The New Psychology of Leadership

The New Psychology of Leadership –
Identity, Influence and Power, S.

Alexander Haslam, Stephen D. Reicher
and Michael J. Platow, Psychology Press,
East Sussex, 2011.
This book is about what leadership means

and about how it works. What is ‘new’
about it is that it takes an approached
based on scientific argument and evidence.
Thus The New Psychology of Leadership
should appeal to and resonate with science
teachers. Although an academic text book
it is a straightforward, well organised and
easy read. If you want to get a feel for what
the book is about you could read the
Scientific American article the authors
wrote on the book’s publication [1] and/or
the article written by two of the authors on
Rethinking the Psychology of Leadership
[2].
There is no shortage of books on leadership. However many of them are based on

identifying the personality characteristics of leaders or the techniques they employ to get
people to do what they want them to. The individuals described in these books often do not
lead; they are more likely to be mangers or administrators who seek compliance from those
they attempt to lead through authority or incentives. Such strategies inevitably fall short of
the potential of the organisation as the members often game the system to pursue their own
self-interest rather than the goals of the manager or administrator. A leader by contrast
works to get followers to identify themselves with the goals and a common purpose that they
share with the leader. This common purpose gives the followers and their leader a shared
identity that creates a ‘we’ rather than the authoritarian ‘I’ of the manager or administrator.
Such teams with such a shared identity often over-achieve as the talents of the group form
something greater than the sum of their parts. By contrast groups that are subject to a
manager’s authority or incentives often under-achieve as the whole becomes less than the
sum of its parts – a useful definition of a dysfunctional organisation. This book argues that to
succeed, leaders need to create, champion and embed a sense of group identity of which
they themselves are representative.
Chapters 1 and 2 deal with traditional research into leadership which focus on the leader as
an individual, discovering their personal traits and qualities (chp 1) and the influence of the
circumstances the leader finds them self in and the influence of the perceptions that potential
followers have of the leader (chp 2). The discussion in these chapters includes the
anomalies and inconsistencies in the evidence base that do not fit the explanations of
leadership shown by these traditional approaches. In chapter 3 the authors suggest a new
psychology based on the psychology of the group rather than the psychology of an individual
to analyse leadership behaviour.
In the next four chapters of the book the authors present the evidence and explanation to
support the central thesis in their book. Chapter 4 emphasises the need for leaders to be
perceived by their followers to have qualities, attributes and behaviours in common with
them. Leaders who look like ‘one of us’ are seen as better leaders and are more likely to be
effective in getting us to do things and make us feel good about doing those things. In
chapter 5 we see that in addition leaders have to be seen to stand up for the group and
advance its interests, be a champion of the group. That is if the leader is seen to be
achieving positive outcomes for the group, ‘doing it for us’, then group members will be
motivated to do the work that makes the vision of the group a reality. Without that leadership
action, followers may well support the idea of the group’s vision without actually doing the
work to make it happen. Chapter 6 deals with the role of the leader in moving a group from
how it sees itself in the present to how it would like to see itself in the future. In the authors’
terms, moving the group’s social identity to a new social reality. To do this the leader has to
work to define the perceptions the members of the group have of themselves and of their
leader, to define the boundaries of common interest that they share and that bind them
together and to define future proposals as an expression of their shared values, beliefs and
priorities. Chapter 7 deals with how leaders can influence the behaviour of others. To do this
leaders have to create an accord between themselves, their proposals and group identity to
achieve power through rather than over the group. This can be achieved by creating a
compelling image of the group’s identity, creating displays of that identity that the group
participates in and by creating structures and procedures within which the group can operate
to advance the common understandings, values and beliefs of the group and its leader.
In the final chapter (chp 8) the authors draw their arguments together to show that
leadership is a process of managing social identity. Leadership is rooted in a social
relationship between leaders and followers; it is not a matter for leaders alone. If leaders do
not form a social relationship with their followers then there is no leadership at all. The holy
grail of leadership is to mould group members into a cohesive unit, to generate collective
enthusiasm and to guide the application of that enthusiasm.
References:
1. The New Psychology of Leadership, S. Alexander Haslam, Stephen D.

Reicher and Michael J. Platow, Scientific American Mind, September 2007
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/d577/3ecee88b2c1db50334a3c2c9acf4d56
5d63b.pdf accessed September 2017.
2. Rethinking the psychology of leadership: From personal identity to social identity, S.
Alexander Haslam, Stephen D. Reicher, 2016 https://research-repository.st-
andrews.ac.uk/bitstream/handle/10023/8707/Reicher_2016_Leadership_Daedalus_A
ccepted_Manuscript.pdf?sequence=1 accessed September 2017.

The New Psychology of Leadership

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

The New Psychology of Leadership

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

The New Psychology of Leadership

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

The New Psychology of Leadership –

Identity, Influence and Power, S.

This book is about what leadership means

There is no shortage of books on leadership. However many of them are based on

1. The New Psychology of Leadership, S. Alexander Haslam, Stephen D.

You might also like