Objective: This paper aims to reveal differences in students’ and teachers’ perception of the latter’s teaching leadership and discusses the characteristics of effective teaching leadership. Method: The current study investigates students’ and teachers’ perceptions of teaching leadership through questionnaires, divides their perceptive differences into three categories, and compiles interview outlines based on Baker’s Path-Goal theory. These three categories of teachers were selected, resulting in a sample of twenty-five college teachers from China’s coastal area, who were then interviewed in depth. Results: College teachers and students had different perceptions of teaching leaderships, with the most common being students having low evaluations and teachers having high self-evaluations. Six main characteristics of effective teaching leadership of university teachers are summarized from the coding analysis of interview results.
