Face of a leader

A study that examined the relationship between the width and length of the face of leaders found that the facial structure of a CEO is related to the behavior of his teams and predicts the company's financial performance. Let's find out how it works

Tags: Dr. Miriam Dishon-Berkowitz | Galileo

Leadership researchers have been dealing with the question of whether personality traits predict high leadership ability for many years. This question has remained controversial for years, but recently new research evidence has accumulated that the answer to the question is probably yes.

A second question that has not yet been investigated is whether physical attributes may also predict successful leadership? And here, in a study published in the journal Psychological Science, Elaine Wong, Margaret Ormiston and Michael Hazelhan try to identify physical characteristics of leaders so that these characteristics predict the performance of their organization.

The physical feature examined in the study is the ratio between the width of the face and the length of the leader's face (width-to-height ratio), i.e. WHR. Wider faces are expressed in high WHR while low WHR is expressed in narrow and long faces. Recently it was found in studies that a high WHR indicates a tendency to aggressiveness among men. It was also found that people with a high WHR perceive themselves to be more powerful than people with a lower WHR.

Since other studies have also found a connection between a sense of power and effective leadership, the hypothesis tested in the current study is that organizations whose CEO is a man with a higher WHR will achieve higher financial performance than organizations headed by a male CEO with a lower WHR.
Team sharing and decision making

Since a leader does not influence organizational results alone, but makes decisions with people and with many teams, the study examined the influence of another factor: the cognitive complexity of the teams in the organization (and see below). Teams with low cognitive complexity tend to refer to the world in black and white terms and do not notice subtleties. This tendency is reflected in rigid decision-making, characterized by submission to authority figures, customs and tradition.

Conversely, teams characterized by a high capacity for cognitive complexity tend to notice subtleties and see the world in shades of gray. Their decision-making style is based on examining different and diverse points of view, and they are not afraid to criticize. Since teams with low cognitive complexity are more likely to obey authority, the hypothesis was tested that the relationship between the physical characteristics of the leader (WHR) and the financial performance of the organization would be strengthened among teams characterized by low cognitive complexity.

The study was conducted on a sample of 55 CEOs of companies that are on the list of the top 500 companies in the world, as ranked by the economic magazine Fortune. Among the companies there are computer companies, electronics, clothing and the like. To calculate the WHR of the leader use his picture as it appears on the Internet, usually on the company's website.

Since it is not possible to directly measure the cognitive complexity of the CEO's teams, it was measured as follows: First, the CEO's letters to the shareholders of his organization were collected, in which he reports on the company.

Since the CEO usually does not write these letters himself, but is assisted by several teams, the researchers assumed that these teams wrote the letters. Second, use a method of content analysis accepted in the field. According to this method, lists of words and phrases characterizing high or low levels of cognitive complexity were developed in the past.

Words indicating high cognitive complexity are, for example, "maybe", "about" and "tend to...". Conversely, words and phrases indicating low cognitive complexity include the words and phrases "without a shadow of a doubt", "absolutely" and "irreversibly". The CEOs' letters were examined according to this content analysis method, and were rated as characteristics of teams with a low or high level of cognitive complexity.

Finally, to measure the organization's financial performance, they used a common index in the field, which is return on assets (ROA: a financial index that explains how much revenue the company will generate from each dollar invested in its assets). These data were taken from a database accepted in the field.

From the analysis of the research findings, it became clear that the physical characteristic of the ratio between the width of the CEO's face to their length (WHR) predicts the company's financial performance: companies led by CEOs whose faces are wider, meaning that they are taller, achieved greater financial success. Furthermore, this relationship is amplified among companies whose teams exhibited lower levels of cognitive complexity.

In conclusion, this study joins studies done in recent years that indicate a relationship between the psychological traits of leaders and the performance of companies. And now, all that remains for the company's shareholders is to demand a photo of the candidate for the CEO seat before they make a decision...

The author is a psychologist, an organizational and marketing consultant and a lecturer at the Ono Academic College

The full article was published in Galileo magazine, December 2011