National citizenship as a mediator of organizational innovation

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to report an initial investigation into the role of national citizenship status in relation to leadership and organizational innovation in the context of the United Arab Emirates, an Arabian Gulf country with a workforce in which migrants far outweigh the number of locals. Design/methodology/approach The authors use grounded theory methodology to gather initial data and reveal potentially appropriate theory for further research into the role of national citizenship as it correlates with organizational innovation. Findings The dominant themes that emerged were that citizen leaders display high levels of willingness to deviate from organizational schemata to respond to new situations; a preference for focus on the big picture; and low monitoring of subordinates. These findings indicate that citizen leaders experience greater ease in diverging from organizational schemata, suggesting that national citizenship status may afford a freedom that enhances the potential to contribute to organizational innovation. Research limitations/implications The issue of national citizenship is clearly one of increasing significance in the global workplace and, therefore, must be added to the academic research agenda given the combination of more frequent worldwide professional migration and the growing imperative of organizational innovation. To this end, the authors suggest potentially useful frameworks for further study. Originality/value This pioneering research has applicability to other geopolitical regions with high numbers of migrants in their workforces.

Expat or citizen? Raising the question of a potential impact of status on leader behavior

“…In other words, these leaders' capital is low given their expatriate status and limited job security, and a consequence of this is their preference for adhering closely to organizational schemata and eschewal of possible innovativeness. This hypothesis is borne out by a UAE study that found that citizen leaders display a far greater tendency to deviate from established organizational procedures than expatriate leaders (Goby and Alhadhrami, 2018). Divergence and innovation go hand in hand (Anderson et al, 2014), but, as Chen et al (2005) demonstrate, innovation can give rise to conflict, clearly something that less secure leaders will typically strive to avoid.…”

“…Our findings suggest that the lack of national citizenship status may constitute a vital part of an actor's context which affords more limited material for possible divergence and innovation. In the UAE context, the expatriate's status is lower than the citizen's Forstenlechner, 2010, 2012;Goby and Alhadhrami, 2018), and this lower status generates a sense of being marginalized (Walton, et al, 2012). It could be hypothesized that in contexts of escalating professional migration, national citizenship status comes to function in a way similar to how Bourdieu (1997) argues educational qualification does in France, namely, that it may confer an inherent status-enhancing benefit.…”