Leader driven organizational adaptation

Abstract

Purpose

Earlier research has identified adaptive leadership strategies and organizational culture as two key factors that influence a firm's adaptive capabilities. However, little is known about how leadership and organizational culture affect each other. Nor do the authors know how the combined effects of adaptive leadership and culture facilitates organizational adaptation over time. The purpose of this paper is to address this gap by using a co-evolutionary perspective to enhance the understanding of this phenomenon.

Design/methodology/approach

Data were collected through informant interviews, observations and archival material.

Findings

Study findings reveal that leaders can enhance organizational adaptability by creating an appropriate context to guide the co-evolutionary interactions between their leadership strategies, organizational culture and employees towards the ongoing achievement of firm goals.

Originality/value

The study enhances the understanding of how leaders facilitate organizational adaptability, especially in a family business context.

Citation

Seah, M., Hsieh, M.-H. and Huang, H.-Y. (2014), "Leader driven organizational adaptation", Management Decision, Vol. 52 No. 8, pp. 1410-1432. https://doi.org/10.1108/MD-07-2013-0380