of attributes with the Big 5 Personality traits, mostly confused by terms, taxonomies, so more research is required.
Skills for Effective Leaders
Three skillful areas required for effective leaders are:
- Technical Skills
- Interpersonal Skills
- Conceptual Skills
№1 ~ Technical Skills — Important at lower-level management, whereby knowledge of organization technologies, methods, structures, and processes is more relevant.
Technical skills are also important for the supervision of subordinates and knowledge of competitor’s products.
Technical skills are common in entrepreneurial managers and their competencies can feed innovation initiatives.
Technical skills can change over a manager's career.
№2 ~ Interpersonal Skills — This is knowledge of human behavior, group processes and the ability to interpret the feelings and motivation of others.
Specific aptitudes Include:
- Empathy
- Social Insight
- Verbal communication
- Diplomacy
These skills can:
- Facilitate Working with others
- Help avoid and Handle conflict
- Improve handling difficulties and supporting staff
№3 ~ Conceptual Skills — These consist of:
- Good Judgment
- Creativity
- Meaning Derivation
- Foresight and intuition
Refined cognitive agility enables those with such skills to see patterns and inter-relationships in complex working environments.
- They can distinguish shades of grey compared to black and whole
- These skills are considered essential for strategic planning
- High ability is linked with advancement and effectiveness
- Low ability linked with career derailment
The phrase “Charming but not brilliant” relates to managers with strong technical and interpersonal skills but a lack of conceptual skills.
Managerial Competencies
Such competencies are considered to be a combination of skills, behaviors, and traits. They include:
- Emotional Intelligence
- Social Intelligence
- Learning Ability
№1 ~ Emotional Intelligence — Includes soft-skills like:
- Empathy
- Self Awareness
- Self Regulation
- Self Expression
Emotional Intelligence is relevant in the following areas:
- Understanding and dealing with relationships within an organization
- Management of Self under pressure
- Dealing with crises
- Impact assessment for change
- Behavioral selection for different scenarios
- Motivating and dealing with staff
There is some controversy on emotional intelligence with critics claiming that it simply bundles known traits and skills, adding no new insights on effective leadership.
№2 ~ Social Intelligence — Is the ability to determine the right leadership approach in a certain situation by selecting the appropriate response.
A core ability here is social perception — the awareness to understand the needs, challenges, and opportunities facing an individual or group.
- It requires behavioral flexibility, social leadership skills with a wide repertoire of behaviors
- Self-monitoring is very important as it allows a leader to monitor their own behavior for effectiveness
№3 ~ Learning Ability — Lifelong learning is woven into the modern business world, requiring leaders who can:
- Learn and apply new knowledge
- Learn from mistakes
- Change and challenge assumptions
- Enrich their own mental models
Relevant traits are:
- Achievement orientation
- Emotional stability
- Self-monitoring
- Internal locus of control
Leaders with these traits tend to be:
- Motivated to achieve excellence
- Open-minded, curious and confident
- Prepared to take action
Situational Relevance
Leaders need many skills but specific skill selection is situation-dependent, such as:
- Level of management
- Type of organizations
- External environment
Technical Skills
As touched on above, the requirement for technical skills can change over a manager's career.
Technical skills are the highest importance at the beginning of the career followed by interpersonal skills and then conceptual skills.
As a manager progresses into leadership the importance of skills inverts — conceptual skills and interpersonal skills becomes more important than technical skills.
Type of Organization
An interesting question about leadership skills is how transferable they are.
There is a general agreement in research that they are not transferable to other functions or organizations at a lower level. With less agreement and more debate at higher levels with the following considerations:
- Unique aspects of an industry
- Culture of organizations
- Importance and relevance of a leader’s network and industry background
External Environment
Theories suggest that the skills required are relevant to the environment and status of the organization. Some examples include:
- Entrepreneurial or Startup company versus stable mature organization
- Stable industry versus turbulent
- Local business versus global
Premium skills identified in research for dealing with these situations include:
- Mature cognitive agility
- A high degree of empathy
- Self-awareness
- Acute cultural sensitivity
Final Thoughts
There’s a lot of ‘dense’ material on this topic with cross-reference between terms and interpretations commonplace.
Research is hindered by methodology and some conceptual weaknesses:
- No theory on the relationship between attributes and effectiveness with respect to advancement
- Lack of attention to context
Research repeats a lot too, which is perhaps indicative of the variation and complexity associated with trait theory.
That said, to distill a few simple takeaways, my recommendations for managers and future leaders are:
- Develop soft skills as much as hard, technical skills
- Learn your strengths and weakness
- Maintain self-awareness
- Identify and develop relevant leadership skills in your field
- Remember that strengths can become weaknesses
- Compensate for your weaknesses
If you’re hungry for more, there’s a selection of articles in the piece below:
