Conceptualizing leadership across cultures

In this article, we summarize research on how the meaning of leadership varies systematically across cultures, and describe the conflict in the literature between the quest for universals and the identification of cultural contingencies in leadership theory. We review the literature on the relationships between cultural dimensions and leadership, and discuss implications of this range of research for management practice.     

Strategic leadership across cultures: Current findings and future research directions

Research on strategic leadership has proliferated for a long time. However, very little work has been conducted to investigate this issue from a cross-cultural perspective. To fill this gap, we first review recent findings on strategic leadership in different cultural backgrounds. Then, based on the upper echelons theory, we summarize what researchers have found regarding the effects of personal characteristics of strategic leaders on firm performance in terms of observed personal experience, personality, values, cognitive style, and leadership behaviors. Furthermore, we generate some future research directions focusing on concepts, theories, and also methodological issues of strategic leadership across cultures. We consider how research across different cultures will enrich our understanding of strategic leadership and unfold the “black box” of why and how strategic leaders have positive effects on firm level performance. Finally, practical implications for managers are considered.     

Ethical leadership across cultures: a comparative analysis of German and US perspectives

This paper examines beliefs about four aspects of ethical leadership –Character/Integrity, Altruism, Collective Motivation and Encouragement– in Germany and the United States using data from Project GLOBE (Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior Effectiveness) and a supplemental analysis. Within the context of a push toward convergence driven by the demands of globalization and the pull toward divergence underpinned by different cultural values and philosophies in the two countries, we focus on two questions: Do middle managers from the United States and Germany differ in their beliefs about ethical leadership? And, do individuals from these two countries attribute different characteristics to ethical leaders? Results provide evidence that while German and US middle managers, on average, differed in the degree of endorsement for each aspect, they each endorsed Character/Integrity, Collective Motivation and Encouragement as important for effective leadership and had a more neutral view of the importance of Altruism. The findings are reviewed within the social‐cultural context of each country.     

Servant leadership,organisational trust,and bank employee outcomes

Using servant leadership and social exchange theories as the theoretical frameworks, our study proposes and tests a research model that investigates trust in organisation (TIO) as a mediator of the impact of servant leadership on three critical outcomes. These outcomes are intention to be late for work (ILW), creative performance, and service recovery performance. Data obtained from frontline bank employees in three waves at one-week apart and their managers in Saint Petersburg in Russia were used to test the aforementioned relationships. The results demonstrate that TIO is an immediate outcome of servant leadership. TIO gives rise to lower ILW and higher creative and service recovery performances. The aforesaid findings reveal that servant leadership mitigates ILW and boosts both creative and service recovery performances only through TIO. Implications for theory and practice are discussed in our paper.     

Delegating effectively across cultures

This article builds on the contingency approach to global leadership to examine empowerment in a cross-cultural context. Drawing upon ethnographic research on employees of a French NGO in Madagascar, our study demonstrates that effective empowerment is not dependent on the amount of delegation, but rather it is dependent on how delegation is performed. Understanding the cultural representations of formalization, skill development, collective work, and decision-making appeared to be crucial to effective delegation in Madagascar. This result suggests that managers should adapt the way that they empower their teams based on the conditions and forms of delegation prevailing in local cultures.     

Management styles across Western European cultures

Management styles differ greatly across Europe although Europeans themselves may not always be aware of it. European executives usually deal with the countries closest to them and more distant countries are not as well known to them, whether linguistically, culturally, or geographically. As Europe 1993 makes executive transfers and recruitment easier than before across the European Community, it seems important to make managers aware of the variety of management styles across Western European countries. European managers frequently know more about American management and even Japanese management than they do about other European management styles. Their lack of understanding about European management styles may inhibit the emergence of a unified European management style in the future. © 1995 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Symmetric and asymmetric leadership cultures: A comparative study of leadership and organizational culture at Hyundai and Toyota

This study compares national cultures, leadership strategies, and work environments in two successful global automobile companies, Hyundai Motor Group and Toyota Motor Corporation. Despite competing head-on in the same market, it was found that these companies use very different leadership strategies as a basis for both global competition and local operations. Based on the results of a comparative case study, structured interviews, and related media and empirical data, it was found that Toyota competes both strategically and managerially by emphasizing planning and work systems to mitigate the impact of any turbulence in the external environment (stability is key), while Hyundai competes by accepting environmental uncertainty and risk as a part of normal daily operations (flexibility is key). We refer to these approaches as symmetric and asymmetric leadership and organizational cultures. As a result of these differences, Hyundai is able to change course more quickly than its larger competitor as new opportunities and technologies emerge. While national cultures played a role in differentiating between the two firms, leadership differences had a more pronounced effect on organizational behaviors and subsequent performance. Results are consistent with previous research and reinforce the conclusion that top management leaders’ behavior can have a significant influence on emergent organizational cultures and performance.     

Transcendent leadership

Leadership theories abound, but few have provided a means to integrate the depth and breadth of the vast literature available. Building on the research of Crossan, Vera, and Nanjad (who propose Transcendent Leadership as an integrative framework), we describe the key leadership challenges of leading across the levels of self, others, organization, and society. We argue that much of the leadership discourse has focused almost exclusively on leadership of others and occasionally on the leadership of the organization as a whole, yet little has focused specifically on the integral component of leadership of self. We provide evidence of the necessity of multiple levels of leadership, as well as some practical guidance, by drawing from in-depth interviews of six leaders in various contexts.     

Positive global leadership

In the wake of increasing globalization, today's organizational leaders are faced with unprecedented complexity. To help meeting the challenge, this article proposes a new positive approach to global leadership. After first providing the background on positivity, positive global leadership is carefully defined and its similarities and differences with both the established and contemporary leadership theories are noted. The discussion then turns to how positive global leadership addresses three major challenges in the global context of distance, cultural differences and cross-cultural barriers. The article concludes that this new positive approach can help global leaders to leverage diverse strengths in themselves and their environment to more effectively meet the escalating challenges they face now and in the future.     

公仆型领导:概念的界定与量表的修订

采用一组管理者-员工配对样本数据和一组管理者样本数据对西方的公仆型领导的结构与含义进行了深入分析并对量表的效度进行了验证.探索性因素分析(N=285)表明,公仆型领导由利他主义、情绪抚慰、智慧、说服引导和社会责任感五个维度构成.验证性因素分析(N=304)表明,五维度的结构模型对数据拟合最佳.为了更好地考察公仆型领导量表的结构效度和实证效度,采用"管理者-员工"配对样本(N=209)数据进行分析,结果表明,公仆型领导量表具有较高的结构效度和实证效度.     

Effects of culturally verbal and visual congruency/incongruency across cultures in a competitive advertising context

Existing consumer behavior theories suggest that consumers tend to recognize, better comprehend, and respond favorably to information that is both relevant and consistent with their beliefs and values. This study extends these theories by employing cultural arguments and pictures to examine the effects of culturally verbal and visual congruency/incongruency on consumer ad and brand attitudes in multiple-ad and multiple-brand environments. The studies were conducted with subjects in Canada and China. The results suggest that, when the contrast ad is culturally incongruent, an ad containing a culturally congruent argument and congruent picture elicits the most positive responses, compared to other ads with different combinations of arguments and pictures. However, an ad containing a culturally incongruent argument and incongruent picture also elicits more positive responses than an ad with a culturally congruent argument and incongruent picture or a culturally incongruent argument and congruent picture.     

The Influence of Servant Leadership on Restaurant Employee Engagement

Servant leadership is a leadership philosophy which addresses the concerns of ethics, customer experience, and employee engagement while creating a unique organizational culture where both leaders and followers unite to reach organizational goals without positional or authoritative power. With employees viewed as one of the greatest assets for organizations, maintaining loyal, productive employees while balancing profits becomes a challenge for leaders, and drives the need to understand employee engagement drivers. Thus, the purpose of this study was to qualitatively explore servant leadership from the perspective of employees. Participants were 11 employees from a servant leadership led restaurant who took part in two focus groups. The modified van Kaam method (Moustakas 1994) contributed to data analysis, which examined employee responses for comparison and assessment. Several themes emerged including servant leader experience, servant leader traits, the impact of servant leadership, the application of servant leadership, and limited employee attrition. The themes revealed servant leadership positively influences employee engagement while contributing to employee loyalty to the workplace. Based on the servant leader experience, participants were more committed, built healthy work relationships, and actively participated in achieving organizational goals. Findings are discussed in light of current research and practical applications are provided.     

仆从领导文化与企业声誉管理

本文将Grahame企业声誉的理论模型运用于仆从领导文化与企业声誉管理内在关系的研究。通过对仆从领导的“齿轮传动模型”的阐释,本文分析了仆从领导文化与企业声誉管理相关的四个特征,即领导知名度、员工参与度、顾客满意度与社区和谐度,揭示了企业文化作用于企业声誉管理的“光环效应”。     

Planning the leadership transition

According to the author, a successful leadership change should not be left to chance. Such a transition must be planned and carefully managed.     

Mentoring across cultures: The role of gender and marital status in Taiwan and the U.S.

We examined the interaction of gender and marital status on attaining mentors among 405 managers and professionals in contrasting Taiwanese and U.S. cultures. In line with social role and signaling theories and the cultural concepts of gender-egalitarianism and individualism/collectivism, married U.S. women had a lower likelihood of having a mentor compared to single women or men. Being married disfavored U.S. women but did not disfavor Taiwanese women. Further analyses using only the U.S. protégé sample also revealed that being married was positively related to psychosocial mentoring received only among male protégés. We discuss results from a cross-cultural perspective.     

Entrepreneurial personalities in political leadership

Societies around the globe respond to the contemporary technological and economic change by defining entrepreneurship and innovation as core principles for future competitive advantage. Does this rise of the “entrepreneurial society” also imply that entrepreneurial personalities are becoming increasingly widespread and powerful in political leadership? Joseph A. Schumpeter already argued that highly influential entrepreneurs are unique and show a certain personality pattern that can be described as being not only high in creativity and change orientation but also high in competitiveness and rule-breaking. It is interesting to ask whether such Schumpeterian personalities indeed play an increasingly important role in political leadership, given that daily routines of policy leaders, at least at first glance, usually require rather non-entrepreneurial strategies such as careful, risk-averse diplomacy. To address this question, we first survey the existing literature on personality and political leadership. We further present a novel personality analysis of an influential business leader that recently made a transition to political leadership: Donald J. Trump, the incumbent US president. Employing a language-based, computerized method of analyzing Twitter statements, we compare his online personality to the online personality of other influential entrepreneurs and business managers, who do not engage in political leadership. The results indicate that Trump is indeed distinct in that he shows stronger features of a Schumpeterian personality. However, he is also comparatively high in Neuroticism. We discuss these findings focusing on the potential implications of a concentration of entrepreneurial mindsets in political leadership.