Leadership in organisational change
A post-structuralist research agenda
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 20500019 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Eleanor Mackillop (0000-0003-3345-7499, University of Liverpool, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2018 |
| Volume | 25 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 205-222 |
| Publication date | 2018-03-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Organization (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1350-5084 • E-ISSN: 1461-7323 |
| Publisher | SAGE Publications (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1177/1350508417733137 |
| OpenAlex | W2757805624 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 4 |
| References cited | 57 |
The organisational change literature remains dominated by macro- and microexplanatory models which tend to exclude conflict, mess and power in favour of enumerating universalistic steps or, as is the subject of this article, leadership definitions and factors for successful change. In this article, I review and question some of the mainstream literature on leadership in organisational change, drawing on Laclau and Mouffe’s political discourse theory and its mobilisation by critical leadership studies of organisational change. This article problematises change leadership as a set of multiple and changing practices, pragmatically deployed by organisational players. In exploring those avenues, I deploy a five-step ‘logics of critical explanation’ approach – specifically designed by Laclauian discourse theorists – characterising organisational change practices according to social (rules and norms), political (inclusions and exclusions) and fantasmatic (fears and hopes) logics. Rather than a set of factors or top–down causes and effects, I offer a situated and critical explanation of leadership in organisational change. This research contributes to critical explanations of organisational change politics by considering leadership as a set of changing discursive practices and by developing four situated dimensions of leadership, which build on concepts of empty and floating signifiers, to add to discussions of the role of individuals in organisational politics
Critical management studies · Critical theory · Epistemology · Leadership studies · Leadership style · Mainstream · Organisational change · Political science · Politics · Public relations · Situated · Social science · Sociology · Education, Leadership, and Health Research · Foucault, Power, and Ethics · Law · Management and Organizational Studies
Leadership and performance beyond expectations
Leadership
Logics of Critical Explanation in Social and Political Theory
Voicing Seduction to Silence Leadership
Peripheral Vision
The effects of transformational and change leadership on employees' commitment to a change
Peripheral Vision
Peripheral Vision
Organizational Change as Discourse
A Social Identity Model of Leadership Effectiveness in Organizations
From Loss to Lack
Anti-leaders(hip) in Social Movement Organizations
Discourse of the real kind
Designer Deviance
Poststructuralism and After
The Institutional Entrepreneur as Modern Prince
Thinking differently about leadership
Emphasising the political and emotional dimensions of organisational change politics with Laclauian discourse theory
The Management of Change in Public Organizations
Interpretive Approaches to British Government and Politics
Dichotomies, dialectics and dilemmas
The Practice of Leadership in the Messy World of Organizations
Prozac leadership and the limits of positive thinking
Discourses of Leadership
Leadership, more or less? A processual, communication perspective on the role of agency in leadership theory
Reading leadership through Hegel’s master/slave dialectic
Metaphor, Catachresis and Equivalence
Managers, Doctors, and Culture
Leadership
Dialectics of leadership
Managers Doing Leadership
Critical leadership studies
Towards a negative ontology of leadership
Leadership
Ideology and post-Marxism
Human geography without scale
Critical performativity
Cooling Out the Marks
| Citations per year | 1 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2022 - 2024 (3) |
| Highly cited | No |