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One recent direction for leadership research has been the use of purely qualitative data and qualitative analysis. One analytical method used in this phenomenological research has been the full grounded theory method. That method has generated social process theories about leadership in organizational settings. The present research operationalizes those theories into questionnaire format. This operationalized work gives support to a one-factor model for social processes of leadership (SPL) in organizations. It also identifies four lower-order social processes of leadership. Concurrent validity is concluded from a high correlation with Bass & Avolio’s and Podsakoff’s transformational leadership constructs. The correlations are so high that the SPL scale might be tapping the same underlying construct as transformational leadership. The augmentation effect of transformational leadership over (transactional) management is also supported. Support has been obtained for ongoing grounded theory-based research into the social processes of leadership and influence, and related phenomena, in organizations.

Persistent change has placed considerable pressure on organizations to keep up or fade into obscurity. Firms that remain viable, or even thrive, are staffed with decision-makers who capably steer organizations toward opportunities and away from threats. Accordingly, leadership development has never been more critical. In this chapter, the authors propose that leader development is an inherently dyadic process initiated to communicate formal and informal expectations. The authors focus on the informal component, in the form of organizational politics, as an element of leadership that is critical to employee and company success. The authors advocate that superiors represent the most salient information source for leader development, especially as it relates to political dynamics embedded in work systems. The authors discuss research associated with our conceptualization of dyadic political leader development (DPLD). Specifically, the authors develop DPLD by exploring its conceptual underpinnings as they relate to sensemaking, identity, and social learning theories. Once established, the authors provide a refined discussion of the construct, illustrating its scholarly mechanisms that better explain leader development processes and outcomes. The authors then expand research in the areas of political skill, political will, political knowledge, and political phronesis by embedding our conceptualization of DPLD into a political leadership model. The authors conclude by discussing methodological issues and avenues of future research stemming from the development of DPLD.

This study examines how perceptions of injustice, anger, and group identification motivate follower intentions to engage in collective action against leaders. The study revolved around the Malaysian prime minister’s actions and responses toward allegations of misuse of public funds. Responses from 112 Malaysians via a cross-sectional survey revealed that follower perceptions of leader injustice are significantly related to anger toward the leader, which in turn is related to intentions to engage in collective action. The relationship between perceptions of distributive injustice and anger is moderated by group identification, while group efficacy moderates the relationship between anger and collective action intentions.

Through his call to “reverse the lens” in leadership, Shamir (2007) helped trigger the emergence of followership theory as a new field of study in leadership research. While followership theory brings exciting new opportunities to leadership studies, it also introduces theoretical and conceptual challenges for researchers. In this chapter we address these challenges by showing how followership can be positioned fully within the leadership construct. We extend Shamir’s (2007) call for a balanced view in leadership by showing how followership theory adds new perspectives on the ways in which we can study leadership as a dynamic, fluid, relational process. The alternative views we present (e.g., position, role, identity, constructionist, and co-creation) approach leadership study from a range of paradigmatic perspectives that allow us to more fully capture the behaviors, interactions, relational dynamics, and processes through which leadership and followership are created and constructed. We conclude by reflecting on Shamir’s legacy as a scholar, and the contributions he made through his willingness to not only open his mind, but also to constructively challenge alternative perspectives and views.

This chapter takes a new approach to emotions through the lens of a relational identity among hybrid professionals, using those in healthcare as particularly relevant examples. Sharpening the focus on underpinning emotional dynamics may further explain how professional managers can be effective in hybrid roles. The chapter seeks to build on the internal emotional states of these professional managers by understanding how outward emotional displays might influence their subordinates. The understanding of how emotional states/displays in manager–employee relationships influence target behaviors may help multiprofessional organizations generate better-informed leadership practice in relation to desired organizational outcomes, e.g. more efficient and effective health services.

This chapter explores how industrial PhD students are engaged in authentic leadership processes while coping with challenges through self-leadership. The authors illustrate how self-leadership can be a helpful approach to managing the leading-and-being-led dilemma. They argue that self-leadership is a process of goal achievement in collaboration with key stakeholders and, therefore, an important aspect of authentic leadership. The authors identify four aspects of self-leadership that influence authenticity: roles, resources, relations and results. Kringelum, Mortensen and Holmgren call for research into the emergence of self-leadership and authentic leadership, the leadership capabilities required and the double-sidedness and dilemmas inherent in such emergences across different contexts.

Across different research fields, it is increasingly acknowledged that gender is not a binary variable and goes beyond the male–female dichotomy. At the same time, gender is a prominent social cue that affects evaluations and interactions among individuals. Thus, gender can impact social processes on many levels in complex ways. Meetings provide arenas where key social processes unfold that are relevant to the organization. Understanding which role gender takes in this context is therefore central to organizations as well as meeting research. This chapter provides a critical review of research to date on social influence in meetings, specifically zooming in on the role of gender. The authors conducted a multi-step systematic literature review and identified 43 studies across a wide area of disciplines (e.g., psychology, communication, and management). The authors put special emphasis on the methodologies employed across this work since a comprehensive understanding of the applied methods is core for a synthesis of research results. Through the analysis, the authors pinpoint six variables – individual gender, sex role orientation, gender composition, gender salience, contextual factors such as task type and organizational settings, and the construction of gender as a social concept – that are directly related to gender and which represent factors that are critical for the role of gender in the meeting context. Thereby, this chapter aims to provide a roadmap for researchers and practitioners interested in the role of gender during workplace meetings. The authors conclude by highlighting methodological and managerial recommendations and suggest avenues for future research.

In the current era, characterized by volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity (VUCA), organizations are becoming increasingly more complex and less formal. Consequently, traditional control processes are being replaced by knowledge-sharing processes, informal coordination, and networks. Hence, different leadership theories and methods, which are more in line with these developments, are required. Terms such as “leadership in the plural,” “emergent leadership,” “leadership as a structural and networked phenomenon” reflect changes in how the author understands the phenomenon of leadership and sets the direction for new approaches. This chapter describes four paradigm shifts from the traditional approach to leadership, which highlighted the role of a formal leader who influences a group of followers. The author presents a stream of research emphasizing a relational approach among multiple individuals and reframe leadership as an influence action of many. These influence exchanges result in an emergent influence pattern or a leadership configuration. Nevertheless, the author sought to not “throw the baby out with the bathwater,” therefore the author claims that the formal leader is embedded in this configuration. Building on social network analysis and recently developed methodologies, the author provides a platform for measuring leadership as a many-on-many influence process. The author depicts the research she conducted analyzing advice networks, while aspiring to create a synthesis between the traditional and emergent leadership approaches. At the practical level, to understand and develop leadership in organizations nowadays, the author suggests acquiring a “broad and multi-focal lens” to capture the complexity of leadership.