Individual Attributes
Hello bloggers and welcome back to my blog.
I want to ask, does the perfect leader exist? If so, what attributes does he/she possess that makes him/her the perfect leader?
Last week we talked about the importance of leadership and different traits leaders may possess. So I have mentioned that I am currently in graduate school working on a completing Master’s degree program. I am currently taking a leadership class and this week I want to discuss the individual attributes that affects leadership abilities.
I also mentioned that for many decades now, hundreds of researchers and scholars have been trying to analyze the components of leadership. Of course there are many theories out there, but one in particular suggest that anyone can be a leader, as long as they are capable of learning from their experiences. The creators of this model call it the skills model, i.e. a capability model that explores the connection of a leader to their skills and knowledge.
An essential component of the skills model are the individual attributes that comprise a leader’s skills and abilities. The founders of this model suggest that the following attributes affect a leader’s mastery in skills and knowledge gained: general cognitive ability, crystallized cognitive ability, motivation, and personality. According to Northouse (2016), by deeply analyzing the attributes of the individual, researchers hoped to provide explanation of fundamental details of effective performance leadership, and answer questions such as, “What accounts for why some leaders are good problem solvers and others are not? What specific skills do high- performing leaders’ exhibit? How do leaders’ individual characteristics, career experiences, and environmental influences affect their job performance?”
Now let’s examine the components of the individual attributes a little bit closer.
General Cognitive Ability
This attribute does not share a connection with an individual’s experience, instead, biology is the common factor. This includes the individual’s ability of perceptual processing, information processing, general reasoning skills, creative and divergent thinking capacities, and memory skills. For this attribute, intelligence describes the leader’s acquisition of complex organizational problem- solving skills and the leader’s knowledge (Northouse, 2016).
I want to reference one of my favorite Disney movies, Pocahontas, as an example. For those of you that are not familiar with the story, Pocahontas is the daughter of a powerful leader of an Indian tribe. In the film, the English colonists attempt to conquer the Indians and take over their land while looking for gold. Pocahontas secretly befriends one of the colonist, John Smith, and they quickly develop a relationship, intrigued by one another’s worlds. After Pocahontas and John’s relationship is discovered by the tribe, one of the warriors, Kococum attempts to intervene, but is killed by one of the colonist. This then sparks war between the two societies.
Although the Indian culture is all she knows, Pocahontas has the dynamic intellect to bring the two worlds together and reach a peaceful resolution. Pocahontas demonstrated strong leadership abilities by uniting both groups and urging them to look past their differences and embrace what they have in common.
Crystallized Cognitive Ability
So over time, and as we get older, wisdom comes, or at least it is supposed to come. The crystallized cognitive ability implies that one’s intellectual ability is developed over time and is acquired through experience. It indicates that as the cognitive ability progresses, we are better able to process difficult information and learn new skills. As our learning capacities are expanded, our knowledge of problem- solving skills, conceptual ability, and social judgment skills are increased, which advances the potential for leadership. The difference between crystallized cognitive ability and general cognitive ability, is that, crystallized cognitive ability is the type of intelligence presented is steady, and does not decline as people get older.
Take Mulan for example. She is a young woman that joins the Chinese army and does not have the slightest clue of what she is doing or what it takes to defeat the Huns. As you will see, the leader of the Chinese army has to implant a sense of unity into the group, all while attempting to teach them new skills and tactics to defeat the enemy. Mulan shows great courage and eventually acquires knowledge and learns the skills necessary to survive as a Chinese soldier.
Motivation
The founders of the skills model suggest that motivation is a vital part of developing leadership skills and I have to agree. Motivation keeps you going and in the fight. They propose that the three proponents of motivation that makes it necessary to have effective leadership are willingness, dominance, and social good. One, leaders must want to lead in order to accomplish organizational problems, two, expressing dominance demonstrates their ability to influence, and three, commitment to the social good reflects the leader’s duty to enhance the overall human good (Northouse, 2016). These components taken together develops the leader’s abilities.
In the classic movie, The Lion King, another one of my favorites, Simba loses his way after the tragic death of his father, Mufasa. Simba does not want to take his rightful place as king and is convinced there is another destiny for him. After running into his childhood friend, Nala, she tries to convince him to return to Pride Rock and challenge his Uncle Scar to assume the position of king. But it isn’t until Simba meets Rafiki, the bamboo, who shows him his father and gives him the motivation to return home and end the catastrophe.
Personality
According to Northouse (2016), the skills model suggest that “any personality characteristic that helps people to cope with complex organizational situations probably is related to leader performance.” This attribute is relevant to the development of leadership skills because some personality characteristics have the potential to affect a leader’s ability to solve organizational problems or in situations of conflict, some personality characteristics are helpful to a leader’s performance (Northouse, 2016).
Let’s consider the movie, Remember the Titans. Gary’s personality affects his leadership abilities as a team captain. Motivated by racial tensions, he starts off with the intent to divide the teams, by indicating that he has his “guys” and allocates what position they will play. Gary personality characteristics does not include being a team player, being receptive to others, and he is inconsistent in his leadership performance by overlooking some members of the team. The best line in the movie is stated by Julius to Gary, “attitude reflects leadership, captain!”
At the beginning of this blog, I asked does the perfect leader exist. Based on my readings and the knowledge gained through learning about the skills model, I would say no, there is not a perfect leader. As we saw in my video references, none of them were perfect, but all demonstrated leadership abilities that supported the skills model. It is the experience, development, learning, and making mistakes to make a great leader.
Leadership in Public Administration 