The Impact of Personality and Competence of Leaders on Business Success

Purpose: This article aims to identify leaders’ personality and competence traits that determine success for Polish small and medium-sized enterprises. Design/Methodology/Approach: Empirical data are selected from an experimental survey conducted by the Statistics Poland from December 2017 to January 2018 as part of the Determinants of Entrepreneurship Developments in the SMEs Sector project. We used 20959 surveys of enterprises in which the leader (an owner or a manager) played a dominant role. To test the dependence of measures of success (selected aspects of changes in enterprises) and assessments of the importance of personality and competence features of leaders, we built appropriate contingency tables and used the Pearson chi-square independence test. We also applied logistic regression and calculated the appropriate odds ratios. Findings: When estimating logistic parameters, we obtained a model with five statistically significant variables: beliefs about the possibility of achieving set goals; high aspirations and constant search for new challenges; passion and commitment; fluency in foreign languages; and knowledge of the company’s market. Practical implications: The results of this research suggest for enterprises a need for pro-development activities in the field of managerial competencies.