Self-other agreement on charismatic leadership: Relationships with work attitudes and managerial performance

The purpose of this study was to examine whether self-awareness of managers (defined as agree-ment between self and other leadership ratings) would influence work attitudes (i.e., trust and organizational commitment) of managers and their subordinates and relationships between charismatic leadership behavior and managerial performance. Multisource data were collected from 83 managers (who responded about their trust, organizational commitment, charismatic leadership, and socially desirable responding), 249 subordinates (who rated their manager’s charismatic leadership and responded about their trust and organizational commitment), and 83 superiors of focal managers (who rated managerial performance). Results indicated that lev-els of work attitudes and correlations between work attitudes, charismatic leadership, and per-formance varied as a function of self-awareness of managers. The practical and research impli-cations of these findings are discussed. The assessment and training of self-regulation (e.g., self-awareness, emo-tional intelligence, 360-degree and upward feedback) are growing in popu-larity as managers and researchers have recognized that individuals are only marginally controllable by external organizational controls, yet significantly motivated by internal attitudes and self-regulation mechanisms (Church & Waclawski, 1999; Goleman, 1998; Yammarino & Atwater, 1997). Self-awareness is a self-regulation mechanism that enables one to work coopera-tively (Levasseur, 1991), seek feedback from others (Atwater & Yammarino, 1997), and adjust one’s attitudes and behaviors to adapt to organizational demands and contexts (Baumeister & Tice, 1986; Tsui & Ashford, 1994). Work attitudes (e.g., trust and organizational commitment) also may serve as internal behavioral controls, potentially substituting for external I thank Maureen Bezold, Veronica Godshalk, Howard Lin, and the anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments