GM586 Unit 3 MLQ Self-Rating Interpretation Example

Rated Higher by Me, Except on Watching Over Catering: A Unit 3 Interpretation of Full Range Self and Rater Scores

[Student Name]

Purdue University Global

GM586: Transformational Leadership

Unit 3 Self-Rating Interpretation

[Instructor Name]

[Date]

The university dining operation, the writer, the raters and every score are composite and illustrative; the instrument and research cited are real.

The Instrument and the Raters

I completed the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire self form, and seven people completed the rater form: the director of dining services, two peer managers and four kitchen and catering supervisors who report to me. Each item asks how often the leader shows a behavior, using a five-point frequency scale scored 0 through 4, and the items are grouped into the scales of the full range model (Avolio & Bass, 2004). The instrument is licensed, so this paper reports scale scores only and quotes no items.

The Scores

I report each scale as my self score followed by the mean of the seven raters, and I mark a gap where the two differ by more than half a point.

Idealized influence, combining attributes and behaviors: self 3.2, raters 2.9. No marked gap.

Inspirational motivation: self 3.0, raters 2.8. No marked gap.

Intellectual stimulation: self 3.4, raters 2.4. A gap of a full point, with me higher.

Individualized consideration: self 3.6, raters 2.7. A gap of 0.9, with me higher.

Contingent reward: self 3.1, raters 3.0. Close agreement.

Management by exception, active: self 1.5, raters 2.6. A gap of 1.1, with raters higher.

Management by exception, passive: self 0.8, raters 1.1. No marked gap.

Laissez-faire: self 0.4, raters 0.6. No marked gap.

John Fleenor and colleagues' review of self-other agreement found that leaders' self-ratings are commonly higher than others' ratings, and that leaders who overrate themselves tend to be seen as less effective (Fleenor et al., 2010). My two highest self scores, on the scales most associated with being a good boss, are the two where I overrate the most. That fits the pattern. My active management score runs the other way.

Testing the Gaps Against the Record

A gap is a difference in perception, not a finding about behavior. To test each one, I read the minutes of the last eight menu-planning meetings, which I chair, and my sent messages to the four supervisors over the same two months.

Intellectual stimulation. I believe I invite new ideas. The minutes show that in six of eight meetings, I presented a menu rotation or a pricing decision and then asked for comments. In only two did I ask the group for ideas before I had a proposal. Ideas that supervisors offered after I had presented were adopted three times out of eleven. My raters seem to have seen what the minutes show: I ask for views after I have decided, which feels like inviting ideas to me and like asking for approval to them.

The minutes show me asking for ideas after I had already decided, which felt like stimulation to me and like a request for approval to the people in the room.

Individualized consideration. I believe I know my supervisors as individuals. My messages show regular contact with all four, but almost all of it concerns tasks. Over two months, I found three messages that asked about a supervisor's development or interests, all to the same person. Bass and Riggio describe individualized consideration as attending to each follower's needs for growth, acting as a coach or mentor (Bass & Riggio, 2006). The record shows attention to the work, not to the person.

Contingent reward. Close agreement here makes sense. I set clear targets for food cost and waste, and supervisors know what earns recognition. The minutes record targets and results at every meeting.

Active management by exception. I believe I delegated catering orders to the catering supervisor last year. My messages show I checked 27 catering orders over two months, often asking for the head count and menu before the supervisor had confirmed them with the client. I thought of these as quick questions. The catering supervisor, and probably others who saw the pattern, experienced them as monitoring. The raters saw more of this behavior than I did because I did not recognize it as monitoring at all.

Leanne Atwater and Francis Yammarino found that self-other agreement on leadership ratings affected how well those ratings predicted performance, and that leaders who overestimated themselves were often less effective than their self-ratings suggested (Atwater & Yammarino, 1992). The value of the gaps is that they point to behaviors I had not seen in myself.

Why I Saw Myself Differently

Each gap has a plausible reason, and naming it helps me trust the evidence rather than argue with it. On intellectual stimulation, I judge myself by my intentions: I want ideas, so I think I invite them. My raters judge me by what happens in the room, where a finished proposal arrives first. On individualized consideration, I count every conversation as attention, because I care about my supervisors. They count only the conversations that are about them. On active monitoring, the gap is reversed for a similar reason. I remember my catering questions as small and helpful, one at a time, while the catering supervisor experiences all 27 together as a steady signal that I do not trust her judgment.

In each case I rated the behavior from the inside and my raters rated it from the outside. The questionnaire asks about behavior others can observe, so on these scales the outside view is probably closer to what the instrument means to measure. That is the main reason I take the gaps seriously, even though seven raters is a small group.

Limits

Seven raters is a small number, and the mean can be moved by one person. My four supervisors may rate active monitoring higher because they are the ones being monitored. The director, who sees me in different meetings, may see less of it. Scale scores also compress many behaviors into one number. The minutes and messages help, but they do not capture what I say in passing in the kitchen.

The Scale for the Development Plan

I will focus a later development plan on intellectual stimulation. It has the largest gap in my favor, the minutes give a clear baseline, and the behavior, asking for ideas before deciding, is something I can practice in meetings I already chair. The active monitoring finding matters too, but it may improve as a side effect: if I ask supervisors for their ideas before I decide, I may trust their decisions enough to stop checking them.

References

Atwater, L. E., & Yammarino, F. J. (1992). Does self-other agreement on leadership perceptions moderate the validity of leadership and performance predictions? Personnel Psychology, 45(1), 141-164. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1744-6570.1992.tb00848.x

Avolio, B. J., & Bass, B. M. (2004). Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire: Manual and sampler set (3rd ed.). Mind Garden.

Bass, B. M., & Riggio, R. E. (2006). Transformational leadership (2nd ed.). Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Fleenor, J. W., Smither, J. W., Atwater, L. E., Braddy, P. W., & Sturm, R. E. (2010). Self-other rating agreement in leadership: A review. The Leadership Quarterly, 21(6), 1005-1034. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.leaqua.2010.10.006