5 Factor Theory Of Leadership

Leadership is defined by “A leader is one or more people who selects, equips, trains, and influences one or more follower(s) who have diverse gifts, abilities, and skills and focuses the follower(s) to the organization’s mission and objectives causing the follower(s) to willingly and enthusiastically expend spiritual, emotional, and physical energy in a concerted coordinated effort to achieve the organizational mission and objectives.” (Winston, 2006). Since the beginning of time the belief has been that leadership is something you are either born with or not. The debate is about whether leadership is innate or can it be taught. Nature or innate characteristics are behaviours that we are born we have since birth. Nurture is the idea we are

Examining which of these characteristics are key to being an effective leader. (Judge, 2002) Researched into the traits of an effective leader, using leadership and personality in self- report 5- factor model. The results indicated that Extraversion was the most consistent correlation in leadership emergence and effectiveness. That Neuroticism, openness, experience and conscientiousness account for 90% of the individuals’ results. (Colbert, 2012) however believed that this did not take into account the complexity of personality. Colbert decided to research leadership and personality using both self- report and observer ratings. Using the Big Five, which examines openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness and neuroticism. Results showed that 155 participants in leaderless discussion supported their hypothesis and further more results showed that the relationship between personality and leadership had an effect on group

(Fiedler, 1964) Contingency model of leadership effectiveness examined the relationship between personality characteristics and leadership. The model has three sections, identity leadership style, Identify the situation and finally to determine the most effective leadership style. The first part of the model identified the leadership style by using the LPC or the least preferred co- worker. This is a scaled self- report measure that would ask you to identify both the situation and the effectiveness of the co-worker. Results showed that a leading relationship- orientated leaders were effective in moderately favoured situations. Task- orientated leaders were favoured in both unfavourable and favourable