Kevin S. Groves and Ann E. Feyerherm
Unprecedented transformations to the nature of work and organizations are compelling leadership and organization development scholars and practitioners to reexamine the relevance…
Abstract
Purpose
Unprecedented transformations to the nature of work and organizations are compelling leadership and organization development scholars and practitioners to reexamine the relevance and utility existing models of leadership potential. While there exist several published leadership potential models, the range and intensity of environmental forces fundamentally changing the nature of work and organizations demands a revision of leadership potential. The purpose of this study is to develop a leadership potential model that reflects the current and emerging nature of work and leadership challenges while also providing organizations a practical tool for talent review processes, succession planning and leadership development practices.
Design/methodology/approach
This article presents a field study consisting of semistructured interviews with 45 leaders engaged in a highly complex, volatile and uncertain industry: US healthcare.
Findings
Our results illustrate a dynamic two-dimensional model of leadership potential that comprises both cognitive (analytical aptitude and learning agility) and behavioral (people savvy and leadership capability) competencies operating across micro- and macro-levels of influence.
Practical implications
The article concludes with a series of recommendations for how leadership and organization development professionals, executive teams and boards may utilize the model for leader assessment and selection practices, talent review and succession planning and talent development initiatives.
Originality/value
The proposed model of leadership potential offers several advancements to the field's existing theoretical frameworks. The proposed model highlights the criticality of competencies aligned with the changing nature of work, including collaboration skills, divergent thinking, environmental scanning and evaluating data in ambiguous contexts. The model diverges from the existing theory by establishing leader drive as a motivation to serve others and initiate sustainable changes in business operations.
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Ann E. Feyerherm and Cheryl L. Rice
This research investigates the relationship among a team's emotional intelligence, the team leader's emotional intelligence, and team performance. Twenty‐six customer service…
Abstract
This research investigates the relationship among a team's emotional intelligence, the team leader's emotional intelligence, and team performance. Twenty‐six customer service teams and their leaders were studied using the three components of Salovey and Mayer's (1990) conception of emotional intelligence: Understanding emotion, managing emotion, and identifying emotions. Team members and two corporate directors assessed team performance using customer service, accuracy, productivity, and continuous improvement as performance indicators. Of the three components of emotional intelligence (EI) studied, only understanding emotion and managing emotion positively correlated with some measures of team performance. However, no correlations occurred between identifying emotions and any performance measure. Of the six positive correlations between team EI and team performance, three were between EI and customer service. No EI components correlated with productivity or continuous improvement performance measures. Study results also indicate that team leader EI has a neutral to negative relationship with team performance from the team members' perspectives. The data show, overall that a negative relationship exists between team leader EI and team performance as rated by individuals. The only positive correlation was between team leader understanding emotion scores and customer service, as rated by managers. This result is consistent with the findings stated previously that team EI positively correlates with customer service.
Dale Ainsworth and Ann E. Feyerherm
Transorganizational systems (TSs) are a collection of organizations that have agreed to work interdependently to accomplish a task too large in scope for a single organization. TS…
Abstract
Purpose
Transorganizational systems (TSs) are a collection of organizations that have agreed to work interdependently to accomplish a task too large in scope for a single organization. TS are organizational structures capable of addressing large-scale problems, and are vitally important. However, relative to the stand-alone organization, TS theory is under-developed and currently no comprehensive diagnostic model exits for managing TS change. Theoretically constructed diagnostic models are essential ingredients of any planned change effort. The purpose of this paper is to propose a comprehensive model for diagnosing TS.
Design/methodology/approach
In this paper a comprehensive model for diagnosing TS is proposed. In constructing the model existing literature is integrated with the enduring organization development work of Cummings and Worley (2015). These authors developed a comprehensive model to diagnose organizations at three levels: individual, group, and organization. This paper proposes adding a fourth, higher order level – the TS level.
Findings
The resulting diagnostic model offers theorists and practitioners a comprehensive framework for use in diagnosing TS functionality and performance.
Practical implications
The results of quality diagnosis are essential in managing change leading to improved TS effectiveness.
Originality/value
Currently no comprehensive diagnostic model is available for managing higher order change in TS. This paper aims to fill this void.
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Ann E. Feyerherm and Sally Breyley Parker
Organizations are currently striving to become more sustainable, as resources dwindle and social desirability for sustainability increases. This is important in public sector…
Abstract
Organizations are currently striving to become more sustainable, as resources dwindle and social desirability for sustainability increases. This is important in public sector organizations as well as private, and exemplars are needed. Therefore, this chapter provides a description of how a public housing authority in pursuit of a social mission parlayed an energy performance contract into a triple bottom line sustainability journey. The Cuyahoga Metropolitan Housing Authority's (CMHA) sustainability journey has been shaped most significantly by the commitment of CMHA leadership to collaboration (internal and external) as a core strategy. The chapter provides a rich description of CMHA's emergent partnerships with various organizations in their environment; focusing first on energy and later encompassing social, ecological, and economic sustainability. It describes and analyzes the leadership that emerged which played an essential role in supporting the complexity of increasing collaborative involvement. New theories of leadership, most specifically Complexity Leadership Theory (Uhl-Bien & Marion, 2008), emergent leadership (Goldstein et al., 2010), and adaptive leadership (Heifetz, 1994) are used to make sense of the leadership philosophy and actions that worked in the sustainability journey.
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Hilary Bradbury-Huang is professor in the Management Division of Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU). Her research, scholarly activism, and teaching focus on the human and…
Abstract
Hilary Bradbury-Huang is professor in the Management Division of Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU). Her research, scholarly activism, and teaching focus on the human and organizational dimensions of creating healthy communities. At OHSU she teaches in the healthcare MBA and physician leadership development programs. She also develops the action research approach to community based participatory research for health.
Barbara Steele and Ann Feyerherm
This chapter explores the evolution of a network, initially based on providing sustainable seafood through Loblaw’s supply chain, to a network that is collectively working to…
Abstract
Purpose
This chapter explores the evolution of a network, initially based on providing sustainable seafood through Loblaw’s supply chain, to a network that is collectively working to improve ocean health. It describes the role of the CEO and key managers, the internal changes taken by Loblaw to become a more sustainable organization, and the external partnering that resulted in a more coherent network with shared goals.
Design
The chapter describes models and theories of sustainable organizations, issue nets, and collaboration and then applies the concepts to understand Loblaw’s sustainability journey and the creation of a network.
Findings
The model of the evolution to a sustainable organization is extended to include the journey to sustainable issue or domain networks. What Loblaw and the partnering organizations were able to create suggests that there are increasing levels of collaboration around changing a domain, if there is the courage to take a leap of faith and increase an organization’s time horizon beyond immediate financial demands.
Originality and value
The findings of this chapter will help senior executives with responsibility for shifting supply chains to become more sustainable. In addition, this case provides a new level of detail in describing the journey to sustainability, shifting from a company focus to an issue focus.
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Susan Albers Mohrman and Abraham B. (Rami) Shani
The large number of publications about sustainability and sustainable development that have been published during the past decade has dealt largely with the science of…
Abstract
The large number of publications about sustainability and sustainable development that have been published during the past decade has dealt largely with the science of sustainability, the content of sustainability initiatives, and increasingly with the need to more closely link the economic, environmental, and social purposes and operating logic of the firm. Recent literature stresses the inherent social nature of the challenges to aggressively moving to more sustainable ways of operating for the well-being of our planet, society, economy, organizations, and humans. Despite rich case examples, guidance on how to organize to achieve the triple bottom line is limited. We take stock of the current state of knowledge, using an adaptive complex system perspective to articulate the challenges of organizing for sustainable effectiveness. Most of the global economy and the knowledge upon which it is predicated carry a logic of resource abundance even in the face of increasing competition for scarce resources, and a singular focus on economic outcomes. We argue that the development of new capabilities to address triple bottom line sustainability requires a change in that logic and requires new rules of interaction, new organizational and interorganizational designs, and new ways of learning. The premise is that systems can build on their inherent capabilities to learn and to act collectively in order to adapt. We argue that by working together to collaboratively explore how to organize for sustainability, academics and practitioners can accelerate knowledge generation and progress. This chapter provides the theoretical framing context for the chapters to come.
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Pamela Lirio, Terri R. Lituchy, Silvia Ines Monserrat, Miguel R. Olivas‐Lujan, Jo Ann Duffy, Suzy Fox, Ann Gregory, B.J. Punnett and Neusa Santos
The purpose of this paper is to examine career‐life issues of successful women in the Americas.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine career‐life issues of successful women in the Americas.
Design/methodology/approach
A total of 30 interviews were conducted with successful women in Canada, Argentina and Mexico. Themes were pulled from the interview transcripts for each country, analyzed and then compared across countries, looking at universalities and differences of experiences.
Findings
The women in all three countries conveyed more subjective measures of career success, such as contributing to society and learning in their work, with Canada and Mexico particularly emphasizing receiving recognition as a hallmark of career success.
Practical implications
This research provides insight into the experiences of successful women in the Americas, which can inform the career development of women in business.
Originality/value
This research contributes to the literature on women's careers, highlighting successful women's experiences across cultures and in an under‐researched area: Latin America.