Role of personality type and leadership style in the choice of the conflict handling style of the college principals and directors of the colleges in the state of Punjab

Abstract

Two hundred and forty three college principals and Directors were surveyed in the state of Punjab in India. The most common conflict handling style among the college Principals and Directors were Compromising and Accommodating. Collaborating and Avoiding were almost at par with each other. Least common style of conflict handling was Competing. Compromising and Accommodating style of conflict handling were most common among the leading personalities ESTJ and ESFJ and with the most common Transformational and Transactional leadership styles. All these factors made the job of college principals in the government as well as in the private sector, very tough and challenging. College Principals and Directors were having their own set of personality type, conflict handling style and a distinct leadership style. In their investigation on the relationship between Big Five personality traits and conflict and facilitation between work and family roles it was found that extraversion was related to greater facilitation between roles but was negatively related to conflict, whereas neuroticism was related to greater conflict but only weakly related to facilitation.