ABSTRACT
Competency-based approaches emphasize the role of individuals in leadership processes and applied utility in theory development. The competencies that are used are derived from a variety of sources or a combination thereof: theoretical perspective, inductive analyses, best-practice surveys, literature reviews, and so on. Competency-based leadership approaches, like all approaches and theories, are limited in their utility based on what they seek to describe, explain, or predict. Critiques sometimes wrongly target the theory when they are actually critiquing the purpose. In the practical dimension, competency-based approaches tend to dominate the training and development arena because it is easy to integrate individual trait studies with the experience and insight of experienced leaders. Competency approaches have been important in all positions since the scientific management revolution of the early twentieth century. Competency-based leadership approaches tend to summarize the state of the art and provide integrative theories from an individual perspective.
