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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.

In this paper we develop a model for researching the influence that a board of directors can have on improving an organization’s sustainability performance. Our model explores sources of cognitive flexibility of boards needed to recognize and respond to the need for improved sustainability performance. We first define concepts of sustainability, sustainability competence, and sustainability performance. We then analyze two forms of board capital (a board’s human capital and its social capital) and three aspects of a board’s information processing (its patterns of information search, discussion and debate, and information absorption) that we suggest affect a board’s cognitive flexibility and thereby influence whether a board decides to adopt sustainability performance goals. Our model also suggests that an organization’s strategic flexibility – as represented by its current endowments of resource flexibilities and coordination flexibilities – will moderate the relationship between a board’s decision to adopt sustainability performance goals and an organization’s subsequent achievement of those goals. We also suggest that our model is generally relevant to any research seeking to predict the influence of boards on strategic change in many forms, not just to research focused on sustainability issues.

In our framework, we examine the influence of both reactive and proactive cognitive variables on strategic change. Reactive sources that impact strategic change are perceptions and attributions – cognitions that determine the “what” and the “why” of performance. Perceptions are first-order cognitions that assess what is the performance feedback: positive or negative? After performance feedback is perceived, attributions are second-order cognitions that attempt to establish why the performance is positive or negative.

This paper explores what differentiates success from failure in post-acquisition integration. It seeks to overcome some of the limitations of previous research by adopting a more holistic and dynamic examination of the process and by focusing on aspects that can be readily applied in practice. Four cases of mergers and acquisitions (M&A) in the global automobile industry are examined using secondary data and taking a grounded theory approach. The four cases comprise two pairs of successes and two pairs of failures. Two of the pairs comprise established multinational companies, while two others comprise emerging multinational companies’ acquisitions of Korean automakers; in each case, there was one successful M&A and one failure. It is inducted that what differentiates the successful cases from the failures is their different approaches to two common tensions in post-acquisition integration, namely, their approaches to integration strategy and people issues. A two-level framework is proposed in which post-integration is managed simultaneously and dynamically at the strategic and people levels. These inductive findings, if verified by a more broadly based empirical examination, will extend M&A theory by providing a more integrated and dynamic approach to post-acquisition integration, in which strategic and people perspectives are jointly taken into account and interact with each other, thereby creating value for both acquiring and acquired firms.

German universities (GU) require an active control to ensure fulfillment of the strategic goals and to strengthen their competitiveness against other national and international institutions for higher education. Implementing a performance measurement and management (PMM) is one possible way of achieving this. But, the instrument has not yet arrived in GU. Therefore, this chapter describes the specific requirements for implementation of PMM in a GU.

With the intention to deeply understand processes, structures and decisions, and in order to derive the necessary transformations for PMM in GU as well as to contribute profound recommendation for an appropriate implementation of PMM in GU we investigated a GU using a case study design. Hence, the case university, which illustrates phenomena in real-world context.

The findings of the case study are threefold. First, the traditional categories of PMM are inadequate for GU and have to be adapted to the specific requirements of every university. Second, performance measures differ from those in companies concerning addressees, complexity of data supply, and goal conflicts. Third, the basic principle of controllability is not valid for GU. These differences to PMM systems in business companies have to be considered during implementation of PMM in universities and highlight needfulness of transformations.

We develop an integrative conceptualization of how firms set and alter strategic goals, incorporating insights from goal-setting literatures across the disciplines of marketing, management, and psychology. Our framework accounts for the internal and external forces that impact the content of a firm's goals as well as the dynamic processes by which these goals are formed and changed over time. By proposing this framework, we strive to offer insights into the “black box” of organizational goals that connect firm resources and environmental context to firm strategies. Illustrative data to support our framework are provided from a case study of a Fortune 100 communication firm's entry into an emerging, high-technology, new product marketplace.

Academic libraries develop strategic plans as instruments for grounding operational work in shared vision and measurable goals. The authors of this chapter test the assumption that technical services work is often absent in library strategic plans, even if that work is an assumed component. They explore the representation of technical services through a rich content analysis of Association of Research Libraries member strategic plans to reveal key themes and use the results as a tool to more broadly develop a set of guiding principles for technical services professionals in the 21st century. To provide valuable and relevant services to users, technical services professionals must develop bold and sustainable guiding principles informed by both their representation in their libraries' strategic plans and emerging trends in academic libraries.

Implementing the sustainable development goals (SDGs) has proven a significant challenge for companies. While multinational enterprises (MNEs) have shown a real intention to contribute to these goals, they face major barriers in implementing the SDGs in their core business strategies. Extant academic studies on this phenomenon have primarily explored why companies “should” address the SDG agenda but have not (yet) explored what “works,” what does not “work,” and why. Therefore, evidence of a sizable gap between intention and realization is growing. Besides, there is a limited explanation for the existence of this gap and no validated implementation models that could help overcome it. Additionally, management research remains relatively fragmented. The diversity of existing theoretical and empirical frameworks makes it difficult to consolidate scientific and practical insights on “how” to guide companies to accelerate the global goals through their core operations.

This study is one of the first attempts to draw lessons from extant research on effective SDGs’ implementation strategies. For that, we upgrade the “SDG Compass,” which has been recognized as a leading framework for SDGs implementation in companies’ core activities. A critical assessment of the literature on the SDGs implementation has been conducted through a systematic literature review (SLR) and bibliometric analysis. This has helped us identify gaps in the SDG implementation practice and accumulate relevant insights supporting a more integrated and upgraded implementation framework: the SDG Compass+. This framework can advance coordinated theoretical and practical research by identifying the antecedents and critical factors of impactful SDG implementation strategies.

The dynamic environment in which the academic library operates requires explicit links between business strategy and a new management priority including the development of people; this is the focus of human resource development (HRD). It serves the needs of an organization by ensuring that employees’ expertise is state-of-the-art, something that is critical in a period of rapid technological development coinciding with ever-expanding societal needs. HRD can be relied upon to support and shape a wide range of academic library initiatives requiring a competent and engaged workforce by recognizing people as the organization’s most critical asset, one that drives competitive advantage and helps it out-perform the market. Emphasis is placed on developing an organizational context that will attract and develop talented individuals and leaders and keep them engaged. Furthermore, HRD activities must respond to job changes and integrate staff skills sets with the long-term plans and strategies of the organization thus ensuring the efficient and effective use of resources. This chapter explores HRD as a strategic concern of the organization and how it can best serve the organization in the long term. In so doing, it considers how HRD can help the academic library focus resources in those areas where there are strong likelihoods that they can produce substantial improvements in future capacity and performance. This kind of strategic planning helps the organization configure resources within a dynamic competitive environment, thus serving market needs and satisfying stakeholder expectations, helping meet its business purpose and maintain its strategic direction. The case study developed here highlights the need for the effective linkage of HRD and strategic planning for the advancement of the academic library. It suggests the need for developing and implementing both a strategic plan and an HRD plan and developing a culture of strategic human resource development (SHRD) in academic libraries.