This study of US Navy Sea Air and Land (SEAL) commandos contributes to research investigating min... more This study of US Navy Sea Air and Land (SEAL) commandos contributes to research investigating mindfulness in high-reliability organizations (HROs) by identifying the individual and collective influences that allow SEALs to build capacity for mindful behaviors despite the complexity of their missions, the unpredictability of their operating environments, and the danger inherent in their work. Although the HRO literature identifies a number of hallmarks of reliability, less attention is paid to how mindfulness is operationally achieved in situ by individuals on the frontline working in HROs. This study addresses this gap using a multiphase, multimethod investigation of US Navy SEALs, identifying new links between individual mindfulness attributes (comfort with uncertainty and chaos) and collective mindfulness influences (a positive orientation towards failure) that combine to co-create a phenomenon we call "mindfulness in action." Mindfulness in action occurs when HROs achieve an attentive yet flexible focus capable of incorporating multiple-sometimes competing-realities to assess alternative solutions and take action in dynamic situations. By providing a more nuanced conceptualization of the links between individual mindfulness attributes and collective mindfulness influences, this paper opens up new avenues of discovery for a wide range of reliability-seeking organizations. For supporting media please see .
Please refer to published version for the most recent bibliographic citation information. If a pu... more Please refer to published version for the most recent bibliographic citation information. If a published version is known of, the repository item page linked to above, will contain details on accessing it.
Introduction: So What? 1. Fuzzy Logic: Managing in an Occluded World 2. Managing Fashions: A Eulo... more Introduction: So What? 1. Fuzzy Logic: Managing in an Occluded World 2. Managing Fashions: A Eulogy for Flared Trousers 3. Chaos, Culture, and Evolution: The Configuration of Organization 4. Managing Change through Commitment: Autistic, New Model, and Pandorian Organizations 5. Deep Leadership: In Theory 6. Mismanaging Risk: The Madness of Cows 7. Negotiating: Groundhog Groundrules References
Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to crimina... more Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
Tottenham Court Road, London wn 4LP. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this... more Tottenham Court Road, London wn 4LP. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
Business process re-engineering (BPR) was a leading form of organizational restructuring from the... more Business process re-engineering (BPR) was a leading form of organizational restructuring from the late 1980s until the late 1990s. This paper seeks to contextualize its development and account for its particularly bellicose language by re¯ecting on its historical antecedents in the west and its contemporary competitors in the east. We suggest that one way of reading BPR is as a form of`inverse colonization' in which US managerial discourse both assimilated and revolted against the growing domination of Japanese thinking and practice. We conclude with some speculative comments on related causes of the rise of violent managerial rhetoric.
The version presented here may differ from the published version or, version of record, if you wi... more The version presented here may differ from the published version or, version of record, if you wish to cite this item you are advised to consult the publisher's version. Please see the 'permanent WRAP url' above for details on accessing the published version and note that access may require a subscription.
This study seeks to better understand how notions of sovereign power as a response to terrorism a... more This study seeks to better understand how notions of sovereign power as a response to terrorism are built and bolstered through use of the signifier ‘leadership’. Through a post-foundational analysis of the speeches, press conferences and writings of former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, we theorise ‘sovereign leadership’ as the deployment of the signifier leadership in ways that foreclose language so as to normalise the discourse and acts of sovereign power. Our key finding is that sovereign leadership offers a (misleadingly) straightforward solution to the complex problem of terrorism through foreclosing language so that alternative responses are excluded. In exploring articulations of sovereign leadership, we illuminate its contingency, and therefore, also its contestability, within a system of discursive resources. We posit three foreclosing moments that are drawn upon to bolster the urgency, affective salience and justness of sovereign leadership: emergency, positivity and vulne...
Current research on political leadership draws attention to its contested and stretched character... more Current research on political leadership draws attention to its contested and stretched characteristics. We conceptualise this milieu as representing the terrain for the identity work of political leaders, and the space generated for political leadership. This paper adopts a narrative analysis of ethnographic and in-depth interview data to map out the degrees of freedom (the leadership space) of political leaders. We seek to explore ways in which the space for political leadership is both opened up and closed down, and ask what this might tell us about possibilities for political leadership in the future.
This paper is about the relationship between leadership, organisational morals, and temporality. ... more This paper is about the relationship between leadership, organisational morals, and temporality. We argue that engaging with questions of time and temporality may help us overcome the overly agentic view of organisational morals and leadership ethics that dominates extant literature. Our analysis of the role of time in organizational morals and leadership ethics starts from a virtue-based approach to leading large-scale moral endeavours. We ask: how can we account for organizational morality across generations and independently of the leader? To address this question, we studied the leadership model of the Jesuits, a Catholic Religious Order. Our case reveals that a virtue-based model of leadership does not necessarily imply that those who are selected to lead the organization are themselves virtuous, but that the processes underpinning the exercise of leadership are cyclical and repeated as truthfully as possible. Virtuous leadership, for the Jesuits, is therefore about the constru...
A considerable amount of research supports the contention that between two thirds and three quart... more A considerable amount of research supports the contention that between two thirds and three quarters of all change programmes fail in their own terms. In this paper I suggest that our inability to determine the future runs contrary to many assumptions about change management and that an amalgam of three particular theories of indeterminacy (constructivism, indeterminacy and complexity theory) ‐ which I call subjunctivism ‐ may help understand the problem.
The collaborative phenomenon Collaborative leadership has become an increasingly influential para... more The collaborative phenomenon Collaborative leadership has become an increasingly influential paradigm of thinking within leadership studies, with the idea gaining interest amongst both scholars and practitioners (Bolden, 2012; Grint and Holt, 2011; O'Reilly and Reed, 2012). Pitched as a solution to ever more complex, even intractable, global and social problems, such as global warming, changing global political power dynamics and the financial crisis experienced in western democratic nation states, collaborative leadership is offered as a means of generating more imaginative and sustainable solutions across established organizational and political boundaries (Benington and Moore, 2010). Shifting terrain within major global economic and political issues, the argument goes, necessitates that managers, political leaders and citizens conceptualise leadership differently. Can we therefore assume that there are plenty of live examples of collaborative leadership on the move within organizations and social movements? A body of practical experience developing alongside collaborative leadership philosophising? In reality it seems as though writing about the idea of collaborative leadership has overtaken the extent of its practice (Grint, 2010). What we are experiencing, rather than everyday collaborative leadership practice, is a collaborative zeal within the literature.
This article offers a praxis of democratic leadership development, arguing that the framework pre... more This article offers a praxis of democratic leadership development, arguing that the framework presented can act as a means of rethinking how collective forms of leadership are developed within and between organisations. Building on notions of leadership development as process and person-based, we interpret these as contested, democratic and contingent discursive achievements in a process of developing. Post-foundationalist theory, particularly the work of Ernesto Laclau, is introduced as a means of ‘democratizing’ key dimensions of leadership development: working with ‘leadership’ and ‘democracy’ as empty-floating signifiers holding the potential to generate energetic engagements between leadership development participants. A framework consisting of four dimensions is introduced, with particular attention paid within each dimension to its practice relevance. First, we seek to democratise the leader-subject, reinterpreted as a contested and contingent signifying subject of discourse....
This study of US Navy Sea Air and Land (SEAL) commandos contributes to research investigating min... more This study of US Navy Sea Air and Land (SEAL) commandos contributes to research investigating mindfulness in high-reliability organizations (HROs) by identifying the individual and collective influences that allow SEALs to build capacity for mindful behaviors despite the complexity of their missions, the unpredictability of their operating environments, and the danger inherent in their work. Although the HRO literature identifies a number of hallmarks of reliability, less attention is paid to how mindfulness is operationally achieved in situ by individuals on the frontline working in HROs. This study addresses this gap using a multiphase, multimethod investigation of US Navy SEALs, identifying new links between individual mindfulness attributes (comfort with uncertainty and chaos) and collective mindfulness influences (a positive orientation towards failure) that combine to co-create a phenomenon we call "mindfulness in action." Mindfulness in action occurs when HROs achieve an attentive yet flexible focus capable of incorporating multiple-sometimes competing-realities to assess alternative solutions and take action in dynamic situations. By providing a more nuanced conceptualization of the links between individual mindfulness attributes and collective mindfulness influences, this paper opens up new avenues of discovery for a wide range of reliability-seeking organizations. For supporting media please see .
Please refer to published version for the most recent bibliographic citation information. If a pu... more Please refer to published version for the most recent bibliographic citation information. If a published version is known of, the repository item page linked to above, will contain details on accessing it.
Introduction: So What? 1. Fuzzy Logic: Managing in an Occluded World 2. Managing Fashions: A Eulo... more Introduction: So What? 1. Fuzzy Logic: Managing in an Occluded World 2. Managing Fashions: A Eulogy for Flared Trousers 3. Chaos, Culture, and Evolution: The Configuration of Organization 4. Managing Change through Commitment: Autistic, New Model, and Pandorian Organizations 5. Deep Leadership: In Theory 6. Mismanaging Risk: The Madness of Cows 7. Negotiating: Groundhog Groundrules References
Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to crimina... more Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
Tottenham Court Road, London wn 4LP. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this... more Tottenham Court Road, London wn 4LP. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
Business process re-engineering (BPR) was a leading form of organizational restructuring from the... more Business process re-engineering (BPR) was a leading form of organizational restructuring from the late 1980s until the late 1990s. This paper seeks to contextualize its development and account for its particularly bellicose language by re¯ecting on its historical antecedents in the west and its contemporary competitors in the east. We suggest that one way of reading BPR is as a form of`inverse colonization' in which US managerial discourse both assimilated and revolted against the growing domination of Japanese thinking and practice. We conclude with some speculative comments on related causes of the rise of violent managerial rhetoric.
The version presented here may differ from the published version or, version of record, if you wi... more The version presented here may differ from the published version or, version of record, if you wish to cite this item you are advised to consult the publisher's version. Please see the 'permanent WRAP url' above for details on accessing the published version and note that access may require a subscription.
This study seeks to better understand how notions of sovereign power as a response to terrorism a... more This study seeks to better understand how notions of sovereign power as a response to terrorism are built and bolstered through use of the signifier ‘leadership’. Through a post-foundational analysis of the speeches, press conferences and writings of former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, we theorise ‘sovereign leadership’ as the deployment of the signifier leadership in ways that foreclose language so as to normalise the discourse and acts of sovereign power. Our key finding is that sovereign leadership offers a (misleadingly) straightforward solution to the complex problem of terrorism through foreclosing language so that alternative responses are excluded. In exploring articulations of sovereign leadership, we illuminate its contingency, and therefore, also its contestability, within a system of discursive resources. We posit three foreclosing moments that are drawn upon to bolster the urgency, affective salience and justness of sovereign leadership: emergency, positivity and vulne...
Current research on political leadership draws attention to its contested and stretched character... more Current research on political leadership draws attention to its contested and stretched characteristics. We conceptualise this milieu as representing the terrain for the identity work of political leaders, and the space generated for political leadership. This paper adopts a narrative analysis of ethnographic and in-depth interview data to map out the degrees of freedom (the leadership space) of political leaders. We seek to explore ways in which the space for political leadership is both opened up and closed down, and ask what this might tell us about possibilities for political leadership in the future.
This paper is about the relationship between leadership, organisational morals, and temporality. ... more This paper is about the relationship between leadership, organisational morals, and temporality. We argue that engaging with questions of time and temporality may help us overcome the overly agentic view of organisational morals and leadership ethics that dominates extant literature. Our analysis of the role of time in organizational morals and leadership ethics starts from a virtue-based approach to leading large-scale moral endeavours. We ask: how can we account for organizational morality across generations and independently of the leader? To address this question, we studied the leadership model of the Jesuits, a Catholic Religious Order. Our case reveals that a virtue-based model of leadership does not necessarily imply that those who are selected to lead the organization are themselves virtuous, but that the processes underpinning the exercise of leadership are cyclical and repeated as truthfully as possible. Virtuous leadership, for the Jesuits, is therefore about the constru...
A considerable amount of research supports the contention that between two thirds and three quart... more A considerable amount of research supports the contention that between two thirds and three quarters of all change programmes fail in their own terms. In this paper I suggest that our inability to determine the future runs contrary to many assumptions about change management and that an amalgam of three particular theories of indeterminacy (constructivism, indeterminacy and complexity theory) ‐ which I call subjunctivism ‐ may help understand the problem.
The collaborative phenomenon Collaborative leadership has become an increasingly influential para... more The collaborative phenomenon Collaborative leadership has become an increasingly influential paradigm of thinking within leadership studies, with the idea gaining interest amongst both scholars and practitioners (Bolden, 2012; Grint and Holt, 2011; O'Reilly and Reed, 2012). Pitched as a solution to ever more complex, even intractable, global and social problems, such as global warming, changing global political power dynamics and the financial crisis experienced in western democratic nation states, collaborative leadership is offered as a means of generating more imaginative and sustainable solutions across established organizational and political boundaries (Benington and Moore, 2010). Shifting terrain within major global economic and political issues, the argument goes, necessitates that managers, political leaders and citizens conceptualise leadership differently. Can we therefore assume that there are plenty of live examples of collaborative leadership on the move within organizations and social movements? A body of practical experience developing alongside collaborative leadership philosophising? In reality it seems as though writing about the idea of collaborative leadership has overtaken the extent of its practice (Grint, 2010). What we are experiencing, rather than everyday collaborative leadership practice, is a collaborative zeal within the literature.
This article offers a praxis of democratic leadership development, arguing that the framework pre... more This article offers a praxis of democratic leadership development, arguing that the framework presented can act as a means of rethinking how collective forms of leadership are developed within and between organisations. Building on notions of leadership development as process and person-based, we interpret these as contested, democratic and contingent discursive achievements in a process of developing. Post-foundationalist theory, particularly the work of Ernesto Laclau, is introduced as a means of ‘democratizing’ key dimensions of leadership development: working with ‘leadership’ and ‘democracy’ as empty-floating signifiers holding the potential to generate energetic engagements between leadership development participants. A framework consisting of four dimensions is introduced, with particular attention paid within each dimension to its practice relevance. First, we seek to democratise the leader-subject, reinterpreted as a contested and contingent signifying subject of discourse....
The British area bombing of Germany in World War II (1942-1945) is one of the most enduring contr... more The British area bombing of Germany in World War II (1942-1945) is one of the most enduring controversies to have emerged from the conflict. This presentation, which is based on a work-in-progress with Keith Grint (Warwick University Business School), has the aim to examine the campaign in terms of leadership and ethics. The issue itself has been dealt with either by historians (who are generally loath to pass ethical judgment) or by philosophers. The latter have framed British area bombing in absolute terms-whether the campaign was ethical from start to finish (or not)-and this framing is characterized by a certain disregard to matters of context, chronology, and contingency. We propose the first holistic and interdisciplinary approach to the area bombing controversy, firmly grounded in a virtual history methodology. As Richard Overy writes in his Why the Allies Won (1996), important historical watersheds such as the Battle of Britain, Pearl Harbor or the Battle of Stalingrad are turning points in retrospect only. To contemporaries these events often indicated no more than a moment of respite, followed by a tortuous path, and further trials, the outcomes of which were as yet uncertain. They obscure the considerable efforts that were still necessary to win this war against an elusive, clever and formidable enemy. One feature of the presentation then is its profiling of the British strategic dilemma at the time when the area campaign began in 1942: at this stage in the war precision bombing techniques were extremely poor, while fire-bombing brought considerable devastation to built-up inner cities. In opting for fire-bombing, the British were throwing in the only fully operational weapons system with which they could dent German continental might. As long as the Germans had the capacity to put resources in the way of the bomber fleets, this was a ruthless, but pragmatic course of action. Bombing during the period 1942-1944 qualifies as an example of Machiavellian virtù, the strategic prowess or flexible disposition necessary to exploit fortuna and win a war. Not having pursued this course of action would have amounted to an inadvertent scaling down of the war effort against Nazi Germany, with all that this entailed. When Harris revives his city campaign in autumn 1944, after a six-month lull in area bombing during which his force has been diverted to operational support of Overlord (D-Day), the fundamentals have changed: there are now other (and more effective) alternatives to area bombing; expediency is beginning to play a major role in the decision to continue area bombing (but expediency alone does not provide sufficient grounds for arguing a 'dirty hands' case); and the decision is correlated to military blunders and political interference that occurred during the hard slog from Normandy to Berlin. Our conclusions differ from the absolutist standpoint, both in qualitative and ethical terms. We not only identify two distinct periods, but we also argue that the first period (1942-44) corresponds to a context of 'choiceless choices', where area bombing was a necessary evil. Conversely, area bombing during the second period (1944-45) was an unnecessary evil, and bears the hallmark of Arendt's banality of evil.
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