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This chapter focused on challenges and tensions that characterize leadership in the military context. It aims to identify and analyze key paradoxes that are reflected in this unique setting, while exploring the challenges, opportunities, and advantages posed by these core paradoxes for leadership. It addresses different types of paradoxes, among them: (a) shared leadership versus hierarchical leadership, (b) flexibility and creativity versus conformity and discipline, (c) complexity and chaos versus simplicity and linearity, (d) hegemonic and prototypical leadership versus leadership of multiple identities, and last (e) distant leadership and exchange relationship versus intimate leadership and communal relationship. For each focal paradox, we uncover the dynamics, processes, management tensions, and possible subsequent outcomes. We suggest that leadership that is able to effectively attend to competing expectations and paradoxical tensions is essential in the current hybrid and complex organizational structure and unique context of the military. The chapter draws on interviews and prior research of leadership in the Israeli military, as well as other global military contexts, to gain a more nuanced understanding of the challenges of modern military leadership.

This paper aims to identify the factors affecting continued use of digital libraries in a military context.

Semi-structured interviews with four focus groups consisting of 21 respondents, who are military education instructors and librarians, were carried out. This qualitative approach study adopted content analysis methods that were designed to contrast and make comparisons based on the participants’ responses. The valid responses were analyzed using NVivo 12 Plus.

Using semi-structured interviews, this study presents five dimensions of critical success factors generated from the analysis of the content of the qualitative data. The dimensions highlighted are as follows: perceived quality factors; perceived instrumental support; perceived ease of use; users’ expectation and users’ satisfaction; and net benefits and perceived usefulness.

This study is only focussing on military education instructors and librarians in the vicinity of four regions in Peninsular Malaysia. For practical implications, it provides an understanding of how the organization could sustain the continued use of a military-context digital library (DL).

This study makes a new practical contribution to DL information systems’ successful implementation practices in a military context. This study also serves as a guideline for the organizational stakeholders to have a better understanding of their knowledge and the digitalization environment. The findings of this study provide an understanding of how the organization could sustain the continued use of digital libraries in a military context.

This study fills the void in the literature by investigating the DL use in the context of a military setting.

The purpose of this paper is to explore how male and female leaders define effective leadership in an extreme context.

The authors conducted in-depth interviews with leaders working in an extreme context (a matched sample of female and male Majors and Colonels in the Canadian Armed Forces) and analysed military training materials.

In the military, male and female leadership looks much more similar than might be expected. Further, surprisingly this is not occurring because women are leading in more masculine ways, but rather the opposite; men are leading in more feminine ways.

There is a need for organizations to recognize and acknowledge the role of feminine leadership behaviours. This may also give women a better opportunity to succeed in these types of leadership roles.

This study contributes to the leadership literature by furthering our understanding of the boundary conditions for transformational leadership in relation to gender stereotypes, situational strength, and social identity.

This paper aims to identify the critical success factors of the continued usage of digital library (DL) successful implementation from the perspective of users with organisation support factors as key antecedents.

Based on the extensive literature review, this study has constructed a conceptual framework based on organisational support perspectives and updated Delone and McLean’s information system success model. A pilot study was carried out on a sample of 105 respondents from military-context. A survey instrument including 22 measurement items was designed to identify the level of DL information system (IS) successful implementation practices in military context. Descriptive statistical analysis and reliability analysis were used to analyse the data with SPSS software.

The findings indicate that training and education, DL environment and communication support, continuation of usage intention, net benefits and user satisfaction are the critical success factors that play key role in ensuring the continued usage DL successful implementation in military context. The military-context DL needs to obtain critical success factors of DL practices implementation to sustain its continued usage, particularly for the active users of its members.

This study only considered the military personnel who have visited the five main military libraries. For practical implications, the development of instruments in this study may be valuable tools to evaluate DL in other DL settings in Malaysian context other than academic settings.

This study makes a new contribution to DL IS successful implementation practices in military context. This study also provides important information for decision-makers involved in DL IS successful implementation practices and provides useful reference for future researchers in this research area.

This paper aims to report the findings of a study examining the relationship between different leadership styles and engagement through the mediating role of proactive personality.

Servant leadership, paradoxical leadership, authentic leadership, employee engagement and proactive personality were assessed in an empirical study based on a sample of 348 military personnel in Spain. The questionnaire data were analyzed through SEM using EQS and bootstrapping analysis using the PROCESS macro for SPSS.

The results reveal that servant leadership style in officers partially impacts their cadets' engagement through proactive personality but that authentic and paradoxical leadership styles do not mediate the relationship. The authors also verify a direct relationship between proactive personality and engagement.

The study implications advance the literature on leadership in emphasizing new leadership styles to increase proactive personality and engagement in the military context. This study verifies the importance of military leaders fostering servant leadership as an antecedent of proactive personality. Finally, the authors show that servant leadership partially impacts engagement through proactive personality.

This study explores the relationship among servant, paradoxical and authentic leadership styles, proactive personality, and engagement – relationships that have not been explored theoretically and tested empirically in the military context.

This paper aims to illustrate the need for context-adapted models of military learning organizations (LOs), identify challenges to building LOs in the military and discuss how maturing as an LO provides military organizations a competitive advantage.

This paper highlights the primarily industrial focus of existing literature, discusses a sample of nuanced challenges to building military LOs and posits potential benefits of military LOs future operational environment.

Building military LOs is an area of research that remains underdeveloped. Advancing LO theory requires researchers to consider context and the challenges organizations may encounter during efforts to build LOs.

This paper highlights gaps and alignment in LO theory to advance the argument that context-adapted approaches to building military LOs are needed.

The purpose of this paper is to undertake an analysis of the engagement of organization and management literature with military and militarization themes and issues.

An interpretive, textual literature analysis which identifies a range of international themes and issues in relation to militarization.

Identifies a modernistic‐managerialist tendency in the organization and management literature which elects to engage with military aspects and issues. This is predicated on a perceived mutual utility between the apparently separable “military” and “non‐military” domains and revolves around a series of commonly invoked texts and sets of popular cultural representations. Also recognises that organization and management commentaries influenced by critical perspectives tend not to engage so readily with military contexts and points up political commitments that might make this the case. Identifies approaches to blurring military/non‐military divides in current militaristic representations.

Provides a considered thematic and paradigmatic reflection on militarization commentary in extant organization and management literature. Identifies and explores methodological challenges in considering militarization and its pervasive effects and delineations.

Maps the organization and management literature in relation to militarization and generates a series of critical platforms from which to embark on a corresponding exploration of militarization.

Conducts a novel consideration of the limitations of management and organization literature's hitherto treatment of military and militarization aspects. Generates a fruitful set of conditions and insights for international critical organization and management approaches to military topics and issues.

This paper aims to investigate issues affecting the integration of retired military officers into civilian work using a competence model as an analytical framework.

The paper combines literature review with empirical study. The primary method of data collection was a series of in-depth, face-to-face interviews with 25 retired army officers in Lithuania.

Despite evidence that a career as an officer in the military develops valuable competencies that have obvious potential in the civilian labour market, the integration of retired army officers into the civilian labour market is fraught with difficulties. Apart from the obvious inappropriateness of specific competencies associated with armed combat for civilian occupations, even competencies acquired in military service that align closely with those required in civilian jobs do not necessarily translate because of different contexts and different value systems.

The empirical basis is limited to army officers in Lithuania, and the authors urge caution in extrapolating to other military personnel and other countries. To the extent that the approach has generic value, there are clearly implications for demobilisation after major conflicts or return to civilian life of personnel involved in international peace-keeping.

This exploratory research suggests that a competence framework can identify limits and possibilities of aligning competencies acquired in military service with those required in civilian occupations, provided context and values are incorporated as part of the analysis. The approach piloted in this paper could be useful more widely for facilitating mobility between sectors and occupations arising from the adoption of disruptive technologies.

The paper demonstrates the value of a structured approach to comparing competencies in context and the mediating role of values in moving from military to civilian occupations.

Stress and the military go hand-in-hand, particularly in combat environments. While some personality traits or types weaken relationships between stress and performance, others, such as psychopathy, may strengthen them. In the present chapter, we consider the ramifications of individuals with high levels of psychopathy or psychopathic tendencies in the military with regard to both their own stress and performance and that of those around them. We discuss different reactions to psychological and physical stress, as well as the implications of psychopathic tendencies as they relate to current military issues, including gender, leadership, teamwork, turnover, post-traumatic stress disorder, and suicide. By juxtaposing relevant research findings on stress and psychopathy, we conclude that psychopathic tendencies should have neither uniformly negative nor positive effects on stress and performance in the military. Rather, effects on such individuals and the peripheral others with whom they interact will likely vary greatly depending on numerous factors.

Military officials who become accustomed to the distinct culture of the military face a variety of challenges when attempting to transition into the civilian workforce as veterans. These hardships even pertain to short- and mid-term veterans (SMVs) who leave the military at early career stages to pursue alternative career options. In this study, the authors explored the career construction decisions made by South Korean SMVs who left their military careers and successfully transitioned into the civilian workforce.

The authors used a phenomenology approach and conducted a semi-structured interview with 19 SMVs to unpack their career transition experiences.

The authors identified the motivational factors that encourage SMVs to develop their four career adaptabilities and illustrated the necessity for such qualities pre- and post-transition. Furthermore, the authors characterized each individual experience by the theoretical constructs of career adaptability and highlighted the contextual characteristics that prompted the emergence of career adaptability.

This study contributes to the understanding of career mobility at early career stages and how career adaptability is developed and manifested in the context of transitioning from the military to civilian society.