Personality & Organisational Leadership

Question 1

The 18 factor taxonomy of effective leadership was later aggregated into a 4 factor model. What are these 4 facets?

Answer 1

1. Leadership and supervision
2. Interpersonal relations and communication
3. Technical behaviours and mechanics of management
4. Useful behaviours and skills

Question 2

Provide an example of the following 4 factor model facet.
Leadership and supervision.

Answer 2

Coordinating subordinates and other resources to get the job done.

Question 3

Provide an example of the following 4 factor model facet.
Interpersonal relations and communication.

Answer 3

Communicating effectively and keeping others informed.

Question 4

Provide an example of the following 4 factor model facet.
Technical behaviours and mechanics of management.

Answer 4

Administration and paperwork

Question 5

Provide an example of the following 4 factor model facet.
Useful behaviours and skills.

Answer 5

Handling crises and stress.

Question 6

At the most aggregated level, effective leadership facets map onto what 2 dimensions?

Answer 6

1. Task performance
2. Contextual performance

Question 7

What facets of the 4 factor model does the dimension of Task Performance (2 factor model) encompass?

Answer 7

1. Leadership and supervision
2. Technical behaviours & mechanics of management.

Question 8

What facets of the 4 factor model does the dimension of contextual Performance (2 factor model) encompass?

Answer 8

2. Interpersonal relations and communication
3. Useful behaviours and skills

Question 9

The FFM and effective leadership: Judge et al (2002) provided the most widely referenced meta-analysis in the field.
They aggregated how many correlations?
From how many studies?
How many managers made up the sample?
From what level organisations and what industry sectors?

Answer 9

• 222 correlations aggregated
• from 73 different studies
• sample contained more than 25000 managers
• from every level in organisations across every industry sector

Question 10

How did the studies included in Judge et al (2002) meta-analysis operationalise leadership effectiveness?

Answer 10

Predominately through ratings made by either the leaders supervisor(s) or the leaders subordinate(s).

Question 11

What correlations did the meta analysis by Judge et al return?

Answer 11

Extraversion = .24
Openness = .24
Neuroticism = -.22
Agreeableness = .21
Consciousness = .16

Question 12

What was probably the most meaningful statistic to come from the meta-analysis by Judge et al (FFM and effective leadership)?

Answer 12

The moderately strong multiple correlation (r = .39) between the five dimensions and effective leadership.
- this reflects the variance in leadership effectiveness that is explained by the combination of all 5 dimensions.

Question 13

Judge et al (2002) meta-analysis notes 3 key limitations plague the literature and all 3 limitations centre on the validity of the criterion measures. What are these 3 limitations highlighted by Judge et al?

Answer 13

1. Ratings of effective leadership are seldom validated against objective measures of leadership effectiveness.
2. Studies seldom use a taxonomy of effective leadership.
3. The need for 360 degree leadership effectiveness ratings (multi source).

Question 14

Provide an example of the benefits and predictive power objective ratings of effective leadership can offer.

Answer 14

Study by Bloom and van Reenen (2010) developed an interview rating scale based on 18 dimensions of effective leadership.
In an international study of 5850 manufacturing firms effective leadership scores were shown to predict objective criteria including;
Sales per employee
Firm profitability
5 year growth of sales and firm survival

Question 15

Bloom and van Reenen’s study demonstrates that there are well established principles of good leadership that do predict real world outcomes, however, in the psychology literature not all ratings of effective leadership are likely to be valid. Provide an example (remember Bloom and van Reeten developed objective ratings)

Answer 15

How much influence do you feel your supervisor had on the productivity and overall effectiveness of the unit (may lack validity).

Question 16

The vast majority of studies included in Judge et al’s meta-analysis did not measure different dimensions of leadership effectiveness (didn’t use a taxonomy). Why is this a problem?

Answer 16

Even assuming that the global measures are valid, what does it really tell us about effective leadership. There may be a correlation between extraversion and effective leadership but are extraverts better at task performance related competencies, better at contextual competencies, or are they good at both?

Question 17

It is argued that there is a need for 360 degree leadership effectiveness ratings as single source ratings cannot capture the multi level nature of leadership effectiveness. Explain and provide an example.

Answer 17

Ratings from different sources have the potential to reflect unique variance in leadership performance. For instance leadership behaviours such as providing coaching and career advice are likely to be observed more closely by a leader’s subordinates than by a leader’s supervisor.

Question 18

Oh & Berry (2009) set out to address the 3 key limitations identified by Judge et al (2002). What was the aim of their study?

Answer 18

Oh & Berry (2009) investigated the usefulness of the FFM in predicting leadership effectiveness (both task competence and contextual competence) assessed using a 360 degree performance rating system.

Question 19

Describe the sample that participated in Oh & Berry’s (2009) study.

Answer 19

• 277 managers from a large energy company
• all middle managers who occupied a diverse group of positions at organisational levels above front line supervisors but below the level of vice president.
• managers generally had between 40 & 100 employees below them

Question 20

In Oh & Berry’s (2009) study, what were the predictor variables and how were they operationalised?

Answer 20

• the dimensions of the FFM
• assessed with the Work Behaviour Inventory which is a 240-item self report measure.

Question 21

In Oh & Berry’s (2009) study, what were the criterion variables and how were they operationalised?

Answer 21

• task leadership & contextual leadership
• an average of 1 supervisor, 6.75 peers, & 4.69 subordinates rated each manager in terms of 17 primary competencies.
• these 17 primary competencies were aggregated to allow for the overall calculation of task competency & contextual competency

Question 22

Oh & Berry (2009) found all FFM dimensions apart from which one predicted both task performance and contextual performance?

Answer 22

Agreeableness - it only predicted contextual performance (and not task performance) when captured with the 360 degree rating system.

Question 23

In Oh & Berry’s (2009) study, what was the overall difference between supervisor alone ratings & those from the 360 degree rating system?

Answer 23

When supervisors alone are used to rate leadership effectiveness, the reliability coefficients are typically much lower than when 360 degree ratings are used.

Question 24

What explanation did Oh & Berry argue for the noted difference between supervisor alone ratings & ratings captured by the 360 degree rating system?

Answer 24

Oh & Berry (2009) argue that the jump from for example.16 supervisor rating to .32 360 degree rating for the dimension of openness is as the 360 degree rating system offers more reliable and valid measurement.

Question 25

In Oh & Berry’s (2009) study, in terms of 360 degree ratings, the multiple R value for task performance is .40. Meaning the 5 dimensions combined explain 16% of the variance seen in task performance ratings. Taking into account the reliability coefficients O = .32, C = .27, ES = .31 & E = .28 what conclusion can be derived from the reported coefficients?

Answer 25

With reliability coefficients this high on the FFM dimensions you would expect the multiple R value to be higher. Thus, there must exist some redundancy within the five factor dimensions; not all validity coefficients are explaining unique variance. Some dimensions could possibly be dropped without a reduction in the multiple R value

Question 26

Oh & Berry’s (2009) study defined leadership effectiveness in terms of both task performance and conceptual performance. Provide an example of what this operationalised approach allowed for as opposed to an overall global measure of leadership effectiveness.

Answer 26

In the case of the dimension agreeableness, this nuanced approach allowed for the realisation that agreeableness was significantly related to contextual performance but not task performance. Note that this finding was before controlling for the other personality dimensions!

Question 27

What was the outcome in Oh & Berry’s (2009) study once they controlled for the shared variance between agreeableness and the other FFM dimensions?

Answer 27

Agreeableness which correlated highly with conscientiousness, extraversion and emotional stability - was no longer related to contextual performance, but was significantly inversely related to task performance.