Where the LPI Began Origins of the Student LPI Instrument Development Pilot-Testing of the Student LPI Empirical Studies About Student LPI's Creators Where the LPI Began The Leadership Practices Inventory (LPI) has its origins in a research project Jim Kouzes and Barry Posner began in 1983. They wanted to know what people did when they were at their "personal best" in leading others. They started with the assumption, however, that they did not have to interview and survey star performers in excellent companies to discover best practices. They assumed that by asking ordinary people to describe extraordinary experiences, they would find patterns of success. They were right. After some preliminary research, Kouzes and Posner devised a personal-best leadership experience survey consisting of 38 open-ended questions. In 25 years, Kouzes and Posner have refined this survey, and performed it on nearly a million of leaders in every field. From an early analysis of the personal-best cases, they developed a model of leadership that consists of what Kouzes and Posner call The Five Practices: Modeling the way Inspiring a shared vision Challenging the process Enabling others to act Encouraging the heart This led them to develop a quantitative instrument - the Leadership Practices Inventory (LPI) - that would measure the leadership practices they uncovered. Back to top Origins of the Student LPI Most of the leadership development programs designed for college students are based on studies and models that were developed for managers in business and public-sector organizations. Serious questions can be raised about whether such models and their concomitant instruments are applicable to college students and collegiate environments, which differ considerably from the environments in which managers operate. One substantive literature review concluded that "valid instruments designed specifically for college students to measure their leadership development did not exist." This assertion is still true today. The Student Leadership Practices Inventory (Student LPI) was developed to fill this gap. Back to top Instrument Development In developing the original Leadership Practices Inventory (LPI), case studies from over 2,500 managers about their personal-best experiences as leaders were collected. Content analyses of these case studies suggested a pattern of behaviors and actions used by people when they were most effective as leaders: Model the Way, Inspire a Shared Vision, Challenge the Process, Enable Others to Act, and Encourage the Heart. The development of a student version of the instrument followed the same case-study approach to investigate whether the leadership behaviors of college students were comparable with those of managers. The initial student group consisted of outstanding student leaders at a large urban state university campus, as demonstrated by their nomination for a nationally prominent leadership development experience for college students. Four students were randomly selected by year in school (junior or senior) and gender (male or female) to participate in this stage of the research project. The students were asked to think about their personalbest leadership experiences and to make notes about the behaviors they believed were most critical to the success of their endeavors. One week later, in a structured-interview format, each student responded to specific questions based on the personal-best survey reported in The Leadership Challenge. The interviews lasted between 30 and 90 minutes; each was tape-recorded with the respondent's consent. The student interviews were content-analyzed for themes (sentences or phrases) about leadership actions and behaviors. These themes were coded and tabulated into the five leadership categories that had been originally proposed from private-sector and public-sector managers. These findings indicated that college student leaders did engage in these leadership practices and that this conceptual framework was relevant to the college student's leadership experience. A recent study followed a similar process for validating the appropriateness of the personal-best leadership case study methodology and Student LPI for use with college students. Back to top Pilot-Testing of the Student LPI Each statement on the original LPI was assessed in terms of its congruence with the themes derived from case studies of students' personal-best leadership experiences. The purpose of this coding was to determine which LPI statements accurately reflected the behavior of student leaders, thus facilitating the process of identifying terminology and concepts appropriate for use with a college-student population. Using this data, items were modified as necessary for use in the pilot version of the Student LPI. The pilot version of the Student LPI consisted of 30 descriptive statements paralleling those found in the original LPI. Each of the five leadership practices was assessed with six statements on the Student LPI, and each was measured with a five-point Likert scale (where 1 meant "rarely" and 5 meant "very frequently"). The statements focused on leadership behaviors and on the frequency with which the individual engaged in those particular behaviors. Twenty-three members from the student senate at a small private suburban college campus were asked to serve as the test site for studying the pilot version of the Student LPI. After these students completed the pilot version, they participated in an item-by-item discussion to determine whether any test statements were ambiguous, confusing, or not applicable to their experience as student leaders. This discussion was tape-recorded. Of the 30 test items, 25 (83 percent) were unanimously determined to be clear and understandable and to consist of terminology and concepts that were within students' and student leaders' experience. Ways to improve the somewhat problematic remaining items were also discussed and determined. Five student leaders who had not been involved with any of the earlier Student LPI efforts were invited to participate in a focus-group discussion of the revised Student LPI, and only very minor editorial changes were suggested. Back to top Empirical Studies A large number of empirical studies using the Student LPI have been conducted. For example, fraternity chapter presidents across the United States completed the Student LPI-Self and had the members of their executive committees complete the Student LPIObserver. The members of the executive committees also assessed the effectiveness of their chapter presidents along several dimensions, for example: building team spirit, representing the chapter to administrators and alumni, meeting chapter objectives, facilitating volunteers, and so on. The most effective chapter presidents engaged in each of the five leadership practices significantly more frequently than did their less effective counterparts. Studies of sororities, resident advisors, and orientation advisors all reported similar findings. Moreover, studies demonstrated that engagement in the five practices was unaffected by various characteristics of the group setting such as age, race, gender, compensation for a leadership position, election into a leadership position versus those in nonhierarchical positions, and full-time or part-time student status. In addition, it has been demonstrated that students do not vary their leadership practices when involved in a one-time leadership project versus a project or program lasting for an entire academic year. However, students who returned for a second year in a leadership position or had taken a leadership course generally engaged in each of the five leadership practices more often than their counterparts. Several studies have shown that participation in a leadership development program resulted in significantly higher leadership practices scores compared to those students who had not been through a program. These findings were independent of such demographic variables as year in school, family cluster affiliation, gender, GPA, Greek affiliation, or ethnicity. While the previous discussion generally focused on validity, as a psychometric instrument the Student LPI has generally shown strong reliability. Overall, the Student LPI shows consistent relationships with various measures of effectiveness, as reported across multiple constituencies. Moreover, the Student LPI is robust across different collegiate student populations (for example, fraternities, sororities, residence halls, orientation programs, academic majors, and the like). It is relatively independent of various demographic variables (gender, age, ethnicity, and so on) but possibly affected by previous leadership experiences and leadership course work. More in-depth information on the empirical studies, including research findings and internal reliability scores can be found in the Facilitator's Guide. Back to top About Student LPI's Creators LPI and Student LPI creators Jim Kouzes and Barry Posner are preeminent researchers, award-winning writers, and highly sought after teachers in the field of leadership. Their groundbreaking studies, pioneered in 1983, led them to create a model of leadership that has been embraced by nearly a million leaders from around the world. Writers Their first book, The Leadership Challenge, was named book-of-the-year by the American Council of Health Care Executives, received the Critic's Choice Award from U.S. book review editors, and has been translated into more than 15 languages. Credibility, their second book, was named one of the five top business books by Industry Week. A Leader's Legacy is their collection of 22 powerful essays examining the ways in which leaders can have a lasting impact Researchers As Kouzes and Posner have continued to expand their research and writing, all their leadership guides and teaching tools have attracted a wide audience and consistent praise. The Leadership Practices Inventory (LPI), the Student LPI, LPI Online, and Student LPI Online are powerful instruments that make leadership teachable and learnable and have set the industry standard. The inventory and supporting products have been used successfully by businesses, schools, and nonprofit organizations and have been verified and validated by more than 100 independent researchers. Teachers and Leaders Jim Kouzes is chairman emeritus of the Tom Peters Company. Barry Posner is dean of the Leavey School of Business and professor of leadership at Santa Clara University. Jim and Barry are frequent conference speakers, and each has conducted leadership development programs for hundreds of organizations, including: Alcoa Applied Materials ARCO AT&T Australia Post Bank of America Bose Charles Schwab Cisco Systems Conference Board of Canada Consumers Energy Dell Computer Deloitte + Touche Egon Zehnder International Federal Express Gymboree Hewlett-Packard IBM Johnson & Johnson Kaiser Foundation Health Plans and Hospitals Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories Leadership Greater Hartford Levi Strauss & Co. L. L. Bean 3M Merck Mervyn's Motorola Network Appliance Pacific Telesis Roche Bioscience Siemens Sun Microsystems TRW Toyota U.S. Postal Service United Way VISA To learn more about Jim Kouzes, Barry Posner, and The Leadership Challenge series of books, audios, videos, training materials, and workshops, check out the Leadership Challenge Website. Back to top

To learn more about Student LPI, Kouzes and Posner, and the Leadership Challenge Model, visit the Leadership Challenge Website.

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