and pragmatic leadership has been provided by a series of experimental studies. For example,Strange and Mumford (2005), in their study of vision formation, found that viable visions could be constructed by using the causes evident in successful prior models (a charismatic strategy) or by rejecting the goals evident in unsuccessful models (an ideological strategy).
In another study along these lines,Bedell, Hunter, and Mumford (in press) developed measures to assess people’s proclivity to a charismatic, ideological, or pragmatic leadership style. Subsequently, she assessed forecasting strategies and found that charismatic, ideological, and prag-matic leaders displayed the expected differences with regard to the causes and goals applied in projecting the outcomes of future events. A final experimental study conducted by Hunter, Bedell-Avers, and Mumford (2009) also assessed participant’s proclivity for a leader type. Researchers then asked participants to engage in a computerized leadership simulation that allowed for the manipulation of multiple contextual factors, including environmental complexity and situational framing. Results of the study indicated that the three leader types performed differently under varying contextual conditions. It should be noted that, although moderated performance effects were observed, no main effect differences were found among the three leader types on any of the study’s criteria. This ‘‘non-finding’’ combined with the situational moderator effects highlight the general notion that the three pathways represent distinct, yet equally viable pathways to outstanding leadership (Mumford, 2006).
Pierro, Stefano, & Kashy, 2002;Schriesheim, Castro, & Yammarino, 2000;
Yammarino, 1996). In addition, multi-level consideration of a phenomenon may also bring to light issues that were previously unimagined. For example, in their investigation of multi-level innovation, Mumford and Hunter (2005)discovered a series of multi-level paradoxes – where what was necessary for innovation at one level of analysis seemingly contradicted what was required at another.
With respect to the structure of the chapter, we will use a multi-level framework employed in a number of prior investigations of multi-level phenomena (e.g.,Mumford & Hunter, 2005;Mumford, Bedell et al., 2008;
Mumford, Espejo et al., in press). More directly stated, we will consider the variables that might operate to shape the emergence and performance of charismatic, ideological, and pragmatic leaders operating at the individual, group, organization, and environment levels.
Individual-Level Influences
Leadership, at its most basic level, involves contact and interaction between a given leader and a follower. In this sense, there are a number of individual-level variables that may impact the emergence and performance of charismatic, ideological, and pragmatic leaders, including: (1) leader skills, (2) follower contact, (3) follower identity, and (4) leader commitment.
One set of skills relevant to leader emergence and performance is implied by our foregoing discussion with regard to the distinctive characteristics of pragmatic leaders. Earlier, we argued that pragmatic leadership involves the extended analysis of causation in complex systems. This rather straightfor-ward observation has two important implications with regard to leader emergence and performance. First, pragmatic leadership will depend on the acquisition of especially complex mental models describing the causes and consequences of system operations (Mumford, Marcy, Eubanks, &
Murphy, in press). In other words, pragmatic leadership will require prior opportunities to acquire requisite expertise and, thus, will evidence some domain specificity. Second, the performance of pragmatic leaders will depend on the skills needed to analyze and resolve organizational problems vis-a`-vis this expertise. Thus, pragmatic leadership will call for intelligence, creativity, critical thinking, judgment, wisdom, and tacit knowledge (Hedlund et al., 2003;Mumford & Connelly, 1991).
Some support for this conclusion may be found in a series of studies by Mumford and his colleagues (Connelly et al., 2000; Mumford, Marks,
Connelly, Zaccaro, & Reiter-Palmon, 2000;Mumford et al., 2000;Vincent, Decker, & Mumford, 2002; Zaccaro, Mumford, Connelly, Marks, &
Gilbert, 2000). They administered an extensive battery of cognitive skill tests to 1,818 army officers – leaders working in an organization known to value pragmatic leadership. They found that indices of leader performance, ranging from critical incident performance to medals awarded, were positively related (R ¼ .40) to the leader’s expression of complex social problem-solving skills such as creative thinking skills, intelligence, expertise, and wisdom. These findings, taken in conjunction with our foregoing observations, imply the following proposition:
Proposition 1. At the individual level, the emergence and performance of pragmatic leaders will be more strongly influenced by expertise and cognitive skills than charismatic and ideological leaders, and will, vis-a`-vis expertise requirements, evidence greater domain specificity.
Although charismatic and ideological leadership will make more limited demands on complex problem-solving skills and expertise, charismatic and ideological leaders will still need sufficient expertise to permit the formation of viable prescriptive mental models. The basis for the prescriptive mental models being articulated by charismatic and ideological leaders; however, lies in the identification of shared social goals (Prati, Douglas, & Ferris, 2003). The implication of this statement is that charismatic and ideological leaders must be sensitive to, and aware of, the concerns and motivations of followers. This point, in turn, implies that social intelligence will be more important to the emergence and performance of charismatic and ideological leaders than pragmatic leaders (Zaccaro, Gilbert, Thor, & Mumford, 1991).
This point is illustrated in a number of studies including Barbuto and Burbach (2006) who, using a sample of 80 elected officials, found that transformational/charismatic leaders exhibited higher levels of social intelligence. More directly,Wesphal and Stern (2006) found that differing leaders received board appointments via alternative skill pathways.
Specifically, the researchers observed that stronger interpersonal skills could ameliorate a lack of expertise (i.e., expertise typically associated with pragmatic leaders), and allowed these leaders to receive high-level promotions. The aggregate of these studies, then, leads to our second proposition.
Proposition 2. At the individual level, social skills will exert a stronger influence on the emergence and performance of charismatic and ideological leaders than pragmatic leaders.
Along related lines, charismatic and ideological leadership requires sensemaking and sensegiving through articulation of relevant goals. The need for effective communication, in turn, implies that charismatic and ideological leaders must know their audience. In other words, they must minimize psychological, if not physical/structural distance, if they are to perform effectively (Antonakis & Atwater, 2002; Howell & Hall-Merenda, 1999; Shamir, 1995). Thus, interpersonal engagement will prove necessary for charismatic and ideological leaders. In contrast, direct engagement, and the affect unveiled in the course of this engagement, may undermine the kind of complex causal analysis on which pragmatic leadership depends (Mumford, Schultz, & Osburn, 2002). As a result, the emergence and performance of pragmatic leaders will depend on structures that allow them to distance themselves from the immediate concerns of followers and manage follower interactions in such a way as to minimize the need for emotional processing. These observations, in turn, led to our next proposition.
Proposition 3. At the individual level, the emergence and performance of charismatic and ideological leaders will require low psychological distance and high contact between leaders and followers while the emergence and performance of pragmatic leaders will require high psychological distance and more limited contact with followers.
One of the key variables shaping people’s willingness to follow charismatic and ideological leaders lies in the clear articulation of a prescriptive mental model in terms of a global, goal-oriented, vision (Conger & Kanungo, 1998). The attraction of this vision is that it provides followers with a sense of meaning and identity that promotes affective social engagement (Ashkanasy, 2002; Shamir et al., 1993). One implication of these observations is that charismatic and ideological leaders are most likely to emerge and effectively exercise influence when followers have a weak and fragile sense of identity. Although change, conflict, and social loss can induce a weakened sense of social identity (Beyer, 1999), immaturity, inexperience, and identity diffusion may have similar effects (Dvir &
Shamir, 2003; Sy, Tram, & O’Hara, 2006). Under these conditions, the performance of charismatic and ideological leaders will be tied to the quality of the vision statement and the strength of the prescriptive mental model that provides a basis for the vision statement.
In contrast, pragmatic leadership does not depend on the leader creating a sense of identity in followers. This point is of some importance because it implies that pragmatic leaders are most likely to arise in autonomous,
high achieving, populations where identity is provided by the individual activities of followers and threat is low – a notion illustrated in a study bySy et al. (2006)who found that stable, socially aware employees did not need a leader that was cognizant of their emotional needs; they could perform well and were satisfied with their jobs independent of a leader who pro-vided a sense of support and identity. These origins of pragmatic leadership are noteworthy, in part, because they suggest that the performance of pragmatic leaders may depend as much on the quality and capabilities of followers as on the prescriptive mental model being articulated (Collinson, 2006). Taken together, these observations suggest the following two propositions.
Proposition 4. At the individual level, charismatic and ideological leaders will emerge in vulnerable populations while pragmatic leaders will emerge in autonomous high achieving populations.
Proposition 5. At the individual level, the performance of charismatic and ideological leaders will depend on the quality of the prescriptive mental model underlying the vision being articulated while the performance of pragmatic leaders will depend on the skills and capabilities of the followers they recruit as much as the prescriptive mental model of the leader.
Although charismatic and ideological leaders both rely on followers investing in a vision, it is important to recognize the differences evident in the prescriptive mental model underlying the visions being articulated by charismatic and ideological leaders. Charismatic leader’s prescriptive mental models are based on the feasibility of attaining future goals through collective action. Thus, charismatic leadership depends on the articulation of opportunity. When positive collective action is not possible, however, the removal of threats to traditional patterns of behavior, the logic provided by ideological leaders through their prescriptive mental models, will prove more attractive. Along related lines, one would expect that charismatic leaders will perform effectively in the pursuit of opportunities while ideological leaders will perform more effectively when salient emerging threats loom in the environment.
Proposition 6. At the individual level, charismatic leaders are more likely to emerge and perform effectively when the pursuit of opportunities is crucial while ideological leaders are more likely to emerge and perform effectively when the removal of threats is crucial.
Not only do the conditions that give rise to charismatic and ideological leaders differ, vis-a`-vis the key characteristics of their prescriptive mental models, the characteristics leaders must evidence to allow for the effective exercise of influence will also differ. Charismatic leadership will generally benefit from openness, displays of optimism, and manifest confidence on the part of the leader. Although these dispositional characteristics may also contribute to ideological leadership, under conditions of threat peoples’
range of information processing tends to narrow (Jackson & Dutton, 1988) – focusing on the leader and his/her behavior with respect to perceived threats.
This observation is noteworthy because it suggests that followers will attend more to the behavior of ideological leaders and respond more negatively to incongruent, non-value consistent, behavior. As a result, ideological leaders, as opposed to charismatic leaders, must evidence greater conformity to group values and a greater willingness to make personal sacrifices for these values (Yorges et al., 1999) – point illustrated by Bedell et al. (2006) who found that ideological leaders, in comparison to charismatic and pragmatic leaders, were the more strongly committed to their values and were unwilling to compromise their beliefs for personal attainment or gain. Accordingly, the following proposition seems indicated.
Proposition 7. At the individual level, self-sacrifice and sustained personal commitment to a vision will be more important to the emergence and performance of ideological leaders than charismatic and pragmatic leaders.
In sum, we proposed that a number of variables operating at the individual level impact the emergence and performance of charismatic, ideological, and pragmatic leaders. Broadly, we suggest that pragmatic leaders will emerge and largely rely on their expertise to lead, while ideological and charismatic leaders will, in general, emphasize social skills and emotional appeals when interacting with followers. Such observations have implications for other individual-level factors, including physical and psychological distance, where strong social skills would seem to play a larger and more substantive role in leader success. Along related lines, pragmatic leaders appear more likely to excel in populations that respond well to logical, rational appeals. Finally, the differing aspects of the leaders’ mental models would appear to impact the responses of subordinates in varying ways. For example, the ideological leaders’ emphasis on a core value or set of values would seem to suggest that sacrifice for those ideals would be more critical to the emergence and performance of this leader type. The propositions generated highlight the dynamic interplay between leader, follower, and context, with the cong-ruence of all three being necessary for high-level achievement.
Group-Level Influences
Our foregoing observations with regard to self-sacrifice and sustained personal commitment on the part of leaders point to a variety of potential group-level influences on the emergence and performance of charismatic, ideological, and pragmatic leaders. Although a variety of group-level variables might influence leader emergence and performance, four variables appear especially noteworthy: (1) trust, (2) cohesion, (3) interdependence, and (4) exchange relationships.
Although trust has been conceptualized in different ways by different investigators (e.g., Pillutla, Malhotra, & Murnighan, 2003; Rousseau, Sitkin, Burt, & Camerer, 1998), it can be argued that trust arises from both interpersonal appraisals and the fairness of exchange relationships.
In fact, trust appears integral to the emergence and performance of ideological leaders. Ideological leaders appear to emerge in response to perceived unfairness and victimization of a group (Moghaddam, 2005).
Thus, Mumford et al. (2008) found that incidents of other’s corruption were often associated with the emergence of ideological leaders. The emergence of ideological groups in reaction to conditions where trust is low; however, requires ideological leaders to evidence unusually high levels of inter-personal trustworthiness if they are to exercise effective influence over followers.
Proposition 8. At the group level, ideological leaders will emerge under conditions where trust is low; however, the performance of ideological leaders will require high levels of interpersonal trust in the leader.
Interpersonal trust also appears integral to both the emergence and performance of charismatic leaders. Thus,Pillai, Williams, Lowe, and Jung (2003) in a study of presidential voting found that trust mediated the relationship between attributed charisma and perceived voting patterns.
Along similar lines, Bommer, Rubin, and Baldwin (2004) found that cynicism within groups tended to undermine transformational leadership behavior. When these findings are considered in light of the fact that future-oriented visions, by virtue of their intangibility, require placing trust in the leader, the following proposition seems indicated.
Proposition 9. At the group level, the emergence and performance of charismatic leaders will depend on high levels of trust.
In contrast to charismatic and ideological leaders, interpersonal trust does not appear to be integral to the emergence and performance of pragmatic
leaders. Pragmatic leadership, however, does require people to work together for shared interests (Mumford & Van Doorn, 2001). The basis of interaction in shared interest, in turn, implies that the emergence and performance of pragmatic leaders will be related more to perceptions of equity and justice than interpersonal trust. Hence, the emergence and performance of pragmatic leaders will be conditioned by perceptions of process, procedural, and distributive justice – with distributive justice proving a particularly important influence on performance.
Proposition 10. At the group level, perceptions of process, procedural, and distributive justice will prove more important to the emergence and performance of pragmatic leaders than interpersonal trust.
In addition to trust, cohesion also seems to influence the emergence and performance of charismatic, ideological, and pragmatic leaders. The importance of cohesion to the emergence and performance of ideological leaders is illustrated in a recent study by Mumford et al. (2008). They examined the characteristics of the groups giving rise to ideological, charismatic, and pragmatic leaders. Qualitative material describing group processes was content coded for a variety of variables including group exclusivity, strong group affect, and peer group influence. In a subsequent discriminant analysis contrasting groups, it was found that groups led by ideologues differed from groups led by charismatics and pragmatics with respect to group insecurity and oppositional bonding (actions taken to differentiate the group from other groups). Thus, it seems reasonable to conclude that high levels of group cohesion, cohesion that may in fact be created by the leader through techniques such as oppositional bonding, are necessary for the emergence and performance of ideological leaders.
In the case of charismatic and pragmatic leaders, however, cohesion appears to operate in a somewhat more complex fashion. Charismatic leaders, by articulating a future-oriented vision that defines the group and provides a basis for action, will require cohesion for the effective exercise of influence through people. This point is well illustrated by Sanders and Schyns (2006) who found positive relationships between charismatic behaviors and group consensus. However, charismatic leaders emerge, in part, because the vision being articulated provides a basis for cohesion – an observation suggesting that low levels of group cohesion may promote the emergence of charismatic leaders. On the contrary, because pragmatic leaders cannot function effectively when there is no consensus about shared goals and interests, the emergence of pragmatic leaders will depend on at
least a minimal level of cohesion in the group. These observations about cohesion, in turn, suggest the following three propositions.
Proposition 11. At the group level, the emergence and performance of ideological leaders will depend on high levels of group cohesion.
Proposition 12. At the group level, the emergence of charismatic leaders will be linked to low levels of cohesion while the performance of charismatic leaders will depend on the leader creating high levels of cohesion.
Proposition 13. At the group level, the emergence of pragmatic leaders will depend on some minimal level of cohesion but the performance of pragmatic leaders will not depend on high levels of cohesion.
Cohesion, of course, proves beneficial to group performance when the level of interdependence in the activities of group members is high (Zaccaro, Gualtieri, & Minionis, 1995). Interdependence also calls for shared mental models (Day, Gronn, & Salas, 2004). Thus, charismatic and ideological leaders may prove more likely to emerge under conditions where inter-dependence is substantial by virtue of their articulation of a common vision.
Moreover, the interdependence of group members may promote the spread and acceptance of this model through social reinforcement (Klein & House, 1998) while the institutional frameworks arising from this interdependence will promote effective group action in relation to the vision being articulated by the leader (Jacobsen & House, 2001). Although interdependence will facilitate the emergence and performance of both charismatic and ideo-logical leaders, interdependence will prove less important to pragmatic leaders. In fact, it seems reasonable to suggest that when group members evidence low levels of interdependence and high levels of autonomy, the ability of pragmatic leaders to orchestrate action through planning and the analysis of causation will prove especially beneficial.
Proposition 14. At the group level, high levels of interdependence will contribute to the emergence and performance of charismatic and ideological leaders while low levels of interdependence will contribute to the emergence and performance of pragmatic leaders.
A final group-level variable that appears of note in understanding the emergence and performance of charismatic, ideological, and pragmatic leaders may be found in the nature and quality of leaders’ exchange relationships with followers. Not only is there reason to suspect that the nature of exchange relationships differ across leader types but also that these
exchange relationships will have differential effects on leader emergence and performance. Thus,Strange (2004)in contrasting charismatic, ideological, and pragmatic leaders with respect to variables characterizing interactions with lieutenants, or close followers, found that charismatic, ideological, and pragmatic leaders differed with respect to follower interaction. More specifically, charismatic leaders, but not pragmatic leaders, were likely to have relationships characterized by a mutual exchange of support. This finding suggests that joint commitment to a vision is critical for charismatic leadership.
Ideological leaders, but not charismatic leaders, however, were more likely to share direction of the group with key lieutenants. Shared leadership is likely to prove effective, and contribute to the performance of ideological leaders, due to the foundation of ideological groups in shared beliefs and values.
For charismatic leaders, however, the central role played by the leader in articulating his/her personal vision may effectively prohibit shared leadership.
Proposition 15. At the group level, the emergence and performance of ideological but not charismatic leaders will be influenced by shared leadership.
To summarize, there appear to be a number of noteworthy and interesting variables operating at the group level that would appear likely to impact the performance and emergence of the three leader types. Because group-level phenomena typically involve the coordination and interaction among multiple individuals, variables such as cohesion and interdependence are of notable impact to the performance of the differing leader types. For example, pragmatic leaders would appear to perform well in autonomous, high achieving, and independent populations. In contrast, interdependence, cohesion, and shared leadership are more relevant to the success of ideological and charismatic leaders, albeit with a few notable differences.
These observations seem to highlight the challenges leaders face when attempting to coordinate and interact with collections of individuals.
Moreover, available evidence on the three leader types appears to indicate that charismatic, pragmatic, and ideological leaders approach group-level tasks in qualitatively different ways and may perform differently as the context and follower composition varies.
Organizational-Level Influences
Not only will group-level variables influence the emergence and perfor-mance of charismatic, ideological, and pragmatic leaders, it appears that a
number of variables operating at the organizational-level will also exert some noteworthy effects in this regard. Although a host of variables have been used to describe organizations, five variables appear especially noteworthy in shaping the emergence and performance of charismatic, ideological, and pragmatic leaders: (1) order, (2) complexity, (3) profession-alism, (4) politics, and (5) culture.
The concept of order, or its inverse chaos, derives from recent applica-tions of complexity theory in attempts to account for organizational behavior (e.g.,Bradbury & Lichtenstein, 2000; Colbert, 2004). Chaos may be defined as the amount of uncertainty resulting from actions taken on potential causal operatives within an organizational system. In other words, chaotic environments are characterized by shifting and unstable causation. Instability in causal operatives, of course, limits the feasibility and effectiveness of the kind of causal analysis that provides a basis for formation of the prescriptive models commonly applied by pragmatic leaders. Chaotic environments, as a result, will tend to inhibit pragmatic leadership.
Under chaotic conditions, however, the future, goal-oriented models constructed by charismatic leaders may prove more effective. A future-oriented vision allows for emergent causes, which are subject to potential exploitation in the service of goal attainment. Charismatic models, moreover, can be readily adjusted to take into account shifts in causation provided that the opportunities being pursued remain stable. In this regard, however, it is important to bear in mind a caveat. In highly chaotic settings, uncertainty may become so pronounced that it becomes effectively impos-sible to envision a future – any future. These conditions will, of course, limit the effectiveness of charismatic leaders. By the same token, however, in highly chaotic organizational settings, where the future is clouded in uncertainty, shared beliefs and values arising from the past might provide a framework for organizational action. As a result, ideological leadership may prove particularly compelling, and particularly effective, in a highly chaotic setting. These points are highlighted byHunter (2007), who found that charismatic leaders demonstrated decrements in performance in highly chaotic, vision-framed situations. Ideological leaders, on the other hand, seemed to generally excel in the majority chaotic conditions. Taken as a whole, these observations about chaotic organizations imply the following proposition.
Proposition 16. At the organizational level, emergence and performance will vary as a function of the amount of chaos in organizational