Leadership Theories

The United States has been home to some of the greatest leaders in the history of mankind. There is no shortage of great leaders that have stood at the forefront of American society and made names for themselves. From Martin Luther King, Jr. who led the Civil Rights Movement, to Franklin Roosevelt, who helped America through the worst years in American history; there is no doubt that they were indeed great leaders and great men. Leadership theories help us to understand why a leader is a great leader. People are not born into greatness. Leaders are made, by way of their environments and the sociopolitical climate around them.

The “great man” theory was popularized by Thomas Carlyle in the 1940s (Manning & Curtis, 2012). Carlyle’s theory was able to get people thinking about leadership, even though there was no scientific basis for it. This theory built upon the view that leaders were born and not made, and there was some type of genetic predisposition that made them such great leaders. It’s not so much that I believe in this theory, but it’s for the fact that it has had such as profound effect on leadership theory. Many people attributed their leaders to just being great people, such as Julius Caesar, Mahatma Gandhi, and that they were not the product of the environment they were in. This myth has propagated the view that some people are meant to be great leaders and others are not (Hoffman, Woehr, Maldagen Youngjohn, & Lyons, 2011).

In stark contrast to the great man theory, there is the theory of transformational leadership, which was first introduced by James MacGregor Burns (Manning & Curtis, 2012). This theory builds up the view that there are people who exist that are able to inspire others innately. Through their speech and positive disposition, or charisma, these speakers could move masses. Malcolm X and Vince Lombardi are notable names of people who held such charisma that move men to doing just about anything they requested of them. These type of leaders put energy and passion in all that they do. They care about the people they are leading and they genuinely want them to succeed. They induce a type of vigor in their followers that makes them want to carry out the leader’s vision (Dvir, Eden, Avolio, & Shamir, 2002). These types of leaders have the ability to make their followers advance to a higher level of motivation (Jung, 2010).

Each of these theories have a central focal point: charisma (House & Howell, 1992). The great man theory believes that their personal charisma is something that is inherently in them, whereas transformational leadership theory views it as something that is developed. Likewise, both of these theories acknowledge that leaders are not like other people and they have to have the “right stuff” (Organ, 1996). Though people would love to think that the leader(s) they support are great, sometimes they’re just really charismatic individuals who can inspire the will of the people. Great men have qualities about them that people like. Their charisma is their power. Some of the greatest leaders in history, who have given some of the most inspiration talks, are transformational leaders. These are the kind of leaders I have always gravitated to and many others as well. Great men indeed exist, but they are made.

References

Dvir, T., Eden, D., Avolio, B. J., & Shamir, B. (2002). Impact of Transformational Leadership on Follower Development and Performance: A Field Experiment. Academy of Management Journal, 45(4), 735–744. doi:10.2307/3069307 ↩
Hoffman, B. J., Woehr, D. J., Maldagen Youngjohn, R., & Lyons, B. D. (2011). Great man or great myth? A quantitative review of the relationship between individual differences and leader effectiveness. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, 84(2), 347–381. doi:10.1348/096317909X485207
House, R. J., & Howell, J. M. (1992). Personality and charismatic leadership. The Leadership Quarterly, 3(2), 81–108. doi:10.1016/1048-9843(9290028-E ↩
Jung, D. I. (2010). Transformational and transactional leadership and their effects on creativity in groups. Creativity Research Journal, 13(2), 185–195. doi:10.1207/S15326934CRJ1302_6 ↩
Manning, G., & Curtis, K. (2012). The art of leadership (Fourth Edition.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill. ↩1 ↩2
Organ, D. W. (1996). Leadership: The great man theory revisited. Business Horizons, 39(3), 1–4. doi:10.1016/S0007-6813(9690001-4 ↩