The Competent School Principal: Personality Traits and Professional Skills

Abstract

Purpose: The purpose of the present research was to study school principals’ perceived sense of professional self-efficacy, in an attempt to unveil its unique components, and to substantiate a Traits-Skills conceptualization of a competent school principal. Design: 550 serving school principals filled out a self-report questionnaire, which contained items describing common school principals’ tasks and routine assignments. Respondents reported how well they were able to execute each of those tasks or assignments under restricting circumstances. Facet Theory was the methodological approach for designing the study and data processing, using Smallest Space Analysis. Findings: The study provided empirical evidence in support of the Traits-Skills conceptualization of a competent school principal comprising 1) Four traits: Intra-personal human ability; Inter-personal (social) human ability; Strategic intra-organizational (conceptual) ability; and Inter-organizational (political) strategic ability, and 2) Five administrative skills: General management; Staff management; School general leadership; Instructional leadership; External relations. Originality and Social Implications: The Traits-Skills conceptualization of the competent principal can be instrumental in bringing about an analytical view of principals’ sense of professional self-efficacy. It can also serve as a guide to selecting candidates for principalship positions and to their training.