One of the strength’s to the Trait Approach is said to be that it naturally draws people in due to its tendency to appeal to the popular image of leader’s being gifted (Northouse 2010). I am not sold on this being such a good thing. Yes, the Trait Approach falls in line with current thoughts on who a leader should be, but is that such a good thing? I see how it perpetuates the stereotype, but at the end of the day I’m afraid that that’s all this view of a leader is. We need to level the playing field to make Leadership an obtainable goal for just about everyone. The trait approach’s limited scope in what it thinks a leader should be helps keep popular opinion from including people who might not fit it’s limited definition.
A negative to the Trait Approach is said to be that it does not take situations into account (Northouse 2010). It does not allow for different types of leader’s to even exist. From high school to college to running my own businesses there are always people I see who would be fantastic leaders but don’t agree with me. When I was running my landscaping company I needed someone to run another crew in another part of town. There was an employee who was organized, did immaculate work, and got along with everyone else but knew how to get things moving when they got stagnant. He did this without thinking about it, so when I asked him to run my new crew he looked at me like I had five heads and said he wasn’t smart enough for that. Whether he was smart or not had nothing to do with it, he just had the innate ability to be good at this crew. What he lacked was the self-confidence, a very important major leadership trait. Due to that, he never took the job and I was not about to force him. He needed to know he could do it for it to truly work. The Triarchic Theory of Intelligence allows for three separate and distinct types of intelligence (Northouse 2010). Each of these types of intelligence could easily define a different type of leader. The analytic intelligence type is linked to successful leadership, however in a situation where the leader has too much of this it can actually be counterproductive to establishing healthy lines of communication (Northouse 2010). In a case like this perhaps Practical Intelligence type would be more suited to the situation. I would also classify my would-be crew leader as having a Practical Intelligence type. Due to his predefined notion of what a leader is supposed to be however, he would not let himself even try. The Trait Approach does not consider situations such as this. It holds before us a popular definition for us to measure ourselves against, not find our own personal leader within us based on our own personal strengths. It strives to seek out a select few that measure up to its standards and hold them on a pedestal.
This is where we get the stereotype. The theories that developed when people started to seek out what made a leader great, were called “great man” theories (Northouse 2010). The Trait Approach is one such theory that defines what the stereotype of a Great Man is, but doesn’t effectively describe what makes a person a good leader. It cannot do such a thing, as the answer is not so simple that you can define a leader as one type of person. The Trait Approach’s definition of a leader is so narrow it almost exhibits the essence of a maxim, not a theory. When the Trait Approach was being developed scholars were looking at the great leaders such as Gandhi, Lincoln, and Napoleon. A theory is a culmination of evidence from numerous research to explain something (PSU World Campus 2013). A maxim is based upon one person’s experience (PSU World Campus 2013). The Trait Approach uses the traits of a finite group of people to boil it down into one generality of what qualities these great people had that made them significant. Essentially the Trait Approach is not based on many bits of research, but on one narrow train of thought. It’s not a bad thing to glean what we can from the greats, but it only looks at social, political, and military leaders. It does not look at great leaders of the great schools or other people in history such as directors, coaches, or others that lead just in a platform that is not part of the narrow scope that limits the people studied to classic leaders. This encapsulates the essence of a maxim rather than the spirit of a theory.
As long as we keep defining leaders in such a limited way, public opinion of who their leaders should be will be hard pressed to change. People need to know what specifically makes a leader (Northouse 2010). The Trait Approach may be an easy answer, but the reality is the answer is not so cut and dry. The Trait Approach oversimplifies and in doing so perpetuates the classic leadership examples. This leads to people not thinking they have leadership qualities, when in fact many people would excel at leading and they just do not know it yet. In my high school all the school leaders more or less follow the major leadership traits. They are all high achievers, confident, driven, and outgoing. That describes a small group of people in a big school. The paradigm was set up that leaders followed these traits. Even at the time I knew friends or people I was familiar with would be wonderful at certain group leaders or school council. These people however did not fit the paradigm. For example there was this girl that wanted very much to start a new club in school that helps the environment. This student was sociable, honest, and driven but not have the best grades. She told me once that she started to look around at all the school leaders and sees that they are all high achievers. This person might be the perfect leader of this club, however due to perpetuating stereotypes of classic leaders it never happened. The idea was dreamed and never realized in the blink of an eye and this person might never realize what a perfect leader they would have made in this situation. The next year the school president started the Environmental Club and my friend was too upset, at herself and in general, to even join.
The trait approach’s limited scope in what it thinks a leader should be helps keep popular opinion from including people who might not fit it’s limited definition. This helps solidify the thinking that leaders must be certain things. The truth however, is that leaders are many things. Many different types of leaders for many different situations. The Trait Approach is not wrong, just limited. Instead of being seen as being one theory of one type out of many, it seems to be accepted as a standard against which people compare themselves. If we can just level the playing field it will open the door for all types of people to find a leader in themselves that they never knew was there.
References:
PSU World Campus. (2012). Lesson 1: Introduction to Leadership. Retrieved from:
https://courses.worldcampus.psu.edu/fa12/psych485/001/content/01_lesson/04_page.html
Northouse, Peter G. (2010). Leadership, Theory and Practice. Los Angeles, CA: Sage Pubications.