Toward a more political perspective of leader effectiveness: Leader political support construct validation

Organizations long have been referred to as political arenas which leaders must navigate with skill and savvy. However, investigations of the role of leader political behavior on leader effectiveness largely have been avoided, perhaps due to historically negative connotations of organizational politics. Recently, a base of conceptual literature has begun to grow regarding the positive possibilities of organizational politics, including the potential benefits followers may reap from leaders' political support. However, empirical research testing the theoretical tenets of leader political support (LPS) is lacking. Thus, the purpose of this investigation was to advance a more political perspective of leader effectiveness by developing and validating a psychometrically sound measure of LPS. Using a multi-phase, six-sample approach, we provide evidence of content validity, internal consistency, convergent validity, discriminatory validity, and criterion-related validity of our measure of LPS. These findings advance knowledge by demonstrating that leaders' political behavior contributes to their effectiveness across a number of different conceptualizations. Additionally, the validation of the construct facilitates future research on LPS that can further evaluate its importance for leaders and their followers.