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influence of organizational culture on the risk-taking propensity of student leaders
Colleges and universities pride themselves on their ability to develop students into leaders. Many opportunities are available so students can become involved, develop leadership skills, and have leadership experiences. The hope is that students will take these leadership skills with them and become successful in their post-graduation experiences. One skill, among many identified, that characterizes a successful leader is the ability and willingness to take appropriate risks. And, because leaders influence and are influenced by the culture of the organization within which they lead, it follows that the culture will have some influence on the risk-taking propensity of the leader. There is a dearth of literature on the relationship between organizational culture and behaviors of leaders. This study takes a first step in examining this relationship for college students. One hundred student leaders from a large state university were surveyed regarding their personal propensity and their propensity as a leader of a specific organization. Additionally, the culture of their organization was determined. Hypotheses regarding the relationship between organizational culture and leader's risk propensity, and between risk scores and organizational purpose were tested. A major conclusion from this study is that there is no significant influence of organizational culture on the risk propensity of student leaders for this population. The literature review reveals some possible explanations such as the student's maturity level, level of experience as a leader and within the specific organization, and perception of risk. Programmatic recommendations include holistic training regarding risk and organizational culture for student leaders and for student development professionals, as well as programs that allow students to assess and understand their own risk propensity. Recommendations for research include replication of this study as well as research on group decisions toward risk for student leaders, the effectiveness of theoretical versus experiential training regarding risk for student leaders, more in-depth analysis of particular cultures and risk-taking propensity of student leaders within that culture, and studies of the relationship between various demographic and personal factors and risk-taking propensity.
"Major Subject: Agricultural Education".
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Includes bibliographical references (leaves 86-97).