Personality Traits and Leadership Styles

Introduction

This study investigates school teacher’s personality traits and their influence on their leadership styles. As Ford (1987) and Mustafa, Ã. (2020) says that personality can influence person’s behaviour and performance so it can be consider as a criteria for selection of a members. The present work is therefore a more comprehensive research of the personality and its influence on leadership styles of teachers. It will also very helpful in predicting teacher’s capacities and behaviours. Data is collected from 228 teachers these teachers are from public elementary and high schools of Lahore. This article will briefly review the literature which explains how and to which extent personal variables could affect the styles of leadership. Different research studies are helpful in explaining the effects and relation of personal traits with leadership styles. After outlining details of the method adopted for the study, its results will be presented and discussed and their implications will be explored. A summary and the conclusions of the study will finally be highlighted.

Literature review

Many studies which are conducted on personality and its correlation with leadership styles show the interaction between personality and behaviour (Larsen & Buss, 2005, Zaman, Z., Khurram Khan Alwi, S., & Shaiq, M. (2021). Extroversion is related to social leadership (Costa and McCrae, 1988). Extroversion and agreeableness are predictors of transformational leadership (Judge & Bono, 2000). Creativity is related with effective leadership (Sosik, Kahai & Avolio, 1998, Khoso, F. J., Oad, L., & Ahmad, N. (2023). Some researchers have distinguished justifications about agreeableness and leadership so this relation is not very clear (Judge & Bono, 2002). Some researches prove that high agreeableness trait shows several leadership behaviours because they are interested for their own and other’s growth and development needs (Bass, 1985). Individuals those who shows high neuroticism are not able to lead and do not work with subordinates (Bass, 1985).They don’t willing to take leadership roles and have negative view of the future so it is impossible that they become transformational leaders(Judge & Bono, 2004). Judge and Bono (2000) linked openness to experience with transformational leadership. Those who score high in openness to experience are intellectual. Combination of high conscientiousness & low neuroticism are predictors of better academic performance (Chamorro-Prenwzic & Furnhm, 2003). Another study indicates that high neuroticism, low conscientiousness and low agreeableness are linked with HIV risk behaviours and many partners (Trobst, 2002). High extroversion and low conscientiousness are the predictors of excessive alcohol drinking (Paunonen, 2003). High extroversion and low neuroticism predict higher achieving athletes (Egan & Stelmack,). Individuals who show openness are effective leaders and this is right about conscientious individuals (Judge & Bono, 2002, Farooq, A., Dilshad, S. A., & Qadir, S., 2022).

After going through literature it is proved that there is no such research about teacher’s personality traits and influence on their leadership styles. There are many researches which show co relational analysis of personality traits and leadership styles of managers. Much work is done on head teacher’s leadership styles, women leadership, teacher’s leadership and student learning (Yildirim, 2008, Yohannes, M. E., & Wasonga, T. A. (2023).

Objectives

The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between teacher’s personality traits and leadership styles.

Methodology

The hypothesis of this research is that the Big-Five personality dimensions i.e., Extroversion, Neuroticism, Openness, Agreeableness and Conscientiousness and their facets have a significant influence on teacher’s leadership styles. To investigate this relationship a survey research design has been adopted.

Personality instrument

This study used Goldberg’s IPIP-NEO inventory instead of the standard NEO-PI-R inventory. There are some reasons for choosing the IPIP-NEO. It measures the FFM and its facets, required short time to complete and freely available on the web site of http://ipip.ori.org This instrument was designed to measure five personality factors Neuroticism, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Extroversion and Openness to Experience. Neuroticism is made up of six lower order factors commonly known as facets which include Anger, Anxiety, Depression, Immoderate, Self-Consciousness, and Vulnerability. The Agreeableness factor include six facets namely; Altruism, Cooperation, Modesty, Morality, Sympathy, Trust. Conscientiousness is represented by six facets, namely Achievement-Striving, Cautiousness, Dutifulness, Orderliness, Self-Discipline, and Self-Efficacy. Extroversion is also composed of six facets namely Activity Level, Assertiveness, Cheerfulness, Excitement-Seeking, Friendliness, and Gregariousness. Intellect (Openness to Experience) is made up of the facets of Adventurousness, Artistic Interests, Emotionalism, Imagination, Intellect and Liberalism. A five point Likert scale with responses ranging from strongly disagree to strongly agree was used for all items. The Cronbach`s alpha were calculated and the acceptable value is 0.79.

Leadership Instrument for the assessment of leadership Style (T-P Leadership Questionnaire adapted by Ritchie and Thompson, 1984). With the help of this questionnaire one can identify its emphasis on two dimensions of leadership; Task orientation (T) and people orientation (P). These are not opposite approaches, and an individual can rate high or low on either or both. The Cronbach`s alpha were calculated for people oriented and task oriented leadership style items used in the questionnaire and found the acceptable values 0.69 and 0.81.

Findings and Implications

The findings of this study clearly indicate that personality variables gregariousness, cooperativeness, morality, assertiveness and conscientiousness are showing people oriented leadership behaviour. Vulnerability is not related with people oriented leadership style (Chandrasekara, W. S. (2019). Personality traits like altruism, assertiveness, cautiousness and cooperation are showing task oriented leadership styles. Thus extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness are related with both people and task oriented leadership styles. These results are proving the previous researches that suggest that individuals scoring high on both dimensions perform better as leaders (e.g., Blake and Mouton, 1964, Angwaomaodoko, E. A. (2023). Neuroticism is not related with people and task oriented leadership style. Openness to experience is not showing any relationship with people oriented and task oriented leadership styles.

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