Initial reflections on leadership

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Most of my experience with leadership has been in small- to medium-sized organizations, and small departments driven by creative discipline in post-secondary education. It was interesting to untangle my views of “management” and “leadership,” which were very much intertwined into a single role or function, possibly because of the way I have experienced leadership expressed in these contexts. Even in many corporate environments, team managers are often referred to as “team leaders,” which may or may not be an accurate reflection of their roles and responsibilities. My initial ranking of leadership attributes in our group exercise reflected this view, and upon reading and reflecting on several leadership approaches, I have gained greater insight into understanding my views on my past, present, and future leadership strategies.

Workman and Cleveland-Innes (2012) cite Gill (2006) and his functional model of leadership, describing a separation of leadership and management functions. This was a helpful first step in deconstructing my thoughts on the role of leader vs. manager. Under this functional model, leadership is inspirational, whereas management is more transactional (Workman & Cleveland-Innes, 2012, p. 317). They go on to describe a transformational view of leadership, in which they differentiate leadership from management as affecting outcomes for people vs. outcomes for efforts. This concept also resonated strongly for me. 

However, this stratified view of leadership vs. management seems to be one that might work best in large, hierarchical organizations. Characteristics our group noted were absent from the discussion of leadership attributes include: trustworthy, transparent, empowering, flexible, innovative, and resilient. Many of these were key attributes in Castelli’s (2016) review of the reflective leadership framework. It is interesting to consider how in recent years there has been a growing emphasis on empathy and openness in leadership, which contrasts with different hierarchies of values in leadership studies from even ten years ago. Reflective leadership does seem to align both management and leadership principles to fulfill higher organizational strategies and goals, connecting with individuals in a more engaged way. I can see reflective leadership being a very effective model in smaller teams with flatter organizational structures. 

I appreciated Huggins (2017) describing distributed leadership as a form of “post-heroic leadership.” The idea of leader as hero was one which our team seemed to reject very soundly, ranking characteristics such as courageousness, determination, and ambition very low in our assessments, both individually, and as a group. The idea of developing leadership capacity in others is a powerful idea. Co-operative values and working toward a shared vision, rather than an individual’s heroic quest seem like ideas more fitting of 21^st century values. Similarly, Khan (2017) contrasts adaptive leadership vs. transactional leadership, concluding that the former is better suited to the complex and changing environments within learning, and that the behaviourist aspects of the leader-follower model, while offering structure and stability in maintaining a steady state, do not provide a complete set of tools and strategies needed to navigate change.

These ideas also start to align with some indigenous perspectives on leadership, which are a refreshing contrast from the western European view. Some of the foundational principles include: 1) focus on the whole community; 2) harmony in relationships; 3) spirituality in beliefs and actions; 4) values, notably cooperative behaviour and focus on the greater good; 5) decision-making by consensus; and 6) integrity and honesty, respect over popularity (Julien et al., 2010). These ideals tend to produce leaders who view their role as one of service, rather than authority. Additional qualities pointed out by Julien et al. (2010) which resonated with me are the “long view” of the impacts of leadership decisions on future generations, the idea that all actions and interactions are interconnected, the idea that leaders are servants of the community, and the strong role of women in leadership, as “keepers of the drum.”

The holistic view and the idea of leader as humble servant of the community are powerful ideas. Integrating many of these views into my own leadership architecture is an interesting and challenging exercise, where I am learning – and unlearning – a great deal about how I have viewed leadership and how to develop new practices moving forward. I look forward to learning and embracing new perspectives as we continue along this journey of understanding leadership and our role in navigating change.