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Leadership & Organization Development Journal Factors influencing followers' perception of organisational leaders Eric Chong Helene Wolf
Article information: To cite this document: Eric Chong Helene Wolf, (2010),"Factors influencing followers' perception of organisational leaders", Leadership & Organization Development Journal, Vol. 31 Iss 5 pp. 402 - 419 Permanent link to this document: http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/01437731011056434
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Factors influencing followers’ perception of organisational
leaders Eric Chong
Victoria Management School, Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington, New Zealand, and
Helene Wolf New Zealand Trade and Enterprise, Wellington, New Zealand
Abstract
Purpose – This study seeks to confirm the main factors in the followers’ perception of leaders and to explore effects of collectivist values, age and work experience on followers’ perception of leaders.
Design/methodology/approach – Confirmatory factor analysis is done for the 32-item Romance of leadership scale and an exploratory multi-level research in perceptions of 452 individuals in five cultural groups.
Findings – The study confirms the “influence” and the “interchangeability” of leaders as independent constructs in the followers’ perception of leaders. The results indicate: older followers view leadership change more negatively than younger followers; with more work experience followers view the influence of leaders diminishing; differences in perception of followers from collectivist and individualistic cultures were inconclusive.
Research limitations/implications – A large proportion of the sample used in this study were young undergraduates with little work experience and exposure to organisational leadership. A more representative spread of age and work experience in a replication of this study will mean the findings could be generalised.
Practical implications – The research suggests that inexperienced followers attribute more influence to leaders. With greater exposure at work they are likely to see limitations in their leaders’ influence. As followers age they see leadership change as more troublesome for organisational performance. This could create cognitive dissonance among followers who see leaders as having diminishing influence but at the same time being increasingly irreplaceable.
Originality/value – This paper contributes to the relatively limited amount of research on followers’ perception of leaders. This will assist in understanding the determinants of effective leadership.
Keywords Leadership, Individual perception, Cross-cultural management, Organizational performance
Paper type Research paper
Introduction Behaviourist Mary Parker Follett was perhaps the first to suggest that understanding and accommodating the needs of followers were essential for organisational performance (Follett, 1947). This was a departure from studies that had, hitherto, focused exclusively on leaders and leadership. In later years, researchers such as Pfeffer (1981) and Meindl (1990) have questioned the validity of studies that examine only one of two inextricably linked concepts. Klein and House (1995) and Conger and Kanungo (1998) have observed that empirical research on followers have been largely neglected. This observation is supported by Bjugstad (2006) who reported a search on
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
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Received June 2009 Revised October 2009 Accepted November 2009
Leadership & Organization Development Journal Vol. 31 No. 5, 2010 pp. 402-419 q Emerald Group Publishing Limited 0143-7739 DOI 10.1108/01437731011056434
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the Amazon.com book titles uncovering 95,220 titles on leadership and only 793 titles on followership. This empirical study is on followership. It seeks to confirm the factor analytical model of followers’ perception of leaders established in earlier studies and examines the variables that are likely to affect the individual’s perception and the collective perceptions of individuals from different ethnic groups.
Leaders and followers Research on followers had been included in studies that focused primarily on leadership. Miller et al. (2004) examined the effectiveness of follower behaviour as an extension of Fiedler’s (1967) contingency model of leadership. Performance was contingent on situational variables and the motivational deposition of both followers and leaders. Bjugstad (2006) integrated Kelly’s (1992) follower types with Hersey and Blanchard’s (1982) leadership styles. The degree of passive-active behaviour and a predisposition for independent-dependent/critical-uncritical thinking determined follower types. These were labelled as Alienated, Pragmatist, Passive, Conformist or Exemplary. Leadership styles were characterised along a task-relationship behavioural continuum. It was proposed that the appropriate leadership behaviour ought to vary according to the follower type.
The shift towards transformational leadership from transactional leadership theory reflected an interest in the perceptions and psychological needs of followers. Transformational leaders gained popularity largely because of their charismatic qualities (Bass, 1998; Pounder, 2003). These included projecting and sustaining a heroic image, inspiring and gaining the admiration and commitment of followers.
While there has been extensive and ongoing research into leaders’ behaviours and the development of leadership models, less has been done on followers. The research that has been done into the underlying reasons for followers’ behaviour covers three broad determinants: Followers’ traits and values, followers’ experience and followers’ perception of leaders.
Followers’ traits and values Followers were categorised according to their personality traits that supported successful leaders. “Good” followers became a part of the followership that has been described as effective (Miller et al., 2004), exemplary (Banutu-Gomez, 2004), and courageous (Chaleff, 1995). The traits associated with followership include commitment, initiative, courageous conscience, creativity and innovation, and having a sense of direction, drive and intensity. These traits appear indistinguishable from those of effective leaders. Ehrhart and Klein (2001) explained that followers gravitated towards leaders who demonstrated traits that they valued. “Value congruence” made followers and leaders comfortable with one another and facilitated establishment of common ground (Bjugstad, 2006).
If traits and values of effective followers and leaders are similar then to be truly effective, leaders must imbue the predominantly desired traits and values of their followers. They must be seen to embody the group identity or the group prototype which characterises membership through context-specific attributes (Hogg, 2001; Turner et al., 1987). Indeed it has been said that the primary purpose of leaders is to be identified with and be of situational relevance to their followers. Greenleaf (1991) proposed a moral principle which held that legitimate authority only be granted
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allegiance in response to the clearly evident servant stature of the leader. Dennis and Bocarnea (2005) extracted five servant-leader attributes from their factor analytical model. These were empowerment, love, humility, trust and vision. Agosto’s (2005) biblical study of “servanthood” qualities of Jesus Christ and St Paul included personal sacrifice, humility, risk taking and the maintenance of a clear mission that challenged the social structures of their day. The wide appeal of these espoused values is evident. However, will followers in different societies with different value systems perceive organisational leaders in the same light?
Researchers such as Adler (1986, 2002), Hofstede (1980, 2001) and Hofstede and McCrae (2004) proposed that personality traits, values and culture were connected to behavioural choices. House et al. (2004) explained the commonality and distinctiveness in behaviour across different cultures in the Global Leadership and Organisational Behaviour Effectiveness (GLOBE) study which included a separation of culture into its “etic” and “emic” qualities. The former were common in most cultures and the latter were culture-specific. Common cultural typologies include those based on values (Schwartz and Bilsky, 1990) and leadership (House et al., 2002). Culturally embedded values lie along nine dimensions: uncertainty avoidance, power distance, societal collectivism, in-group collectivism, egalitarianism, assertiveness, future orientation, performance orientation, and human orientation. The relative positions of cultures within these dimensions are thought to explain similarities and/or differences in perception and behaviour. For example, Jung et al. (2009) studied the “moderating” effects on leadership resulting from followers’ collectivist orientation. Such an orientation has relatively higher levels of value agreement between followers and leaders, and greater social integration and attribution of shared meanings among followers. It is for these reasons that the position and influence of the leader in collectivist cultures are thought to be more entrenched. We will test this proposition in the following hypotheses:
H1.1. Followers from collectivist cultures will perceive leaders as being more entrenched (or less interchangeable) in their positions when compared with the perception of followers from individualistic cultures.
H1.2. Followers from collectivist cultures will perceive leaders as having more influence when compared with the perception of followers from individualistic cultures.
Followers’ experience and age Bennis (1997) identified trust as a crucial factor in follower-leader relationships. Trust developed over time whereby the leader had to demonstrate task competency through accomplished skills, knowledge and abilities (Fairholm and Fairholm, 2000). In addition to being seen as competent, leaders must demonstrate integrity and a genuine concern for people to gain followers’ trust (Shaw, 1997). In a three-year study of 7,500 workers Froggatt (2001) found that organisations’ financial performance were significantly better when followers trusted their leaders to act in their best interest. However, the same leadership behaviours could illicit varying responses from different groups of followers.
The situational leadership theory (Hersey and Blanchard, 1982; Hersey et al., 2001) suggests that the follower’s reaction will depend on the “maturity” of the individual.
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However, the lack of an operational conceptualisation and measurement of “maturity” had hindered empirical testing of this theory (Norris and Vecchio, 1992). A limited number of studies, notably Ojode et al. (1999) and Vecchio and Boatwright (2002), used the age and educational level of followers as indicators of maturity in predicting perceptions of leadership styles. The latter study found that age was positively related with desire for a more directive leadership style. The authors concluded that this reflected a desire for less autonomy and was contrary to the expectation that more matured followers need less task-direction, and so more autonomy, from the leader. If this is true, the perceived need for more leadership involvement increases the influence and indispensability of the leader. Building on the Romance of Leadership research (Meindl, 1995; Awamleh and Gardner, 1999; Felfe, 2005; Schyns et al., 2007), we will test the age variable on the follower-perceived influence and interchangeability of leaders through the following hypotheses.
H2.1. Older followers will perceive greater influence of leaders when compared with the perception of younger followers.
H2.2. Older followers will perceive the interchangeability of leaders more negatively when compared with the perception of younger followers.
Ehrhart and Klein (2001) attributed differences in follower responses to differing interpersonal needs that varied along a relationship-task continuum. Building on this, Miller et al. (2004) studied followers’ behaviour in relation to two variables: the favourability of relationship with the leader and work experience. The results of their study indicated that experienced followers were assessed more favourably than inexperienced followers regardless of whether they had a positive or negative relationship with their leaders while inexperienced followers did better only when the relationship with their leaders was neutral. The ambivalence of the more experienced followers in their relationships with their leaders, and their more favourable assessment in spite of this, suggests that they attach less significance to the influence of their leaders when compared with inexperience followers. This hypothesis will be tested in H3.
H3. Followers with more work experience will perceive their leaders as having less influence when compared with the perception of followers with less work experience.
Followers’ perception of leaders It was Staw (1975) who first observed that followers tended to rate their leaders on the reported performance of their organisations rather than on their abilities and behaviour. Since then other researchers have observed that followers tended to attribute causality of events and occurrences to leaders even though there were no basis for it. Calder (1977) explained this behaviour as resulting from social discourse between followers regarding organisational outcomes. The focus on leadership in such discourse arose from the follower’s need to ascribe causality to humans (leaders) thereby psychologically making events subject to human control.
Charismatic leaders have mastered the use of “impression management” (Bass, 1985) to gain followers’ admiration, inspire them and gain their commitment (Conger and Kanungo, 1998) and, create and sustain a heroic image (Gardner and Avolio, 1998).
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Consequently, charismatic leaders appeared larger than life and their leadership were largely symbolic (Pfeffer, 1981). Meindl (1990) described this phenomenon as the “performance cue effect” where the leadership role in events was socially derived, accentuated and ascribed to the leader. In this respect leadership is not so much the role of the leader but the psychology of the individual follower within a sociological group.
Meindl (1995) proposed a follower-centric social constructionist approach where leadership was defined through the followers’ thought processes. Images of prototypical leaders were conjured in the minds of followers that were quite independent of empirical “realities” surrounding the leader. The result was a socially constructed relationship between leaders and followers that relied heavily on a romanticised notion of the leader. This was the basis for the Romance of Leadership which marked a significant departure from leader-centric phenomenology focusing on the leader’s personality and behaviour.
More recent research separated the analysis of individual and group processes. Lord and Brown (2001, 2004) argued that followers’ self-concepts comprised of personal identities that were derived from similarities with and differences from others. There were a multitude of self-concepts but it was the “working self-concept” that predominated at any one time and served to guide the individual follower’s perception and behaviour in a given context. Social identities were derived from group membership. As a group, followers appeared to have more favourable perceptions of leaders with traits and behaviours that measured up to their cognitive schemas of ideal leadership types (Giessner et al., 2009).
The individual-group phenomenon is explored in this multi-level study that delves into the individual follower’s perception of leaders as well as similarities and/or differences of perceptions within distinct cultural groups.
Research purpose The purpose of this research is two-fold. First, it is to confirm the factors for the 32-item Romance of leadership scale replicating studies done in the USA (Awamleh and Gardner, 1999), Germany (Felfe, 2005) and Holland (Schyns et al., 2007).
The second part of this study centres on the followers’ perception of leaders. A review of prior research indicates differences in followers’ personal values (Ehrhart and Klein, 2001; Bjugstad, 2006) and work experience, within a given relationship with the leader, (Miller et al., 2004) are likely to affect the follower’s behaviour and performance. However, behaviour and performance are end results. An intervening variable is the follower’s perception (Staw, 1975; Calder, 1977; Pfeffer, 1981; Meindl, 1990). While followers may not necessarily act on all their perceptions, their behaviours are most certainly shaped by them. Prior research had also indicated that followers’ behaviours in relation to their leaders were the result of collectivist values, age and work experience. The second exploratory part of this multi-level study examines these three variables in relation to how leaders are perceived.
At the group level, the hypotheses test whether the collectivist-individualistic values have a bearing on followers’ perception of leaders.
H1.1. Followers from collectivist cultures will perceive leaders as being more entrenched (or less interchangeable) in their positions when compared with the perception of followers from individualistic cultures.
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H1.2. Followers from collectivist cultures will perceive leaders as having more influence when compared with the perception of followers from individualistic cultures.
At the individual level the followers’ age and work experience are tested for influence and interchangeability of leaders.
H2.1. Older followers will perceive greater influence of leaders when compared with the perception of younger followers.
H2.2. Older followers will perceive the interchangeability of leaders more negatively when compared with the perception of younger followers.
H3. Followers with more work experience will perceive their leaders as having less influence when compared with the perception of followers with less work experience.
Method Sample The sample comprised 452 management students from Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. More females (59.8 per cent) were represented as well as young adults (20 years and below) forming 68.7 per cent of the sample. The part-time and fulltime working experience of the respondents varied from less than one year (47.2 per cent) to six years and more (7.6 per cent). A sample comprising of a fairly large proportion of relatively young and inexperienced respondents used in this study was not considered inappropriate as the focus was on followers and not on generally older and more experienced leaders. The demographic details are in Table I.
New Zealand is a multi-ethnic country and the sample of university students reflects this diversity. This ethnic diversity provides an opportunity to test whether different values, which form the “core of culture” (Hofstede, 2001) and inherent in ethnic groups, affect perception of leadership. When asked to indicate their ethnicity 53.9 per cent of the respondents claimed Anglo descent, 4.3 per cent hailed from Continental Europe, 12.1 per cent from Southern Asia (mainly India), 21.7 per cent from Confucian Asia (mainly China) and 8 per cent from Oceania (NZ Maori and Pacific Islanders). The classification of ethnicity along these lines follows closely the GLOBE coding system (House et al., 2004) which has all except the Oceania group (see Table II).
Procedure Hard copies of the information sheet and questionnaire were distributed in the lectures and the students were required to complete them and hand them in before leaving the lecture. Instructions on how to complete the survey forms were read from prepared scripts to ensure consistency. No other information was given on the content of the questionnaire. Equally sufficient time was given to all respondents to complete the questionnaires which were collected as they left the lecture.
The information sheet required the respondents to state their age, gender, working experience (part-time and/or fulltime) and ethnicity. Examples of ethnic descriptions were provided to avoid confusion over race, ancestry and nationality. The respondents had to state both the nationality and ethnic group they identified with.
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Measurement The romance of leadership scale (RLS) established by Meindl and Ehrlich (1988) was used in this study. The RLS has been widely used in experimental research with students and employees in the USA (Awamleh and Gardner, 1999), Germany (Felfe, 2005) and Holland (Schyns et al., 2007). It comprises of 32 items requiring responses on a seven-point Likert scale (Table III). The English version of the RLS was left unchanged from the earlier studies except for a minor amendment to item 27 to contextualise it (namely changing “President of USA” to “Prime Minister of NZ”). Out of the 32 items 15 were negatively phrased and reverse coded for data entry. This design was to prevent the tendency of respondents to agree or disagree with the items without regard of their content. Initial validation studies in the three countries resulted, in most cases, in a three-factor structure. In this study, the RLS was re-validated through factor analysis.
Demographic variables Frequency Percentage
Gender Female 262 59.8 Male 176 40.2
Age 16-20 þ 301 68.7 21-26 þ 70 24.4 27-32 þ 13 3.0 33-45 þ 17 3.9
Full-time employment Less than 1 year 321 73.3 1.00-2.99 years 66 15.1 3.00-5.99 years 20 4.6 6.00-10.99 years 16 3.7 11 years and over 15 3.4
Part-time employment Less than 1 year 92 21.0 1.00-2.99 years 149 34.0 3.00-5.99 years 161 36.8 6.00 years and over 36 8.2
Table I. Summary of demographic variables and nationality of ethnic groups
Anglo Europe Southern Asia Oceania incl.
Maori Confucian Asia
n ¼ 236 n ¼ 19 n ¼ 53 n ¼ 35 n ¼ 95 Britain New Zealand – English
Sweden Norway Spain Germany Russia
India Iran Indonesia Malaysia Philippines Thailand
New Zealand – Maori Fiji Cook Islands Samoa Tokelau Niue
China Hong Kong Singapore Korea Taiwan Vietnam
Table II.
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Items Scalea
1 When it comes right down to it, the quality of leadership is the single most important influence on the functioning of an organisation 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
2 The majority of business failures and poor organisational performances are due to factors that are beyond the control of even the best leaders
b 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
3 Most things in an organisation have very little to do with the decisions and activities of its leaders
b 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
4 Anybody who occupies the top level leadership positions in an organisation has the power to make or break the organisation 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
5 The great amount of time and energy devoted to choosing a leader is justified, because of the important influence that person is likely to have 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
6 Sooner or later, bad leadership at the top will show up in decreased organisational performance 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
7 Luck has a lot to do with whether or not business leaders are successful in making their firms profitable
b 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
8 High-versus low quality leadership has a bigger impact on a firm than a favorable versus unfavorable business environment 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
9 It is impossible for an organisation to do well unless it has high-quality leadership at the top 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
10 When faced with the same situation, even different top-level leaders would end up making the same decisionsb 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
11 Many times, it doesn’t matter who is running the show at the top, the fate of an organisational is not in the hands of its leaders
b 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
12 A company is only as good or as bad as its leaders 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 13 You might as well toss a coin when trying to choose
a leaderb 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 14 With a truly excellent leader, there is almost nothing
that an organisation can’t accomplish 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 15 Even in a bad economy, a good leader can prevent a
company from doing poorly 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 16 Top level leaders make life and death decisions
about their organisations 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 17 The connection between leadership and overall
company performance is often a weak oneb 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 18 Many times, organisational leaders are nothing more
than figureheads like the King and Queen of Englandb 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
19 It’s probably a good idea to find something out about the quality of top level leaders before investing in a firm 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
20 When a company is doing poorly, the first place one should look to is its leaders 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
(continued)
Table III. Romance of leadership
scale
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Reliability The internal consistency of the instrument as it was used in this study was good with Cronbach’s alpha (a ¼ 0.778). The reliability of Factor 1 was a ¼ 0.805 and Factor 2 was a ¼ 0.776. The reliability for Factor 3 could not be assessed as it had only two items and was dropped from the study. A bivariate correlation analysis revealed no significant (r ¼ 0.05, p ¼ 0.301) correlation between Factor 1 and 2. Therefore these two factors represented independent constructs.
Validity and factor definition The 32 items were subjected to principal component analysis revealing nine components (eigenvalues .1) which explained 55.3 per cent of the variance. Two components accounted for a significant amount of variation while the third to ninth component accounted for approximately 5 per cent of the variation. When the data was rotation a three-factor solution resulted that explained 33.2 per cent of variance (i.e.
Items Scalea
21 The process by which leaders are selected is extremely important 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
22 So what if the organisation is doing well; people who occupy the top level leadership positions rarely deserve their high salaries
b 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
23 In comparison to external forces such as the economy, government regulations, etc., a company’s leaders can have only a small impact on a firm’s performance
b 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
24 When the top leaders are good, the organisation does well; when the top leaders are bad, the organisation does poorly 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
25 There’s nothing as critical to the “bottom line” performance of a company as the quality of its top- level leaders 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
26 In many cases, candidates for a given leadership position are pretty much interchangeable with one another
b 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
27 The Prime Minister of the New Zealand can do very little to shape the course of our country
b 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
28 Leadership qualities are among the most highly prized personal traits I can think of 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
29 Leaders should not be held totally responsible for what happens to a firm’s performance
b 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
30 There are many factors influencing an organisation’s performance that simply cannot be controlled by even the best of leadersb 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
31 One leader is as good or as bad as the nextb 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 32 No expense should be spared when searching for and
selecting a leader 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Notes: a 1 ¼ Strongly agree; 2 ¼ Agree; 3 ¼ Slightly agree; 4 ¼ Neither agree nor disagree;
5 ¼ Slightly disagree; 6 ¼ Disagree; 7 ¼ Strongly disagree; b Reverse coded itemsTable III.
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Factor 1 – 15.5 per cent, Factor 2 – 11.9 per cent and Factor 3 – 5.8 per cent). The details are in Table IV.
Schyn et al. (2004) differentiated three factors in the Romance of leadership scale. The first factor was labelled as the “influence of the leader” reflecting the extent the leader could affect organisational outcomes. The second factor was defined as the “interchangeability of leaders”. This emphasised the extent leaders could be replaced by another leader without adverse organisational repercussions. These two factors are independent of one another. A leader can be seen as highly influential but easily replaced. The third factor, comprising of five items, was simply labelled as “other factors”.
The re-validation of the scale in this study revealed a similar three-factor structure. However, a difference was that the first factor which best represents the theory, was the “interchangeability of leaders”. The items under this factor were identical to those of the earlier Dutch study by Schyn et al. (2004) except for three additional items (2, 7 and 23). These additional items referred to “luck” and other circumstances outside the control of leaders that could affect organisational outcomes. All items under this factor were negatively phrased. Stronger agreement meant stronger perception that leaders could be changed without negative consequences. The second factor had 17 identical items with the first factor in the earlier study. The items under this factor reflected the extent followers believe the leader’s influence was important in determining organisational outcomes.
In the present study of NZ students (mean age ¼ 20.8 years, SD ¼ 4.5), the 13 items under the “interchangeability of leaders” and the 17 items under the “influence of a leader” were identical to those in a rotated factor solution from the sample of 364 US students (mean age ¼ 21.4 years, SD ¼ 2.5) cited in Schyns et al., 2007 p 39 (see Table IV). This serves as a further validation of the two predominant factors used for further data analysis in this study.
The third factor, comprising two items, could not be tested for reliability and was dropped. Although it was dropped its existence highlights the followers’ attribution of reasons beyond the control of leaders (item 29 – “Leaders should not be held totally responsible for what happens to a firm’s performance”, and item 30 – “There are many factors influencing an organisation’s performance that simply cannot be controlled by even the best leader”) that could account for organisational performance or non-performance.
Data analysis and results The demographic differences in ethnicity, age and full-time work experience and their relationship to interchangeability of leader factor and influence of leader factor were investigated using a multivariate analysis. The results, in Table V, show significant F values. However, the Levene’s Test did not reject the assumption of equal variances with p . 0.05.
When the results for the dependent variables were considered separately using univariate analysis none of the variables were significantly related to the influence factor. Therefore, both H1.2: Followers from collectivist cultures will perceive their leaders as having more influence when compared with the perception of followers from individualistic cultures, and H2.1: Older followers will perceive greater influence of leaders than younger followers, are not supported.
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Factors Items F1 (F2) F2 (F1) F3
1. When it comes right down to it, the quality of leadership is the single most important influence on the functioning of an organisation 20.050 (20.014) 0.409 (0.339) 0.091 4. Anybody who occupies the top level leadership positions in an organisation has the power to make or break the organisation 0.064 (20.060) 0.450 (0.265) 20.080 5. The great amount of time and energy devoted to choosing a leader is justified, because of the important influence that person is likely to have 0.293 (20.245) 0.411 (0.369) 20.219 6. Sooner or later, bad leadership at the top will show up in decreased organisational performance 0.159 (20.238) 0.323 (0.426) 20.257 8. High-versus low quality leadership has a bigger impact on a firm than a favourable versus unfavourable business environment 20.071 (0.159) 0.433 (0.315) 0.009 9. It is impossible for an organisation to do well unless it has high-quality leadership at the top 0.030 (0.158) 0.480 (0.427) 0.030 12. A company is only as good or as bad as its leaders 20.007 (0.023) 0.553 (0.442) 0.050 14. With a truly excellent leader, there is almost nothing that an organisation can’t accomplish 0.025 (0.019) 0.547 (0.384) 0.050 15. Even in a bad economy, a good leader can prevent a company from doing poorly 20.040 (0.142) 0.377 (0.392) 20.097 16. Top level leaders make life and death decisions about their organisations 0.038 (20.076) 0.512 (0.437) 20.157 19. It’s probably a good idea to find something out about the quality of top level leaders before investing in a firm 0.193 (20.319) 0.485 (0.333) 0.016 20. When a company is doing poorly, the first place one should look to is its leaders 0.018 (0.034) 0.500 (0.463) 0.041 21. The process by which leaders are selected is extremely important 0.272 (20.287) 0.524 (0.350) 20.255 24. When the top leaders are good, the organisation does well; when the top leaders are bad, the organisation does poorly 20.051 (0.193) 0.556 (0.567) 0.096 25. There is nothing as critical to the “bottom line” performance of a company as the quality of its top- level leaders 20.132 (0.185) 0.487 (0.552) 20.112 28. Leadership qualities are among the most highly prized personal traits I can think of 20.023 (20.092) 0.385 (0.250) 20.334 32. No expense should be spared when searching for and selecting a leader 20.177 (20.090) 0.422 (0.186) 0.003 2. The majority of business failures and poor organisational performance are due to factors that are beyond the control of even the best leaders 0.469 (0.390) 0.038 (0.056) 0.333 3. Most things in an organisation have very little to do with the decisions and activities of its leaders 0.671 (0.465) 0.004 (20.145) 20.170 7. Luck has a lot to do with whether or not business leaders are successful in making their firms profitable 0.526 (0.353) 20.058 (20.001) 0.068
(continued)
Table IV. Romance of leadership scale: rotated three-factor solution
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Factors Items F1 (F2) F2 (F1) F3
10. When faced with the same situation, even different top-level leaders would end up making the same decisions 0.461 (0.285) 20.262 (0.063) 20.106 11. Many times, it doesn’t matter who is running the show at the top, the fate of an organisation is not in the hands of its leaders 0.546 (0.422) 0.091 (20.088) 0.033 13. You might as well toss a coin when trying to choose a leader 0.692 (0.528) 0.043 (20.010) 20.389 17. The connection between leadership and overall company performance is often a weak one 0.678 (0.559) 0.009 (20.159) 20.119 18. Many times, organisational leaders are nothing more than figureheads like the King and Queen of England 0.574 (0.428) 0.039 (20.085) 20.036 22. So what if the organisation is doing well; people who occupy the top level leadership positions rarely deserve their high salaries 0.543 (0.501) 20.004 (0.045) 0.053 23. In comparison to external forces such as the economy, government regulations, etc, a company’s leaders can have only a small impact on a firm’s performance 0.583 (0.463) 0.021 (20.026) 0.063 26. In many cases, candidates for a given leadership position are pretty much interchangeable with one another 0.531 (0.582) 20.066 (0.040) 0.213 27. The Prime Minister of New Zealand can do very little to shape the course of our country 0.671 (0.507) 0.031 (20.020) 20.086 29. Leaders should not be held totally responsible for what happens to a firm’s performance 0.112 (20.067) 0.012 (20.053) 0.683 30. There are many factors influencing an organisation’s performance that simply cannot be controlled by even the best leader 20.184 (20.098) 0.031 (0.043) 0.787 31. One leader is as good or as bad as the next 0.734 (0.593) 0.030 (0.057) 20.107 % of variance explained for NZ study only 15.53 11.86 5.78
Notes: Italic figures are items with the highest factor loadings within the column. Figures in parentheses (F1 and F2 only) are from the study of US students cited in Schyns et al., 2007, p 39 Table IV.
Variable Wilks’ l F value Sig. of F *p , 0.05
Ethnicity 0.92 4.428 0.000 *
Age 0.96 8.438 0.000 *
Full-time work 0.98 4.503 0.012 *
Full-time work squared 0.98 3.454 0.033 *
Table V. Multivariate test of
significance: age, ethnicity and full-time
work experience in relation to
interchangeability and influence factors
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The two demographic variables which appeared significantly related to the interchangeability factor are ethnicity [F(4, 430) ¼ 7.048, p ¼ 0.000] and age [F(1, 430) ¼ 16.826, p ¼ 0.000]
There was no significant perceptual difference in the comparison of the collectivist with the individualistic groups. Therefore, H1.1: Followers from collectivist cultures will perceive leaders as being more entrenched (or less interchangeable) in their positions when compared with the perception of followers from individualistic cultures, is not supported. The result of post-hoc multiple ethnic group comparisons of the interchangeability of a leader scale revealed significant difference only between Confucian Asians (M ¼ 4.0211, SD ¼ 0.7923) and the Anglo group (M ¼ 3.2559, SD ¼ 0.9201), p ¼ 0.000.
There was a positive relationship between age and interchangeability of a leader. With an increase of ten years, participants’ mean response to the interchangeability of a leader scale increased by 0.9 times the parameter estimate. This indicates that with age followers felt that leaders cannot be interchanged without adversely affecting organisational performance. H2.2: Older followers will perceive the interchangeability of leaders more negatively when compared with the perception of younger followers, is supported.
There was a significant relationship between the influence of a leader and full-time work experience [F(4,430) ¼ 6.270, p ¼ 0.013], with the mean influence of a leader decreasing with increasing work experience [F(1,430) ¼ 6.580, p ¼ 0.011]. H3: Followers with more work experience will perceive their leaders as having less influence when compared with the perception of followers with less work experience, is supported.
Discussion The results of this study confirm the findings of previous studies (Awamleh and Gardner, 1999; Felfe, 2005; Schyns et al., 2007) that suggest influence and interchangeability of leaders are two independent and measurable constructs in the followers’ perception of leaders. These constructs explain a similar amount of the total variation across the 32 items in this study (27.4 per cent) as compared with studies done in USA, Germany and Holland (22.5-29.4 per cent). In this study the influence factor accounts for slightly less variation than the interchangeability factor, while the reverse is reported in the other studies. It is interesting to note that factor structure in the NZ sample has strongest similarity with the factor structure of the US sample with two primary factors and one weak factor associated with only two items. The reason for this could be the language of instruction was English for both US and NZ samples minimising translation issues. Additionally, both samples consisted of undergraduate students and were larger than 300 respondents, a compliance standard suggested by Tabachnick and Fidell (2001) for this type of study. These similarities would make the samples more comparable both qualitatively and quantitatively. The differences relative to the German and Dutch samples which included employee respondents suggest that, while the factor structure appears relatively invariant across contexts, contextual differences could lead to organisational performance being attributed to “other factors” not directly associated with the leader.
The analysis into the relationship between demographic variables and the interchangeability factor indicate that with age, followers have an increasing tendency to feel that the leader cannot be changed without having a negative effect on organisational performance. This supports the findings of Vecchio and Boatwright
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(2002) that indicated a desire for more leadership stability with age. The results of this study show the correlation between age and aversion to leadership change tends to be consistent across followers from different ethnic groups. A possible explanation is that, across ethnicities, as people age they become more set in their ways; being less comfortable with changes and more tolerant of the status quo. This tendency could translate into greater apprehension of a change in leadership.
The perception of interchangeability varied with ethnicity. There was a significant difference in the mean scores between Confucian Asian group and the Anglo group ( p ¼ 0.000). Participants in the Anglo group had significantly lower scores (i.e. more change tolerant) than the Confucian Asian group on the interchangeability factor. Although the study was done in New Zealand, could the collectivist values of Confucian Asian group predispose them to view leadership interchangeability less favourably? Perhaps, more significantly, 70 per cent in the Confucian Asian group were from China and Vietnam where experience with frequent political leadership change would have been less as compared with other groups. This inexperience, coupled with collectivist values developed in a more totalitarian environment, could have increased the perception of uncertainty associated with leadership change in the respondents. However, the possession of collectivist values alone does not appear to affect perceptions of interchangeability. The differences between the collectivist groups taken as a whole and those of Southern Asian and Oceania collectivist ethnicities, taken separately, were not statistically significant.
Leader interchangeability and influence are separate constructs and so it is entirely possible for an individual to experience apparently conflicting perceptions at the same time. For example, the need for continuity, reflected in the aversion to leader interchangeability, can appear with diminished leader influence (i.e. the need to retain a leader who has hardly any influence).
The findings on the relationship between work experience and influence of a leader suggest that, with more full-time work experience, a person’s view of how influential a leader is in an organisation diminishes. This is consistent with Miller et al.’s (2004) finding that performance of more experienced followers was independent of their perceived relationship with their leaders. The perception of reduced influence of leaders with increased follower work experience is observed across all ethnic groups. It appears that when inexperienced followers join organisations for the first time they tend to attribute more influence to leaders. However, it is plausible their perceptions change with greater exposure to leadership at work. The longer followers work the more likely they will see limitations in their leader’s influence. As followers increase their work experience over time they also age. With age followers see leader change as more troublesome for the organisation. The implication is that older followers who chose to remain with an organisation have to balance the need for leadership continuity with the need to be led by an influential leader. While it is possible that, with age, the need for continuity outweighs the need for influential leadership; the cognitive dissonance this creates can be frustrating for older followers where leaders appear to have diminishing influence but at the same time being increasingly irreplaceable.
Limitations and conclusion The present study used the responses of a large number of young undergraduate students who typically would not have had much work experience and exposure to
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organisational leadership. Their perceptions of organisational leadership are likely to be based on either generalizations from textbooks or a limited range of experiences in other settings. In contrast, if cultural differences in perceptions do exist, these are likely to have emerged from this sample as individuals would have faced fewer culturally homogenizing influences.
The voluntary nature of survey resulted in some ethnicities having very few respondents and an overwhelming majority of student being between 18-24 years old. It will therefore be useful for a replication of this study with more participation from different ethnicities and a more representative spread for age and work experience.
Overall it is hoped that this study has highlighted a possible connection between followers’ perception of leaders and cultural values, age and working experience. While age and work experience appear to have a direct bearing on different constructs of the follower’s perception of a leader, the connection between perception and cultural values appears inconclusive. More research is required where values derived from the work environment are considered together with ethnicity in determining the effects on follower perception.
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About the authors Eric Chong has a doctorate in business administration from Brunel University, UK, and is currently with the Victoria University of Wellington, NZ. Eric has researched and designed senior management competency models for use in assessment centres. His current research interest is on the effects of work and cultural environments in determining leadership and managerial competency requirements and assessed performance. Eric Chong is the corresponding author and can be contacted at: [email protected]
Helene Wolf has a master’s degree in management science from Victoria University of Wellington. Helene has researched the development of leadership theory and practice and is currently with New Zealand Trade and Enterprise as a market development specialist.
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