Validating the Ready, Willing, and Able Leader Scale of Student Leadership Capacity

Abstract

Numerous difficulties exist in employing psychometrically sound quantitative measures of leadership development that are both generalizable and brief. Here, we highlight our efforts in creating the Ready, Willing, and Able Leader (RWAL) Scale. This instrument of leadership capacity: (a) has been psychometrically validated for use with college student populations; (b) includes measures of leadership capacity that are known to be essential to effective leadership practice (leader self-efficacy, motivation, and skill); (c) is broad enough for use across diverse educational and developmental contexts; and (d) is brief and concise.

Competitive Team Environments and Student Leader Capacity Growth

“…Each item's 7-point Likert-based response scale ranged from "strongly disagree" to "strongly agree." The RWAL scale is relatively new, having been recently tested and validated(Rosch & Collins, 2020).Within our current study, the alpha reliability statistics that emerged from our analysis ranged from barely acceptable (0.63 within the LSE post-test) to quite strong (0.88 within the MTL-AI pre-test). Given these results, we elected to continue with our analysis.To measure coach support, we used an adapted version of the Mentoring for Leadership Development scale created and employed within the Multi-Institutional Study of Leadership Development (MSL).…”

“…The definition of "leadership capacity" continues to serve as a relatively contested concept within leadership scholarship (Dugan, 2017). However, some research (e.g., Hannah & Avolio, 2010;Rosch & Collins, 2020) and Able" model of leadership (Keating, Rosch, & Burgoon, 2014), represents the central construct within which we evaluated student growth upon within this study. In the model, leadership skill ("Able") consists of a combination of transformational and transactional skills (Rosch & Collins, 2020) originally developed as part of the transformational leadership theories (Bass & Avolio, 1994) and measured within the Transformational Leader Behaviors scale (Podsakoff, et al, 1990).…”

“…However, some research (e.g., Hannah & Avolio, 2010;Rosch & Collins, 2020) and Able" model of leadership (Keating, Rosch, & Burgoon, 2014), represents the central construct within which we evaluated student growth upon within this study. In the model, leadership skill ("Able") consists of a combination of transformational and transactional skills (Rosch & Collins, 2020) originally developed as part of the transformational leadership theories (Bass & Avolio, 1994) and measured within the Transformational Leader Behaviors scale (Podsakoff, et al, 1990). Leader self-efficacy ("Ready") refers to a prospective leader's sense that enacted behaviors would be successful and is related to one's confidence acting as a leader (Hannah, et al, 2008).…”

“…A central aspect to this model of leadership learning is that students must develop capacity within all three areas before leadership behavior might manifest in any given context (Rosch & Collins, 2020). Without motivation to engage in the work of leadership, an emerging leader with skill and self-efficacy might decide to opt out of such work.…”

Gender identity, inter-team competition and leader self-efficacy developmental trajectories in a multi-institutional leader development program

“…The survey at the beginning of the CLC experience early in the Spring semester included demographic items inviting participants, in part, to share their gender identity. In addition, it included a measure of leader self-efficacy adapted from the Ready-Willing-Able measure of overall leader capacity (Rosch & Collins, 2020), which has been employed in past research involving student leadership educational initiatives. CLC participants were again invited to complete the same measure of leader self-efficacy on the day of their competition in April, and then again were invited to complete a final measure of their leader self-efficacy at least four months later.…”