Theories of Leadership: Trait Approach

THEORIES OF LEADERSHIP:

There are some personal qualities and traits which are essential to be a successful leader.
1) Trait Approach:
 The trait approach represents the earliest notions of leadership and was popular between 1930
and 1950.
 The advocates of their theory are of the opinion that the persons who are the leaders are
psychologically better adjusted to display better judgement and to engage themselves in social
activities.
 They seek more information ,give more information and take lead in interpreting or summing
up a situation .
 Most of the trait theories believe that leadership traits are inherited or in born and these cannot
be acquired by learning.
Henry Fayol divided these qualities into physical , mental ,educational ,technical and experience

Ralph M. Stogdill ,According to him ,various traits theories have suggested these traits in a
successful leader:
i) Physical and constitutional factors
ii) Intelligence
iii) Self confidence
iv) Sociability
v) Will power (initiative, persistence, ambition)
vi) Dominance
vii) Surgency (talkative, cheerfulness, enthusiasm, alertness, originality, expreessiveness)
In a later study, Gliseli ,had found the following qualities related with leadership success:
i. Supervisory ability
ii. Achievement inactivation
iii. Self actualisation
iv. Intelligence
v. Self assurance
vi. Decisiveness

The study of the line of successful leader reveals that the following important traits are
possessed by many of them.
1) Intelligence
• Leaders generally have higher level of intelligence than the average of their
followers.
• Intelligence is the natural quality of a person ,to a great extent , because it is
directly related to the brain.
• As the human beings are born with their brains, it is generally laid that “leaders are
born and not made.”
• Intellegence means ability to think scientifically.
• Analyse accurately and interepret clearly and precisely the problems before them.
• Psychologies claim that intelligence can be improved with the help of proper
training programmes.
2) Physiological Factors:
• Height ,weight , physique ,health and appearance of an individual have a very strong
impact on the personality and success of the leadership
3)Emotional Stability
• A leader must have high level of emotional stability.
• He must be consistent in his action ,should not be biased and should know how to
control anger.
• He must be well adjusted and self confident personality who believes that he can
handle most of situations successfully.
4) Intense Inner Motivational Drive:
• Have the inner urge to keep on accomplishing something all time.
• Stimulating the inner drive of his followers also.
5) Human Relations Attitude:
• Try to develop social understanding with other people.
• He should have intimate knowledge about the people and for interpersonel relationship.
• Knowledge of how human beings react to different situations.
6) Vision and Foresight:
• Visualise trends and devise his policies and programmes with foresight based on
logical programmes.
7) Empathy:
• On the basiis of empathy he can predict and understand the behaviour of people but for
than he must have an understanding of rights, beliefs, values and feelings of other people.
8) Fairness and Objectivity
• He should not be based and he should not allow himself so become emotionally involved.
9) Technical Skills:
• Planning , organizing, delegating, analysis, selecting, advice, making decisions, controlling
,and winning cooperation constitute technical competence of leadership.
• A leader can win support from his subordinates with his/her technical skills.
10) Open Mind and Adaptability:
• He should not be critical of others .
• He must accommodate the view point of others and should be willing to modify his
decision on the basis of that.
11) Art of Communication:
• Good communication skills can be used for persessive informative and stimulating
purpose.
• A successful leader is one with whom people cooperate willingly and not under any
pressure.
12) Social Skills.
• A leader should know the plus and minus points of his subordinates.
• A successful leader is one with whom people cooperate willingly and not under any
pressure.
Criticism of the Trait Approach
Some of the qualities of the leaders and inborn, others can be developed by management
through proper training programmes. But various studies prove that the trait theory cannot
hold good for all sets of circumstances.
1. Various studies prove that the trait theory cannot hold good for all sets of
circumstances.
2. The list of traits is not uniform and different authors have given different list of
traits.
3. It fails to take into account influence of other factors on leadership.
4. The theory fails to indicate the comparative of different traits.
5. There have been many persons who have been outstanding leaders in business
although they have been humourless ,narrow minded ,unjust and authoritarian .In
the same manner there been many persons who were not good leaders although they
had the above specified traits.
6. No evidence has been given about the degree of the various traits because people
have the various traits with different degrees.
7. There are no definite tests for the measurement of these traits and hence no
conclusions can be drawn.
This theory ,however ,provides that leaders should have certain personal
characteristics .Some of these qualities are inborn , others can be developed by the
management through proper training programmes.

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THEORIES OF LEADERSHIP:

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