What do people desire in their leaders? The effect of leadership experience on desired leadership traits

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to determine how leadership experience affects the value leaders place on leadership traits. In particular, the author sought to determine if individuals with different amounts of leadership experience deferentially desire traits related to dominance and cooperation. Design/methodology/approach – Participants reported the importance of dominant and cooperative traits for an ideal leader, and reported the number of leadership roles that they had experienced. Findings – The desirability of dominance-related traits decreased as leadership experience increased, but only for women. In contrast, the desirability of cooperation-related traits remained the same, regardless of leadership experience or gender. Practical implications – Overall, these findings suggest leaders learn to desire different traits as they gain leadership experience. Implications of this research may exist in both business and political domains. In business, several leadership outcomes depend on trait desirability. In addition, interview and selection decisions may depend on the leadership experience and gender of the decision-maker. Organizations should carefully select members of the organization to make these critical hiring decisions. In politics, candidates would be wise to consider the leadership experience and gender of constituents in their self-presentation attempts. Originality/value – This research presents the first examination of the effect of leadership experience on the desirability of leader personality traits. In addition, this is one of the first studies to refocus on the dominance/cooperation dichotomy and “ideal” leadership – a promising focus for future trait research.