Search results

The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of some pressing but under-researched aspects of public leadership. Ten propositions about public leadership are set out and these are intended to be thought-provoking and even controversial in order to stimulate researchers to design research which addresses key theoretical and practical questions about leadership in the public sphere. They will also help practitioners navigate an increasingly complex leadership context.

This invited essay uses ten propositions about public leadership, selected from three sources: the leadership literature, the author’s own research and from collaborative research discussions with academics, policy makers and practitioners.

The first proposition argues for distinguishing public leadership from public service leadership given that the former is about leadership of the public sphere. Other propositions concern context; purpose; conflict and contest at the heart of public leadership; leadership with political astuteness; dual leadership; leadership projections; fostering resilience; leadership, authority and legitimacy; and the challenge to researchers to use research designs which reflect the complexity and dynamism of public leadership.

While this essay is primarily addressed to researchers, there are many ideas and concepts which practising leaders will find insightful and useful in their work.

This essay draws on deep experience in undertaking high-quality academic research about public leadership which draws from and feeds into policy and practice. It utilises organisational psychology, public management and political science to create synergies in order to enhance the understanding of public leadership.

The purpose of this paper is to present the findings arising from a three year research project which investigated a major system-wide change in the design of the NHS in England. The radical policy change was enshrined in statute in 2012 and it dismantled existing health authorities in favour of new local commissioning groups built around GP Practices. The idea was that local clinical leaders would “step-up” to the challenge and opportunity to transform health services through exercising local leadership. This was the most radical change in the NHS since its inception in 1948.

The research methods included two national postal surveys to all members of the boards of the local groups supplemented with 15 scoping case studies followed by six in-depth case studies. These case studies focused on close examination of instances where significant changes to service design had been attempted.

The authors found that many local groups struggled to bring about any significant changes in the design of care systems. But the authors also found interesting examples of situations where pioneering clinical leaders were able to collaborate in order to design and deliver new models of care bridging both primary and secondary settings. The potential to use competition and market forces by fully utilising the new commissioning powers was more rarely pursued.

The findings carry practical implications stemming from positive lessons about securing change even under difficult circumstances.

The paper offers novel insights into the processes required to introduce new systems of care in contexts where existing institutions tend to revert to the status quo. The national survey allows accurate assessment of the generalisability of the findings about the nature and scale of change.

The purpose of this paper is to analyse three innovative Master's programmes designed for public and voluntary sector managers across three EU countries.

The paper compares similarities and differences between the programmes in order to shed light on the “innovation journey” which the authors took in establishing these programmes, and on the distinctive pedagogies which have been designed and developed to help address the complex dilemmas and challenges facing public and voluntary sector managers in the three countries.

The paper draws on theories of innovation and entrepreneurship to illustrate how these programmes were created, and how both new curriculum content and new approaches to pedagogy had to be developed.

The paper addresses the current and future learning needs of these public and voluntary service managers.

Purpose – Reform, transformation and restructuring have become endemic in public services. This paper aims to examine the central “modernisation” and improvement themes of public service reform in Denmark and the UK. Design/methodology/approach – The paper is based on the authors' reflections on experience and analysis, drawing on the UK and Denmark as sites where there have been substantial efforts to undertake public services reform. It argues that there has been a weakening of the hierarchically organised state in favour of more differentiated governance regimes that cut across the public, private and voluntary sectors. However, the new dynamic image of public leadership and the apparently enlarged opportunities for managerial discretion seem to be counter‐balanced by a strengthening of central interventions and controls. Findings – The paper identifies that managing the tensions and paradoxes of governance regimes has become a key element of the work of public service managers, and that this means that three sets of dynamics need to be worked with. First, the dynamics of self‐creation means that authority is not solely formal but that self‐constitution is necessary. Second, the dynamics of strategising means that managers cannot rely on a fixed legal or professional set of values but must be able to decode, challenge and develop varied sets of values and goals, working with varied rationales for action. Third, the dynamics of networking and negotiation mean that management and leadership positions are partly created through negotiated relations in a network‐like governance structure. Practical implications – These dynamics mean that teaching and learning have to address new challenges if programmes for public service leaders and managers are to be enabling. Originality/value – The paper highlights the challenges facing public sector leaders and managers.

In this age of management consultants, change and uncertainty – it is often the employee who feels left out. In the past few years, organizational restructuring has been widespread in UK local government. At the same time, staff are being increasingly consulted on their views and options through employee surveys.

While considerable research has been conducted into the reasons for union growth and decline at aggregate level, much less attention until recently has been paid to explaining differences between individuals and groups in the workplace concerning why some belong to a trade union and others do not. This research explores the attitudes to work, the company and the trade union among financial sector workers.

Employee surveys are becoming increasingly widespread among both public and private sector organisations. Yet, while there are many articles and books on the technical aspects of how to carry out an employee survey there is much less contemporary information about the impact of employee surveys on the organisation? This paper examines why local authorities undertake employee surveys and the extent to which these contribute to strategic change. The research is based on a review of the use of employee surveys by 12 organisations using surveys at the corporate level. The research found that surveys are used for a variety of purposes to influence change. Purposes are primarily either concerned with organisational assessment (as a diagnostic prior to change) or to implement organisational changes. These results suggest that employee surveys are both mirrors and makers of organisational change. The paper concludes with some theoretical, methodological and ethical implications for academic researchers in the ways that they use and report surveys.

The concept of community leadership is examined, using a model with four arenas of leadership. Little attention has been paid to the capabilities which managers (as well as councillors and staff) need to perform effectively in this new leadership role. The paper is based on a case study of a highly innovative council. The paper examines three issues: the capabilities required for community leadership in terms of working with communities, in terms of working in partnerships, and the management development programme to support cultural change. The research shows that service delivery in the context of community leadership is increasingly complex, varied and outwardly focused. New skills include responding as well as directing, using lateral as well as vertical skills, having an impact on other organizations, not just one’s own. These have major implications for hierarchical organizations and professionally‐driven services. The development of a community leadership focus also contains tensions for the management of performance and motivation.

The study examines the widely held assertion that unemployed managers will possess the characteristics traditionally associated with managerial ability to a lesser degree than managers in employment. In contrast to conventional wisdom the unemployed appear to possess many of the attributes traditionally associated with managerial ability. These results are discussed in terms of the stability of personality over time, the influence of organisational factors in the causes of job loss and the possibility that the unemployed managers studied had a greater than average preference for risk‐taking. The implications of these results for personnel management are explored.