Followers’ HEXACO personality traits and preference for charismatic, relationship-oriented, and task-oriented leadership

Kimberley Breevaart*, Reinout E. de Vries

*Corresponding author for this work

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticleAcademicpeer-review

    23 Citations (Scopus)
    121 Downloads (Pure)

    Abstract

    The aim of the current study was to examine the HEXACO personality traits in relation to followers’ preference for charismatic, relationship-oriented, and task-oriented leadership. Based on the similarity perspective, we expected followers high on Honesty-Humility, Extraversion, and Openness to Experience to prefer a charismatic leader, and those followers high on conscientiousness and low on Openness to Experience to prefer a task-oriented leader. In addition, from a need fulfillment perspective, we expected followers high on Emotionality to prefer a task- and a relationship-oriented leader. We examined these expectations using paper vignette methodology in a sample of 272 undergraduates. The results showed that most participants preferred a relationship-oriented leader over a charismatic or task-oriented leader. In addition, we found support for all our hypotheses, with the exception of the relations between Honesty-Humility and preference for charismatic leadership, and Conscientiousness and preference for task-oriented leadership. Our findings contribute to the nomological network of the role of follower characteristics in the leader-follower relationship. Implications and suggestions for research on charismatic leadership are provided.

    Original languageEnglish
    Pages (from-to)253-265
    Number of pages13
    JournalJournal of business and psychology
    Volume36
    Issue number2
    Early online date23 Dec 2019
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - Apr 2021

    Keywords

    • Big Five
    • Charismatic leadership
    • HEXACO
    • Leadership
    • Preference for leadership

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