CLS Research Themes

Staff at the Centre for Leadership Studies are involved in a range of research activities which can be broadly grouped under the following four themes.

1. Personal challenges of leadership
   Through our research we seek to help individuals make sense of a variety of seemingly intractable dilemmas associated with leadership. Many of these arise from a complex interaction between ethical, political and personal considerations. Some of these challenges belong to those in leadership roles; others are more to do with the expectations of other people. What can leaders do to improve their chances of success, and how can others relate to them in a constructive way?
2. New ways of thinking about leadership
   Are leaders necessary? Do leaders simply pull their followers or do those behind push them? Are our theories of leadership too fixed and individualistic? A common assumption made in 21st century Anglo-American cultures is that we can solve all organizational problems by finding the right leader. We challenge the simplistic nature of this assumption and through our research and teaching, seek to help people in organisations find meaningful solutions to the leadership problems they perceive. We aim to illuminate the limitations of habitual and conventional thinking about leadership and to engage with ideas and explore valuable alternatives from different enquiry paradigms. These alternative perspectives draw on insights from amongst such disciplines as philosophy, political theory, economics, sociology, theology in order to balance insights from the more obvious disciplines of psychology and business studies which have dominated the leadership field in recent years.
3. How to improve leadership development
   We support and evaluate innovative leadership development programmes, and we are interested in the more diffuse experiences and processes which form and prepare people for leadership. Our research is designed to understand the complex relationship between individual learning, reflection and application. We exercise a healthy scepticism toward ‘quick fix’ recipes for leadership development and simplistic theories and concepts that do more to obscure than to enlighten. We seek to understand leadership development in context and take into account such influencing factors as one’s peer group, organisational culture and broader socio-economic trends.
4. The relationship between leadership and organisational performance
   Leadership and performance can both be understood as part of a complex network of inter- and intra-organisational processes. We challenge the assumption that there is a simple ‘cause and effect’ relationship between leadership and organisational performance. Our research in this area is grounded in the traditions of Organisation Studies and Social Theory. As such, it is directed towards understanding individual and organisational performance through systemic relationships and processes in preference to more static perspectives, such as those based on competency or performance indicator frameworks.

For further information on the research of specific faculty members please refer to the Faculty Research Interests page.