Traits of Leaders and Active Listening

Abstract

Listening is an important managerial competency which contributes to managerial effectiveness and also contributes to many positive outcomes at organizational and individual level. In this paper, we investigate, the relationship between personality types and listening styles with a view to find specific listening styles appropriate to different personality types. We have argued that active listening is impacted by the traits leaders have. Employing the well-established taxonomy of the Big-Five traits, we have formulated five propositions predicting the likely impact of each of these traits on active listening. Extraversion and neuroticism are likely to take a leader away from active listening, but the other three traits—agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness to new experiences—seem to enable active listening. We have also discussed the implications of our work for theory and practice.