Collective Management Based on Holistic Leadership: A Case Study of Cisco Systems

Abstract

Through collective management at Cisco Systems in the United States, practitioners at all levels of management, rather than just a select few, overcame various contradictions through “strategic collaborations” across divisions within the company to respond to the challenge of new business innovation. Moreover, through skillful management of leadership at the formal organization layer, the informal organization layer, and the psychological boundary layer (the boundary layer between the two aforementioned layers), all practitioners of the company demonstrated holistic leadership, which enabled creative dialogue, cooperation, and understanding as well as rapid decision-making and action. Strategic collaboration based on holistic leadership enables outstanding ideas to be readily incorporated into the organization and to be examined and acted on by a single team. This chapter discusses processes whereby collective management based on Cisco System’s holistic leadership changed staff behavior and the corporate culture to achieve business innovation.

Citation

Kodama, M. (2017), "Collective Management Based on Holistic Leadership: A Case Study of Cisco Systems", Developing Holistic Leadership, Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 143-169. https://doi.org/10.1108/978-1-78714-421-720171005