Competency means a relatively long-lasting way of behavior and thinking as a personal internal property that generally appears in various situations. This study aimed at examining elements of competency necessary for leaders who lead innovation of a r...
Competency means a relatively long-lasting way of behavior and thinking as a personal internal property that generally appears in various situations. This study aimed at examining elements of competency necessary for leaders who lead innovation of a rural community recently faced with the crisis and opportunity of Korea-U.S. FTA and support by central and local governments, respectively. To do this, two researches were conducted.
Research 1 implemented semi-structured in-depth interviews with 10 leaders in successful rural communities to analyze cases collected and examine competency. As a result, 16 elements of competency were drawn for leaders in rural communities: effective communication, rural community formation, vision presentation, morality, devotion to a rural community, patience, positive thinking, internal locus of control, firm belief, passion for a rural community, wide personal relations, cultivation of talented people, continuous critical mind, self-development, problem-solving ability, and competency for understanding problems with a rural community. On the basis of these results, questionaries were developed to measure competency of rural community leaders.
Research 2 confirmed criterion-related validity and usefulness of competencies found in Research 1 through a quantitative test with a survey. As a result, a total of 11 competencies, including effective communication, rural community formation, morality, devotion to a rural community, positive thinking, firm belief, passion for a rural community, wide personal relations, cultivation of talented people, and problem-solving competency, had criterion-related validity confirmed, showing correlation with leadership effectiveness variables. The 16 competency elements had a significant amount of explanation about other remaining leadership effectiveness variables than the extent of external project attraction. These results generally supported the results of Research 1 and verified appropriateness of the developed scale. There were significant differences in leadership effectiveness by the upper and lower groups of competency, supporting the results of Research 1 as a whole.
Research 2 also examined relations between leadership effectiveness variables and leadership competency in rural communities as a sum of criterion-related questions. As a result, leadership competency in rural communities was significantly correlated with leader perception of rural community citizenship behaviors, leader perception of leader satisfaction, leader perception of rural community cohesiveness, leader perception of rural community productivity, and leaders' rural community commitment. There were also significant differences in leader perception of rural community citizenship behaviors, leader perception of leader satisfaction, leader perception of rural community cohesiveness, and leaders' rural community commitment by the upper and lower groups of leadership competency in rural communities.
Finally, discussion were held about theoretical suggestions and practical implication of this study and its limitations and future research tasks were presented.