The New Psychology of Leadership The New Psychologyof LeadershipIdentity, Inuence, and PowerS. Alexander Haslam, Stephen D. Reicher,and Michael J. Platow First published 2011by Psychology Press27 Church Road, Hove, East Sussex, BN3 2FASimultaneously published in the USA and Canadaby Psychology Press270 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016Psychology Press is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group,an Informa businessCopyright 2011 Psychology PressAll rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted orreproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic,mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafterinvented, including photocopying and recording, or in anyinformation storage or retrieval system, without permission inwriting from the publishers.This publication has been produced with paper manufactured to strictenvironmental standards and with pulp derived from sustainableforests.British Library Cataloguing in Publication DataA catalogue record for this book is available from the British LibraryLibrary of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication DataHaslam, S. Alexander.The new psychology of leadership: identity, inuence, and power /S. Alexander Haslam, Stephen Reicher, and Michael Platow.p. cm.Includes bibliographical references and index.1. LeadershipPsychological aspects. 2. Identity (Psychology)I. Reicher, Stephen. II. Platow, Michael. III. Title.BF637.H4-395 20101584dc222010015929ISBN: 9781841696096 (hbk)ISBN: 9781841696102 (pbk)This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2010.To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledgescollection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.ISBN 0-203-83389-9 Master e-book ISBN ContentsList of gures ixList of tables xiForeword xiiiPreface xixAcknowledgmentsxxv1 The old psychology of leadership: Great men and thecult of personality 1Leadership in history: The great man and his charisma 2The political decline of the great man approach: The impactof the great dictators 5The standardization of leadership: Personality models and theirfailings 7The biographical approach: Looking for the roots of greatnessin personal histories 10The theoretical deciency of individualistic models 12The political deciency of individualistic models 14The faulty denition of leadership 16Conclusion: Five criteria for a useful psychology ofleadership 172 The current psychology of leadership: Issues of context andcontingency, transaction and transformation 21The importance of context and contingency 22The importance of followers 28The importance of that special something 38Conclusion: The need for a new psychology of leadership 42 3 Foundations for the new psychology of leadership:Social identity and self-categorization 45Social identity and group behavior 46Social identity and collective power 60Dening social identities 64Conclusion: Setting the agenda for a new psychologyof leadership 734 Being one of us: Leaders as in-group prototypes 77The importance of standing for the group 78Prototypicality and leadership eectiveness 82Prototypicality and leadership stereotypes 94Prototypicality and the creativity of leaders 103Conclusion: To lead us, leaders must represent us 1065 Doing it for us: Leaders as in-group champions 109The importance of fairness 111From fairness to group interest 118Clarifying the group interest 130Conclusion: To engage followers, leaders actions andvisions must promote group interests 1326 Crafting a sense of us: Leaders as entrepreneurs of identity 137The complex relationship between reality, representativeness,and leadership 138Social identities as world-making resources 143Who can mobilize us? The importance of dening categoryprototypes 147Who is mobilized? The importance of dening categoryboundaries 155What is the nature of mobilization? The importance deningcategory content 159Conclusion: Leaders are masters not slaves of identity 1627 Making us matter: Leaders as embedders of identity 165Identity as a moderator of the relationship between authorityand power 166Leaders as artists of identity 171Leaders as impresarios of identity 179vi Contents Leaders as engineers of identity 188Conclusion: Leadership and the production of power bothcenter on the hard but rewarding work of identitymanagement 1928 Identity leadership at large: Prejudice, practice, and politics 197The prejudice of leadership 198The practice of leadership 205The politics of leadership 215Notes 219References 223Glossary 245Index of leaders and leadership contexts 253Author index 257Subject index 263Contents vii List of gures2.1 A typical LPC inventory (after Fiedler, 1964) 263.1 The process of depersonalization underpinning the transitionfrom thinking about the self in terms of personal identity(as I) to thinking about the self in terms of social identity(as we) 533.2 The role of shared social identity in transforming a collectionof disparate individuals into a coherent social force 603.3 The dierence between power over and power through(after Turner, 2005) 623.4 Variation in self-categorization as a function of comparativecontext 673.5 The ongoing and dynamic relationship between social reality,prototypicality, and leadership 733.6 Prisoners and Guards in the BBC Prison Study (Reicher &Haslam, 2006b) 744.1 Sociograms from the Robbers Cave study (from Sherif, 1956) 814.2 Variation in in-group prototypicality as a function ofcomparative context (adapted from Turner & Haslam, 2001) 864.3 English football fans at the 2004 European FootballChampionships in Portugal (Stott et al., 2007) 934.4 Perceived leader fairness as a function of (a) that leadersin-group prototypicality and (b) perceivers social identication(data from van Dijke & de Cremer, 2008) 1005.1 The group engagement model (after Tyler & Blader, 2000) 1165.2 Support for a hospital CEO as a function of his allocation ofdialysis machine time and the identity of patients (data fromPlatow et al., 1997, Experiment 3) 122 5.3 Perceived charisma as a function of organizationalperformance and leader behavior (data from Haslamet al., 2001) 1255.4 Ideas generated by followers in response to a leadersvision for the future as a function of that leaders priorbehavior (data from Haslam & Platow, 2001) 1306.1 The importance of leaders dress as a dimension ofidentity entrepreneurship 1406.2 Leaders whose lives came to dene group identity 1527.1 Leaders who paid a high price for failing to understandthe basis of their authority 1687.2 The building containing Raclawice Panorama 1827.3 The struggle for leadership in the BBC Prison Study(Reicher & Haslam, 2006b) 1908.1 The 3 Rs of identity leadership 2058.2 The leader trap. A social identity model of the rise and fall ofthe great leader 214x List of gures List of tables1.1 Correlations between personality variables and leadership(data from Mann, 1959) 91.2 A representative sample of the sources of leadership secretsand their number (from Peters & Haslam, 2008) 112.1 Contextual variation in optimal leader style as predicted byLeast Preferred Co-worker (LPC) theory (adapted fromFiedler, 1964) 272.2 French and Ravens taxonomy of power and the observedcapacity to use dierent forms of power on others (basedon Kahn et al., 1964) 343.1 Observers perceptions of leadership-related processes in theBBC Prison Study (data from Haslam & Reicher, 2007a) 744.1 Group performance and group maintenance as a functionof the process of leader selection (data from Haslamet al., 1998) 80 ForewordThe social identity approach toleadership and why it mattersIn June 1954, two groups of a dozen 11-year-old boys alighted from separatebuses in isolated Robbers Cave State Park in Oklahoma. For the next threeweeks these young men would participate in what later became known as theRobbers Cave experiment. For the rst week they would live in separation indierent parts of the park, as the two groups separately bonded. In this week,one group would kill a rattlesnake and would proudly name themselves theRattlers.TheothergroupwouldnamethemselvestheEagles.Inthenextweek,thegroupswerebroughttogethertoplaycompetitivegames.Atthispoint all hell broke loose as the Eagles and the Rattlers competed and foughtwith each other. Then, in the studys nal week, the researchers set coopera-tivetasksfortheboys.Thisinvolvedthemworkingtowardssharedgoalsrather than conicting ones. This repaired the damage of the previous weekand the boys went home on the same bus, with Eagles and Rattlers in somecases even riding together as friends.Someyearslater,HenriTajfel,aUniversityofBristolprofessorofsocialpsychology, wondered what would be the minimal intervention that could getboysofapproximatelythisagetodividethemselvesintoseparategroupsliketheboysfromOklahoma.Inthisandinmanysubsequentexperimentswith dierent co-authors, he found that even the most minimal interventionswouldcausein-groupfavoritismandout-groupdiscrimination.Inthemostfamous of these experiments, the subjects were divided into a Klee group anda Kandinsky group, supposedly on the basis of their liking for paintings bythesetwoabstractartists.Althoughinfactthedivisionwasrandom,theKleessubsequentlypreferredtheirfellowKleesanddiscriminatedagainstthoseawfulKandinskys,whiletheKandinskyssymmetricallypreferredfel-low Kandinskys and discriminated against those awful Klees.These experiments with schoolboys would hardly seem to be the origins fora serious book on the psychology of leadership, that most adult of subjects,traditionally concerned with the behavior of CEOs, generals, and presidents.ButthebehavioroftheschoolboysinOklahomaandBristolbroughtintoquestionassumptionsthatunderpinnedhugeareasofpsychology,andalsohugeareasofeconomics.Theboysbehavioralsopointstothetheoreticalunderpinning for The New Psychology of Leadership. Why? Because in these experiments the schoolboys demonstrated that their motivation was dierentfromthestandardmotivationdescribedineconomicsandalsofromthestandard behavior examined in psychology. More specically, in the contextof the experiments, the boys showed that they made a distinction between weand they. The we of the Rattlers, the they of the Eagles, or vice versa. The weof the Klees, the they of the Kandinskys, or vice versa.Ofcourse,tomakesuchdistinctionsisabasichumanpropensity.TheexperimentersshouldnothavebeensurprisedthatthisoccurredinOkla-homa, nor that it occurred in Bristol. It is seen in kids games of ball, wherefriendsdividethemselvesintogroups,oftenchosenwithsomerandomness,andinmoreseriousghtswhichcanariseregardlessofwhetherornottheothergroupisplayingfair.Muchmoreseriously,suchwetheydistinctionsare seen in wars, where patriotic young men, and now women, put their livesontheline,toprotectusagainstthem.Atthesametime,inothercontexts,individuals seek to establish a distinct identity for their in-group through actsofkindnessandgenerositytowardsout-groups.However,ineverycasetheimportance of us is paramount.The division of we and they is therefore one of the most important featuresof human psychology. It is no coincidence that it should lie at the heart of thepsychologyofleadership,becauseunderstandingandengagingwithsuchdistinctions is basic to what leadership is all about.Leadership has been perhaps one of the most written-about topics in all ofhistory. As Haslam, Reicher, and Platow indicate, we can nd discussions ofthetopicgoingasfarbackasPlato.Butitisamajorthemeofyetolderliteratureaswell,sincemuchofTheOdysseyandTheIliad,theVedas,andtheOldTestamentconcernwhatleadersdidandtheoutcomesoftheirdecisionsandactions,forgoodorill.Inmoderntimes,moreprosaically,leadershipbooks,andbiographiesofleaders,takeprimeshelfspaceinair-portbookstores.Togivejustoneexample,JohnC.Maxwell,aconsultantwho has made a list of the 21 indispensible qualities of a leader, claims tohave sold more than 13 million copies of his many books.But, as Haslam, Reicher, and Platow point out, there is something missingin the previous works on leadership. For when, like Maxwell, people considerapersonasapotentialleader,theytypicallyconsiderthetraitsorqualitiesoftheindividualinquestion.Haslam,Reicher,andPlatowshowushowthe psychology of leadership has been largely concerned with such individualattributes.Butwhatevertruththeremaybetothisapproach,itignorestheothersideoftheequation:itignoresthemotivationofthosewhoaretofollow.Itfailstorecognizethatthemajorroleoftheleaderistogetthosefollowerstoidentifythemselveswithawewhosegoalsarealignedwiththoseoftheleader.That,forthemostpartiswhatleadershipisallabout:itisabouttheinteractionbetweenthemotivationandactionsofthefollowersandtheleaderandthatmotivationismediatedbyhowthosefollowersthinkofthemselves,and,correspondingly,howtheydenetheir goals.xiv Foreword I do not know of a literature in economics that explicitly claims to be aboutleadership,buteconomicshandlingofthetheoryoforganizationstellsuswhatsuchatheoryofleadershipwouldbe.Traditionaleconomicsmakesadierent error from that of failing to consider the motivation of the followers.It considers their motivation, but too narrowly. The standard economics oforganizations derives from the so-called principal-agent model, where thereis a manager, who is called the principal, and there is a worker, who is calledtheagent.Thisagentmustdecidewhethertofollowtheleader,andtowhat extent. In standard economics the agent only cares about his or her ownself-interest.Agentsdonotcareatallaboutdoingwhattheleaderwouldwantthemtodo,oraboutfulllingthegoalsoftheorganization,orevenaboutdoingwellinthejobtowhichtheyhavebeenassigned.Atypicalrst-yearproblemforeconomicsgraduatestudentsisthustoderivethemonetary incentives that the principal should give to the agent in the interestof the organization.Therearetworeasonswhythisdescriptionoftherelationbetweentheprincipalandtheagentisbadeconomicsandalsoabaddescriptionoftherole of the leader. First, there is a yet more advanced literature in economicsthat shows that there are many ways in which the agent will game the system,rather than do what is in the principals interest; and, empirically, economistshaveveriedthatpeopleareverysmartatgamingthoseincentives.(Thisshouldbenosurprisetodogowners;dogsarealsosmartinrespondingto incentives.) Thus organizations that rely only on their members personalself-interestandtheprovisionofmonetaryincentivesarelikelytooperatevery badly.But there is also a much more fundamental problem with this economics:ithasleftoutthelessonsofRobbersCaveandoftheminimalgroupexperiments.Ithasoverlookedthefactthatagentsmayalsoformawe,andthatidenticationwillbeassociatedwithgoalsthatalignorconictwith the goals of the organization. Insofar as the agents identify themselveswith a we whose goals accord with those of their organization, that organi-zationwillmakethebestofitsenvironment.Butinsofarastheagentsidentifywithawewhosegoalsarecountertothoseoftheirorganization,the organization will fall short of its potential; I think, in most cases, disas-trously so.Leadershipisthusonlypartiallyaboutindividualpersonalitytraits(theelementarypsychologyapproachalthoughthesetraitsmaybeofsomeimportance). Leadership is also only partially about setting the right incen-tives(theelementaryeconomicsapproachalthoughtheseincentivesarealsoofsomeimportance).ThisiswhereHaslam,Reicher,andPlatowandtheirNewPsychologyofLeadershipcomein.Theysaysomethingnewand fundamental about leadership. It is not just about what leaders say anddo; it is about what they say and do in the context of their followers willing-nesstoidentifyasawe,whoaccordinglyacceptorrejectwhattheleaderwants them to do.Foreword xv There is also a very special role for a leader in this process. When followersidentify with a we, they almost invariably take on a notion of what we shouldor should not do. It is natural for followers, or potential followers, to denethis notion of what they should or should not do in personal terms. For them,theleaderservesastherolemodelsomeonewhosetsthestandards,whois the ideal, who is the focus of attention and the topic of gossip. Sometimes,the leader is even the protagonist in the creation myth of the group of we, asinthestoriestoldinmostrmsabouttheirfounding.Thiscanbeseenindocuments as disparate as the placemat menus of restaurants such as LegalSeafoodorHartsTurkeyFarm,afamilyrestaurantinMeredith,NewHampshire.Itisalsoseenintheannualreportsofthegreatcorporations,such as Goldman Sachs, IBM, and Microsoft.People take stock in their groups leader; the leaders actions symbolize forthem what they should or should not do. The leader is the archetypal one ofus. In some cases leaders are so great that we cannot even aspire to be likethem, but nevertheless their actions still indicate what we are supposed to do.Togivebutoneexample,considerJesusChrist,whomanyconsidertheworlds greatest leader to date. For his followers, we are the Christians and ourgoal is to be like Him.As Haslam, Reicher, and Platow set it out, a simple but profound theoryunderlies their New Psychology of Leadership. And that theory seems so veryrightthatitmaycomeasasurprisethatthisisnotalreadytheconceptofleadershipeverywherefrompsychologyandeconomicstextbookstotheairport bookstores. But it is new because it runs counter to the major trendsinbotheconomicsandpsychology.Inthecaseofeconomicsitexpandsmotivation to take into account our identication as a we, and the associatednotion of how we should behave. That is new to economics.Inpsychology,socialidentitytheory,astheschoolofthoughtfollowingTajfel is called, is outside of the mainstream. A prominent psychologist onceexplained to me why. He said that the goal of the mainstream of psychologyis to deduce how people think. As expressed by Nisbett and Ross, people areamateur scientists, who have models of how the world operates. The role ofthe psychologist is to deduce what those cognitive processes are, and how theydierfromthethinkingofrealscientists.Butthisviewofpsychologyrulesoutthepossibilitythatpeoplemayhaveexactlytherightmodelofhowtheworldworks,butwanttodothingsthatarepeculiartotheirgroup.Because it explores the nature of the wes that people ascribe to, and the wayinwhichthesegroupmembershipsaecthowtheywanttobehave,socialidentitytheorizingthustakesaverydierentperspectivefrommainstreampsychology.But it is precisely because The New Psychology of Leadership begins withsuchanovelperspectivethatitcangiveussuchanoriginalview.Thiscap-turesthetruestructureofwhatleadershipisallabout.Accordingly,onalmost every page of the text that follows there is a new subtlety about whatleadership means and about how it works. It takes a subject older than Platoxvi Foreword and as current as Barack Obama in a new and correct way. I am very muchhonored to have been asked to write the Foreword to this book. I hope thatyou, the reader, will appreciate it as much as I do.George A. AkerlofBerkeley, CaliforniaDecember 24, 2009Foreword xvii PrefaceTheleaderswhoworkmosteectively,itseemstome,neversayI.AndthatsnotbecausetheyhavetrainedthemselvesnottosayI.TheydontthinkI.Theythinkteam.Theyunderstandtheirjobtobetomaketheteam function. . . . There is an identication (very often quite unconsciously)with the task and with the group.(Drucker, 1992, p. 14)The title of this book, The New Psychology of Leadership, raises three ques-tions. What do we mean by leadership? What do we mean by the psychologyofleadership?Andwhatisnewaboutourapproachtothepsychologyofleadership?Itisbesttobeclearaboutthesemattersbeforewestartonthebody of the book.What is leadership?Leadership,forus,isnotsimplyaboutgettingpeopletodothings.Itisabout getting them to want to do things. Leadership, then, is about shapingbeliefs,desires,andpriorities.Itisaboutachievinginuence,notsecuringcompliance. Leadership therefore needs to be distinguished from such thingsasmanagement,decision-making,andauthority.Theseareallimportantandtheyareallimplicatedintheleadershipprocess.But,fromourdeni-tion,goodleadershipisnotdeterminedbycompetentmanagement,skilleddecision-making,oracceptedauthorityinandofthemselves.Thekeyrea-son for this is that these things do not necessarily involve winning the heartsandmindsofothersorharnessingtheirenergiesandpassions.Leadershipalways does.Even more, leadership is not about brute force, raw power, or incentiviza-tion. Indeed we suggest that such things are indicators and consequences ofthefailureofleadership.True,theycanbeusedtoaectthebehaviorofothers.Ifyouthreatendirepunishmentfordisobedienceandtheninstructotherstomarchotowardsaparticulardestination,theywillprobablydoso.Equally,ifyouoerthemgreatinducementsforobedience,theywill probably do the same. But in either of these cases it is most unlikely that theywill be truly inuenced in the sense that they come to see the mission as theirown.Ifanything,theoppositewillbetrue.Thatis,theyarelikelytorejecttheimposedmissionpreciselybecausetheyseeitasexternallyimposed.So, take away the stickor the carrotand people are liable to stop march-ing,oreventomarchointheoppositedirectioninordertoasserttheirindependence.Notonlydoyouhavetoexpendconsiderableresourcesinorder to secure compliance, but, over time, you have to devote ever-increasingresources in order to maintain that compliance.In contrast, if one can inspire people to want to travel in a given direction,then they will continue to act even in the absence of the leader. If one is seenas articulating what people want to do, then each act of persuasion increasesthecredibilityoftheleaderandmakesfuturepersuasionbothmorelikelyandeasiertoachieve.Inotherwords,insteadofbeingself-depleting,trueleadership is self-regenerating. And it is this remarkablealmost alchemicquality that makes the topic of leadership so fascinating and so important.What is the psychology of leadership?If leadership centers on the process of inuenceif, in the words of RobertCialdini, it is about getting things done through others (2001, p. 72)then,in order to understand it, we need to focus on the mental states and processesthat lead people to listen to leaders, to heed what they have to say, and to takeon the vision of the leader as their own. It is important to stress, however, thatouremphasisdoesnotreectareductionistbeliefthatleadershipisanentirelypsychologicalphenomenonthatcanbeexplainedbypsychologyalone. On the contrary, our approach is situated within a tradition that arguesthattheoperationofpsychologicalprocessesalwaysdependsuponsocialcontext (Israel & Tajfel, 1972). This means, on the one hand, that psycholo-gists must always pay attention to the nature of society. On the other, it meansthatpsychologyhelpsidentifywhichfeaturesofsocietywillimpactmoststronglyonwhatpeoplethinkordo.Putslightlydierently,whatgoodpsychologydoesistotelluswhattolookforinoursocialworld.Itmostdenitely does not provide a pretext for ignoring the world and looking onlyinside the head.In the case of leadership, there are a range of social and contextual factorsthatimpactuponaleaderscapacitytoinuenceothers.Mostimportantlyperhaps, these include (a) the culture of the group that is being led, as well asthat of the broader society within which that group is located, (b) the natureoftheinstitutionswithinwhichleadershiptakesplace(e.g.,whether,touseAristotlestaxonomy,thoseinstitutionsaredemocracies,aristocracies,ormonarchies),and(c)thegenderofleadersthemselves.Allofthesefactorsareimportantintheirownright.Atvariouspointsintheanalysis,wewillalsodemonstratehowtheyimpingeontheinuenceprocess.Nevertheless,ourprimaryfocusremainsondevelopingacomprehensiveaccountofthexx Preface inuenceprocessitself.Inthiswayweprovideaframeworkfromwhichitispossibletounderstandtheimpactnotonlyofculture,institutions,andgender, but of social and contextual factors in general.Overall, then, we look at how leadership operates in the world becausetherealityofleadershipisthatitisverymuchoftheworld.Indeed,notonlyisitacriticalpartoftheworldasweknowit,butitisalsoaprimarymeans by which our world is changed. The key reason for this is that leader-shipmotivatespeopletoputtheirshoulderstothewheelofprogressandworktogethertowardsacommongoal.Aspsychologists,ourfocusispre-ciselytounderstandthenatureofthementalgluethatbindsleadersand followers together in this eort. What commits them to each other andto their shared task? What drives them to push together in a particular direc-tion? And what encourages them to keep on pushing?What is new in the new psychology of leadership?To refer to a new psychology of leadership is to imply a contrast with anoldpsychology.Soletusstartwiththat.InChapters1and2,weshowhow,traditionally,leadershipresearchhasanalyzedrelevantphenomenaatan individual level. Most obviously, considerable eort has been devoted tothe task of discovering the personal traits and qualities that mark out greatleaders.Andevenwhereresearchhasacknowledgedthatleadershipisnotabout leaders alone, the emphasis has remained very much on the character-isticsoftheindividualleaderandthewaysinwhichthesemapontothedemandsofthesituation,theneedsoffollowers,orsomeotherleadershipimperative.Inshort,inallthiswork,leadershipistreatedverymuchasanI thing.We, by contrast, start from a position that speaks to the points raised byPeter Drucker in the quotation at the start of this Preface. For us, the psych-ology of eective leadership is never about I. It is not about identifying orextollingthespecialstuthatsetssomeapartfromothersandprojectsthemintopositionsofpowerandinuence.Forus,eectiveleadershipisalways about how leaders and followers come to see each other as part of acommonteamorgroupasmembersofthesamein-group.Itthereforehaslittletodowiththeindividualityoftheleaderandeverythingtodowith whether they are seen as part of the team, as a team player, as able andwillingtoadvanceteamgoals.Leadership,inshort,isverymuchawething.Thispoint,ofcourse,isnotnewinitself.Afterall,wehavejustcitedDrucker making the same point some 20 years ago. Yet it is one thing to makeassertions about what constitutes good leadership. It is quite another to pro-vide a sound conceptual and empirical basis to back up these assertions andto help theorists and practitioners choose between them. If leadership reallyisawething(andwebelieveitis)thenweneedtounderstandwhatthismeans, where it comes from, and how it works.Preface xxi Our answers to these questions all center on issues of social identity. Thatis,theyallfocusonthedegreetowhichpartiestotheleadershipprocessdene themselves in terms of a shared group membership and hence engagewitheachotherasrepresentativesofacommonin-group.Itispreciselybecausethesepartiesstopthinkingintermsofwhatdividesthemasindi-viduals and focus instead on what unites them as group members that there isa basis both for leaders to lead and for followers to follow. And it is this thatgives their energies a particular sense of direction and purpose.However, here again it is not entirely novel to use social identity principlesasthebasisforapsychologyofleadership.IntheAcknowledgments,wenoteoursubstantialdebttoJohnTurnerwhoseworkongroupinuenceprovidestheconceptualbasisforasocialidentitymodelofleadership.Aswell as ourselves, a number of other researchersnotably Mike Hogg, Daanvan Knippenberg, and Naomi Ellemershave made these links explicit andprovided empirical support for the idea that eective leadership is groundedinsharedsocialidentity.However,whatwedointhisbookwhatisnewaboutourpsychologyofleadershipisthatweprovideadetailed,system-atic, and elaborated account of the various ways in which the eectiveness ofleadersistiedtosocialidentityandwegroundthisaccountinacarefulconsideration of relevant empirical evidence.As the titles of chapters 4 to 7 suggest, the structure of our argument canbe summarized in terms of the following four principles:First, we argue that leaders must be seen as one of us. That is, they havetobeperceivedbyfollowersasrepresentingthepositionthatbestdis-tinguishesourin-groupfromotherout-groups.Statedmoreformally,wesuggest that, in order to be eective, a leader needs to be seen as an in-groupprototype.Second, we argue that leaders must be seen to do it for us. Their actionsmust advance the interests of the in-group. It is fatal for leaders to be seen tobe feathering their own nests or, even worse, the nests of out-groups. For it isonlywhereleadersareseentopromotetheinterestsofthein-groupthatpotentialfollowersprovewillingtothrowtheirenergiesintothetaskofturning the leaders vision into reality.Third, we argue that leaders must craft a sense of us. What this means isthattheydontsimplyworkwithintheconstraintsofthepre-existingiden-titiesthatarehandeddowntothembyothers.Rather,theyareactivelyinvolvedinshapingthesharedunderstandingofwhoweare.Muchoftheirsuccessliesinbeingabletorepresentthemselvesintermsthatmatchthemembersunderstandingoftheirin-group.Itliesinrepresentingtheirprojectsandproposalsasreectingthenorms,values,andprioritiesofthegroup. Good leaders need to be skilled entrepreneurs of identity.Fourth, we argue that leaders must make us matter. The point of leader-ship is not simply to express what the group thinks. It is to take the ideas andvalues and priorities of the group and embed them in reality. What counts assuccess,then,willdependonhowthegroupbelievesthatrealityshouldbexxii Preface constituted. But however its goals are dened, an eective leader will help thegroup realize those goals and thereby help create a world in which the groupsvalues are lived out and in which its potential is fullled.Inthebooksnalchapter,wedrawthesevariousprinciplestogethertoaddress a number of over-riding issues for the practice and theory of leader-ship. Most importantly perhaps, we clarify what a leader actually needs to doin order to be successful. Some readersparticularly practitioners and thoseatthemoreappliedendoftheleadershipeldmightaskwhywetakesolong to get to what might be seen as the heart of the matter. Our response isthat we feel that it is critical to provide a secure foundation before we set outto tell people what to do. We want to persuade the reader of the credibilityandcoherenceofanidentityleadershipapproachbeforewesetoutwhatidentity leadership means in practice.We believe that this is all the more important given the huge challenges oursocietiescurrentlyface.Asaresultofarangeofglobaldevelopmentsinmilitarytechnology,inreligiousextremism,inpoliticalconict,inenviron-mentaldegradation(tonamejustfour)thedierencebetweengoodandbadleadershipcanreasonablybesaidtoconstituteallthedierenceintheworld. We need leaders who not only have the right goals but who can alsomobilize humanity to support them. And we cannot advise leaders lightly onahunchorawhim.Weneedacasethatisbuiltlessonopinionandmoreon well-substantiated scientic argument.The need for a new psychology of leadership has never been more pressing.Preface xxiii AcknowledgmentsIt would have been impossible to produce this book without the contributionsofalargenumberofcolleaguesandcollaborators.Inarangeofcapacities,their input has been indispensable: as research partners, as editorial advisors,andascriticalcommentators.Inanearlierdraftweattemptedtoidentifythem all individually. Yet despite the fact that the list was very long (and keptgetting longer), important people were always left out. Nevertheless, severalkey collaborators stand out as having played a major role in the developmentofthisbook.NickHopkinshasbeenaco-authoronalltheresearchthatexamines processes of identity entrepreneurship; Naomi Ellemers has workedclosely with us on work into issues of motivation and power; and Daan vanKnippenberg has been a key partner on studies that examine the dynamics ofprototypicality. As well as this, the ideas we explore have been steadily honedthroughongoingcollaborationswithInmaAdarves-Yorno,JohnDrury,RachaelEggins,JonathanGosling,JolandaJetten,AndrewLivingstone,AnneOBrien,KimPeters,TomPostmes,KateReynolds,MichelleRyan,Stefanie Sonnenberg, Russell Spears, Cliord Stott, Michael Wenzel . . . andmany others.Yet from any list of collaborators that we might draw up, one person standsoutaboveallothers:JohnTurner.Heisthepersonwhooriginallyhadtheideaforthebook,thetheoristwhogeneratedmanyofitsmostimportantideas,andthementorwhohasbeenourever-presentpartnerthroughout.Intellectually and practically, then, he has been central to the books journeyfrom formative idea to material reality. Indeed, he is our co-author in all butname.OfallthemanyvirtuesthatJohnandourothercollaboratorshavedis-played, possibly the single most important has been patience. For this bookhas been a very long time coming. It is seven years since we were rst issued acontract by the publisher, and in that time the manuscript has been throughmultiplephasesofproductionandseveralmajorrevisions.Wewouldnothavehadtheconvictiontoundertakethese,northewilltoseetheprojectthroughtocompletion,withouttheverygeneroussupportandencourage-mentthatwehavereceivedalongtheway.Thishascomefromcolleaguesbothinsideandoutsideourowninstitutions,fromtheeditorialteamat Psychology Press, and also from our friends and families. We would also liketo thank the Economic and Social Research Council, the Australian ResearchCouncil,andtheCanadianInstituteforAdvancedResearchforfundingarangeofprojectsoverthisperiodthatallcontributedtotheproductionofthis book.For all of this assistance we are extremely grateful. However, Cath, Jannat,and Diana have been our most stalwart supporters, and it is to them that weowe our greatest debt of gratitude. Thank you.Alex, Steve, and MichaelNovember 2009xxvi Acknowledgments 1 The old psychologyof leadershipGreat men and the cultof personalityEective leadership involves inuencing others so that they are motivated tocontribute to the achievement of group goals. This process lies at the heart ofhuman progress. Scarcely any advance that civilization has made would havebeen possible without itwhether in arenas of politics and religion, scienceand technology, art and literature, sport and adventure, or industry and busi-ness. For good or for ill, leaders are widely recognized as the proper focus forour attempts to understand the tides and shape of history. As a result, fromanearlyage,wearetoldwonderfulstoriesabouttherolethatgreatleadershave played in making history and initiating the changes that have created theworld as we know it.This focus fuels widespread fascination with the lives of leaders, and moreparticularly with their individual psychology. How were they brought up? Whatkeyeventsshapedtheirintellectualandsocialdevelopment?Whataretheirdening psychological characteristics and traits? What makes them so special?Toanswersuchquestions,avastindustryhasgrownupinwhichallmanner of people have found voice: not only psychologists, but managementtheorists,historians,politiciansandpoliticalscientists,theologians,philos-ophers, journalists, and a range of social commentators. Their contributionsincludescienticanalyses,scholarlybiographies,andpopularaccountsofleaderslives.Thenatureofthesecontributionsisvariedandfar-reaching,andagreatmanyarebothveryinsightfulandhighlyreadable.Acommontheme in these various treatments, however, is that, almost without exception,they endorse an individualistic understanding of leadership that sees this as aprocessthatisgroundedinthenatureofindividualleaders.Inthisway,leadershipisseentoarisefromadistinctivepsychologythatsetsthemindsandlivesofgreatleadersapartfromthoseofothersassuperior,special,dierent.Thisbookdoesnotseektodiminishthecontributionthatgreatleadershave made to the shaping of society, nor does it seek to downplay the import-ance of their psychology. What it does do, however, is question and provideanalternativetothisindividualisticconsensus.Indeed,ratherthanseeingleadership as something that derives from leaders psychological uniqueness,wearguetheveryopposite:thateectiveleadershipisgroundedinleaders capacitytoembodyandpromoteapsychologythattheysharewithothers.Stated most baldly, we argue for a new psychology that sees leadership as theproduct of an individuals we-ness rather than of his or her I-ness.As we will see, this perspective forces us to see leadership not as a processthatrevolvesaroundindividualsactingandthinkinginisolation,butasagroup process in which leaders and followers are joined togetherand perceivethemselves to be joined togetherin shared endeavor. It also follows from thispointthatinordertounderstandleadershipproperly,ourgazeneedstoextend beyond leaders alone; in particular, it needs to consider the followerswith whom they forge a psychological connection and whose eort is requiredin order to do the work that drives history forward.We need this broad gaze because the proof of leadership is not the emer-gence of a big new idea or the development of a vision for sweeping change.Rather,itisthecapacitytoconvinceotherstocontributetoprocessesthatturn ideas and visions into reality and that help to bring about change. Forthisreason,leadershipisalwayspredicatedonfollowership,andthepsych-ology of these two processes is inextricably intertwined. Critically too, we willsee that followers can only be moved to respond enthusiastically to a leadersinstruction when they see the leader as someone whose psychology is alignedwiththeirswhenheorsheisunderstoodtobeoneofusratherthansomeone who is out for themselves or one of them.We readily recognize, however, that persuading readers of the merits of thisnew appreciation of leadership is no easy task. Not least, this is because theold psychology of leadership is deeply ingrained both in psychological theor-izing and in popular consciousness. Its intellectual shackles are both tight andheavy.1 Accordingly, we need to start our journey by inspecting those shacklesand then loosening ourselves from their grasp.Leadership in history: The great man and his charismaIfthereisonemodelofleadershipthatexempliestheindividualisticcon-sensus that we have identied as lying at the heart of the old psychology ofleadershipitisthatofthegreatman.This,indeed,isoneofthecorner-stones of traditional academic and popular understandings of leadership. Itisthemodelwewererstintroducedtoinchildhoodbooksaboutmonu-mentalguressuchasAlexandertheGreat,JuliusCaesar,andAbrahamLincoln. It is the model that is found in those history texts that recount thefeats,andextolthevirtues,ofextraordinarygureswhoseemaraceapartfromtherestofus.Itisthemodelthatinformsthebiographiesofleadingbusinessmenthatlinetheshelvesofairportbookstallsandthatinviteustofollowintheirfootstepstosuccess,inuence,andtremendouspersonalwealth. It makes for wonderful reading, but as a window onto the causes ofgreat leaders success it is deeply awed. Not least, this is because by deningits subject matter in a manner that precludes interest in great women, theapproach displays its partiality from the outset.2 The New Psychology of Leadership OneoftheearliestformalstatementsofthegreatmanmodelisfoundinPlatosRepublic(380nc/1993),atextthattakestheformofadialoguebetweenthemaster,Socrates,andhisstudent,Adeimantus.Socratesstartsbyassertingthatonlyarareclassofphilosopher-ruleristtoleadtheuneducated and brutish majority and that, without such people, democracyitself is in peril:Socrates: Lookatitinthecontextofwhatweweresayingearlier.Weagreed that a philosopher has a quickness of learning, a goodmemory, courage, and a broadness of vision.Adeimantus: Yes.Socrates: Fromhisearliestyears,then,helloutclassotherchildrenateverything, especially if he is as gifted physically as he is men-tally, wont he?Adeimantus: Of course.Socrates: So when he grows up, his friends and fellow citizens will wantto make use of him for their own aairs?Adeimantus: Naturally. . . .Socrates: That leaves us with only a tiny number of people, Adeimantus.(Socrates, 380 nc/1993, pp. 217218)Although only embryonic, Platos analysis set the scene for the greater bodyof subsequent leadership research that has gone on to focus attention on thepsychology of the individual and to argue that it is the leaders distinctive andexceptional qualities that mark him (or, less commonly, her) out as qualiednot only for responsibility and high oce, but also for universal admirationand respect.Inessencetoo,workofthisformprovidesastraightforwardresponsetothe perennial question of whether great leaders are born or made. It answersborn. It suggests that leaders are individuals who are superior to others byvirtue of their possession of innate intellectual and social characteristics. Inshort,leadersaresimplypeoplewhoaremadeoftherightstuandthisstu is seen to be in short supply. Writing over a century before Plato, the pre-Socratic philosopher Heraclitus expressed this point very bluntly: The manyare worthless, good men are few. One man is ten thousand if he is the best(500 nc; cited in Harter, 2008, p. 69).Movingforwardover2,000years,similarviewswerearticulatedinaninuentialseriesoflecturesonHeroesandHeroWorshipdeliveredbyThomasCarlyleinMay1840.Intherstoftheselectures,TheHeroasDivinity, Carlyle declared that Universal history, the history of what manhasaccomplishedinthisworld,isatbottomtheHistoryoftheGreatMenwho have worked here. He went on We cannot look, however imperfectly,upon a great man, without gaining something by him. He is the living light-fountain, which it is good and pleasant to be near. The light which enlightens,which has enlightened the darkness of the world (Carlyle, 1840, p. 3). Again,The old psychology of leadership 3 then, we are encouraged to regard the stu of leadership not as the stu ofordinary mortals but as the stu of gods.Exactly what this stu is has been a topic of intense debate for most of the2,500 years that separate the world of Heraclitus from ours today. Commonly,though, it is conceptualized in terms of distinctive traits that are believed tomake those who possess them inherently more adept at directing, managing,andinspiringtheremainderofthepopulationwhorequiretheirdirection,management, and inspiration.Dierentanalysesplaceanemphasisontheimportanceofdierenttraits. For Socrates the dening characteristics of a great leader were quick-ness of learning, good memory, courage, and broadness of vision, as well asphysicalpresenceandprowess.Distilledintocontemporarypsychologicalthinking,theseideasaretypicallyrelatedtomentalqualitiessuchasdecisiveness,insight,imagination,intelligence,andcharisma.Ofthese,itisthelastcharismathathasreceivedthemostintensescrutiny.Inmanyways, this is because the idea of charisma captures particularly well the senseofsomethingspecialsurroundinggreatleadersandourrelationshipwiththem.Reviewing the development of thinking about charisma, Charles Lindholm(1990) charts a lineage that progresses from John Stewart Mills (18591869/1975)notionofthegeniuswhosepleasuresareofahigherorderthantheanimalisticgraticationsofthemajority,throughFriedrichNietzsches(1885/1961) bermensch (or superman) who is impervious to both pleasureandpain,toGustaveLeBons(1895/1947)notionofthehypnoticcrowdleader.However,itwasintheseminalwritingsofMaxWeber(1921/1946,1922/1947)thattheconceptofcharismawasrstintroducedexplicitlyandexplored in depth.AsAntonioMarturanoandPaulArsenault(2008)pointout,intheori-ginal Greek the word charisma ( ) has multiple meaningsincludingthe power to perform miracles, the ability to make prophecies, and the cap-acity to inuence others. Generally, though, the term is taken to refer to theideaofaleadersspecialgift.Yetratherthanseeingthissimplyasagiftthatleaderspossess,Webersuseofthetermalsoreferredtocharismaassomethingthatisconferredonleadersbythoseinthecommunitythattheylead. As he put it:The term charisma will be applied to a certain quality of an individualpersonalitybywhichheissetapartfromordinarymenandtreatedasendowed with superhuman, or at least specically exceptional powers orqualities. These are such as are not accessible to the ordinary person, butare regarded as of divine origin or as exemplary, and on the basis of themtheindividualistreatedasaleader.. . .Itisveryoftenthoughtofasresting on magical powers. How the quality in question would ultimatelybejudgedfromanyethical,aesthetic,orothersuchpointofviewisentirelyindierentforpurposesofdenition.Whatisaloneimportant4 The New Psychology of Leadership ishowtheindividualisregardedbythosesubjectedtocharismaticauthority, by his followers or disciples.(Weber, 1922/1947, p. 359)Unfortunately, the nuanced meaning that Weber gave the term has tended toget lost in more recent academic writing as well as in lay usage. In part this isbecauseWeberswritingsoncharismawerethemselvesinconsistent:some-times treating it as an attribution to leaders and sometimes as an attribute ofleaders(Iordachi,2004;Loewenstein,1966).Inlinewiththelatterreading,contemporary references to charisma tend to regard it as characteristic of theperson rather than something that is endowed by others. That is, leaders areseentobeeectivebecausetheyhavethecharisma(orthecharismaticper-sonality) that allows them to articulate a vision for a given group of followersand to generate enthusiasm for that vision.Lendingsomecredibilitytotheunderlyingconstructhere,studiesndreasonable agreement between raters in assigning leaders to charismatic andnon-charismatic categories. For example, Richard Donley and David Winter(1970)foundhighlevelsofagreementamonghistorianswhentheyaskedthem to judge the greatness of US presidents. Nevertheless, the fact that apersons charismatic status can dramatically increase (or decrease) after theirdeath is highly problematic for arguments that its source lies within the indi-vidual alone. Part of the problem here is that the precise nature of charismaalso proves incredibly dicult to pin down. In many ways this is unsurprising,as Weber himself saw charisma as something that was distinguished preciselyby being impossible to denelying specically outside the realm of every-day routine and being foreign to all rules (1922/1947, p. 361).Notwithstandingitsundoubtedutilityasatheoreticalconstruct,thesedenitionalandempiricaldicultiesposeseriousproblemsforempiricalscientistsparticularlythosewhowanttotreattheconstructasapropertyrather than as a perception. For without knowing exactly what it is they arelookingfor,itishardtodevelopameaningfulplatformforpredictionandexplanation.The political decline of the great man approach: The impactof the great dictatorsTheissueofdenitionaside,Webersanalysisledtohisemergenceasaseminal gure in the modern study of leadership. In this regard, he was verymuch a rationalist, believing that the future of leadership (and society) lay intheinexorableadvanceofinstrumentalrationality(Zweckrationalitt)andinstitutionalroutine.This,however,wasafuturethatWeberviewedwithsome concern, writing that The routinized economic cosmos . . . has been astructure to which the absence of love is attached from the very root. . . . Notsummers bloom lies ahead of us . . . but rather a polar night of icy darknessand hardness (cited in Lindholm, 1990, p. 27).The old psychology of leadership 5 AsWebersawit,onlycharismaticprophetscouldsavesocietyfromthisform of soul-destroying bureaucratic leadership. In the 1920s and 1930s thiswasaviewthatresonatedwithmanyordinaryGermanswhohopedforthe appearance of a charismatic Bismarck-like saviour who might take themfrom economic gloom and social breakdown into sunnier terrain (see Frankel,2005). Such views are illustrated by the following comments of a Nazi high-school teacher as he reected on the failure of the Weimar Republic:Ireachedtheconclusionthatnoparty,butasinglemancouldsaveGermany. This opinion was shared by others, for when the cornerstoneofamonumentwaslaidinmyhometown,thefollowinglineswereinscribedonit:Descendantswhoreadthesewords,knowyethatweeagerlyawaitthecomingofthemanwhosestronghandmayrestoreorder.(Abel, 1938/1986, p. 151)Ofcourse,eventssurroundingWorldWarIIprovedWeberrightaboutthepolarnight,buttheyalsoshowedhimtobespectacularlywrongabouttherolethatcharismaticleaderswouldplayinhistoricalprogress.Farfromsavingthemassesfromdarkness,charismaticdictatorswereresponsibleonlyfordeepeningthegloom.Farfromsavingnationsandpeoples,theydestroyed them.A core problem with Webers analysis was that it counterposed the will ofthe leader to that of the rest of the population. According to his view, leadersneed agency because masses lack it and hence heroic leadership was requiredinordertosavethemassesfromthemselves(forextendeddiscussionsseeReicher, Haslam, & Hopkins, 2005; Reicher & Hopkins, 2003). It is clear toothatthedictatorsthemselvessawthemassesasamaterialtobeused(andabused)intheserviceoftheleaderratherthanviceversa.BothHitlerandMussoliniarticulatedthisthroughastrikinglysimilarconceptionoftheleaderasanartist.AninsightintothisemergesfromaninterviewthattheGerman journalist Emil Ludwig conducted with Mussolini in 1932. In this,Mussolini described how:When I feel the masses in my hands, since they believe in me, or when Imingle with them, and they almost crush me, then I feel like one with themasses. However, there is at the same time a little aversion, much as thepoetfeelstowardsthematerialsheworkswith.Doesntthesculptorsometimesbreakthemarbleoutofrage,becauseitdoesnotpreciselymold in his hands according to his vision? . . . Everything depends uponthat, to dominate the masses as an artist.(cited in Falasca-Zamponi, 2000, p. 21)Inasimilarvein,Hitlerdescribedhimselfasanartistwhocreatedhistorythrough his domination and subjugation of the masses. And in this respect,6 The New Psychology of Leadership hismostaccomplishedartisticworkwasthemyththatheandGoebbelscreatedaroundhisownleadership(Kershaw,2001,p.4).AsthehistorianAndrewRobertsobserves:Hitleracquiredcharismathroughhisownunceasingeortstocreateacultofhisownpersonality.[He]deliberatelynurturedthisstatusasinfalliblesupermanuntilmillionsprovedwillingtoaccepthimathisownoutrageouslyinatedestimation(2003,p.51).InSusanSontagswords,neverbeforewastherelationofmastersandslavesso consciously aestheticized (cited in Spotts, 2002, p. 54).Asaresultofhavingwitnesseditsdestructivepotentialrst-hand,intheperiod after World War II, attraction to strong leaders was viewed with pro-found skepticism, if not horror. Here the charismatic leadership that Weberhad considered a solution for social problems came to be seen as an extremeand dangerous form of dysfunctionality. Charisma was a curse not a cure. Toprove this point, a plethora of studies now diagnosed leaders who had culti-vated mass followings as suering from a wide variety of clinical disordersincludingpsychoticism(Bion,1961),paranoiddelusion(Halperin,1983),narcissisticpersonality(Kershaw,2000;Kohut,1985),andborderlineper-sonality disorder (Lindholm, 1990; Waite, 1977). The same shift also createdpressurestodemocratizethestudyofleadership.Thisinvolvedmovingbeyondafascinationwithaveryfewexceptionalsupermenandtakingleadership into the realm of everyday psychology.The standardization of leadership: Personality models andtheir failingsAsthescienticstatureofpsychologyadvancedoverthecourseofthelastcentury, one of its main developments was the science of personality testing.Indeed, for many, this activity became both a sign of psychologys scienticmaturityandatoolbywhichmeansitsscienticaspirationscouldbeadvanced (e.g., Eysenck, 1967, 1980). Moreover, in contrast to the elitism thathadbeencharacteristicofthepreoccupationwithgreatmen,theriseofpersonalitypsychologyisanexampleofthedemocratizationofthediscip-line.Itwasofandforthemajority,notsimplythechosenfew.Indeed,notonly could personality tests be administered to large numbers of people, butmasstestingwasalsodemandedtoensurethereliabilityandvalidityofthewide variety of tests, measures, batteries, and psychometric instruments thattheindustryofpersonalitytestingspawned.Accordingly,whereaspreviousattemptstodivinethecharacterofindividualshadrequireddetailedbio-graphicalresearching,nowitcouldbeascertainedthroughtheadministra-tion of standardized tests. And where previously analysts had focused on theselect few, now they could survey the broad multitude.Oneeldinwhichthisformoftestingreallycaughtholdwasthatoforganizationalpsychology,andhereonedomaininwhichresearcherswereparticularlyinterestedwasleadership.Thelogicofthisenterprisewasundeniable;ifitwerepossibletousesuchtestingtoidentifyfromalargeThe old psychology of leadership 7 sampleofpeoplethosefewwhomightbesuitedanddestinedforhighoce,thenthiswouldbeaninvaluableaidtoorganizations(andoneforwhichtheywouldpayhandsomely).Notonlycoulditinformprocessesof recruitment and selection, but so too it might guide decisions about train-ing and promotionallowing employers to ensure that the large amounts oftimeandmoneyinvestedintheseareasfellonfertileratherthanstonyground.For this reason, in the two decades following World War II, work on lead-ershipwasdominatedbyahunttoidentifythosetreasuredmeasuresofpersonality that might help organizations identify leaders of the future. SomeindicationofthescaleofthisenterpriseemergesfromaninuentialreviewconductedbyRalphStogdill(1948)thatappearedintheJournalofPsych-ology. This considered some 124 studies that together examined the predictivevalueofsome27attributesfromintelligenceanduencyofspeechtosocialskillsandbio-socialactivity(e.g.,playingsport).Onthebasisofthisanalysis,Stogdillconcludedthatvefactorsappearedtohavesomeroletoplayintheemergenceofleadership:(1)capacity(e.g.,intelligence,alertness);(2)achievement(e.g.,scholarship,knowledge);(3)responsibility(e.g.,dependability,initiative);(4)participation(e.g.,activity,sociability);and (5) status (e.g., socio-economic status, popularity).However, while some minimal level of these various dimensions appeared tobehelpful,theircapacitytopredictleadershipvarieddramaticallyacrossdierent studies. This point was reinforced a decade later in another extensivereviewconductedbyRichardMann(1959).Surveyingallthestudiescon-ductedbetween1900and1957,Mannsanalysislookedattherelationshipbetween leadership and over 500 dierent personality measures as divergentasoralsadism,theF-scale[ameasureofauthoritarianism],adventurouscyclothymia[bipolardisorder],hypochondriasis,andtotalnumberofvistaresponses[responsestoRorschachtestsbelievedtosignifydepression](1959, p. 244).Toprovidesomestructuretohisanalysis,Mannorganizedthesestudiesinto seven meaningful clusters of measures. These corresponded to the maindimensionsonwhichpersonalityresearchhadfocused.AswithStogdillsearlier survey, Manns primary observation was that the relationship betweenleadershipandthesedierentpersonalityvariableswashighlyvariablebutgenerally low. Indeed, from the ndings summarized in Table 1.1 we can seethattheaveragestrengthofthestatisticalassociationsbetweenleadershipandeachofthesevenmainpersonalitydimensionswasonlyeverweakatbest.Thusinthecaseofeventheverybestpredictor(intelligence),thistypically predicted only 5% of the variance in leadershipleaving a massive95% unaccounted for.As well as being generally poor predictors of leadership, it was apparent toboth Stogdill and Mann that the meaning of many of the qualities in whichtheywereinterestedvariedasafunctionofthecontextinwhichtheyweredisplayed.Whatcountsasaleadershipqualitydependsonthecontextin8 The New Psychology of Leadership whichleadershipisrequired.Thismeans,forexample,thatapoliticiansintelligence,adjustment,andsensitivitywillappeardierenttotheintelli-gence,adjustment,andsensitivityofasoldier.Dierentcontextsthuscallfor dierent forms of the same quality.A related problem was that with most personality variables it was not thecase that the more a person had of a given attribute, the better he or she wasasaleader.Apersoncanhavetoomuchofaseeminglygoodthing.Inthe case of intelligence, Stogdill therefore observed that the leader is likely tobemoreintelligent,butnottoomuchmoreintelligentthanthegrouptobeled(1948,p.44;originalemphasis).Thisledhimtoconcludethattheve personality factors he identied (or any of the individual attributes thatcomprised them) were likely to be of little use without some knowledge of asixthfactor:thesocialsituationinwhichtheleaderisfound.Thiswasbecause:A person does not become a leader by virtue of the possession of somecombinationoftraits,butthepatternofpersonalcharacteristicsmustbear some relevant relationship to the characteristics, activities and goalsof the followers. Thus leadership must be conceived in terms of the inter-action of variables which are in constant change and ux.(Stogdill, 1948, p. 64)Stogdill did not specify what he meant by some relevant relationship, butclearlythisconclusionwasverymuchatoddswiththepremisesoftheTable1.1 Correlationsbetweenpersonalityvariablesandleadership(datafromMann, 1959)PersonalitydimensionNo. oftestsDirection ofassociationaMedian absolutecorrelationb (r)Varianceexplainedc (r2)Strength ofassociationdIntelligence 196 positive .25 5% weakAdjustment 164 positive .15 2.3% weakExtroversion 119 positive .15 2.3% weakSensitivity 101 positive (