European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology

Leader Behaviours and their Perception across Organizational Levels

Leader behaviours and their perception across organisational levels are a critical and evolving area in leadership research (e.g. Bono et al., 2012; Harms & Spain, 2014; Lord & Dinh, 2014; Martinko et al., 2007). In particular, the distinction between leaders’ behaviours and the ways in which these behaviours are perceived by others have been widely discussed in the field. While there have been recent calls among leadership scholars to focus more on leader behaviours rather than to rely on how they are perceived (Banks, 2023; Banks et al., 2023; Fischer et al., 2023; Fischer & Sitkin, 2023), understanding leadership requires an examination of how leader behaviours are enacted and interpreted across different levels of the organization.

The topic is relevant both for theory and practice as it relates to the ongoing debate on how leadership should be measured, developed, and defined. Research shows that to get a more complete picture of leadership effectiveness, there is a need to focus on both leader behaviours and how these behaviours are perceived and interpreted by different actors within the organization (Hogan & Kaiser, 2005; Lord & Dinh, 2014). Leadership research often splits behaviour and perception, sometimes even treating them as rival lenses. This special issue brings them together by asking how behaviour changes across settings and how different groups make sense of those changes. By proposing such themes as a bilateral relationship between leader behaviours and their perception, as well as the dynamics of this relationship over time, this special issue hopes to showcase research demonstrating the value of studying both “sides of the coin”.

In addition, we hope to encourage submissions on many current and underexplored topics that would advance our understanding of leadership as a process in a complex, modern workplace. For instance, perceptions of leader behaviour outside of the dyad of leader and follower are not well understood yet. Also, more research is needed on discrepancies between leader intentions and follower perception of intentions, especially in polarized social contexts and new forms of work.

Moreover, the topic has key importance for practice and the elaboration of leadership training programs. The effectiveness of such programs depends on a strong foundation of scientific evidence (Leroy et al., 2024), which can only be achieved by gaining a deep understanding of both enacted leader behaviours and how they are interpreted by perceivers at different levels in the organization.

Finally, incorporating within- and between-person methods at various levels of analysis is essential to fully capture the complexity of leaders’ actions and their interactions with followers. In this special issue, we aim to contribute to a deeper understanding of leadership dynamics and to the development of more effective leadership practices.

For this special issue, we seek contributions considering, but not limited to, the following areas:

1. Theory development

• Theoretical models proposing new or conceptually advanced configurations of leader behaviour and its perceptions, which consider the role of new working contexts in shaping leader behaviours and their perceptions.
• Multi-level conceptualizations of the impact of leader behaviour at multiple levels of organizations with a view to understand how and why perceptions across levels differ.

2. Underlying processes and contexts

• Studies including models that explain why and under which conditions leader behaviour and its perceptions affect workplace outcomes, notably when leaders and others differ in their perceptions/(perceived) intentions or when behaviour is perceived as inconsistent or ambivalent.
• Research that investigates polarisation in follower perceptions—why perceptions of the same behaviour may diverge significantly.

3. Interplay between different actors in organizations

• Studies looking at leader and follower behaviour and their interaction, such as how behaviours from one party trigger behavioural reactions of the other party and what that means for an effective collaboration.
• Studies considering the role of organisational hierarchy in how leaders behave and how their behaviour is perceived.
• Contributions considering interactions between personality traits (e.g., leader–follower trait congruence) in shaping behavioural expressions and perceptual accuracy; team outcomes of leader behaviour, for example, perception differences between team members and how this affects outcomes; and relative leader behaviour, that is, perceptions of how one follower is treated compared to others.

4. Methodological advancements

• Studies that develop and validate new measures of leader behaviour (e.g., behavioural indicators).
• Studies that develop new measures that allow for the measurement of perceptual biases in leadership ratings and studies using advanced statistical approaches (e.g., polynomial regression analyses, multilevel modelling, pattern approaches).