Differential behavioral pathways linking personality to leadership emergence and effectiveness in groups

Härtel, T. M.; Hoch, F.; Back, M. D.

Abstract

This study integrates leadership process models with process models of personality and behavioral personality science to examine the behavioral-perceptual pathways that explain interpersonal personality traits’ divergent relation to group leadership evaluations. We applied data from an online group interaction study (N = 364) alternately assigning participants as leaders conducting brief tasks. We used 4 variable types to build the pathways in multiple mediator models: (a) Self-reported personality traits, (b) video recordings of expressed interpersonal behaviors coded by 6 trained raters, (c) interpersonal impressions, and (d) mutual evaluations of leadership emergence/effectiveness. We find interpersonal big five traits to differently relate to the 2 leadership outcomes via the behavioral-perceptual pathways: Extraversion was more important to leadership emergence due to impressions of assertiveness evoked by task-focused behavior being stronger valued. Agreeableness/emotional stability were more important to leadership effectiveness due to impressions of trustworthiness/calmness evoked by member-focused/calm behavior being stronger valued.