More than motivation: How individual leadership attributes impact the intention to apply for leadership roles

Abstract: Leader development is a popular field of study within the leadership, psychology, and human resource development (HRD) domains, with leadership models offering a framework to practitioners within these realms for crafting leadership development programs (Pearce, 2007). As such, various studies (e.g., Deci & Ryan, 2002; Miniotaitè & Buciunienè, 2015; Ryan & Deci, 2008) have evaluated the traits, skills, and situational influences that independently and collectively contribute to an individual’s likelihood of becoming a leader. However, often researchers fail to examine an individual’s intention to apply for a leadership position within their evaluation of an individual’s leadership potential (cf. Chan & Drasgow, 2001), whereby potentially depleting scarce time and monetary resources. This occurs because although some scholars have attempted to identify a collective assessment for leadership potential and development (cf. Bernthal & Wellins, 2006), only a third of organizations within the United States have clear protocols for assessing leadership potential (Dries & Peppermens, 2012). Furthermore, scholars have often focused solely on traits such as personality or values (Chan & Drasgow, 2001; Chan et al., 2012) and perceptions (Felfe & Schyns, 2014) in evaluating the contributing factors that impact motivation and intention. This evaluation of isolated and linear impacts presents only a partial understanding of the antecedents that work together to compel an individual to apply for a leadership position. Thus, a research inquiry underpinned by the theory of planned behavior (Ajzen, 1985) that evaluated the panoptic landscape of factors contributing to an individual applying for a leadership position was merited and subsequently conducted in this study. Specifically, this study evaluated the impacts of the Big Five personality factors, individual and collective values, past leadership experience, and leadership perceptions on MTL and intention to apply for a leadership position.
Ajzen (1985) was the first to proclaim that “intention is thus assumed to be the immediate antecedent of behavior” (p.1) and therefore the examination of motivation alone would not yield a robust depiction of factors contributing to an individual assuming a leadership role (Achtziger & Gollwitzer, 2018). Despite this awareness that motivation and intention are two separate influences of behavior, and although prior research (Chan & Drasgow, 2001; Bandura et al., 2020) examined the motivation to lead (MTL), only nominal research has been conducted that examined the relationship between an individual’s MTL and their intention to apply for a leadership position (e.g., Felf & Schyns, 2014; Kennedy et al., 2021). As well, while Kennedy et al. (2021) is to be commended for furthering the literature in tying together personality traits, MTL, and leader intention, the meritorious contributions of values, perceptions, and leadership experience presented by Felfe and Schyns (2014) which added depth to the multi-factorial aspect of leader intentions was omitted. Thus, no research to date has evaluated the multi-variable antecedents of MTL and their relationship to the intention to apply for a leadership position. Therefore, the current study integrated personality traits, values, past leadership experience, perceptions of leadership, and the motivation to lead within the same model to assess the impact on an individual’s intention to apply for a leadership position. A parsimonious model (see Figure 1) of the intention to apply for a leadership position (IALP) was derived through various statistical analyses including factor analysis, hierarchical regression analysis, and path analysis. The results indicated that the personality traits of extraversion and openness to experience, as well as the value of vertical individualism either indirectly or directly influenced an individual’s intention to apply for a leadership position. As well, past leadership experience, leadership self-efficacy, and MTL had a direct impact on an individual’s intention to apply for a leadership position.
The presence of the partial indirect effects indicated that there are omitted intervening variables (cf. Zhao, Lynch, & Chen, 2010) between values and intention to apply, past leadership experience and intention to apply, and leadership self-efficacy and intention to apply. Therefore, a significant contribution of the present study to the literature and research realms is that despite assessing a robust, multi-factorial, evaluation of antecedents, partial indirect effects remained, indicating that other variables yet to be examined influence motivation to lead and intention to apply. Subsequently, we contend that the resulting research presenting a robust model of leader development has contributed to the fields of leadership and HRD as well (Hutchins & Rainbolt, 2017), as we provide a guiding framework for practitioners and organizations to identify emerging leaders.
Key words: intention to apply for a leadership position, motivation to lead, personality trait