1.3 Approach and Organization of the Chapters of This Book
Leadership Is Both a Science and an Art
Some people might claim that an understanding of leadership is just common sense. But then again, there is a saying, “Common sense is like deodorant. The people who need it the most don’t use it.” Or “commonsense is not so common these days.” Perhaps something similar can be said about leadership. All joking aside, while some of what we report in this book may seem like commonsense, one big problem with relying on commonsense is that it can vary among individuals. In other words, what may seem like commonsense to one individual might actually seem wrong or contraindicated by another. As an example, consider a person in a supervisory position who has a follower who has a new baby at home, and that baby has been keeping them up at night. It might seem commonsensical that the follower should be shown a high degree of support from the supervisor, even to the point of allowing the follower’s performance to slip for a period of time. On the other hand, another individual’s commonsense might be more skeptical, and say that it all depends on the situation and whether the individual’s performance is crucial to the team at a critical point in time. While some research on leadership has largely confirmed what might be intuitive or held as commonsense on the part of many people, much research has also identified seemingly counterintuitive aspects of effective leadership. In short, in this book, we rely largely on scientifically-based research to tease out our understanding of effective leadership.
Furthermore, we recognize that leadership can be understood and learned through role modeling, practice, feedback, and experience. With that said, we suggest that experience as a way of learning about effective leadership can be a double-edged sword. We have known people who have attempted to teach leadership through their own eyes and personal experiences. In many cases, individuals have a wealth of good experience from which they can draw to help others develop their own leadership. Nevertheless, there is another old saying, “While learning through experience is good, learning from the experiences of others is even better.” What this means is that even the most experienced leader should not over-generalize principles of good leadership based on that person’s own experiences. Instead, the wisest approach is to take into account the experiences of others, as well as what systematic research has revealed.
In summary, our approach is based on three key principles or techniques. First, we base much of what is written in this book on systematic research. Second, we use case videos to help students learn through the role-modeling of actual, real-life leaders. Role-modeling is known to be an effective means of developing leaders, and our video-based approach is equipped to take advantage of this principle. Many of the leaders who are featured in the videos are in first-time or lower-level leadership positions, with which many students can readily identify. Students can use material in this book to help them analyze the situations and leadership dilemmas that are described by the individuals in respective videos. Third, students will learn through story-telling, which is not only an effective means of practicing leadership, but also developing one’s own leadership capabilities. In other words, students can develop insights and skills (and role models) by hearing the stories of individuals who have faced leadership challenges, and then made decisions or taken actions to deal with those challenges.
Role models (both positive and negative) for effective leadership can be found in a variety of media or sources. One prominent source is cinema, including movies and miniseries. In other words, cinematic productions often portray leaders and leadership principles that align with much of what you will see in this book. One such cinematic production, Band of Brothers, was a miniseries that aired on HBO. It portrays the story of a company of men and their leaders in the U.S. Airborne infantry in WWII. The nature of this mini-series and examples of how its characters illustrate both effective and ineffective leadership can be found in Chapter 1, Section 5 “Appendix: Role Modeling Leadership from WWII—The Cases of Band of Brothers and Red Tails”. Red Tails is another cinematic production that is also described in Section 5. It involves the story of the Tuskegee Airmen, Black pilots and support staff who displayed excellent performance in fighting the German Luftwaffe in WWII, two leaders of the Red Tails are featured in Section 5.
Organization of This Book
The chapters are divided into three parts:
Foundations for Effective Leadership
Contemporary Issues with Leadership
Visionary and Strategic Leadership
In Part 1, we primarily overview topics that have received a lot of traditional attention in the field of leadership. These topics include leadership characteristics (e.g., traits and behavioral styles), relationship building, followership, and situational/contingency leadership. Although these areas are somewhat traditional in leadership thinking, we will add a few new twists. For example, we will describe the principle of “leading with love” as a means of demonstrating people- or relations-oriented leadership. We will further introduce political savvy as a way of thinking about relationship-building that leaders use beyond one’s immediate subordinates or team members
In Part 2, we go into areas that have received more contemporary attention. In other words, these areas are prominent in more recent thinking about effective leadership. They include ethical/responsible leadership, feedback processes, team and shared leadership, and leadership in diverse environments. Some especially interesting and timely issues will receive attention. For example, we will highlight how leadership intersects with corporate social responsibility, how feedback receiving is equally important for leaders as is feedback giving, and how diversity issues for leaders can be considered in both domestic and cross-cultural ways.
In Part 3, we focus on more strategic issues pertaining to leadership. We begin this section with inspirational/visionary leadership, which while applicable at all levels, takes on special relevance at strategic levels of leadership. We then conclude with chapters dealing with how leaders help to form or shape organizational culture, as well as lead organizational change.
Video Cases for This Book
Video cases are an integral part of this book and associated learning. Not only do these videos bring to life the material in the various chapters, they are based on two key learning principles. First, students will learn through the role-modeling of actual leaders in these videos. Role-modeling is known to be an effective means of developing leaders, and our video-based approach is equipped to take advantage of this principle. Second, students will learn through story-telling, which is not only an effective means of practicing leadership, but also developing one’s own leadership capabilities. In other words, students can develop insights and skills (and role models) by hearing the stories of individuals in these videos who have faced leadership challenges, and then made decisions or taken actions to deal with those challenges.
There are two types of video cases that are featured. First, capstone cases depict leaders, who are often at very high levels of their organizations (e.g., CEOs), give their brief takes on leadership processes, qualities, or particular incidents. Second, incident cases generally depict lower-level leaders and their description of particular incidents that they have experienced, how they handled those incidents, outcomes of their actions, and lessons that they learned.
A Look Into the Future
A colleague of ours routinely admitted to his students that several years after taking his course, students would forget 99 percent of what they learned. He went further to suggest that such is the case for all courses that students take, not just his own. Such a large percentage may be a bit of an exaggeration, and it might vary from course to course. Nevertheless, his basic point is well taken. Our colleague went on to further explain to students that despite the overwhelming amount of course material that would be forgotten over time, he hoped that some key principles would be remembered throughout the years and careers of students. We agree with our colleague, and accordingly have derived our own list of seven principles pertaining to effective leadership that we hope students will remember years after attending your leadership course. These principles will be stressed throughout the course and the videos:
Consider leaders, followers, and the context. For many people, effective leadership is all about effective leaders. Undoubtedly, aspects of the individual leader (e.g., personal characteristics and behaviors) are important in leadership processes. But perhaps to the surprise of some, aspects of followers are highly important as well. It may seem counterintuitive, but at least to some degree, leaders can only influence if followers allow them to. Moreover, when followers demonstrate the type of followership that we consider in Chapter 4 “Followership: Managing Up and Sideways”, there is a good chance that people in leadership positions will be better leaders. As the saying goes, “it takes two to tango.” In addition, as suggested above and reinforced in Chapter 5 “Situational Leadership”, we cannot truly understand effective leadership without a handle on the context or situation in which leaders and followers are interacting. It probably is not too hard to imagine that day-to-day “normal” situations might require a different form of leadership, as compared to when a crisis is occurring. In short, an understanding of effective leadership processes inherently involves the simultaneous consideration of leaders, followers, and the context. This combination is shown in Figure 1.1.
Figure 1.1 Determinants of Leader Effectiveness
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Figure shows that leader effectiveness is a function of aspects of the leader, the follower, and the context.
Lead-by-example. Effective leaders never expect followers to do things that they would not do themselves. Throughout history, the most inspiring combat leaders have been those who were out in front of their soldiers. Modern organizations are certainly not analogous to combat, but nevertheless the principle of leading-by-example is still valid. For example, in better service-based organizations, it is not surprising to see people in leadership positions engaging in frontline, customer service activities, especially during peak times. As another example, during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and 2021, we saw a number of political leaders who strongly suggested that to avoid the spread of the virus, citizens should avoid travel during holidays. But yet, they themselves were caught traveling to visit family, or simply for pleasure. Such incongruent behavior does not inspire confidence; nor does it make followers (in this instance, citizens) follow other directives that might be issued. Hypocrites cannot (or at least should not) be viewed as leaders.
Lead-by-walking-around. For some reason, people in leadership roles oftentimes think that they can stay physically separated from the people who they lead. Nothing could be further from the truth. The best leaders are those who get out among the people who they are leading. They do so not for the purpose of checking up on them, but rather to show that they are concerned and want to serve or help their followers. A person who was notorious for leading-by-wandering-around was Sam Walton, founder of Walmart. Walton became known for how he would drive his pickup truck around to various Walmart stores, rather than staying confined to corporate headquarters.
Give recognition. People in leadership roles are often stingy when it comes to giving praise or recognition. Dick Kovacevich, the former CEO of Wells Fargo, claimed that “Recognition is the highest return, most undervalued management tool in America.” Simple praise costs nothing, and it is rare to find people who feel like they have received enough praise in their jobs. The bottom line is that simple praise, as long as it is sincere, is highly motivational to people, and effective leaders are not afraid to dish it out.
Think and act paradoxically. A paradox involves two seemingly opposite phenomena that would appear to be in conflict and irreconcilable. But nevertheless, the two phenomena (or poles of a paradox) are interdependent and need to be harmoniously reconciled over time in order to achieve effectiveness. When a leader thinks and acts paradoxically, that person does not engage in “either-or” choosing of a paradoxical pole, but instead, embraces both poles simultaneously in a “both-and” sort of manner. As an example, in later chapters, we will see how oftentimes, the best way for a leader to gain control is by giving up control. On the surface, these would seem like irreconcilable notions. However, in reality, leaders find that the gaining of control of organizational effectiveness can best be achieved by giving up much control to followers—or allowing more autonomy. We will explore a number of other leadership paradoxes in this book.
Be here now. Back in the 1970s, Ram Dass wrote a book entitled, Be Here Now. In many ways, Dass was ahead of his time in that he talked about the need for people to truly experience the present and be mindful. Since then, advancing technology (e.g., cell phones) and cultural norms (e.g., multi-tasking) have pushed people toward not experiencing the here and now; that is, not experiencing being in one time and place in one’s consciousness. In other words, and to use more current terminology, the modern world pushes us to not experience mindfulness. For example, while carrying on a verbal conversation with an individual who is physically present, one might simultaneously be eyeing their cell phone and responding to text messages. The obvious result is split attention. However, to a large extent, leadership is not a split attention game. Andy Card, President Bush’s chief of staff, said that “You shouldn’t leave the room until the door is shut,” meaning that a leader needs to be solely focused on the conversation at hand. In the above example, if a leader is having a conversation with a follower who is experiencing performance or personal problems, that follower needs the leader’s undivided attention and mindfulness. At that point, in order to “be here now,” the leader needs to turn off the phone and be totally available for the follower.
Take action and build. Laissez-faire is a term associated with a lack of action and decision-making. Research has consistently shown that such inaction is negatively associated with leader effectiveness. In contrast, effective leaders are not missing when needed, and instead they take action and make decisions. Sometimes decisions are avoided by people in leadership positions because of fear of failure or risk. In contrast, the most effective leader is the one who can make a number of decisions on a given day, have some of them not turn out to be so successful, but still be able to go home and sleep like a baby. Further, leaders who take action also tend to be builders, if only in a metaphoric sense. In other words, they build up individuals (e.g., by contributing to their learning and development), programs and initiatives, and even entire organizations.
These seven principles are reinforced throughout this book and in the associated case videos that you will view. It is our hope that when most other things about your learning in this course are forgotten, you will remember and practice these principles. If so, you are well on your way to being an effective leader.
Video Case for This Chapter
The video capstone case for this chapter deals with one of the seven principles of effective leadership that hopefully you will remember years after attending a course on leadership.
Jack Jacobs—Leading with Understanding
Jack Jacobs is a Medal of Honor winner who retired after twenty years of service and went to work on Wall Street. He talks about the value of leading by walking around.