IOHRM’s very own, Dr. Jacqui Bergman, a professor in the management department, brought an insightful research project to a conference this past weekend. In a significant step towards understanding the connection of leadership and personality, a research project that initially began as a senior honors thesis, written by student Sara Todd, recently made its debut at the Southern Management Association (SMA) Conference in St. Pete Beach, Florida. The study sought to investigate the connection between an individual's Big Five personality traits and their preference for specific leadership styles.
The project, presented at the conference by Jacqui, started as a senior honors thesis. It aimed to unravel the connection between follower personalities and their preference for particular leadership styles. The central hypothesis was whether an individual's Big Five personality traits could be linked to their preference for different leadership styles. After thoroughly reviewing more recent literature since the thesis was complete, Jacqui and one of the manuscript co-authors, Kwani Taylor, a current second-year IOHRM student, worked to include new findings in the research project. They worked to incorporate more recent academic sources and reanalyzed the data. Following these updates, Jacqui submitted their work to the SMA Conference to share their findings with other researchers and professionals.
This year, the SMA Conference featured a new and unique presentation format. Rather than traditional lecture-style sessions, the conference offered round table discussions, with each room having five tables, and each table hosting three papers on a particular topic. Jacqui presented this work with two other researchers studying leadership. This format allowed conference attendees to join the table or topic that most piqued their interest. The round table discussions offered an intimate atmosphere where Jacqui was able to present a summary of her and her co-authors' work and engage in in-depth discussions with the attendees. Jacqui was delighted with the engaging atmosphere and found other papers presented at the Leadership table to be both interesting and a great way to share ideas with one another. The setting encouraged attendees to ask questions and provide suggestions, leaving Jacqui with both new ideas and key takeaways for future research.
What makes this project even more noteworthy is that Shawn Bergman, one of the co-authors, was also a part of the honors thesis committee for the original manuscript. His involvement highlights the journey of this project, from its original inception to conference presentation years later. This research project's journey, from a senior honors thesis to a conference presentation at the SMA Conference, showcases the importance of academic curiosity and the continuous pursuit of knowledge. The study's findings contribute to our understanding of the relationship between personality and leadership preferences, and Jacqui was ecstatic to be involved in both the project itself and the unique form of presentation the conference hosted. Thank you, Jacqui, for all that you do!
