Leaders's language and employee proactivity: Enhancing psychological meaningfulness and vitality

Today's volatile environment and pressure for continuous improvement require leaders to play a central role in fostering and nurturing employee proactivity. Effective leaders use their communication skills as a key tool to motivate employees to achieve organizational goals. In this study, we tested a model in which leader motivating language (manifested as direction-giving, empathetic, and meaning-making language) fosters the development of employee proactive behavior by shaping a psychological context of meaningfulness and cultivating a motivational state of employee vitality. The findings indicate that the leader motivating language is related directly and indirectly, through psychological meaningfulness, to employee vitality. We also found that psychological meaningfulness and employee vitality are mediating mechanisms through which leader motivating language can result in enhanced employee proactivity. This study advances theory and research on employee proactivity as a contingency of leadership motivating language by integrating three emerging streams of research—relational leadership, relational communication, and proactivity. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.     

Differentiating transformational and non-transformational leaders on the basis of neurological imaging

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the viability of using neurological imaging to classify transformational leaders, versus non-transformational leaders, as identified through existing psychometric methods. Specifically, power spectral analysis measures based on electroencephalograms (EEG) were used to develop and validate a discriminant function that can classify individuals according to their transformational leadership behavior. Resting, eyes closed EEG was recorded from 19 scalp locations for 200 civilian and military leaders. We also assessed follower or peer perceptions of transformational leadership through the use of the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (MLQ). Our discriminant analysis, which involved a two-step, neural variable reduction and selection process, was 92.5% accurate in its classification of leaders. Patterns in the spectral measures of the brain of leaders, including activity and network dynamic metrics, are discussed as potential correlates of transformational leadership behavior. The current work provides a better understanding of the latent and dynamic neurological mechanisms that may underpin the transformational leadership qualities of individuals.     

Is training leaders in functional leadership a useful tool for improving the performance of leadership functions and team effectiveness?

Departing from the functional leadership model, we propose a team leadership training model as a way to improve the performance of leadership functions and foster team effectiveness. Based on a longitudinal quasi-experimental study involving ninety 6-person teams, 45 trained leaders were compared to 45 untrained leaders at two points in time: before the intervention group was subjected to training experience (time 1), and 6 months after the intervention group had completed their training (time 2). Results showed that, compared to the non-trained leaders, the trained leaders registered an improvement in their enactment of leadership functions. Moreover, these results also showed that training leaders led to an improvement in team effectiveness through the development of team leadership functions. The current findings offer new insights into the way that leaders can improve team effectiveness.     

Leading across language barriers: Managing language-induced emotions in multinational teams

This study shows which negative emotion language barriers can provoke among multinational team (MNT) members and investigates how MNT leaders can successfully mitigate these detrimental effects. Multilingual teams constitute a leadership context of paramount importance in today's organizations, which prior research has neglected. Our study contributes to the literature on MNT leaders' emotion regulation strategies by investigating the specific challenges they face in this setting. We advance research on leadership in teams by exploring successful leadership strategies geared towards addressing language-induced emotions and by demonstrating the positive outcomes of MNT leaders leveraging their power in this context. Our study contributes to research on language barriers in multinational corporations by introducing the interplay of language-induced emotions and leadership to this area. Furthermore, it contributes to emotion-sensitive organizational studies by specifying previously established emotion management models for multilingual environments. On this basis, we draw conclusions for the development of future MNT leaders.     

Leadership to Overcome Resistance to Change

Abstract

The thoughtful behavior analysis of organizational leadership and resistance to change by Goltz and Hietapelto (2002) inspired this follow-up article. Goltz and Hietapelto propose that organizational power is determined by the magnitude, frequency, and quantity of consequences under a person's control, and that people resist change when their consequence control is threatened. This presentation extends the Goltz and Hietapelto article by describing 14 distinctions between management and leadership, and offering 16 guidelines for effective leadership that involve more than consequence control. Thus, while managers obtain their influence by controlling other peoples' consequences, leaders go beyond consequence control to benefit the behaviors and attitudes of their colleagues and coworkers. The leadership guidelines are founded on behavioral research and are relevant and practical for any organizational employee, even those who have only minimal influence on the meaningful consequences of their own and others' work life.     

Responsible leadership development – crucible experiences and power relationships in a global professional services firm

There is increasing consensus that Human Resource Development (HRD) has a central role to play in promoting the principles and practices of corporate responsibility (CR). An important HRD intervention involves developing responsible leaders able to attract support for CR throughout the organisation, but empirical research is lacking in this area. This article contributes to the theoretical and practical knowledge of responsible leadership development (RLD) by addressing two questions: first, how does RLD engender learning that goes beyond basic cognitive awareness? Second, what affects participants’ abilities to manifest this learning in the workplace? A review of the RLD literature reveals a ‘knowing-doing gap’, which, it is posited, may be linked to a lack of theorisation around power. This issue is investigated by means of a case study on a responsible leadership development programme run by a professional services firm. Drawing on Bourdieusian concepts of language and power, the study reveals some of the mechanisms that inspired new socially responsible values whilst also demonstrating some of the contextual barriers inhibiting their manifestation in the workplace. It is argued that HRD professionals need to engage with Bourdieusian ideas of language and power to promote deeper learning around responsible leadership, which can more easily be embedded into the workplace.     

Narcissistic leadership

Narcissism—a personality trait encompassing grandiosity, arrogance, self-absorption, entitlement, fragile self-esteem, and hostility—is an attribute of many powerful leaders. Narcissistic leaders have grandiose belief systems and leadership styles, and are generally motivated by their needs for power and admiration rather than empathetic concern for the constituents and institutions they lead. However, narcissists also possess the charisma and grand vision that are vital to effective leadership. We review and critically assess the theoretical and research literature on narcissistic leaders in order to understand the potential positive and negative consequences of their leadership, the trajectories of their leadership, and the relationship of narcissism to established models of leadership. We conclude that the study of narcissistic leaders is inherently limited in scope, and propose a new definition of narcissistic leadership in order to reframe the discussion and better incorporate the topic of narcissism into the field of leadership studies.     

Beyond (But Including) the CEO: Diffusing Corporate Social Responsibility throughout the Organization through Social Networks

Chief Executive Officers and other organizational leaders can affect how corporate social responsibility initiatives are perceived in their organizations. However, in order to be successful with regard to promoting CSR, leaders need to have strong network competencies and to move beyond charismatic leadership. In this paper we offer a critique of charismatic leadership as it relates to CSR, posit that the intellectual stimulation brought about by transformational leadership is more important in this regard, propose that internal and networking is a leadership competence highly relevant to CSR, and emphasize the importance of working through highly credible opinion leaders in promoting CSR.     

The downside of transformational leadership when encouraging followers to network

Network scholars argue that one responsibility of leaders is to help their followers develop social capital. We suggest that one way leaders do this is by encouraging followers to engage in networking behavior. However, we argue that such encouragement is more effective when leaders are seen as less transformational, because followers are then less able to benefit from their leaders’ social capital. We support our arguments with a study of 142 followers and their leaders. Our findings show that followers engage in greater networking behaviors when encouraged by their leaders to do so, but this association is moderated by leaders’ transformational leadership style such that it is stronger as transformational leadership behaviors decrease. We thus introduce an unrecognized cost of leaders’ transformational leadership behaviors. Our findings contribute to research on networking behavior by investigating the role of transformational leadership style, and suggest avenues for research linking social capital and leadership.     

Benevolence-dominant,authoritarianism-dominant,and classical paternalistic leadership: Testing their relationships with subordinate performance

We propose a new typology of paternalistic leadership styles based on how leaders demonstrate authoritarianism and benevolence, the two essential components of this type of leadership. Benevolence-dominant paternalistic leadership refers to leaders' sole dependence on the use of benevolence without their strong assertion of authority, whereas authoritarianism-dominant paternalistic leadership is based mainly on authoritarianism itself; classical paternalistic leadership, which best fits early observations of paternalistic leaders, refers to the salient combination of both leadership components. We used two distinct samples and methods to test this typology and the association with subordinate performance. Across the two studies, a field investigation with Taiwanese military supervisor-subordinate dyads and a hypothetical scenario experiment with U.S. working adults, we found a positive relationship between classical paternalistic leadership and subordinate performance as strong as that between benevolence-dominant paternalistic leadership and performance. Our findings echo the phenomenon that paternalistic leaders tend to combine benevolence with authoritarianism to affect subordinate performance.     

CEO self-discipline in power use: A key moderator for the effect of CEO power

The effect of CEO power depends ultimately on how it is used (i.e., a CEO’s approach to power use), which may vary from one CEO to another. Notwithstanding extensive research on the effect of CEO power on organizational outcomes, researchers have thus far paid very limited attention to how the effect depends on individual differences. In this study I propose a new construct of CEO self-discipline in power use—defined as a CEO’s appeared conformance to the prescribed leadership norms (in particular, norms regarding how leaders should use their power)—and examine how it moderates the effect of CEO power. With a longitudinal dataset from the U.S. computer hardware and software industries, I found that CEO self-discipline in power use weakened the positive effect of CEO power on performance extremeness and improved the effect of CEO power on firm performance.     

Assassination and leadership: Traditional approaches and historiometric methods

Research on the assassinations and attempted assassinations of leaders seems warranted, as leaders and their interactions with extreme followers (e.g., fanatics) and non-followers (e.g., assassins) can have tremendous consequences not only for the leaders but also their larger collectives (e.g., nations, social movements). Based on the traditional and established leadership approaches of power orientation and outstanding leadership, we explored whether particular types of leaders were more likely victims of assassinations and targets of assassination attempts. Using historiometric methods, we found that socialized as well as pragmatic and ideological leaders were the most frequent victims of assassinations; but personalized as well as pragmatic and ideological leaders were the most frequent targets of assassination attempts; and for U.S. Presidents, socialized charismatics were the most frequent victims of assassinations and targets of assassination attempts. Results regarding leader paranoia, regions of the world, and assassins operating alone or as a group in relation to assassinations and leadership approaches also are presented. Implications of these findings for future leadership research involving leaders and their extreme followers, non-followers, and larger collectives are discussed.     

From solidarity to division: An analysis of Lech Wałęsa's transition to constituted leadership

This essay analyzes the capacity and constraints of authority in the contexts of constituted vs. non-constituted leadership. Using the experience of Lech Wa??sa's transition from the leader of the Solidarity social movement to the president of Poland as a case study, this article evaluates the portability of leadership skills and informal authority to the changing operational context of constituted leadership. It argues that the constraints of formal authority are significantly higher than those imposed on non-constituted leaders. As a result, while constituted leaders may have greater resources available to broadcast power, the allocation of these resources entails higher expectation for their custodians. This analysis concludes that a successful transition from non-constituted to constituted leadership is possible only when the leader manages to build new bases of informal authority. Wa??sa failed to expand his informal authority and was unsuccessful at transferring his leadership skills to the presidency.     

How outstanding leaders lead with affect: An examination of charismatic,ideological, and pragmatic leaders

Frameworks for understanding outstanding leadership have flourished in the past decade. Research into the charismatic, ideological, and pragmatic (CIP) model of leadership in particular has examined how leaders develop mental models, frame visions, communicate goals, and utilize political tactics to form relationships with followers and impact society in meaningful ways. However, a discussion of how these types of leaders use emotions and influence tactics to influence followers and affect society is notably absent in the literature. To fill this gap, the current effort focuses on how charismatic, ideological, and pragmatic leaders differ in their use of emotional displays and influence tactics. Results suggest that the emotional displays and influence tactics that leaders use successfully discriminate between CIP leader types and create expected leader styles. Implications of these findings are also discussed.     

领导与权力分界视野下威权领导本质的探索研究

深入探讨了领导与权力二者在影响员工方面的本质差异,并在此基础上分析和揭示了威权领导的本质。研究结果表明:领导是通过构建领导者和追随者的共同目标来激励追随者积极主动地为实现共同目标而努力的过程,它和运用权力的行为有着本质的区别;威权领导在本质上是充分运用正式权力影响下属的行为。因此,威权“领导”与领导的本质相背离,不应纳入领导行为的范畴。     

Leadership in the Plural

This paper reviews the literature on forms of leadership that in one way or other imply plurality: that is, the combined influence of multiple leaders in specific organizational situations. We identify four streams of scholarship on plural leadership, each focusing on somewhat different phenomena and adopting different epistemological and methodological assumptions. Specifically, these streams focus on sharing leadership in teams, on pooling leadership at the top of organizations, on spreading leadership across boundaries over time, and on producing leadership through interaction. The streams of research vary according to their representations of plural leadership as structured or emergent and as mutual or coalitional. We note tensions between perspectives that advocate pluralizing leadership in settings of concentrated authority and those concerned with channeling the forms of plurality naturally found in diffuse power settings such as professional organizations or inter-organizational partnerships. It is suggested that future research might pay more attention to social network perspectives, to the dynamics of plural leadership, to the role of power, and to critical perspectives on leadership discourse.     

Leadership in small-scale societies: Some implications for theory,research, and practice

Leadership studies concentrate on large-scale societies and organizations with formal hierarchies, large power differences, and diverse membership. Much less is known about leadership in small-scale, homogeneous, and relatively egalitarian societies in which humans have spent most of their existence. We summarize the anthropological literature on leadership from traditional, small-scale societies in terms of (1) the functions and roles of leaders; (2) the traits and behaviors conducive to leader emergence and effectiveness; and (3) the motivations and incentives to assume leadership positions. We address how studies of leadership in small-scale societies inform theory development. By viewing leadership and followership in light of our evolutionary history in small-scale societies, we shed new light on outstanding questions in leadership research and on challenges for leadership practice.     

Animating leadership: Crisis and renewal of governance in 4 mythic narratives

This paper analyzes four animated films in order to explore themes of leadership crises and leadership emergence. Drawing on psychoanalysis and structuralist film studies, this paper explores leadership emergence as a mythic structure within the four films, arguing that these myths are structured around a struggle of a young novice against an evil power figure, and the overcoming of this figure through a process of self-discovery and maturation. Central themes include the relations between self-realization of leaders and the social harmony, the battle with evil leaders as an ego-struggle, and exile and journey as a precursor to mature leadership competence. The paper attempts to show how, following Miendl et al. [Meindl, J. R., Erlich, S. B. & Dukerich, J. M. (1985). The romance of leadership. Administrative Science Quarterly, 30, 78–102] leadership myths often conflate individual psychological well-being with social well-being, and add to this perspective that such a conflation may be key to understanding leadership myths as projections of internal psychological dynamics. More generally, it is argued that treating popular culture such as animated allegories as contemporary myth offers scholars a view into popular conceptions of leadership, possible illuminating the relationships between leadership and social organization.     

In learning mode? The role of mindsets in derailing and enabling experiential leadership development

In comparison to the vast literature on leadership theories, concepts, and behaviors, relatively less is known about why leaders often learn little from their leadership experiences, as well as how to support them in doing so. We propose that leaders learn more from their challenging leadership experiences when they are in learning mode, defined as intentionally framing and pursuing each element of the experiential learning process with more of a growth than a fixed mindset. We describe how the extent to which leaders are in learning mode stems from salient mindset cues and guides whether they work through the experiential learning process with a predominantly self-improvement or self-enhancement motive. We theorize about several other likely mediators and moderators of when being in learning mode will manifest in experiential leadership development. Practical implications at the micro, meso, and macro levels, as well as within management education are outlined.     

The Development of Entrepreneurial Leadership: The Role of Human,Social and Institutional Capital

This paper contributes to the literature on entrepreneurial leadership development. Leadership studies are characterized by an increasing emphasis given to an individual leader's social and organizational domain. Within the context of human capital and social capital theory, the paper reflects on the emergence of a social capital theory of leadership development. Using a retrospective, interpretivist research method, the authors present the experience of a cohort of business leaders on an executive development programme to uncover the everydayness of leadership development in practice. Specifically, they explore how entrepreneurial leadership develops as a social process and what the role of social capital is in this. The findings suggest that the enhancement of leaders’ human capital only occurred through their development of social capital. There is not, as extant literature suggests, a clear separation between leader development and leadership development. Further, the analysis implies that the social capital theory of leadership is limited in the context of the entrepreneurial small firm, and the authors propose that it should be expanded to incorporate institutional capital, that is, the formal structures and organizations which enhance the role of social capital and go beyond enriching the human capital stock of individual leaders.