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Dissertation Abstract: Olga Epitropaki

"From ideal leaders to actual managers: A longitudinal investigation of Implicit Leadership Theories, Leader-Member Exchanges, transformational leadership and employee outcomes" focused on the Information-Processing approach to leadership mainly initiated by Robert Lord and his associates (e.g., Lord, 1985; Lord & Maher, 1993) that suggested that work group members, through socialization and past experiences with leaders, develop Implicit Leadership Theories (ILTs), i.e. personal assumptions about the traits and abilities that characterize an ideal business leader. In their subsequent interactions with actual managers employees are assumed to use ILTs as a benchmark in order to form an impression of their manager and they recognize implicit leadership traits as part of the manager's profile (this variable is called ILTs Recognition in my research). Main purpose of my Ph.D. research was to offer a "real-world" test of the information-processing approach in organizational settings and further integrate three predominant leadership theories, i.e., Information-processing or Implicit Leadership Theories (ILTs), Leader-Member Exchange (LMX) and transformational leadership within the same empirical framework.

In more detail, my dissertation had a three-fold purpose: (a) to investigate ILTs factor structure, generalizability and stability over time in a British work context; (b) to test the impact of ILTs Recognition on LMX and transformational leadership, and subsequently on employees’ organizational commitment, job satisfaction, and well-being; and (c) to assess the proposed relationships longitudinally. First, a pilot-study was conducted, focusing only on ILTs, on a sample of 500 full-time employed British citizens. Exploratory factor analyses suggested a 6-factor structure of ILTs (four positive or prototypic: Sensitivity, Intelligence, Motivation, and Dynamism; and two negative or anti-prototypic: Tyranny and Masculinity). Second, the main study of the thesis utilized a two-wave panel design. 439 employees of seven organizations participated in the first wave, whereas 271 of them took part again one year after. Regarding the first purpose of the thesis, confirmatory factor analyses provided further evidence for ILTs 6-factor structure, and supported ILTs generalizability. Also, panel data analyses and tests of alpha, beta, and gamma change supported ILTs stability over time. Second, a set of models linking ILTs, ILTs Recognition, KMX, transformational leadership and employee outcomes were tested by Structural Equation Modeling techniques. Results supported the main proposition that ILTs Recognition was a significant predictor of LMX and transformational leadership. The more prototypic attributes employees recognized in their manager the better the quality of LMX and the more transformational the manager was perceived. On the other hand, recognition of anti-prototypic traits had a negative effect on LMX and transformational leadership perceptions. Mainly indirect effects were found for ILTs Recognition on employee outcomes, through LMX and transformational leadership. Finally, panel data analyses found increases in Prototype Recognition to promote LMX and transformational leadership, whereas increases in Anti-prototype Recognition to have a detrimental impact. Also increases in LMX and transformational leadership were found to promote employees' outcomes. In overall, my study took the information-processing approach out of the "lab" and brought it into the "real-world" and showed it to be an important explanatory framework for understanding leadership phenomena in modern organizations.