Understanding How Charismatic School Leaders Affect a Teacher’s Readiness for Change: The Role of Perspective Taking

I examined the effect of school leaders’ charisma on a teacher’s readiness for change mediated through the teacher’s perspective taking—a social cognitive trait of seeing another’s viewpoint. Study participants were 1,195 teachers working in 95 state elementary schools in the Israeli public-school system at the outset of a large-scale organizational change termed “New Horizon”—a top-down reform that includes changes in teachers’ work and professional development, and in principals’ discretion and autonomy. Using multilevel structural equation modeling, results indicated significant positive relationships between charismatic school leaders and a teacher’s readiness for change through the effects of his/her perspective taking.