Thus, we now turn our attention to leader behaviors and the behavioral approaches to leadership. Researchers then began to reason that maybe the rest of the story could be understood by looking at what it is that leaders do. Still under the influence of the great man theory of leadership, researchers continued to focus on the leader in an effort to understand leadership-who emerges and what constitutes effective leadership. Traits only account for part of why someone becomes a leader and why they are (or are not) effective leaders.
Second, traits are only a part of the story. First, leader traits are important-people who are endowed with the “right stuff” (drive, self-confidence, honesty, and integrity) are more likely to emerge as leaders and to be effective leaders than individuals who do not possess these characteristics. The nearly four decades of research that focused on identifying the personal traits associated with the emergence of leaders and leader effectiveness resulted in two observations. What are the behavioral perspectives on leadership?.
