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The purpose of this paper is to explore the experience of senior leaders who move into the public sector from other sectors of the economy, a process referred to in this paper as inter-sector senior leader transitions. This is a little researched area of public sector leadership yet has significant implications for fundamental public sector reform.

The paper employs an interview design to elicit senior leaders' stories of their transition into the public sector.

The data suggest that successful senior leader transitions are more likely when a set of conditions is met; the leader transitions into CEO role, rather than levels below CEO, ministers provide inter-sector transition support, senior leaders develop responses to stress, senior leaders reject high formalization, their change processes focus on building capacity, and senior leaders confront dysfunctional organizational relationships directly.

The research relies on a relatively small sample. However, access to senior managers at this level can be difficult. Nevertheless, those senior managers who participated were very willing to share their stories.

If public sector organizations are to realize the value of successful leaders from other sectors, they need to invest in structured processes that facilitate the transition. A laissez-faire approach is not viable given the cost of such transitions.

The paper focuses on a little researched area of leadership experience which has significant implications for the development and change of the public sector.

The purpose of this paper is to address the perceptions senior public leaders in local government have regarding the need for business intelligence and their perceptions of the extent to which their organizations are capable of effectively assimilating business intelligence.

The data are from a survey on local governments’ need for and capability to use business intelligence, with a response rate of 50.5 percent, and semi-structured interviews. The survey method originates from private sector research but is adapted to local government conditions in Sweden.

The leaders’ perceptions about the need for business intelligence were fragmented. Their perceptions regarding its use were even more fragmented, both between different municipalities and within municipalities.

The survey is adapted to local government conditions in Sweden and may need further changes to fit other settings. The adaptation and renewal of questions can lead to summation errors in relation to the original survey.

The paper highlights some of the strategic areas where senior public leaders need to advance their business intelligence and prioritize specific organizational capabilities. The dominant logic, enhancing an inward-looking approach, seems to prevent a more thoroughgoing business analysis.

The adaptation of a method that is mainly used in the private sector can give new perspectives to senior public leaders regarding the need for and use of business intelligence and can help them identify the factors that can affect the complexity and volatility in local government settings.

To investigate senior library leaders' perceptions of leadership, and to critically explore whether senior librarians distinguish classic leadership from management/administrative practices, both conceptually and in their work lives.

Thirty top‐level public librarians from Ireland, Britain, and the east coast of the United States were selected for inclusion in this study. A review of the relevant literature was conducted in order to design an interview guide which was then used to conduct structured in‐depth face‐to‐face interviews.

Many responses from the senior librarians indicated an apparent ignorance of any distinction between leadership and management. Eighty per cent of respondents tended to confuse leadership with headship, management, administration, or bureaucracy, or a combination of these. The findings argue that classic leadership is a relatively scarce quality in public libraries in Britain, Ireland, and America. Many public library leaders, instead, focus on management/administration.

The findings have practical implications for librarians at the recruitment and selection stage, and later on for the career paths of middle management personnel who show aptitudes for leadership.

This study of the perceptions of senior public library leaders, across national boundaries, makes a theoretical contribution both to the limited extant literature on leadership in librarianship, and the broad corpus of organizational leadership literature. The current study is the most in‐depth study to date, drawing on thirty face‐to‐face interviews with thirty public library leaders.

To date, public leadership has been conceptualised for Western systems while leadership discourse has spread across governments globally. The purpose of this paper is to begin the task of conceptualising public leadership in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), a federal monarchy in the Arabian Gulf, and proposes a forward research agenda.

The paper employs a qualitative, interview-based design to elicit top government officials’ personal interpretations of the purpose and challenges of public leadership, the practices they engage in, and the arenas across which leadership is performed.

The study finds that whilst notions of public leadership as conceptualised to date are present, cultural and institutional differences result in distinct localised characteristics that belie the managerial presentation of public leadership. Stimulated by these initial findings, three points of departure for future research are suggested: public leaders’ scope for discretion, values and trust.

The research relies on a relatively small, though élite, sample; findings are therefore preliminary, informing ideas for a forward research agenda.

The paper presents a first conceptualisation of public leadership in the UAE, an Arab-Muslim federal monarchy.

Aims to explore the topic of leadership as perceived and practised by public library leaders. Library leaders have a wide‐ranging impact on society but have been largely overlooked as the subject of serious study. The current study seeks to investigate the perspectives of public library leaders beyond national boundaries in order to develop an understanding of the perceptions of current leaders in the field of public librarianship.

A total of 30 senior public library leaders were selected for in‐depth face‐to‐face interviews in three national jurisdictions – Ireland, the UK, and the USA.

The study of the perceptions of senior public library leaders, across national boundaries, makes a theoretical contribution not just to leadership in librarianship, but also to the broader literature on organizational leadership. Nine main thematic areas emerged from the findings. One of these themes, the centrality of leadership to librarianship, is the particular focus of this paper.

The findings support the centrality of leadership for optimal strategic and operational practices in the field of public librarianship. The challenge for the public library sector is to identify and consider the leadership skills and personal attributes that are essential to success.

Presents a representative sample of insights, reflections and assessments from participating public library leaders regarding the centrality of leadership to librarianship.

This article describes how effective public service leaders are choosing to lead in exceptionally challenging circumstances. It outlines the current crucible of demand for excellent services and significant cost reduction and radical organisational change. At its core, it shows how some public service leaders are making great progress by making five key choices ‐ demonstrating bold, engaging and collaborative leadership; majoring on the transformational not transactional elements of change; not letting the inevitable uncertainties get in the way of intense engagement of their people; making tough calls on priorities; and steering their leadership teams and broader leadership communities towards genuine collaboration and connectedness.The article also identifies six leadership frames that public service leaders are drawing on: confidence; safe uncertainty(Mason, 1983); employee engagement; trustworthy leadership; collective, mutually supportive leadership; and appreciative, transformational choices.

The purpose of this paper is to assess the leadership skills and competencies defined in the Pathways to the Profession and understand the value senior corporate communications managers place on those skills and competencies and how senior-level corporate communicators demonstration of those skills and competencies.

Institutional review board approval was obtained for a qualitative research design based on focus groups conducted in four Canadian cities with 25 senior corporate communicators, human resources professionals, and general business managers.

This research has validated the competencies and credentials for senior-level corporate communications and public relations executives as highlighted in the Pathways to the Profession framework. It has also provided the profession with an understanding of the value senior public relations and organizational managers place on professional association membership and professional and academic credentials. This research is an important contribution to the growing body of knowledge on competency frameworks as professional associations, such as the Canadian Public Relations Society, take leadership positions in providing educational institutions with sets of standards for public relations and corporate communications education in Canada.

This research will help the public relations and corporate communications profession provide guidance to educational institutions programming for senior-level public relations and communications management education based on quantifiable data on the value executives place on a particular set of skills and competencies.

This is the first study of its kind that examines the perceived competencies and skills of Canadian senior public relations/communications management leadership. Further this research sought to assess the value of academic and professional credentials necessary for participation in executive leadership roles.

This paper aims to add to the limited extant literature on public library leadership.

The study investigates the desired qualities and behaviours required for public library leaders by interviewing 30 senior librarians from Ireland, the UK and the east coast of the USA in order to develop an understanding of the perceptions of current leaders in the field of public librarianship. A review of the relevant literature was used to design an interview guide which was used to conduct structured in‐depth face‐to‐face interviews.

The findings illustrate that there is no universal or common behaviour, even within national boundaries, for effective public library leadership. Two‐thirds of the interviewees, however, prioritised attention to the implementation of vision – desired goals – as the most essential element of library leadership.

Demonstrates a lack of focus in the leadership problem in librarianship and the need for work to be devoted to the development of leaders. Shows that there is also an absence of success in planning.

The current study is the most in‐depth study to date on this topic, drawing on face‐to‐face interviews with 30 public library leaders. Prior to his study, no in‐depth face‐to‐face study on the topic of leadership in librarianship has been researched and published outside of North America. As this study was undertaken in three national jurisdictions – Ireland, the UK, and the USA – it is also the first interview‐based transnational study on the topic.

By looking into the relationship between organizational culture and excellent leadership in public relations, the purpose of this paper is bifold: first, how and to what extent organizational culture can affect leadership effectiveness in communication management; and second, what possible impact excellent leadership in public relations may generate to reshape organizational culture in a way to further support the value of public relations.

An online survey was distributed to a randomly selected group of 1,000 senior public relations executives in the USA by using the PR executive database of Heyman Associates, a PR executive search firm in New York City. A final sample of 222 senior public relations executives was recruited. This group of respondents mirrored the characteristics of senior executives in the public relations profession in the USA.

The results identified the reciprocal relationship between organizational culture and excellent leadership in public relations. The testing of a non-recursive structural model confirmed that organizational culture generates a direct, positive effect on the achievement of excellent leadership in public relations. More importantly, excellent leadership in public relations also influences organizational culture by reshaping it in a favorable way to support public relations efforts in the organization.

There is insufficient empirical research linking public relations leadership and organizational culture, although it is agreed these two institutional conditions are critical. Thus, this study unpacked the independent and dependent roles of organizational culture in influencing leadership effectiveness in public relations, which may generate implications for both research and practice purposes.