| Implicit Leadership Theory (ILTs), the study of the schema that people use in identifying and labeling others as a leader, has been a topic of research in leadership studies for 40 years. By investigating individuals' internal conception of leaders, researchers are able to better understand leader emergence and leader effectiveness (Lord & Maher, 1991). The research on the generalizability of ILTs from one group to another or one context to another has not produced conclusive results. The stability of ILTs has also not been determined. In this study a sample from was pulled from one academic department within one school. The sample was split into two groups, those that had graduated from the department and had full-time non seasonal work experience and those that were still in their undergraduate program without full-time non seasonal work experience. The entire sample consisted of members from the same generational cohort. The participants completed two different instruments measuring their ILTs and leadership style preferences. The study showed that while there were some consistencies in the ILTs between the two groups there were significant differences in the expectation of some of the leadership characteristics and leadership styles. |
