1 . Personality may play only a small part in leadership effectiveness, but there is no doubt that some leaders have a certain magic that leaves peers envious and followers entranced. If you could bottle this leadership X-factor—charisma—the queue of interested executives would be a long-one. But what qualities can these often highly successful leaders be said to possess?
As individuals, charismatic leaders have highly developed communication skills, including the ability to convey emotions easily and naturally to others, says Ronald Riggio, professor of leadership and organizational psychology. “They are able to inspire and arouse the emotions of followers through their emotional expressiveness and verbal skills.”
“They connect with followers because they seem to truly understand others’ feelings and concerns.”
“And they are great role models because they have the ability to engage others socially and display appropriate role-playing skills that allow them to walk the talk” Professor Riggio says.
“One quality we like in our leaders is if they are seen to really represent us. We think someone is more charismatic, the more they represent our collective identity,” Professor Van Knippenberg says. In this way, a charismatic leader is somehow a larger-than-life version of ourselves.
Academics say that charismatic leaders also manage to stand out from the crowd. They might do this by being unconventional or by taking a different approach to problem-solving, for example.
“They are up for new things, and they are not stuck in the status quo. They are open to out-of-the-box thinking, etc. An optimistic, energetic quality helps us to see leadership qualities in them and makes us open to their influence,” he says.
“A lot of charismatic leadership, and leadership in general, is very contextual. It’s really good in entrepreneurial firms. It’s also good for turnarounds if the organization is in a bad state because it inspires”, says Kai Peters, the chief executive of Ashridge Business School.
But not every organization needs a charismatic leader. Leaders loaded with the X-factor can be narcissistic (自恋的), self-glorifying, exploitative and authoritarian. As Peters says: “Where it is a problem is where you have ‘look at me, I’m a star.’’’
1. Which word is closest in meaning to “charisma” in the first paragraph?
| A．Charm. | B．Character. | C．Gratitude. | D．Optimism. |
2. The charismatic leaders become great role models due to their ______.
| A．proper role-playing skills | B．subtle emotional expressiveness |
| C．marvellous problem-solving ability | D．unconventionality in the crowds |
3. According to Professor Knippenberg, what kind of leaders would be welcomed by us?
| A．The one who has a heroical image. |
| B．The one who can speak for us. |
| C．The one who is a collective version of us. |
| D．The one who resembles us in characteristic. |
4. What is Peters’ attitude towards the contextual feature of charismatic leadership?
| A．Critical. | B．Approved. | C．Neutral. | D．Suspicious. |
