Exploring the Motivation to Lead in a Demanding Environment: The Role of Achievement Values, Grit, and Psychological Capital

Abstract

As leaders across organizational contexts continue to face volatile and often stressful environments, a greater understanding of the psychological underpinnings of the motivation to lead (MTL) in challenging circumstances is needed. Based on a sample of 242 cadets holding leadership positions in a military college, we utilized a distal and proximal conceptualization of MTL to test achievement values, grit, and psychological capital (PsyCap) as antecedents to the three factors of MTL. Controlling for gender, prior leadership positions, and leader tenure, regression modeling revealed grit and achievement values to be positively associated with affective/identity MTL, while PsyCap was positively associated with all three MTL factors. In addition, PsyCap mediated the relation between grit and all three MTL factors. Our findings suggest that PsyCap plays a critical proximal role in MTL in demanding environments, and further implications for research and practice are discussed.