Leadership: Mobilizing People
Lecture 11 is important while studying! > overview of all the highlights that have been discussed
Lecture 1: The essence of leadership, the trade approach
What is leadership? Ability of individual to influence, motivate and enable others to
contribute towards effectiveness and success of organizations. Influence to change thinking,
motivate is to change behavior and enable is providing people with resources to get them to
do what you want. Many leaders focus on influencing but the three go hand in hand
Difference between leaders and managers: manager is more about bureaucracy (concerned
with staffing, budgeting and keeping order), leaders go beyond this by motivation and
determining a strategic direction and vision and helping people get there.
Goal of leaders is to motivate people to get to goals relevant for the organization. These
goals can be different (see slides)
Van de slides: framework for leadership research
Influence of individual characteristics on behaviors and of behaviors on effectiveness is under
the influence of the leadership situation.
The trait approach: are leaders born or formed?
A trait is a stable characteristic of a person (certain consistency in action or behavior). This
can be psychological (personality) or physical. On the slide: different views of different
people on the important traits needed for leadership. Two traits stand out: personality and
intelligence.
Physical traits: height seems to be important for leaders. Correlation coefficient between
height and leadership emergence of .24 is a medium effect.
The more asymmetrical your face is, the more likely you are to develop leadership behaviors
that you need to be a good leader, meaning that you are more likely to become a more
successful leader. Asymmetry doesn’t fit in the beauty standards, meaning you will
compensate in behavior for this. By compensating, you will achieve these qualities faster.
Psychological traits: intelligence = reflection of a set of skills. If you are intelligent, it is easy
for you to learn and pick up things. Intelligence is measured in IQ in intelligence tests.
Relations between different sorts of intelligence and quality of leadership seem to be less big
than is commonly assumed (these are medium effects). However, there is a bigger
correlation between apparent intelligence and leader emergence. This means that it’s more
important to seem intelligent to people than to actually be intelligent.
The big five personality traits are traits that are relevant to predict a persons thought,
feelings and actions: OCEAN (openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness and
neuroticism)
Openness: how willing are you to try new things? This is about being interested in different
things. This has the most strong relationship with creativity: people who are open to new
things, are creative.
Conscientiousness: people who have high conscience have a high work ethic and are willing
to work hard to achieve their goals. This trait is most related to work performance; people
who work hard, perform good in their job.
, Extraversion: people who are extravert are very social and outgoing and more often feel
positive emotions (this makes them friendly and social). Downside: you also voice your
opinions when they are half-formed of not too tactical to share.
Agreeableness: people who are always willing to help and avoid confrontations with others.
It is hard for them to say no to things. Main goal of these people is to maintain social
harmony.
Neuroticism: neurotic people worry a lot, have a lot of negative emotions (opposite to
extraverts) and easily lose their temper (lose self-control easily). Negative emotions do make
you more analytical and make you focus more.
Van de slides: correlations between personality traits and leader emergent and
effectiveness
Conscientiousness is important to become a leader, but less important of being an effective
leader. Explanation: being conscious helps you to work your way up in a company (they may
be promoted at first) but this doesn’t necessarily means that these people are the most
effective leaders
Looking at the correlations, you can conclude that personality is more important to predict
good leadership than intelligence
Emotional intelligence = ability to generate emotions, understand emotions and regulate
your own emotions. This has to do with self-awareness, self-management, social awareness
and relationship management. EI is measured by self-report question set, which isn’t the best
way to measure. EI measured in the same way as intelligence, show limited impact.
Lecture 2: The dark side of leadership
Two aspects of leadership: leader emergence (what is needed to become a leader) and
leader effectiveness (what is needed to be a good leader once you are one). Different traits
are needed to emerge or to be a good leader
Narcissism = personality disorder where someone is manipulative and has a lack of empathy,
low self-esteem, where ego is pumped to compensate
o Sub-narcissism is narcissism where you don’t need therapy but you have some traits
of a narcissist
Question: does power corrupt?
Behavior is caused by personality traits in combination with the situation. There can’t be
behavior caused by one of these two, it is always a combination. Behavior = trait x situation
Article: Power reduces the press of the situation, imlications for creativity, conformity and
dissonance. Power is always related to controll, it means you can influence others. People
with power are less influenced by salient information, which means that the intrapsychic
processes have more impact than the situation in determining the attitude as power reduces
the press of the situation. This means you will be more creative and are more vulnerable to
cognitive dissonance
If you feel in control, you feel more free to creatively express yourself. Your less constraint by
social norms. Cognitive dissonance = attitude and behavior do not match, which often leads
to an uncomfortable feeling. Getting rid of this feeling can be done by quitting the behavior,
or changing your attitude
People in power have more choices. When they are asked to take another attitude, they feel
like they have enough options to have a certain attitude (no pressure of social norms), so it is
easier to change this. This means that people in power have more cognitive dissonance.
Article: Does power corrupt or enable? When and why power facilitates self-interested
behavior. Power can corrupt but there is a moderation and mediation effect. Whether power
, corrupts or not, depends of moral identity. Moral identity moderates relation between
power and moral awareness
Moral identity = self-conception organized around a set of moral traits
Moral awareness = recognizing that a situation contains moral content and can be
considered from a moral point of view
People with high moral identities, have more moral concepts in their mind. When they
experience power, they will be more aware of moral implications
Conclusion: power corrupts when people have a low moral identity
How can you reform your thoughts (brainwash)? (Lifton)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=24&v=B2WQpRageBE&feature=emb_logo
1. Milieu control: having control over all information that people have action to. E.g.:
forbidden books in cults.
2. Mystical manipulation (planned spontaneity): all operations that happen in the
background to make the leader look special. Seems spontaneous but it is all planned.
When you believe this, you will believe anything a leader says
3. Demand for purity: world is divided in good and evil (ones in the group and ones outside
the group). You will need to confirm to the standards of the group
Lecture 11 is important while studying! > overview of all the highlights that have been discussed
Lecture 1: The essence of leadership, the trade approach
What is leadership? Ability of individual to influence, motivate and enable others to
contribute towards effectiveness and success of organizations. Influence to change thinking,
motivate is to change behavior and enable is providing people with resources to get them to
do what you want. Many leaders focus on influencing but the three go hand in hand
Difference between leaders and managers: manager is more about bureaucracy (concerned
with staffing, budgeting and keeping order), leaders go beyond this by motivation and
determining a strategic direction and vision and helping people get there.
Goal of leaders is to motivate people to get to goals relevant for the organization. These
goals can be different (see slides)
Van de slides: framework for leadership research
Influence of individual characteristics on behaviors and of behaviors on effectiveness is under
the influence of the leadership situation.
The trait approach: are leaders born or formed?
A trait is a stable characteristic of a person (certain consistency in action or behavior). This
can be psychological (personality) or physical. On the slide: different views of different
people on the important traits needed for leadership. Two traits stand out: personality and
intelligence.
Physical traits: height seems to be important for leaders. Correlation coefficient between
height and leadership emergence of .24 is a medium effect.
The more asymmetrical your face is, the more likely you are to develop leadership behaviors
that you need to be a good leader, meaning that you are more likely to become a more
successful leader. Asymmetry doesn’t fit in the beauty standards, meaning you will
compensate in behavior for this. By compensating, you will achieve these qualities faster.
Psychological traits: intelligence = reflection of a set of skills. If you are intelligent, it is easy
for you to learn and pick up things. Intelligence is measured in IQ in intelligence tests.
Relations between different sorts of intelligence and quality of leadership seem to be less big
than is commonly assumed (these are medium effects). However, there is a bigger
correlation between apparent intelligence and leader emergence. This means that it’s more
important to seem intelligent to people than to actually be intelligent.
The big five personality traits are traits that are relevant to predict a persons thought,
feelings and actions: OCEAN (openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness and
neuroticism)
Openness: how willing are you to try new things? This is about being interested in different
things. This has the most strong relationship with creativity: people who are open to new
things, are creative.
Conscientiousness: people who have high conscience have a high work ethic and are willing
to work hard to achieve their goals. This trait is most related to work performance; people
who work hard, perform good in their job.
, Extraversion: people who are extravert are very social and outgoing and more often feel
positive emotions (this makes them friendly and social). Downside: you also voice your
opinions when they are half-formed of not too tactical to share.
Agreeableness: people who are always willing to help and avoid confrontations with others.
It is hard for them to say no to things. Main goal of these people is to maintain social
harmony.
Neuroticism: neurotic people worry a lot, have a lot of negative emotions (opposite to
extraverts) and easily lose their temper (lose self-control easily). Negative emotions do make
you more analytical and make you focus more.
Van de slides: correlations between personality traits and leader emergent and
effectiveness
Conscientiousness is important to become a leader, but less important of being an effective
leader. Explanation: being conscious helps you to work your way up in a company (they may
be promoted at first) but this doesn’t necessarily means that these people are the most
effective leaders
Looking at the correlations, you can conclude that personality is more important to predict
good leadership than intelligence
Emotional intelligence = ability to generate emotions, understand emotions and regulate
your own emotions. This has to do with self-awareness, self-management, social awareness
and relationship management. EI is measured by self-report question set, which isn’t the best
way to measure. EI measured in the same way as intelligence, show limited impact.
Lecture 2: The dark side of leadership
Two aspects of leadership: leader emergence (what is needed to become a leader) and
leader effectiveness (what is needed to be a good leader once you are one). Different traits
are needed to emerge or to be a good leader
Narcissism = personality disorder where someone is manipulative and has a lack of empathy,
low self-esteem, where ego is pumped to compensate
o Sub-narcissism is narcissism where you don’t need therapy but you have some traits
of a narcissist
Question: does power corrupt?
Behavior is caused by personality traits in combination with the situation. There can’t be
behavior caused by one of these two, it is always a combination. Behavior = trait x situation
Article: Power reduces the press of the situation, imlications for creativity, conformity and
dissonance. Power is always related to controll, it means you can influence others. People
with power are less influenced by salient information, which means that the intrapsychic
processes have more impact than the situation in determining the attitude as power reduces
the press of the situation. This means you will be more creative and are more vulnerable to
cognitive dissonance
If you feel in control, you feel more free to creatively express yourself. Your less constraint by
social norms. Cognitive dissonance = attitude and behavior do not match, which often leads
to an uncomfortable feeling. Getting rid of this feeling can be done by quitting the behavior,
or changing your attitude
People in power have more choices. When they are asked to take another attitude, they feel
like they have enough options to have a certain attitude (no pressure of social norms), so it is
easier to change this. This means that people in power have more cognitive dissonance.
Article: Does power corrupt or enable? When and why power facilitates self-interested
behavior. Power can corrupt but there is a moderation and mediation effect. Whether power
, corrupts or not, depends of moral identity. Moral identity moderates relation between
power and moral awareness
Moral identity = self-conception organized around a set of moral traits
Moral awareness = recognizing that a situation contains moral content and can be
considered from a moral point of view
People with high moral identities, have more moral concepts in their mind. When they
experience power, they will be more aware of moral implications
Conclusion: power corrupts when people have a low moral identity
How can you reform your thoughts (brainwash)? (Lifton)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=24&v=B2WQpRageBE&feature=emb_logo
1. Milieu control: having control over all information that people have action to. E.g.:
forbidden books in cults.
2. Mystical manipulation (planned spontaneity): all operations that happen in the
background to make the leader look special. Seems spontaneous but it is all planned.
When you believe this, you will believe anything a leader says
3. Demand for purity: world is divided in good and evil (ones in the group and ones outside
the group). You will need to confirm to the standards of the group
