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This article examines the future of intellectual capitalism. It is concluded that intellectual capital has the potential to become the primary wealth creator in most business organisations. The premise for this conclusion is that the knowledge intensive economy experienced by most companies today makes it increasingly difficult to gain a competitive advantage through traditional and tangible competitive weapons alone. It is however clear that the business case for intellectual capitalism must demonstrate sustained earnings as a result of investments in intellectual matters, and it remains to be seen if this will happen in all industries. Intellectual capitalism also needs to mature as a system before intellectual capital will be more measurable, accountable, risk controllable, thereby more manageable, but the progress of such work is slow for the time being. The most important challenge for intellectual capitalism is to develop the necessary organisational platform of social capital, on which intellectual capital can grow. Business leaders wanting to capitalise on their organisation’s intellectual assets, must develop the culture of their organisation. This is not easily done, and cannot be achieved by investing in another knowledge management system or waiting passively for standard setters to come up with new accounting methods for intellectual capital.

This article examines the role of business leadership in the coming decade with respect to social responsibility. It is argued, herein, that the successful leadership agenda in the coming decade will, to a greater degree than today, be shaped by the leader’s ability to take an active and constructive part in the society in which the business operates. The premises for putting forward this hypothesis are that the excesses of the 1990s are over, and the geopolitical, the economic, and the ecological environments offer challenges not seen for a long time in business. Socially responsible leadership in the coming decade will not only be about doing business, but also about questioning how this business is done and how value is created. In an increasingly complex environment, the integrity of the single business leader will matter, as will his or her ability to see the overall role of his or her company in the society in which it operates. Leaders are, to some degree, reflections of what their societies want from them. This paper points to a number of trends where public expectations today call for more social responsibility from commercial players. There are companies showing the way and taking the lead in meeting those expectations, and thereby setting new requirements for business leadership in the coming decade. Even though it is a debated issue, this article concludes that socially responsible leadership will be the answer in meeting those growing expectations. It is also concluded herein that most business leaders will be able to rise to the challenges in the coming decade, as they have before.

The purpose of this paper is to clarify the concept of self as applied to leadership and propose an understanding of how a leader should form conceptions of self, and use these in his or her own development.

Based on self‐, personality‐ and developmental psychology, the paper examines a variety of theoretical foundations, and ties these into the context of leadership and self‐development.

The paper concludes that the self is core, consciousness, and action. The particular characteristics and qualities of the self determine the leader's comprehension of him or herself as a human entity, and is a leader's gateway to self‐confidence and self‐esteem. Leaders therefore need to cultivate an understanding of self by engaging in formative processes which are related to their ability to learn from defining situations, thus raising awareness of points of convergence in a leader's career.

The paper is limited to a conceptual discussion, and further research is needed to verify the proposed hypothesis. Future research should concentrate on empirical work.

The practical outcome is concrete advice, that leaders must engage in processes where their own willpower, beliefs, assumptions, values, principles, needs, relational patterns and social strategies are subject to feedback and testing if their aim is to develop themselves. Self‐development is not the training of skills, nor solely dependent on cognitive strategies.

Most leaders face pressure to develop themselves. The recommendations herein clarify what is a self concept applicable for leaders, and assist in identifying domains, processes and schemata applicable for leadership self‐development.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the importance of willpower in acts of leadership and, if significant, how a leader should develop his or her willpower in order to take a greater leadership role.

The objectives are achieved by a conceptually grounded discussion of the topic, while the arguments are also built upon both a recent survey of leadership acts and on related theoretical material.

Willpower governs acts of leadership. Willpower is a capability that has been found to be genetic, but which also is possible to develop by raised awareness, disciplined practice, and extending one's comfort zones by exposing oneself to challenges. Willpower is a mental capability, and if leaders develop their ability to focus their time and energy management, and become more aware of their feelings, they may improve their willpower. Additionally, their energy balance matters: taking care of basics including paying attention to nutrition and to resting, as well as taking up some form of physical/mental practice may have a positive impact on a leader's willpower.

Research on willpower and its impact on leadership are scarce, and more studies are obviously needed. Since this discussion is conceptual, added empirical research is required.

Leadership must be exercised in organisations, and willpower is an important vehicle in this respect. The implication for practicing leaders is that they need to develop their willpower. This is a capability that most people can develop by raised awareness and disciplined practice, as well as by exposing themselves to challenging tasks aimed at extending their comfort zones.

Some argue that willpower is a quality whose exercise suggests positive outcomes in many areas of life. In leadership research, however, willpower is a capacity that is less studied. Conclusions in the paper support the argument that willpower is important for leadership, and that this is a capacity leaders should pay more attention to and develop. The paper is of value to practicing leaders who want to further extend their leadership capabilities.

As the pendulum swings back towards growth in business, organisational change is again on the top of the corporate agenda. Change management in recent years has not had a very successful record, and organisations must improve their change capabilities – they must better learn the dance of change. The success of change initiatives more than ever depends on the people in organisations. This article presents a people‐oriented approach to change by integrating the latest developments in “inside‐out” positive organisational scholarship with “outside‐in” thinking of future issues. The methodology facilitates better organisational learning as well as boosting people's commitment to change, and is a practical, simple and effective way of structuring and facilitating large‐scale, complex organisational change initiatives.

The purpose of this paper is to describe a way for leaders to lead chaotic change. By chaotic change it is meant changes in an organization when the external and internal complexity and uncertainty are high.

The paper is based on a conceptual discussion.

The paper contributes to concepts of change management in organisations faced with increased complexity in internal and external environment. The study challenges mainstream change management concepts and its chance of success when faced with increased complexity. The authors make suggestions on how to lead chaotic change by influencing the patterns of human interaction. It is recommended to focus change management on people, identity and relationships by changing the way people talk in the organisation.

The authors contend that change management effectiveness is low because leaders underestimates the complexity of change, focusing on tools, strategy and structures instead of paying attention to how human beings change by forming identities through relating.

Successful change management practices must take better account of unpredictability, uncertainty, self‐governance, emergence and other premises describing chaotic circumstances. For a leader this necessitates paying attention to how people form identities in organisations, avoids design oriented command‐and‐control managerial interventions, as well as keeping at bay the anxiety caused by not being in managerial control.

The principal contribution is a conceptual discussion on how to lead people in change by influencing the development and direction of change by changing the on‐going communication in organisations. Theoretical and managerial ideas and insights into change management are provided for organisations faced with increased complexity.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the future concept of leadership. The paper argues a view of leadership in organisations as a shared social influence process of relating, thus challenging mainstream approaches to leadership and the emphasis on leadership as a specialized role.

Conceptual discussion

It is suggested herein that the central acts of leadership in the future will be to focus on the emergence of identity and relationships. It is contended that current paradigms of leadership are limited as they assert leadership as a role with fundamental influence over command and control enabling the design of appropriate interventions for future organisational success. This is not consistent with reality in most organisations today, and will be even less consistent in a near future with added complexity. Therefore a future view of leadership is proposed by paying attention to how leadership may be better understood as an emergent phenomenon when people interact.

The research is conceptual in its nature, and not grounded in empirical evidence. Further research work is needed in order to formalize a full leadership theory.

Leaders must then take better account of how identity and relations emerges to understand what constitute leadership – by viewing leadership as a shared social influence process of relating. For a leader this necessitates acknowledging feelings of not being in control as crucial to the leadership process; enables followers to experience their ability and find their way to act in the moment.

The article challenges the current mainstream paradigm of leadership and its powerbase. Its primary value lies in how one thinks of leadership – as position or as something being emergent/dynamic/not in control.

The objective of this article is to explore and challenge the concept of leadership by presenting a perspective on leadership as identity construction. The perspective presented is based on premises from the complexity sciences.

The article is based on a conceptual discussion.

Leadership is better understood as identity construction. This is because leadership emerges in the interaction between people as the act of recognising and being recognised. Leaders' images of themselves are therefore social constructions and the development of a leadership self (and thereby leadership) is coupled to the interaction between leaders and followers.

The research is limited to a conceptual discussion. The findings need to be further explored and challenged by other methods. The discussion is focused on organisational leadership.

Leaders do not always have the control that mainstream leadership theory suggests. The act of leadership is therefore better understood as identity construction. In the article the authors suggest a conceptual framework for reflecting on leadership identity because self‐images influence people's acts as leaders. The concept of leadership is hence the ability to mobilise the discipline necessary to develop one's self by reflecting on identity in different contexts and coupling this to the acts of leadership.

The principal contribution is a conceptual discussion on the concept of leadership. This contribution provides managerial ideas and insights into the act of leadership in organisations faced with increasing complexity.

This paper aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoint practical implications from cutting-edge research and case studies.

This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds personal impartial comments and places the articles in context.

Willpower governs acts of leadership. It is a capability that has been found to be genetic, but which also is possible to develop by raised awareness, disciplined practice and extending one’s comfort zones by exposing oneself to challenges. Willpower is a mental capability, and if leaders develop their ability to focus on their time and energy management, and become more aware of their feelings, they may improve their willpower. Additionally, their energy balance matters: taking care of basics including paying attention to nutrition and to resting, as well as taking up some form of physical/mental practice may have a positive impact on a leader’s willpower.

The paper provides strategic insights and practical thinking that have influenced some of the world’s leading organizations.

The briefing saves busy executives and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy-to-digest format.

Gender competence as part of engineering education can better prepare men and women to work on sustainable solutions that benefit entire societies. This chapter describes the framework and lessons learned of a community of practice (CoP) for gender equality facilitated by the Mediterranean Engineering Schools Network. Faculty and students from Mediterranean European, North African and Middle Eastern countries came together in this CoP, which was supported by the TARGET project, to develop a practical plan using a reflexive approach. The transfer of knowledge between generations is achieved by using participatory learning processes, facilitating mindful awareness, widening experiences, deepening understandings and building a gender-sensitive mindset. Students embarked on the journey to become change agents. The process led to the consolidation of gender equality knowledge, competence building and the development of change agents for gender equality. This CoP can inspire other institutions to undertake a participatory path towards gender equality – at local, regional, or global level.