How Leaders Woo Followers in the Romance of Leadership

Abstract

This empirical study examines the origins of the romance of leadership from a leader-centric perspective. The impact of Self-Deception and Impression Management on leader perceptions of their leadership was examined to gauge whether leaders hold romantic notions about their leadership. A national survey ( N = 2,376) of business executives was conducted and data were analysed using a multiple-method factor approach. The results indicate that leaders distort their self-attributions to reflect romantic or "idealised" images of leadership. We contend that leaders are motivated to transmit these images through impression management to "woo" followers into constructing romantic images of leadership. Thus, leaders play an active role in the development of the romance of leadership. The study considers the practical and theoretical implications and proposes directions for future research.Cette étude empirique s'intéresse aux origines de la romance du leadership d'un point de vue centré sur le leader. L'impact des illusions sur soi et du management impressionnant sur la perception qu'ont les leaders de leur propre leadership a été pris en compte pour savoir si les leaders adhéraient à des notions romantiques à propos de leur leadership. Les données d'une enquête nationale ( N = 2,376) sur des hommes/femmes d'affaires ont été analysées avec une approche factorielle à méthodes multiples. Les résultats montrent que les leaders distordent leurs auto-attributions pour renvoyer des images romantiques ou idéalisées du leadership. Nous soutenons que les leaders cherchent à transmettre ces images à travers le management impressionnant pour amener les suiveurs à élaborer des images romantiques du leadership. Les leaders jouent donc un rôle actif dans le développement de la romance du leadership. On réfléchit aux conséquences théoriques et

The face of leadership: Perceiving leaders from facial expression

“…Empirically, Schyns et al (2007) found that ILTs affect actual leader perception. Gray and Densten (2007) suggested that leaders who behave in ways that are congruent with their followers' ILTs are more likely to win their support. Indeed, a match between an individual's leader prototype and a leader's actual behavior leads to more favorable evaluations (Nye & Forsyth, 1991).…”

“…Prior research has indicated that leadership is, at least partly, constructed by perceivers (e.g., Gray & Densten, 2007;Schyns, Felfe, & Blank, 2007). In the next sections, we review how leadership is perceived and how perception is related to facial expression.…”

Leader Deception Influences on Leader–Member Exchange and Subordinate Organizational Commitment

“…However, this was clearly not the case in this study. Third, followers may, themselves, engage in self-deception regarding the true impact of a leader's deception (Gray & Densten, 2007). If followers convince themselves that the leader's untruths are of little significance, as is typical with white lies, they perhaps will overlook the deceit.…”

Romance of Leadership in the Public Sector Higher Education in Sri Lanka

“…Burns (1978) pointed out that discussions of leadership sometimes are viewed as elitist due to the power and importance often ascribed to leaders. Prior to the development of the romance of leadership theory (Meindl & Ehrlich, 1987;Meindl, Ehrlich, & Dukerich, 1985), the relative importance of follower in leadership was largely overshadowed by the high volume of research which attributed organizational successes and failures primarily to the leadership (Gray & Densten, 2007).…”