Abstract
This précis revisits an opening statement on a personal philosophy of leadership: that initial statement was informed by theories of leadership; formative experiences of leadership; cultural identity; trends in the development of post-bureaucratic organizations; and sundry work experiences. This revised edition offers reflections on the initial statement, drawing from scholarly readings, discussions, and other developments since the “first edition”.
Personal Philosophy of Leadership (2nd Edition) was completed on June 28, 2018.
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Notes
- 1.
Democratic leadership, aka participative or shared leadership, is a style of leadership whereby the members of a group are given a more participative role in decision making, based on candid conversations, collaboration, competence, the free flow of ideas, honest and open minds, morality and values, and trust and mutual respect. To note, even if democratic leaders allow shared participation in decision making, they often decide who is a member of the group tasked with that and offer guidance to keep discussions balanced and controlled. Democratic leadership does not equate with free-for-all anarchy. Some best practices are to create a streamlined decision-making process, keep a record of all ideas suggested, and before that—of course—recruit and involve the right people.
- 2.
Bolden et al. (2011) presented three useful theoretical perspectives on leadership: (a) leadership as a property of leaders, with related consideration of the traits of leadership, leadership behaviors and styles, situational and contingency approaches, and leadership skills and functions; (b) leadership as a relationship between leaders and followers, with related consideration of leader–member exchange theory and follower-centered perspectives, transformational and charismatic leadership, and servant and quiet leadership; and (c) leadership as a social process, with related consideration of shared and distributed leadership, and discursive and constitutive leadership. Thence, Bolden et al. (2011) proceeded to (re)define leadership as “(1) a process, (2) of social influence , (3) to guide, structure, and/or facilitate, (4) behaviors, activities, and/or relationships, (5) towards the achievement of shared aims” (pp. 20–21).
- 3.
To emerge is to become manifest: this means that what theory emerges need not be entirely new; the only requirement is that it should have come to (some degree of) prominence from a hitherto obscure (or uncertain) position. Depending on how one defines “emerging“, then, other candidates might include evolutionary leadership theory (which states that leading and following are adaptive behavioral strategies that have evolved to solve social coordination problems, the relationship between a leader and his/her followers is fundamentally ambivalent, and modern organizational structures are sometimes inconsistent with the innate psychological mechanisms of leading and following); leader–member exchange (LMX) theory (a still evolving descriptive theory that explains how people relate to and interact with one another); organizational socialization theory (which looks at the processes by which people learn about and adjust to the knowledge, skills, attitudes, expectations, and behaviors needed for new or changing roles in organizations and intuits that without understanding a culture one cannot understand its leadership and vice versa); and social impact theory (which examines the rules whereby individuals can be sources or targets of social influence , with social impact a function of the strength of the source of impact, the immediacy of the event, and the number of sources exerting the impact).
- 4.
Usefully, Rock (2008) made suggestions for further research, the scope of which underscores the limitless potential of the neuroscience of leadership. Questions that still beg answers are: Which of the domains in the SCARF model generate the strongest threats or rewards given different types of organization? What are the links between the five domains? What are the best techniques for minimizing threats and maximizing rewards in each domain? Does the relative importance of each domain vary across, say, individuals, gender, or tenure? What are the implications of the model for organizational design? (Rock, 2008, p. 8).
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Serrat, O. (2021). Personal Philosophy of Leadership (2nd Edition). In: Leading Solutions. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-33-6485-1_5
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