Leadership in a Paradoxical Public‐sector Environment: The Challenges of Ambiguity

Abstract

4 public governance and leadership symposium edition Leadership in a Paradoxical Public-sector Environment: The Challenges of Ambiguity contention is grounded in conflicting and competing values, beliefs, and attitudes about what can be known about, and by, public organisations and how people behave in them (Dixon et al, 2004). These contending perspectives are grounded in perspectives on public administration, which can be characterised as a dichotomy: the traditional hierarchical model and

The Asian Conference on Asian Studies 2020: Official Conference Proceedings

“…The current study initially supports the idea that public organizations should promote paradoxical practice in the workplace (Tripathi & Dixon, 2008). The key lesson for policymakers includes the connections between Confucian values, paradoxical leadership and the increasing levels of PSM.…”

The Management Impact of Elected Leaders

“…Within the uncertainty and varied management strategies, career employees are tasked with upholding the duties of the agency while representing the elected leader's goals and mission. In an environment of negative public perception toward government employee performance, elected leaders face the challenge of leading staff, managing progress, and building a platform to support personal political aspirations (Brewer & Walker, 2010;Choi et al, 2008;Menzel & White, 2011;OPM, 2001;Tripathi & Dixon, 2008). However, if popularly elected leaders do not bring to an agency a clear management strategy and a willingness to understand the nuanced roles within the office, the risk is a staff managed inconsistently, leading to a further obfuscation of the agency's goals and progress.…”

Leadership insights from the top: exploring leadership through the narratives of CEOs in India

“…The understanding of public leadership is influenced by, as opined by Brookes and Grint's (2010) a focus on collective leadership combining both distributed (vertical-functional) leadership and shared (horizontalgeographic/cross sector) leadership; transforming relationships for an integration of services across public services; focus on collective whole system approaches; creating a learning organisation 1 (Senge, 2006); seeking public value (Moore, 1995); problem solving (Rittell and Webber, 1973), and adaptive leadership (Heifetz, 1994;Tripathi and Dixon, 2008). India is a mixture of many cultures with the urban majority influenced to varying degrees by Western culture.…”