Leadership as an emergent property of everyday interaction

A recent HBR blog post, When to Hire an Extreme Leader, features a short video by Harvard Business School assistant professor, Gautam Mukunda. In it, he introduces his theory on the characteristics and importance of what he describes as "extreme leaders". These, he suggests, play a crucial role in determining events in particularly challenging circumstances.

This proposition, which continues the seemingly never-ending search for the 'Holy Grail' of exceptional leadership performance, sees leadership as being within the gift of a few, exceptional individuals. And it is this view of organizational dynamics that I want to challenge here.

The taken-for-granted assumption in the HBR post is that leadership is an elite practice, which arises from a particular set of characteristics possessed by a few, presumed to be special (or "abnormal") individuals. In this case, Mukunda maintains that the paradoxical qualities of "resolve" and "humility" are the critical ingredients in the 'recipe for success'.  Many other characteristics have been similarly championed over the years; as researchers, academics and consultants have sought a universal formula for leadership excellence.

However, from an informal coalitions perspective, leadership is a complex social process enacted by the many. It is not a rational, scientific endeavour practised by a few, gifted individuals. That is to say, it is an emergent phenomenon that is co-created in the moment of people's everyday interactions. As such, it is a normal characteristic of the day-to-day relationships of interdependent people. As they 'go on together', they enable and constrain each other through those interactions. Power relations might be weighted in favour of those in formal leadership positions - often significantly so. But this does not mean that they 'lead' and others 'follow', in the matter-of-fact way that conventional management 'wisdom' portrays the relationship.

This also means that behaviours that are interpreted as acts of leadership are neither predictable nor prescribable in advance. Rather they are labelled as such after the event. And, given the individual and 'elitist' assumptions of the dominant management discourse, it is inevitable that such interpretations and explanations will tend to exaggerate the contributions of those who appear to fit the required criteria. At the same time, the tendency will be to ignore the 'leadership' contributions that others make to the outcomes that emerge. Or these will simply not be seen at all, because those charged with providing the 'legitimate' (i.e. scientifically rational) interpretation of events will be looking in the opposite direction.

 

Copies of Gautam Mukunda's book on the subject

Indispensable: When Leaders Really Matter,

can be obtained from Amazon UK or Amazon US

 

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See related posts:

Reframing leadership - Seven would-be shifts in how we think and talk about leadership practice 

Why escaping the chains of the dominant management discourse is proving difficult

Comments

[Bruce Waltuck]

Hi Chris. Very timely post. I just saw Gautam Mukunda a few days ago in Washington, D.C., at the Excellence In Government conference. Based on his presentation, I understood he was sorting leaders into "filtered" and "unfiltered" types. By this, he meant filtered leaders are those whose ideas and capacities are genrally known when they assume leadership (his analysis was of all U.S. Presidents). As an example, he noted Lincoln's leadership characteristics were not well-known when the Republican nominating convention happened to take place in Lincoln's home state, and when Lincoln was nominated.

With broader regard to the notions of exceptional characteristics making exceptional leaders, I personally agree with your comments. Leadership is something beyond the assignment of authority or power. It is as much emergent from local interactions, as it is bestowed with a particular job or title. In this, I would cite the excellent work of Goldstein, Hazy, and Lictenstein, and their book "Complexity and the Nexus of Leadership." i'd also cite the work of Ron Heifetz and Marty Linsky on Adaptive Leadership. In addition to their books, Ron's teaching and ideas are wonderfully described in Sharon Parks' book, "Leadership CAN Be Taught."

Take care!

Bruce Waltuck, M.A., Complexity, Chaos, and Creativity

[Chris Rodgers]

Many thanks, Bruce, for your helpful comments and useful references.

There is a paradox here, of course. On the one hand, I'm suggesting that leadership is best seen as an emergent property of day-to-day interactions, rather than as an elite practice confined to 'the chosen few'. On the other, much of my consulting practice is based on working with those in formal leadership positions (throughout an organization) to raise their awareness of the hidden, messy and informal dynamics of everyday organizational reality. And this includes the 'messy' (political, ideological, social, emergent, paradoxical, etc) reality of their own role - in contrast to the neatly packaged set of scientifically rational practices which conventional management 'wisdom' attributes to them.

Implicit in this idea of raising awareness, and stimulating a more informed approach to 'formal' leadership practice, is recognition that leadership can indeed be taught. Or rather, perhaps, that it can be learnt as a result of reflective and reflexive practice, arising in the midst of challenging and supportive conversation.