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In this chapter, I propose a model for how school-level leaders manage their emotions. This model consists of six components. School-level leaders typically have little direct influence over the first component of the model, which are the socio-contextual factors in the schools, school communities and jurisdictions in which they work. A school-level leader's identity, sense of self and their personal characteristics comprise the second component of the model. The third component of the model is a multi-directional arrow demonstrating connections and interactions between the socio-contextual factors and a school-level leader's sense of self. Factors that heighten school-level leaders' emotional experiences in schools are considered as part of the fourth component of this model for school-level leaders' emotional regulation. The fifth component are the emotional regulation strategies school-level leaders use to manage emotions that emerge as part of their workday, while influence of supports and professional learning are considered as part of the sixth component, Finally, the model also accounts for the chain reactions and feedback loops that can occur when an individual utilizes an emotional regulation strategy that is unsuccessful. Those processes produce new emotions that must be regulated using similar, or different, emotional regulation strategy(ies).

The focus of this chapter lies with women middle-level leaders. It reports on themes from women in leadership programmes designed and delivered by Barbara Watterston, through the lens of a programme especially developed for the Association of Independent Schools of South Australia (AISSA). This chapter begins by profiling a description of the programme. The main aim was providing women leaders with an opportunity to take stock of their careers, consider ongoing challenges impeding their work as school leaders, and identify options for the future. After the programme finished, volunteers were invited to write a narrative encapsulating their career journey. Three women leaders volunteered, and their insightful reflections regarding their career trajectories constitute a significant portion of this chapter. The final part of this chapter identifies three common themes that emerged from their stories, resonating with ideas which are frequently illuminated in similar programmes and research. These include the importance of ongoing professional learning to be a successful leader, gender-based barriers that caused the women to doubt their abilities and readiness for leadership, and the deep appreciation the women expressed from learning with and from like-minded other women leaders.

As the role of senior school leaders has become more complex, the leadership of improvement, innovation and change has been distributed to middle leaders. However, middle leaders are often not prepared for the shift to strategic thinking and leading. This chapter provides an overview of what it means to think and lead strategically when leading from the middle. Then, the theory is translated into practical templates and tools that can be employed by a middle leader. The context of this chapter is leading a faculty in a secondary school; however, the ideas and examples provided are easily translated to any middle leading context.

This study investigates the relationship between leaders’ collectivist orientation and employees’ innovative behavior, as well as the mediating effects of employees’ collectivist orientation and servant leadership.

Based on a survey of 40 leaders and 219 employees in 12 technologically innovative enterprises in Jiangsu Province, China, a hierarchical linear modeling is used.

The results show that leaders’ collectivist orientation significantly positively affects employees’ innovative behavior. Moreover, leaders’ collectivist orientation significantly positively affects employees’ collectivist orientation/servant leadership, employees’ collectivist orientation/servant leadership significantly positively affects employees’ innovative behavior, and employees’ collectivist orientation/servant leadership partially mediates the relationship between leaders’ collectivist orientation and employees’ innovative behavior.

In response to the lack of research on the relationship between leadership cultural orientation and employees’ innovative behavior, this study sheds light on the effectiveness and mechanism of the influence of leaders’ collectivist orientation on employees’ innovative behavior, thus expanding and deepening the boundaries of theoretical research on leadership, culture and innovation management.

Drawing upon social comparison theory, this paper explores the (in)congruence effect of leader and follower overqualification on leader's downward envy, which in turn leads to leader undermining behavior.

Using two-wave, multi-sourced data gathered in China, a polynomial regression was conducted on 301 leader-follower dyads.

Results show asymmetrical incongruence effects, indicating greater leader's downward envy when leader overqualification was lower than follower overqualification. In addition, by increasing downward envy, leader-follower (in)congruence in overqualification has an indirect positive effect on leader undermining behavior.

This study highlights the importance of being conscious of both parties’ overqualification levels to avoid unfavorable outcomes. Meanwhile, training for both parties is crucial, offering a holistic understanding of leader-follower overqualification differences and downward envy, as well as skills to manage “triggers” of leader undermining.

Our study is among the first to examine the effects of overqualification from a leader-follower dyadic congruence perspective. It suggests that leader's downward envy and undermining behaviors toward followers are influenced by both follower and leader overqualification.

This study aims to explore the impact of leader emotional labor on employee voice. According to the emotion as information theory and the voice as a deliberate decision-making process framework, this study develops and tests a model that examines the mediating effects of psychological safety and perceived voice efficacy in this relationship.

This study conducted two studies to test hypotheses. Study 1 used a quantitative research methodology using a two-wave survey of 435 employees and 58 leaders in China. The research model was analyzed using multilevel path analyses. Study 2 collected 301 full-time employees from Prolific Platform. Hypotheses were tested using Mplus.

The results in Study 1 reveal that leader deep acting has a positive indirect relationship with employee voice via psychological safety. Conversely, leader surface acting has a negative indirect effect on employee voice through psychological safety. The results in Study 2 supported the hypotheses.

This study contributes to the voice as a deliberative process literature by introducing leader emotional labor as an antecedent of voice behavior. Additionally, this study indicates that perceived psychological safety and perceived voice efficacy are two important mediating mechanisms for implementing voice behavior.

Drawing on power approach-inhibition theory, this study develops a conditional indirect effect model to explore how team vertical leader position and expert power indirectly impact members’ shared leadership through vertical leader’s empowering behaviors.

Multi-source data was collected using a field survey research design. The final sample includes 944 employees in 164 teams from 14 companies in China.

This study found that the interaction of team vertical leader position power and expert power was positively related to their empowering behaviors, which in turn were positively associated with shared leadership. Moreover, our post hoc-analysis revealed the moderating effect of team power distance orientation on the relationship between vertical leader empowering behaviors and shared leadership.

This study sheds light on shared leadership literature by examining vertical leader position and expert power as antecedents. We also offer new directions for exploring how power functions by discussing leadership through the lens of power approach-inhibition theory.

This study investigates the benefits of ethical leadership behaviors for leaders themselves and the underlying mechanisms and boundary conditions of this effect.

Using a multi-time and multi-source survey design, data was collected from both leaders and subordinates across three waves.

Ethical leadership behavior was found to be positively associated with the leader’s moral pride, resulting in the leader’s higher in-role performance and perceived manager effectiveness. The effect of ethical leadership behavior was moderated by core self-evaluation (CSE), such that low-CSE leaders benefit more from these behaviors.

Organizations should encourage ethical leadership behaviors and educate leaders to develop moral pride from conducting these behaviors. Leaders with low CSEs can enhance their in-role performance and overall effectiveness by taking pride in their ethical leadership behaviors.

The field of study on ethical leadership has predominantly focused on the positive outcomes for recipients, yet it is imperative to examine the self-benefits for leaders as well. This study drew upon affective events theory to posit that ethical leadership behaviors generate moral pride in leaders, leading to improved work-related attitudes and performance outcomes.

This paper seeks to examine how leaders shape employee creativity by using interpersonal emotion management (IEM) strategies. Drawing on the social information processing (SIP) theory, the authors argue that psychological safety translates leader problem-focused IEM into employee creativity, an impact which is moderated by organizational justice.

Data were collected in two waves from 201 employees and their leaders in China. Regression analysis was used to test the hypotheses.

Leader problem-focused IEM is positively related to employee creativity, and this relationship is mediated by psychological safety. Organizational justice positively moderates the relationship between leader problem-focused IEM and psychological safety as well as the indirect relationship between leader problem-focused IEM and employee creativity via psychological safety.

This paper identifies a novel and useful predictor of employee creativity from the perspective of leader problem-focused IEM and provides practical insights for organizations regarding ways of improving employee creativity.

The purpose of the current innovative practice paper is to introduce a technique to explore leader identity development and meaning-making that builds on the narrative pedagogical tradition. In this paper, we recommend a process for combining turning-point graphing and responsive (semi-structured) interviews to co-explore leadership identity development and meaning-making with college students.

The paper provides student feedback data on the effectiveness of the technique in improving understanding of leader identity and transforming meaning-making.

We hope practitioners can utilize this approach to build leadership identity development and meaning-making capacity in college students.