Leadership, Management, and Team Practices in Research Labs: Development and Validation of Two New Measures

Effective leadership and management practices in research labs contribute to responsible, high-quality research and the well-being of lab members. This paper describes the development and initial validation of two measures. One assesses principal investigators’ leadership and management practices in the lab, and the second gauges related research team practices. Using a cross-sectional survey design, 570 postdoctoral researchers funded by the National Institutes of Health reported on the perceived behaviors of their principal investigator (PI) and the research team. The new PI leadership and management items factored into two dimensions: fostering relationships and directing research. Associations of these new scales with existing, validated measures of ethical leadership and general leader behavior provided evidence for their convergent validity. Scores on the new measures predicted three important outcomes: lab climate for research ethics, self-reported productivity, and job satisfaction. Research team practices provided additional predictive value above and beyond the PIs’ leadership and management behaviors. These findings provide evidence for criterion-related validity. Overall, this study provides evidence for the construct validity of the new Leadership and Management in Science (LAMPS) Measure and the Research Team Practices (RTP) Measure. Qualitative responses to an open-ended survey item reinforced the importance of practices focused on relationships and directive supervision for a positive lab environment. These measures can be useful tools for future research and might be valuable for PIs looking to obtain feedback about their leadership and management practices.manage