Personality Type and Leadership Approach

Effective leadership in public schools includes, but is not limited to being able to communicate goals, set expectations, monitor instructional progress, coordinate the curriculum, and supervise and evaluate faculty (Snowden & Gorton, 2002). All of these leadership skills are driven by a need for leaders to build collaborative rapport and create a positive learning environment for both teachers and students. This study looked at the relationship between personality type as measured by the Keirsey Temperament Sorter (Keirsey & Bates, 1984) and leaders’ preferred leadership approaches as measured by the Instructional Leadership Beliefs Inventory (Glickman, 2002). Although this study found no significant correlations, the data provides insight to help determine how and to what extent personality type is related to a preferred leadership approach.