A Study On Perceived Leadership Soft Skills, Trustworthiness, And Structural Empowerment Of Deans In Three Malaysian Public Universities
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Date
2011
Authors
Md Shahid, Siti Asiah
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Universiti Sains Malaysia
Abstract
This study aimed to examine the leadership soft skills of deans in public
universities of Malaysia. The conceptual framework of this study is based on the model
of leadership soft skills (Crosbie, 2005), the concept of structural empowerment (Kanter,
1977) and the model of organizational trust (Mayer, Davis, and Schoorman, 1995). A
total of 295 support staff grade 17–36 was selected as respondents through stratified
sampling technique. Both methods of data collection, the quantitative and qualitative
methods were utilized to ascertain detailed and in-depth data on how the deans perform
their leadership soft skills were obtained. Findings indicated that deans implemented
moderately all the eight components of leadership soft skills. Structural empowerment
and perceived trustworthiness were significantly related with all the eight components of
leadership soft skills at .01 significant level. The most significant predictor for
perceived trustworthiness was communication skills (β = .351). However, structural
empowerment failed to function as a mediator between leadership soft skills and
perceived trustworthiness. Qualitative findings which showed that all deans were able
to communicate well evidently supported the quantitative findings. Finally, this study
also provides recommendations and suggestions for future research.
Description
Keywords
Leadership Soft Skills , Malaysian Public Universities