Guest editorial: leadership and organizational development in Africa

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to preview contributions on leadership and organizational development in the African context, covered in this special issue of the African Journal of Business and Economic Studies. Design/methodology/approach Summaries of the underlying theoretical/conceptual and/or empirical frameworks, as well as key findings for each paper, were outlined in order to provide insights of each paper’s thematic contribution. Findings Paper 1 identified four basic modes of understanding organizational culture which provides a unique and expanded view on pursuing research in the field. Paper 2 found that managers use authentic and transactional leadership skills to cultivate and nurture the creativities of employees toward increased performances. Paper 3 found the interaction between authentic leaders and followers as inducing high levels of moral and ethical behaviors in followers. Paper 4 found that employee engagement and affective commitment minimize employees’ attrition, irrespective of leadership styles. Paper 5 found that, managers can enhance organizational development by creating an atmosphere for innovation development, and being involved in its implementation. Paper 6 found that leaders who are emotionally intelligent positively evoke subordinates’ citizenship behaviors. Paper 7 identified three distinct and interrelated archetypes of managerial role preferences (i.e. change agents, affective leaders, and result-oriented realists) needed by leaders in their administrative practices. Originality/value The papers provide new insights, in terms of thematic learning and knowledge, which add to the understanding of the contemporary Afrocentric perspective on leadership and organizational development, especially, the dialogue of management activities that promote the relational, critical and constructionist perspectives on leadership and organizational development.

Inspiring Creativity in Diverse Organizational Cultures: An Expatriate Integrity Dilemma

“…This has also contributed to an increase in an already growing fragmentation of perceptions within the creativity paradigm (Hennessey & Amabile, 2010). This fragmentation is also as a result of lack of homogeneity of philosophies concerning the features that qualifies a creative employee (Kaufman & Beghetto, 2009; Sanda, 2017). Likewise, with respect to the vexing discrepancies rising within the creativity undergirding, and for the sake of this study’s aims, employee creativity would be examined as a unidimensional construct.…”

The influence of follower orientation on follower behaviour in the leadership process

“…We applied the study by Carsten et al (2017) in a South African environment to offer evidence of followership in this unique cultural context that differs from that in China in terms of China having higher power distance than the general South African population (See GLOBE study in House et al, 2004;Hofstede, 2011). In conducting this research on the African continent, we wish to contribute to the growing body of knowledge by African scholars, in accordance with the observations of Nkomo (2011), Lerutla and Steyn (2021), Vilakati and Schurink (2021) and Sanda (2017) that leadership studies were predominantly conducted in Europe and the Americas, which raise arguments as to whether their assumptions hold true for those leaders (and followers) operating in the African firm environment.…”

Guest editorial: Organizational and management practices in COVID-19 business environments in Africa – The human factors

“…This change, manifested by COVID aggravated globalization, liberalization, technological changes and advancement and market changes, is rapidly transforming the environment in which organizations operate. As it was observed by Sanda (2017), this change, manifested by globalization, liberalization, technological changes and advancement, and market changes has rapidly transformed the environment in which organizations operate. This, therefore affirmed the general view among management scholars that organizations are embedded in social, cultural, economic and political contexts (see Kuada, 2012), with sociocultural issues, such as power distance, embeddedness and collectivism shaping how most organizations operating in the African business and industrial environments are managed and led.…”

“…Also, going by the argument that effective leadership does not always translate from one situation to the next, what contemporary tools do managers of businesses use or require in tackling today's organizational development challenges? Since Africa is in a unique position as an emerging market economy pursuing affirmative action policies characterized by an open economy (Sanda, 2017), the provision of answers to these questions is of particular importance to our contemporary understanding of human resources management issues in a pandemic-infected work environments in African organizations. Thus, in moving away from the notion that sees organization and management research as focusing on the nature and consequences of managerial actions whereas business research primarily focuses only the determinants of corporate performance (Easterby-Smith et al, 2012), this special issue of AJEMS brings together nine papers that provide new insights that add to our understanding of the contemporary Afrocentric perspective on human resources management advancement in pandemic-oriented industrial work environments.…”

“…This, therefore affirmed the general view among management scholars that organizations are embedded in social, cultural, economic and political contexts (see Kuada, 2012), with sociocultural issues, such as power distance, embeddedness and collectivism shaping how most organizations operating in the African business and industrial environments are managed and led. Thus, using as a point of departure Sanda's (2017) argument that an organizational environment is a manifestation of a society which is stochastic in nature, the environmental dynamics of an organization might not be expected to remain stable in the midst of the rapid changes that were associated with the COVID-19 pandemics. According to an UNCTAD study UNCTAD Report (2020), Even though COVID-19 has pushed more consumers in developing countries to buy online many e-commerce businesses in least developed nations have seen a slump in sales.…”