The Challenge of Leadership in Front Line Clinical Teams Struggling to Meet Current Policy Demands

Teams, and their managers, working at the interface between government policy and service to clients are subject to high levels of anxiety arising out of the persecutory manner in which well-intended policy demands are delivered and cost efficiencies imposed. Informed by Bion's ideas about group behaviours, these responses can be understood as a form of defensive behaviour and identified as Basic Assumption Me-ness. Basic Assumption Me-ness in team managers takes the form of managerialism at the expense of leadership, developing a shell that acts as a protection for the lonely, overburdened, vulnerable and soft inside. This hardness, evident through increased unavailability and a rather sadistic use of boundaries, is communicated to staff, who in turn pass it onto clients. In this manner, it infects all relationships thus stifling emotional engagement, creative thinking and practice. This paper then explores ways in which team leaders, courageous enough to take up their authority in an emotionally engaged manner, can reverse these dynamics to the relief and benefit of all concerned. Leaders need to insist on attendance at meetings and supervision where cases can be properly considered; demonstrate an ability to think about risk as ever present in the work because, as all are well aware, no amount of form filling can eliminate this; and acknowledge that the work requires constant assessment and judgement as well as an ability to stay with the unknown. The aim is to be responsive to the daily struggles of team members working face-to-face with clients and to remain aware of ‘the reality on the ground’ when engaging in an equally lively way with senior management.     

Investigating the Risks of Spiritual Leadership

The spiritual leadership literature suggests that such leadership has a positive influence on organizations’ productivity and profitability as well as on employees’ enjoyment and well‐being. In a qualitative study conducted at a Swedish abbey for nuns, using interviews, observations, correspondence, and documents, this research indicates that spiritual leadership may pose negative risks to organizations and their leaders. Risks in spiritual leadership that are indicated include a culture of narrow‐mindedness and leadership rotation failure that can lead to rigidity and to the leader's work overload because of the demand for limitless empathy and for personal sacrifice. The findings should be viewed as an inspiration for further research.     

Leadership in Social Work Education and the Social Change Model of Leadership

Leadership is a topic of international debate in both social work education and practice. Questions remain, however, regarding what specific models of leadership should be emphasized and how leadership content should be infused within the social work curriculum. This paper seeks to contribute to the ongoing discussion about the infusion of leadership within social work education. Specifically, this paper shares the design and development of a graduate-level social work course in program evaluation that infused education around the social change model of leadership (SCM) and then explores qualitatively how 39 graduate students interpreted and applied this model of leadership through an experiential community-based evaluation project. Findings of this study suggest that students utilized the values identified in the SCM in a range of ways to understand and interpret their leadership experience both in their collaborative groups and in their partnerships with community-based organizations. Community organizations also reported benefiting from the experience in partnership with the students. Implications are discussed in relation to the potential value and impact of this model for social work education.     

Sources of Volunteer Motivation: Transformational Leadership and Personal Motives Influence Volunteer Outcomes

We examined the separate influences of volunteers' personal motives and their team leaders' behaviors on volunteer satisfaction and contributions, along with mediating processes suggested by self‐determination theory. Participants were 302 volunteers who worked in teams at various sites through a central agency. As predicted, both personal motives for volunteering and transformational leadership influenced volunteer satisfaction through enhanced work meaningfulness and higher‐quality team relationships. However, motives that predicted volunteer contribution were different from those that predicted satisfaction. Whereas satisfaction was positively associated with motives concerning esteem enhancement and value expression, contribution was positively associated with motives to gain understanding and negatively related to motives pertaining to esteem enhancement and social concerns. Transformational leadership was positively associated with volunteer satisfaction, but not with volunteer contributions. The theoretical ramifications of these findings are discussed, along with practical implications for the recruitment and retention of volunteers.     

Leadership,Gender and Sense‐making

This article examines the nature of sense‐making processes in teams and considers the extent to which leadership as a sense‐making process is impacted by gender. We conducted an in‐depth inquiry into the decision‐making behaviour of two single‐gender teams and a third, mixed gender team, as they worked together to produce gender‐specific leadership schema in an experimental setting. Our research question was, ‘To what extent is leadership as a sense‐making process impacted by gender?’ The article reports on the design, conduct and outcomes of this research project. We found that using a meeting as part of the research method created a specific instance of a gendered organizational context exerting a dominant and directive influence on individual and collective behaviour. The current trend toward team‐based leadership is likely to involve more meetings with increasing numbers of women in senior positions. This suggests to us that men and women need to be alert to the possibility that the gendered nature of meetings may be acting as a barrier to the expression of feminine forms of leadership.     

Resistance Is Not Futile: Liberating Captain Janeway from the Masculine‐Feminine Dualism of Leadership

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Seducing Leadership: Stories of Leadership Development

This article argues that leadership development is a process of seduction. Drawing on some stories of leadership development from my experience as participant, observer and teacher I show the ways in which certain sorts of highly valued leadership teaching contain seductive elements, including sweeping audiences off their feet and, in some contexts, forestalling critique about the content that is offered. The article also considers the extent to which seduction is a gendered performance. I conclude that, while gender and power are defining elements and constraints in how seductive pedagogical relations are constructed, there are opportunities for experimentation and display that potentially subvert gendered stereotypes. Seeing the seduction in leadership can help us understand leadership and leadership teaching better, and can open the way to doing it differently — to experimentation and innovation.     

大学生领导力发展的影响因素研究

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Reconstructing Granovetter's network theory

We employ concepts from graph theory and cooperative game theory to reconstruct Granovetter's famous thesis concerning ‘the strength of weak ties’. In contrast to existing formal models related to this thesis, our approach captures the mechanisms Granovetter invokes in the derivation of his thesis. Notably, our model allows for an analytical distinction between the strength of ties and the value of ties – a distinction empirical research on the labor market has shown to be of great importance. We use our model to test the theoretical validity of Granovetter's thesis and to evaluate its robustness if implicit assumptions in Granovetter's argumentation are dropped.     

Leadership in Children’s Services

This paper examines the different contexts for leadership in children’s services with a particular focus on integrated working. It reviews contemporary theories that appear to offer relevant frameworks for thinking about children’s service leadership. It is argued that children’s services require leadership at all levels to enable a dynamic, interactive service on the front line. Multi‐professional team leadership is a crucial and much underestimated role in integrated services, which should be thinking in terms of leadership capacity throughout the organisation rather than focusing predominantly on the most senior roles in the hierarchy.     

Leadership development inside‐out in Africa

Leadership development is a high priority for African nonprofit organizations, but we know very little about what causes leaders in Africa change their behavior and how. Most leadership development programs use imported Western models that at best pay only lip‐service to the very different culture and context in Africa. This article outlines the research findings of a three‐country study conducted in Malawi, Uganda, and Kenya. This study found that changes in leadership style, although individual and complex, followed an underlying pattern. External events catalyzed an inside‐out change process. Effective leadership development requires in‐depth understanding and application of local contextual and cultural issues. Ultimately, however, the process of leadership development is tied to deeper, universal principles of human behavior.     

大学生领导力教育若干问题

大学生领导力教育是高等教育的重要使命,是社会变革的现实需要,是当代大学生发展的理性诉求。大学生领导力教育要对领导力进行合理的诠释,避免“早期领导力教育的盲点”．避免大学生领导力教育过程中“贴标签”现象的产生。领导力教育并非易事,它不仅关涉领导理论,也关涉教育实践,同时还要求领导力研究者与教育者的有效结合。     

Leadership criteria in the Pacific Northwest of the USA 19972002

Abstract

There have been very little follow-up leadership behaviour studies. This study describes an investigation of the US insurance industry. Management behaviour was studied in the beginning and at the end of the five-year period 19972002. On the whole insurance managers in the Pacific Northwest in the hard market conditions of 2002 appear on average to have changed their leadership criteria evaluations only slightly: they appreciated staffing and managing by example more than their colleagues did previously in the soft market conditions of 1997. The empirical data were checked for company size and management level. According to three-way variance analysis the different time period (soft or hard market conditions) and company size seem to have affected three leadership criteria: insurance managers in big companies in 2002 seemed to rate organizing, delegating and mutual trust more highly than their colleagues did five years earlier. The study suggests hypothetically that in a soft market period (buyer's market) managers employ a more relationship-oriented leadership style and correspondingly adapt their leadership style to a more task-oriented approach in a hard market phase (seller's market).     

Creating a culture of participation: Early childhood education and care educators in the face of change

This study reports on critical participatory research in an early childhood education and care centre in Finland. The objective was to study which elements are critical in the development and construction of a culture of participation. The data comprise conversations, team meetings and educators' diaries. Data were analysed using thematic analysis. The results indicated that a culture of participation requires four elements: (a) a shared understanding of the image of the child, (b) a shared understanding of professional development, (c) leadership and (d) a shared we-narrative that enables the comprehensive understanding, promotion and maintenance of a culture of participation.     

Leadership, personality and effectiveness

This survey article is about leadership and personality, as it appears to be a renewed interest in this topic. Even when traditional research is re-examined and new research performed the most basic conclusion remains the same. Studies of how personality traits relate to leadership give inconsistent answers. Traditional and contemporary research shows that personality cannot explain leadership. Traits of leaders cannot explain organizational effectiveness. Leadership appears to have a minor impact on organizational effectiveness. The personality approach is less relevant to management. Management and leadership in formal organizations are not about possessing special traits. It is about acting.     

Understanding Leadership Development in African American Youth

Abstract

This exploratory study assesses factors related to leadership development for African American adolescents participating in a community service program designed to develop young African American leaders (N = 345). Psychometric characteristics of self-reported levels of leadership are explored to determine similarities and differences between gender groups. A multivariate analysis of socioeconomic factors, levels of self-esteem, school grades, and social activities as predictors of leadership development produced mixed findings. The results suggest that higher levels of global and academic self-esteem are related to leadership characteristics in female respondents, but not males. On the other hand, the impact of program participation on leadership was only significant in the area of personal relationship skills as a form of leadership for males. Findings from this investigation point out the need for research on leadership development dynamics among African American children and adolescents.     

Leadership and local development: Dimensions of leadership in four Central Queensland towns

Effective community leadership is increasingly recognised in Australia, as elsewhere, as an important contributor to local economic and social development. This article examines the nature of community leadership in four Central Queensland towns as part of a wider project to test the links between it and the pace and form of local development. Empirical data on leadership questions were collected from in-depth interviews with prominent local individuals. The resulting information enables a comparison of the quality and depth of leadership present in each of the towns. The capabilities of key leaders are assessed on the basis of four leadership functions and eight variables representing personal attributes. In addition, the authors develop, and in turn evaluate, a set of a priori propositions about the exercise of leadership in small Australian country towns. The information provided and its subsequent analysis reveal that leaders' backgrounds, styles and abilities vary substantially between the four towns studied and are changing for a variety of reasons.     

Changing generations in today's workforce: Leadership skills for Millennials

The focus of traditional leadership expectations is the individual leader's developmental experience. However, Millennials are seeking to take on leadership roles more quickly than previous generations. The Practice‐Immediacy Model provides a framework where Millennials can take on these leadership roles while continuing to develop their own behavior and skills. The present article expands on the four basic behavioral components of leadership—vision building, standard‐bearing, integrating, and developing. The article then describes the associated specific skills within each behavioral component. Finally, the article proposes an interdisciplinary model that professionals can use to develop leadership skills for Millennials.     

Questioning the Notion of Feminine Leadership: A Critical Perspective on the Gender Labelling of Leadership

Traditionally, leadership has been equated with masculinity. Managerial jobs, at least in business and on senior levels, have been defined as a matter of instrumentality, autonomy, result‐orientation, etc. something which is not particularly much in line with what is broadly assumed to be typical for females. Today, however, there seems to be a broad interest in leadership being more participatory, non‐hierarchical, flexible and group‐oriented. These new ideas on leadership are often seen by students of gender as indicating a feminine orientation. This article argues that it is necessary to critically discuss the whole idea of gender labelling leadership as masculine or feminine and suggests that we should be very careful and potentially aware of the unfortunate consequences when we use gender labels. Constructing leadership as feminine may be of some value as a contrast to conventional ideas on leadership and management but may also create a misleading impression of women's orientation to leadership as well as reproducing stereotypes and the traditional gender division of labour.     

Leadership succession and the emergence of an organizational identity threat

Leadership succession, and the associated changes that new leaders make, can have profound impacts on nonprofit organizations. Despite its importance, there is limited research that examines succession from the point of view of employees and considers how their interpretations of organizational identity and proposed change shape their responses to leadership transitions. In this article, we examine the dynamics that ensued when the founder of Friends of the Earth, a nonprofit environmental organization, stepped down. The case shows how the succession process can expose latent disagreement about an organization's identity and give rise to internal conflict. These patterns suggest that leaders must be attentive to different and often conflicting interpretations of an organization's identity.