The increased reliance on interorganizational collaborations (ICs) has created new challenges for leaders. They must attempt to apply leadership theories and behaviors developed primarily for leading within one organization or group to leading collaborations of multiple organizations and stakeholders. To provide insight into this issue, this study examines leadership behavior in an IC developing a strategic plan to promote changes to address public health and safety concerns related to substance abuse. Combining observations and interviews, we followed a statewide interagency taskforce in a southwestern state of the United States from its inception through completion of its strategic plan within a 10-month deadline. Findings show different leadership behaviors were integrated and evolved over time to strike a balance between decision-making effectiveness and efficiency. In particular, the findings support recent research on examining leadership behavior holistically to develop a ‘fuller full-range’ leadership perspective (Antonakis and House, 2014), especially in terms of how collectivistic and instrumental leadership should complement transformational leadership, and by demonstrating that the combinations of leadership change over time and occur at multiple levels. These findings provide guidance for future practice and research on ICs promoting change.
Given the increasing number of interorganizational collaborations across governmental and private sectors, this study furthers theoretical understanding of these relationships by focusing on dialectical tensions experienced in a collaborative strategic change effort. The research site was an 11-member statewide interorganizational committee working to create change across all involved organizations. Data collection included prolonged observation of meetings over 18 months and interviews with committee leaders. Analytical procedures began with a modified constant comparative analysis that guided the research toward a tension-centered approach for ongoing data collection and analysis. Results include seven dialectical tensions representing three tension types: commitment-based, process-based, and outcome-based tensions. Participants used four strategies for communicatively negotiating tensions: acknowledging, delaying, hedging, and invoking authoritative texts. This study contributes to an increasing awareness of the constitutive nature of communication in collaborations and continues to refine our understanding of dialectical tension management in group interactions.
This study addresses theoretical and contextual weaknesses of symbolic convergence theory (SCT) through a fantasy theme analysis of a life enrichment group (i.e., an all-female club rugby team). By using a variety of data sources, including group social media posts, participant observation, and interviews, the authors found two concurrent rhetorical visions present within this group: belong and triumph. These visions were created through member chaining of fantasy themes. In contrast with current assumptions of SCT, results indicated several tensions within concurrent fantasy themes and the two rhetorical visions. Theoretical and pragmatic implications for transferability and application of symbolic convergence and fantasy themes in other life enrichment groups are discussed.
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