Description
Taylor and Francis Ltd Complexity and Leadership 1st Edition 2022 by Chauhan, Kiran
Leading organisations in our contemporary world means grappling with unpredictability, painful pressures and continual conflict, all in the context of an acceleration in the pace of change. We expect the impossible from heroic leaders and they rarely live up to expectations. With countless recommendations, self-help books and new concepts, scholars and management consultants often simplify and dream unrealistically. This book challenges the more orthodox discourse on leadership and presents a way of thinking about leadership that pays closer attention to experience._x000D__x000D_The contributors in this book, all senior managers or facilitators of leadership development, resist easy solutions, new typologies or unrealistic prescriptions. Writing about their experiences in Denmark, the UK, Israel, Ethiopia, South Africa and beyond, they are less concerned with traits that people can possess and learn, or magical promises of recipes for success, and more with the socio-political process of the interaction between people from which leadership emerges as a theme. We focus on understanding leadership as a practice within which communication, research, imagination and ethical judgements are continuously improvised. So rather than idealising leadership, or reducing it to soothing tools and techniques, we suggest how leaders might become more politically, emotionally and socially savvy. _x000D__x000D_This book is written for academics and practitioners with an interest in the everyday challenges of both individual and group practices of formal and informal leaders in different types of organisations, and is an ideal resource for executives and students on leadership development programmes. We hope this volume will help readers to expand the wisdom found in their own experience and discover for themselves and for others, a greater sense of freedom._x000D_ _x000D_
1 Introduction; PART I BEING LEADERS 2 From magico-mythical thinking to making promises and forgiving: A headteacher's critique of transformational school leadership practice; 3 Acting into the unpredictable future: A project manager's appreciation of a complexity perspective; 4 Leadership as inquiry: Rhythm analysis as a response to contemporary idealisations of freedom; 5 A dialogue with Adam Habib: Radical pragmatism - navigating social justice in universities in the neo-liberal era; PART II DEVELOPING LEADERS 6 A critical look at corporate leadership development; 7 Leading as practice: Expedition-based learning with NASA in the Canyons; 8 A group analytic approach to executive education: Lessons from the larger group; 9 Can talent be managed? A critical perspective on the practice of talent management; 10 A dialogue with Sewit Haileselassie Tadesse: Developing leadership; 11 Final notes on the practice of leadership_x000D_