Pairing an extroverted leader with a proactive team, he says, can hurt, not just hinder, the company’s effectiveness. “Once the extroverted leader responds in a less receptive way, that becomes discouraging for employees and makes them less willing to work hard,” Grant states. “It may also make them less willing to share ideas in the future, which would limit creativity and innovation.”
In fact, the personality conflicts can lead to a power struggle within an organisation, openly pitting leaders against employees. This is especially true in companies or groups with a flat hierarchy – for example, if the leaders were recently promoted from the peer level, or if a new leader’s competence and skills are not yet established. Such situations would “be much more likely to lead employees to challenge, and leaders to feel threatened”, a situation known as “status uncertainty”, according to Grant.
“If you are leading a pizza franchise, you are often doing this as your full-time job, and you might be managing high school and college students who have a different set of aspirations and, in some cases, might actually look down upon you as the leader,” Grant points out. At that point, an employee with a better idea for how to get orders processed efficiently on Super Bowl night, or a suggestion for a new coupon or special deal, could make extroverted leaders feel like their “status is being threatened. They might say: ‘I’m supposed to be in charge here. Let me reassert my authority.’ Whereas the introverted leader, with less of a concern for position, status and power – and a willingness to spend more time listening and less time talking – is likely to quietly process the ideas that come up. That leader is worrying less about the ego or image implications of employees taking charge and introducing ideas.”
The research team also conducted another study that looked specifically at extroverted leadership behaviour, not just self-reported traits. They took 163 college students from a university in the south-eastern US and designated them as team members and leaders in a T-shirt folding group. The aim was to fold as many shirts as possible in 10 minutes, with iPods as a reward for the top performers.
Some students were randomly assigned to lead in either an extroverted or introverted manner. The extroverted leaders were given examples of famous leaders who were bold, talkative and assertive, such as Martin Luther King, Jr. and Jack Welch. The introverted leaders were given examples of famous leaders who were quiet and reserved, such as Mahatma Gandhi and Abraham Lincoln. Both groups were then asked to reflect on a time when they led effectively in a similar manner. Meanwhile, two other graduate students, or confederates, were paired with each group and secretly told to act either passively or proactively, with proactive confederates offering a new, efficient way to fold T-shirts.
The researchers found a significant interaction between extroverted leadership and proactive behaviour that meshed with the findings from the pizza study. When the confederates were passive, teams performed better when led in an extroverted manner, but when the confederates were proactive, teams performed better when led in an introverted manner. “When the confederates were proactive, participants perceived the more extroverted leaders as less receptive to ideas, and they invested less effort in the task,” the researchers write.
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