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What We Know About Leadership
What We Know About Leadership
Although psychologistsknow a great deal about leader- identify with the welfare of our social unit-perhaps be-
ship,personswho make decisionsaboutreal leadersseem causeindividual survival sometimesdepends on group
largely to ignore their accumulated wisdom.In an effort survival (Eibl-Eibesfeld, 1989;J. Hogan, 1978).It is im-
to make past researchmore accessible,interpretable,and portant to distinguish betweena person'sshort-term and
relevantto decision makers,this article definesleadership long-term self-interest; actions that promote the group
and then answersnine questionsthat routinely come up also serve an individual's long-term welfare. History
whenpractical decisionsare made about leadership(e.g., mournfully suggests,however, that without an external
whom to appoint,how to evaluatethem. whento terminate threat to their group, people largely pursue their short-
them). term interests.
This article provides a context for understanding
leadershi!p.In our view, leadershipinvolves persuading
A ccording to the political scientists, the funda-
other peclpleto set aside for a period of time their indi-
mental question in human affairs is "Who shall
vidual cc)ncernsand to pursue a common goal that is
rule?" As psychologists-who are less infused importaDltfor the responsibilitiesand welfare of a group.
with the spirit of realpolitik-we believethe question is
This defi)ution is morally neutral. A Somali warlord who
"Who shouldrule?" The questionmust be answereddur- is trying 1:0bring togethera group of clansmento control
ing national elections,when CEOsare replaced,and when food suPJ;>lies needsthe same skills as an inner-city Chi-
university presidentsretire. The questionconcerns how cago minister who is trying to bring together a group of
to evaluate leadershippotential. When it is answeredin- parishionlersto help the homeless.
correctly, teams lose, armies are defeated,economies Leadership is persuasion,not domination; persons
dwindle, and nations fail. who can require others to do their bidding because of
In terms of the number of printed pagesdevotedto their powerare not leaders.Leadershiponly occurswhen
the subject, leadershipappearsto be one of the most im- others willingly adopt, for a period of time, the goals of
portant issuesin applied psychology.Volumesappearon a group as their own. Thus, leadershipconcernsbuilding
the topic everyyear, and a recent review lists over 7,000 cohesiveand goal-oriented teams; there is a causal and
books, articles, or presentations (Bass,1990). However, definitional link between leadership and team perfor-
the rules of psychological researchare suchthat we tend mance.
to focus on narrowly defined issues.The resultis that our What is it that leadersdo? Beginning with the Ohio
researchis primarily read by other psychologists.Al- Statestu(iiesin the 1940sand I 950s,severaltaxonomies
though J. P. Campbell (1977) and Mintzberg (1982) rec- of leadership behaviors have been proposed, including
ommended that researcherspay more attention to appli- those by Borman and Brush (1993), Davis, Skube,Hel-
cations, what we know seemsto havelittle impact on the lervik, G,~belein,and Sheard(1992),and Yuki, Wall, and
peoplewho actuallymake decisionsaboutleadership.The Lepsinger(1990). They differ primarily in terms of their
gapbetweenwhat we know and what leadershipdecision specificity.Yuki et al.'s list is the broadest; it identifies 14
makerswant to know may explain the popularity of such categoriesof leaderbehavior, including planning and or-
books as In Search oj Excellence (Peters& Waterman, ganizing, problem solving, clarifying, informing, moni-
1982),The ChangeMasters(Kanter, 1983),Leaders: The
toring, motivating, consulting, recognizing, supporting,
StrategiesJar Taking Charge (Bennis & Nanus, 1985), managingconflict and team building, networking. dele-
and The New Leaders (A. M. Morrison, 1992). These gating, dlevelOPingand mentoring, and rewarding. Al-
books are not intended to be scientific dissertations;
rather, they offerpractical suggestionsabout how to iden-
tify and evaluate leadership.To reduce the gap between Robert Hoganand JoyceHogan,Departmentof Psychology, Universityof
researchersand the lay public, this article answersnine Tulsa.GorclonJ. Curphy,PerronnelDecisions,Inc.. Minneapolis,MN.
questions that psychologistsare often askedby persons David P. Campbell servedas action editor for this article.
The a'ilthorswould like to thank David Campbell, John Campbell,
who must choose or evaluateleaders. Dianne Nilsen, Mark Schmit, Robert Smither,and five anonymous re-
What Is Leadership? viewersfor their thoughtful comments on earlier drafts of this article.
Correspondenceconcerning this article should be addressedto
Variouswriters haveargued that our evolutionary history Robert Hogan. Department of Psychology,University of Tulsa, Tulsa,
makes us both selfish (Dawkins, 1976)and yet able to OK 74104.
I APPENDIX