A Measure of Leader Adaptive Self-Efficacy
Open Access
- Author:
- Jayne, Bradley Steven
- Graduate Program:
- Psychology
- Degree:
- Doctor of Philosophy
- Document Type:
- Dissertation
- Date of Defense:
- February 23, 2018
- Committee Members:
- Samuel Todd Hunter, Dissertation Advisor/Co-Advisor
Samuel Todd Hunter, Committee Chair/Co-Chair
Kisha Shannon Jones, Committee Member
Rick R Jacobs, Committee Member
Donald C Hambrick, Outside Member - Keywords:
- Adaptive Leadership
Leadership
Scale Development - Abstract:
- Adaptive leadership is of growing importance in an increasing global, fast-paced business environment (Yukl & Mahsud, 2010). However, current research relies heavily on behavior-based measures. In the present research, we explore a new antecedent of adaptive leadership, leader adaptive self-efficacy, we believe adds key insights to the literature. In doing so, we integrate adaptive leadership theory with self-efficacy theory to provide a cognitive approach to adaptive leadership theory. In this paper, we first define leader adaptive self-efficacy and develop a measure. Our initial construct validation efforts demonstrate support for the proposed single-factor solution and show adequate reliability. Next, we test the convergent, divergent, and criterion validity of the measure across multiple samples. The results demonstrate mixed support for our hypotheses. While many of the proposed relationships between leader adaptive self-efficacy and other constructs are supported, some hypothesized relationships with important criterion constructs are not supported. Specifically, we find that leader adaptive self-efficacy is not significantly related to ambidextrous leadership, the subordinate-rated leader adaptive behavior measure included in the study. However, leader adaptive self-efficacy is related to leader-rated behavioral adaptability, thus providing some support for our criterion-related hypotheses. This research provides a measure of leader adaptive self-efficacy and provides evidence of its validity for use in psychological research. We provide a discussion of our measure’s impact on adaptive leadership theory and make suggestions for future research.