Leadership in organizations

Abstract

This book is about leadership in organizations. Its primary focus is on managerial leadership as opposed to parliamentary leadership, leadership in social movements, or emergent leadership in informal groups. The book presents a broad survey of theory and research on leadership in formal organizations. Topics of special interest are the determinants of leadership effectiveness and how leadership can be improved. William Gardner was added as a second author for this edition to incorporate his knowledge and perspective on effective leadership.The book is appropriate for use as the primary text in an undergraduate or graduate course in leadership. Such courses are found in many different schools or departments, including business, psychology, sociology, educational administration, public administration, and health-care administra-tion. The book is on the list of required or recommended readings for students in many doctoral programs in leadership, management, and industrial-organizational psychology. With its focus on effective leadership in organizations, the book is especially relevant for students who expect to be-come a manager or administrator in the near future, for people who will be responsible for training or coaching leaders, and for people who will be teaching courses or workshops that include leadership as one of the key topics. The book is also useful for practicing managers and consultants who are looking for something more than vague theories and superficial answers to difficult questions about leadership. The book is widely used in many different countries, and some editions were translated into other languages, including Chinese, Korean, Indonesian, Spanish, Greek, Croatian, and Swedish.The content of the book still reflects a dual concern for theory and practice. We have attempted to satisfy two different audiences with somewhat different perspectives. Most aca-demics prefer a book that explains and evaluates major theories and relevant empirical re-search. They are most interested in how well the research was done, what was found, how well the research supports the theoretical basis for it, and what additional research is needed. Academics tend to be skeptical about the value of prescriptions and guidelines for practitioners and may consider them premature in the absence of further research. In contrast, most practitioners want some immediate answers about what to do and how to do it in order to be more effective as lead-ers. They need to deal with the current challenges of their job and cannot wait for decades until the academics resolve their theoretical disputes and obtain definitive answers. Practitioners are more interested in finding helpful remedies and prescriptions than in finding out how this knowledge was discovered. Readers who desire to improve their leadership effectiveness will find this edition of the book is even more useful than previous editions