Search results

The present study aims to examine whether an intervention designed to increase self‐efficacy for transformational leadership results in more transformational leadership self‐efficacy and a higher level of transformational leadership. In previous research higher levels of emotional intelligence have been found to be associated with more transformational leadership; thus the present study also seeks to examine whether higher emotional intelligence makes individuals more receptive to self‐efficacy‐based leadership training.

The study used an experimental design. Participants were randomly assigned to either a self‐efficacy expressive writing condition or a control writing condition. Participants were 118 managers who completed measures of self‐efficacy, transformational leadership and emotional intelligence at the start of the study and again completed measures of self‐efficacy, and transformational leadership after the intervention.

Managers in the intervention condition showed significantly greater transformational leadership self‐efficacy and higher transformational leadership scores than the control group managers at post‐test. Further, those higher in emotional intelligence were more responsive to the intervention.

The intervention holds promise as a low cost and easy to implement method of facilitating development of transformational leadership.

The finding that an intervention aimed at increasing self‐efficacy can increase transformational leadership extends previous research on both self‐efficacy and transformational leadership. This result suggests that leadership self‐efficacy may be an important component of transformational leadership. The finding that individuals higher in emotional intelligence benefited most from the intervention extends previous findings regarding the importance of emotional intelligence in organisational settings. Emotional intelligence may facilitate individuals' openness to change.

Addressing the challenge of continuously strengthening our own leadership begins with considering our self-efficacy, our belief in our capacity to carry out desired actions, and its influence on our agency, our actual capacity to carry out desired actions. Our agency grows when “nudged” along by our self-efficacy. However, this requires insight into what is happening around us, achieved by looking to the following two leadership horizons:

Presence, how much we notice and attend to what is happening, with empathy, for all stakeholders.

Vision and values, why we do what we do, how we see ourselves, and who we aspire to be.

Beyond what these two leadership horizons offer separately, together they influence the stories we shape in our “storied space,” the place we each occupy in which the events of the past and the possibilities of the future converge in our ever-unfolding present. We constantly draw together emerging insights to keep making new meaning and ideating possibilities best matched to addressing emerging challenges. As our understanding sharpens, we narrow our options to the best fitting one, shape it into a prototype, and test it in action. Throughout this, we constantly monitor the resonance of our self-efficacy and agency to keep the actions we intend undertaking realistically sitting at the threshold of what we can nearly accomplish.

Rather than mapping a fixed blueprint, this design approach offers rigor and agility, enabling our agency to grow organically, culminating in leadership fit for purpose, including a sound capacity to strengthen our own leadership, by design.

People have worked together since the beginnings of human time. Since then the forms of collaboration have barely changed. While a group of laborers building the pyramids of Egypt might seem to bear little resemblance to a team of machine operators working in a plant, they actually have much in common. Both groups are made up of people of similar backgrounds with clear loyalties and interests, interacting face-to-face to perform relatively well-defined tasks in pursuit of a shared goal.

In 2002, The Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA) observed the 25th anniversary of the publication of its first Systems, Auditability, & Control (SAC) study. This paper reviews the development of the SAC projects and their impact on Information Systems (IS) auditing in particular. Three different research methodologies were used for collecting the data for this research. First, a rigorous literature review was conducted. Second, an oral‐history methodology was used to collect data via interviews. Third, notes and minutes from many early committee meetings of IIA, including the SAC Committee, were studied. The early years (1954‐1977) saw a dearth of related literature. Thus individual accountants and auditors found it difficult to acquire or gather information on emerging issues. The Systems, Auditability, & Control (SAC) study published in 1977 was one of the major attempts to codify IS auditing knowledge. This study has been followed up by three other SAC projects in 1991, 1994, and 2001. These SAC projects have provided some of the best guidance for IS auditors over these last 25 years. From the beginning of IS auditing, there has been a continued acceleration of technology. In particular, the audit process has been impacted by the proliferation of microcomputers.

Complex collaboration refers to situations where working together effectively across boundaries is critical for complex projects and problems. This work often involves projects of large scope and long duration. The knowledge of a variety of disciplines may be involved. Such projects may cross organizational, national, and/or cultural boundaries. The problem of managing such situations includes ambitious schedules, conflict of cultures and practices, massive amounts of information, multiple languages, and ambiguity of roles and responsibilities. Complex collaboration represents a capability that is essential to effective execution in such situations as new product development, mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures, and supply chain management, as well as large government projects. A number of issues emerge in examining complex collaboration, including: unit of analysis, critical relationships, resource development, virtual teaming, key skills, and improvement processes.

Collaborative forms range from co-located teams engaged in short term local projects, to international joint ventures, to worldwide networks of organizations and citizens linked together to generate global social change. In order to discern patterns that transcend the breadth of forms (including virtual), a new term is introduced that encompasses the entire spectrum: collaborative entity (CE). The diverse and far-ranging CE literature is then integrated into the Collaborative Capacity (CC) Framework. That framework is comprised of ten broad constructs and their interrelationships that, when considered together, capture fundamental aspects of all CEs. The CC Framework provides a bridge-building language to help facilitate inter-disciplinary, multi-dimensional dialogue, research, and perspectives on fostering collaborative capacity.