Qualities of Leadership

Although psychologists have tried to isolate characteristics that make individuals good leaders, one characteristic is undeniably essential: extraversion. Leadership cannot occur in a vacuum. The leader must interact effectively within a group. An extraverted individual is more likely to be a leader than an introverted individual. Researchers have found evidence that certain people are predisposed to assume leadership roles based on their personality traits.

Among any group of unacquainted persons that is given a particular task to perform, a leader must generally emerge before the group can perform effectively. The leader may be task-oriented or socially oriented. The task-oriented leader focuses on the function that the group must perform. The socially-oriented leader places more focus on the feelings and emotions of the group. Regardless of the focus of the leader, this individual tends to talk more than other group members, to initiate conversation more frequently, and to assume a physical demonstration of leadership, e.g., sitting at the head of the table or standing while others are sitting.

Extraversion is one of the five major traits consistently identified in psychological personality tests. Besides extraversion, the other major traits are agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism, and openness (Costa & McCrae, 1992, McCrae & John, 1993). The extraverted individual is outgoing and talkative. This personality type tends to be adept in the use of

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turn out to be totally introverted when confronted with an authority figure. Thus behavior is often a function of situations, not traits. Nevertheless, extraversion does give some indication of the potential for leadership because it is presumably easier for an extraverted person to assume the characteristics of an introverted person than vice versa. To assume leadership a person must be able to communicate with facility. This trait is difficult to acquire for the person who is not accustomed to it. Without the power of verbal persuasion, a leader cannot motivate his or her group to perform specific functions. Conger (1989) gives the example of the chief executive of a bank, who went on a personal tour of his corporation's 250 retail branches for the purpose of mobilizing the branch managers. The executive spent almost all his time talking to people, explaining his vision of transforming the organization. The field visit was successful. The branch managers' motivation was improved and an attitude change was created. This transformation would have been impossible had this leader not exhibited the highly extraverted traits of initiative, communication ability, conceptualization, and promotion of ideas. Leadership of

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