Wisdom and Leadership: Do wise people perform more efficiently?

Abstract

Many scholars have argued that wisdom might be an important skill contributing to leader performance. Although some support is available for this proposition, strong empirical evidence bearing on this proposition is not available. In the present study, 126 graduates were asked to work on a well-established leadership performance task where participants were to assume the role of principal of an experimental secondary school and prepare plans for leading the school. Plans were appraised for quality, originality, and elegance. Prior to the starting to work on the task, participants completed a new measure of wisdom along with a battery of cognitive a non-cognitive individual difference measures. It was found not only that wisdom was positively related to leader performance but was a strong predictor of performance in leadership roles when compared to other individual difference measures. The implications of these findings for leader assessment and development are discussed. Keywords: leadership, wisdom, leader performance, performance prediction