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This chapter reflects on the challenges of connecting global leadership practice and theory through an academia-practitioner research project focused on global/international managers in Danish businesses in and outside Denmark. Based on research and dissemination activities conducted (in part by the authors) as part of the project and the associated cocreative forum, Global Leadership Academy (GLA), four learning points for global leadership development practice will be presented. Considerations for engaging global managers, particularly from small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), are discussed and implications for educational practice are provided. Specifically, issues concerning the challenges of self-identification of global managers, differentiation of types of global leadership roles and the contextualization of global leadership are discussed. This chapter is targeted toward faculty, consultants, trainers, and program designers (full-time or postexperience learning) seeking to design, recruit participants, and foster a meaningful global leadership learning experience for postexperience learners and global practitioners.

This chapter examines the complexity of global leaders themselves. As global leadership research has begun to move beyond a limiting overemphasis on skills and competencies, we merge one focus on the deep structure of leader cognition with a focus on cultural identity that has matured largely independently. In so doing, we seek to push the field toward answering the broader question of what makes a global leader sufficiently complex to handle the vast complexities of the role. We place the construct of self-concept complexity as central to the performance of global leaders in ways ranging from organizational performance to social and community responsibility. By advancing our understanding of the role of self-concept complexity in driving global leadership outcomes, this research seeks to spur further theoretical development and practical application toward a deeper comprehension of the complexity of truly global leaders.

“It should also be noted that the objective of convergence and equal distribution, including across under-performing areas, can hinder efforts to generate growth. Contrariwise, the objective of competitiveness can exacerbate regional and social inequalities, by targeting efforts on zones of excellence where projects achieve greater returns (dynamic major cities, higher levels of general education, the most advanced projects, infrastructures with the heaviest traffic, and so on). If cohesion policy and the Lisbon Strategy come into conflict, it must be borne in mind that the former, for the moment, is founded on a rather more solid legal foundation than the latter” European Commission (2005, p. 9)Adaptation of Cohesion Policy to the Enlarged Europe and the Lisbon and Gothenburg Objectives.

Aim of the present monograph is the economic analysis of the role of MNEs regarding globalisation and digital economy and in parallel there is a reference and examination of some legal aspects concerning MNEs, cyberspace and e‐commerce as the means of expression of the digital economy. The whole effort of the author is focused on the examination of various aspects of MNEs and their impact upon globalisation and vice versa and how and if we are moving towards a global digital economy.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a framework for leader-member exchange (LMX) in the context of global integration strategy of multinational corporations (MNCs). Further, an interaction effect of leader's network centrality and leader's alignment with MNC policies on LMX and resource accessibility is proposed.

The paper begins with the notion that different departments in a subsidiary of an MNC are likely to have different requirements for integration within the MNC network. This paper extends the literature by suggesting that employees working in the same department of a subsidiary of an MNC are likely to have different perception of the degree of integration of their subsidiary with other nodes in the MNC network.

The paper posits that employees forming the “in-group” of a subsidiary leader are more likely to perceive their subsidiary as more integrated than the “out-group” employees; contribute more by way of knowledge transfer than the “out-group” employees; and perform better than the “out-group” employees, because of the moderating effect of leader's network centrality on the relationship between LMX and resource accessibility.

The research has implications for the role of subsidiary leaders in shaping the perceptions of their subordinates toward the global integration strategy of an MNC.

The study fills a gap by integrating the LMX and MNC global integration strategy literatures and proposing the existence of perceptual differences, even at subordinate level.

For the past several decades, the field of global leadership has made noteworthy theoretical and empirical progress. The role of a global follower, however, has not been addressed to date. This chapter focuses on global followers and global followership as vital elements of a global leadership process supporting a traditional followership view that “leadership can only occur if there is followership” (Uhl-Bien, Riggio, Lowe, & Carsten, 2014, p. 83). Two assumptions ground the arguments: global leaders and global followers are engaged in a partnering process of global leadership, and followers and global followers have distinctive characteristics influenced by their specific environments. To explore those assumptions, we start by introducing the followership theory and relevant followership characteristics. Subsequently, we address the role of context in global leader–follower dynamics, extrapolate global followership characteristics from relevant multidisciplinary literature, and offer an example of a global leader–follower partnership. Next, we examine mentions of global followers and global followership in academic and nonacademic literature, and define a global followership construct. The conceptual framework, global followership model, research agenda, and practical implications conclude the manuscript.

This paper illuminates the distinction between individual and organizational actors in business-to-business markets as well as the coexistence of formal and informal mechanisms of coordination in multinational corporations. The main questions addressed include the following. (1) What factors influence the occurrence of personal contacts of foreign subsidiary managers in industrial multinational corporations? (2) How such personal contacts enable coordination in industrial markets and within multinational firms? The theoretical context of the paper is based on: (1) the interaction approach to industrial markets, (2) the network approach to industrial markets, and (3) the process approach to multinational management. The unit of analysis is the foreign subsidiary manager as the focal actor of a contact network. The paper is empirically focused on Portuguese sales subsidiaries of Finnish multinational corporations, which are managed by either a parent country national (Finnish), a host country national (Portuguese) or a third country national. The paper suggests eight scenarios of individual dependence and uncertainty, which are determined by individual, organizational, and/or market factors. Such scenarios are, in turn, thought to require personal contacts with specific functions. The paper suggests eight interpersonal roles of foreign subsidiary managers, by which the functions of their personal contacts enable inter-firm coordination in industrial markets. In addition, the paper suggests eight propositions on how the functions of their personal contacts enable centralization, formalization, socialization and horizontal communication in multinational corporations.

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.