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A self‐help guide to achieving success in business. Directed more towards the self‐employed, it is relevant to other managers in organizations. Divided into clear sections on creativity and dealing with change; importance of clear goal setting; developing winning business and marketing strategies; negotiating skills; leadership; financial skills; and time management.

This monograph seeks to summarise the key influences of a role‐based perspective on leadership when making decisions as to how organisational resources can best be deployed.

Application of new frameworks provides insight into the leadership roles executives can adopt when part of formal, informal and temporary groups within the organisation's senior management team and those parts of the organisation for which they are responsible. The methodology adopted is qualitative, focusing on application of previously developed frameworks.

Adoption of an appropriate leadership role, and the timely switch from one role to another as circumstances change, are found to facilitate improvement in the ability of executives to mobilise organisational resources, and in so doing effectively address those challenges with which the organisation is faced.

A one‐organisation intensive case study of a multinational engineering company engaged in the design, development and manufacture of rotating turbomachinery provides the platform for the research. The research intent is to validate two frameworks in a different organisation of a similar demographic profile to those in which the frameworks were developed. The frameworks will require validating in organisations of different demographic profiles.

The concepts advanced, and implications discussed, provide an insight into the role‐based nature of leadership. The practical steps individual executives can take to develop their ability to adopt different leadership roles are highlighted.

This monograph is an investigation into, and study of the contribution of theory that provides insight into, the process by which executives effectively mobilise organisational resources. This differs from the original contributions to theory, which focused on methodology, data gathering and validation in contrast with the current study that is focused on practical application.

This article investigates goal pursuit practices in a sample of 31 New Zealand high schools. It examines goal knowledge of middle and senior leaders, the alignment of this knowledge and factors related to improvement.

Goals from schools' annual improvement plans were identified and counted at the beginning of the academic year. Senior and middle leaders were asked to recall their school's academic goals from memory. Responses were scored against the goals in the schools' plans to produce an accuracy score for each leader and for each middle and senior leadership team (SLT). At the end of the academic year, leaders recounted their goals and rated and commented on their SLT’s goal focus. Data analysis examined goal knowledge, alignment of middle and senior leaders' goal knowledge and SLT's goal focus. Comments were analyzed thematically in regard to the number and clarity of the goals and how goals were communicated, enacted and monitored.

Our findings show a lack of goal clarity, persistence across the year and effective strategy hampered the majority of schools in their goal pursuit. Only a few schools had a strong and aligned goal focus. Factors influencing perceived improvement included: fewer and greater clarity of goals, engagement of middle leaders in setting goals, establishing sound supporting structures and regular monitoring of progress.

While annual improvement plans outlining multiple goals are often compulsory for schools, little is known about their impact on practice. This research clarifies the state of goal pursuit in a sample of high schools.

The aim of this study is to investigate whether performance management practices affect performance in public sector organizations.

Theoretically, the research project is based on economic as well as behavioral theories. The study distinguishes amongst quantitative performance (efficiency, quantities produced) and qualitative performance (accuracy, quality, innovation and employee morale) and uses survey data from 93 public sector organizations in the Netherlands.

The research shows that the definition of clear and measurable goals is positively associated with quantity performance as well as quality performance. In addition, the use of incentives is positively associated with quantity performance yet not related to quality performance. Finally, the effects of performance management practices in public sector organizations are affected by institutional factors. The results suggest that the behavioral effects of performance management practices are as important as the economic effects in public sector organizations.

All limitations of survey research apply. The survey is based on public sector organizations in The Netherlands; findings may not be transferable to other countries.

The joint introduction of performance management practices may provide an opportunity to increase quantity performance yet may have no impact on quality performance.

The paper responds to previous calls in the literature to use quantitative research methods to generalize findings from previous case studies. Also, the paper empirically tests the impact of performance management practices on performance, an area that has attracted scarce research attention.

Research was conducted in order to identify behaviours that improve a system viability in a complex, chaotic and volatile world. The purpose of this paper is to explain why complex cybernetic systems must be authentic over time in order to maximise their viability in a complex, chaotic and volatile world.

In total, eight faculty staff from the Thunderbird School of Global Management were interviewed around the subject of “being a successful 21st century leader”. These interviews were analysed using Ricoeur's hermeneutic methodology which resulted in three behaviours being identified: be authentic, open and transparent; these behaviours were then deep interpreted according to Ricoeur's methodology using cybernetic principles. This is an innovative piece of research that brings together phenomenology, cybernetics and leadership studies but it is also limited by being a new approach.

Complex cybernetic systems must be authentic because authentic behaviour nurtures the system's identity and ensures that it is able to consistently generate a clear goal signal. It is also proposed that authenticity is important for coping with the “law of variety” by acting as an amplification mechanism.

The research implication is that it is possible to identify behaviours to improve the viability of all complex cybernetic systems.

The work is highly original because it provides a cybernetic explanation for why authentic behaviour is necessary. As far as the author is aware, no work has yet combined cybernetics with leadership behaviours and provided a cogent explanation for why authenticity is so important for system viability. The value of this work is that it clearly shows the value of authentic behaviour by showing how and why authentic behaviour improves system viability and how inauthentic behaviour harms system viability.

Using the moral responsibility theory of corporate sustainability (MRCS) framework , the study examined Chinese textile and apparel (T&A) manufacturers' moral duty positions, goals and structures toward sustainability, with a goal of creating a spectrum of corporate sustainability (CS) performance.

An online survey method was employed to investigate participants' views on their companies' perceptions, goals and structures toward each of the listed sustainability-related activities.

The results showed that all participants expressed their companies have moral responsibilities toward some aspects of sustainability. Particularly, they viewed that their companies emphasize labor relations (LR) and righteous operation (RO) activities over environmental protection (EP) or public welfare involvement (PW) activities when fulfilling their sustainability responsibilities. After analyzing each response by following MRCS, 41 companies were categorized as occasionally sustainability corporations. The remaining 259 responses were categorized as consistently sustainability corporations in selective areas.

The study for the first time revealed the sustainability-related activities that most respondents in Chinese T&A manufacturing industry perceived as perfect or imperfect duties. Findings add knowledge to the area of corporate moral responsibility toward sustainability and show a spectrum of Chinese textile and apparel manufacturers' sustainability performance, empirically supporting MRCS.

Focuses on the importance within an organization of a philosophy for quality management. A clearly defined vision for the organization serves as a basis for identifying and selecting goals. Identifiable, attainable, and realistic goals are essential in leading, motivating and focusing human talents to move efficiently towards goals. There should exist a clearly stated philosophy with respect to total quality management and the organization’s pursuit of its goals. Furthermore, specific criteria and guidelines for developing and implementing TQM will add to efficiency in the TQM effort and enhance results. The philosophy and guidelines must be consistent with the goals which support the pursuit of the organization’s vision. A vision with respect to TQM is appropriate if it is consistent and supportive of the organization’s goals. Provides specific principles essential in developing a philosophy for quality management within an organization. Discusses basic criteria which should be used as a guide in identifying, planning, and executing actions aimed at improving and maintaining quality.

Presents an analysis of Austrian top managers and top management teams based on data gathered from Austrian managers in 301 separate organizations. Through the data collected, builds and presents a comprehensive picture of the current state of Austrian management. Also gives a profile of how Austrian managers compare in certain key competence areas with managers from some of the other European countries in which similar research has been conducted. Shows that in general, Austrian management teams have few interpersonal or value‐based interaction difficulties, but that their key problems, and the key development issues facing them, lie in their ability to understand and manage the structure of their organizations, long‐term issues, and the increasingly competitive and global markets and environments into which their companies are entering. Shows that it is these key areas which are the major sources of conflict, sensitivity, and difficulty within Austrian top management teams. Based on these findings, presents some management development recommendations for Austrian managers to assist in broadening their management competences and thus enhancing their personal, organizational, and business success.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate how performance measurement systems (PMSs) might be designed in order to empower managers of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) towards an active work role.

The study is based on a conceptual approach that combines insights from prior research on performance measurement with that on dimensions of psychological empowerment. An exploratory case study is used to further develop propositions for the design of an empowering PMS. Data from in-depth interviews with six managers of diverse SOEs located within a German city enables the tracing of underlying causal mechanisms.

PMSs that are designed according to the principles of goal clarity, balanced goal difficulty, autonomy-enhancing measurement, and a broad goal scope can positively influence the four dimensions of empowerment: meaning, competence, self-determination, and impact.

The study’s propositions can be used to enhance the governance of SOEs through a particular design of PMSs. This research thus responds to the call for a new generation of governance mechanisms within the complex setting of SOEs.

Current research on PMSs is extended through the construct of psychological empowerment. Thus, an existing governance mechanism is further developed towards being more effective for use in the context of SOEs.

The purpose of this paper is to understand and measure the impact of goal clarity, goal difficulty, and management support on five social and technical outcomes for quality circles (QCs) in a Chinese company.

Survey scales were developed based on previous research and validated using principal component analysis. Analysis of variance confirmed the validity of aggregating individual responses to team-level measures. Models for five outcomes (team member understanding of continuous improvement, team member skills, team member attitudes, team member motivation, and technical success) were developed using multiple regressions.

Goal clarity was found to impact all outcomes. Goal difficulty was found to impact QC team member attitudes. Management support was related to employee's understanding of the value of continuous improvement and to the technical success of QC activities.

All the QCs included in the study were part of a single manufacturing organization. To generalize the findings, data from additional companies are needed.

The results imply that management support is critical to improvement of processes. Even if employees wish to learn new skills, employee's efforts need to be directed, so they are closely aligned with the company's goals and objectives.

This appears to be the first published research study to identify the role of goal clarity, goal difficulty, and management support on both social and technical systems outcomes for Chinese QCs. The findings highlight the value of and need for clearly defined, challenging goals for QC members work on and the need for management support of QC members and QC activities.