This article seeks to explore the impact of leaders’ behaviors on the successful implementation of change. A qualitative empirical study of change leader behaviors based on interviews with leaders from 33 organizations is presented. Analyses of the data indicated that leader-centric behaviors have an adverse impact on change implementation. In contrast, behaviors that may be described as being more facilitating and engaging are positively related to change success. Four critical behavior sets are identified. It was evident that leaders who experienced the highest levels of success deployed all four of the behavior sets and minimal presence of leader-centric behaviors. The study findings provide support for some of the recent research into change leadership. However, they provide a more detailed picture of the nature of behaviors associated with successful change implementation. The article concludes with a brief discussion of limitations and areas for further research.
AgleB. R.NagarajanN. J.SonnenfeldJ. A.SrinivasanD. (2006). Does CEO charisma matter? An empirical analysis of the relationship among organizational performance, environmental uncertainty and top management perceptions of CEO charisma. Academy of Management Journal, 88, 755-768.
2.
Alimo-MetcalfeB. (1995). An investigation of female and male constructs of leadership. Women in Management Review, 10, 3-8.
3.
AndersonN.HeriotP.HodgkinsonG. P. (2001). The practitioner–researcher divide in industrial work and organizational (IWO) psychology: Where do we go from here?Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, 74, 391-412.
4.
AndrewsJ.CameronH.HarrisM. (2008). All change? Managers’ experience of organizational change in theory and practice. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 21, 300-314.
5.
AveyJ. B.WernsingT. S.LuthansS. (2008). Can positive employees help positive organizational change? The impact of psychological capital and emotions on relevant attitudes and behaviors. Journal of Applied Behavioral Science, 1, 48-70.
6.
AvolioB. J.WalumbaF. O.WeberT. J. (2009). Leadership: Current theories, research and future directions. Annual Review of Psychology, 60, 421-449.
7.
BalogunJ.JohnsonG. (2004). Organizational restructuring and middle manager sensemaking. Academy of Management Journal, 47, 523-549.
8.
BartunekJ. M. (1984). Changing interpretive schemes and organizational restructuring: The example of a religious order. Administrative Science Quarterly, 29, 355-372.
9.
BassB. M. (1996). A new paradigm for leadership: An inquiry into transformational leadership. Alexandra, VA: U.S. Army Research Institute for Behavioral and Social Sciences.
10.
BassB. M. (1999). Two decades of research and development in transformational leadership. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 8, 9-32.
11.
BassB. M.AvolioB. J.JungD. I.BersonY. (2003). Complexity theory and strategic change: An empirically informed critique. British Journal of Management, 47, 523-549.
12.
BeerM. (2000). Research that will break the code of change: The role of useful normal science and usable action science, a commentary on Van de Ven and Argyris. In BeerM.Nohria (Eds.), Breaking the code of change (pp. 429-447). Boston, MA: Harvard Business Press.
13.
BrymanA. (1992). Charisma and leadership in organizations. Newbury Park, CA: Sage.
14.
CameronK. S. (2008). Paradox in positive organizational change. Journal of Applied Behavioral Science, 1, 7-24.
15.
ColvilleI. D.MurphyA. J. (2006). Leadership as the enabler of strategising and organising. Long Range Planning, 39, 663-677.
16.
ConnerD. (1999). Leading at the edge of chaos. New York, NY: John Wiley.
17.
ConnerD. (1992). Managing at the speed of change. New York, NY: John Wiley.
18.
CooperC. D.ScunduraT. A.SchriesheimC. A. (2005). Looking forward but learning from our past: Potential challenges to developing authentic leadership theory and authentic leaders. Leadership Quarterly,16, 419-439.
19.
DarcyT.KleinerB. H. (1991). Leadership for change in a turbulent environment. Leadership and Organization Development Journal, 12, 12-16.
20.
DenisJ-L.LangleyA.CazaleL. (1996). Leadership and strategic change under conditions of ambiguity. Organization Studies, 17, 673-699.
21.
EisenbachR.WatsonK.PillaiR. (1999). Transformational leaders in the context of organizational change. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 12, 80-89.
22.
ElrodP. D.IITippettD. D. (2002). The death valley of change. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 15, 273-292.
23.
FinkelsteinS.HambrickD. (1996). Strategic leadership—Top executives and their influence on organizations. St. Paul, MN: West.
24.
FlanaganJ. C. (1954). The critical incident technique. Psychological Bulletin, 51, 327-358.
25.
FredricksonB. L. (2001). The role of positive emotions in positive psychology. American Psychologist, 56, 218-226.
26.
FurnhamA.TaylorJ. (2004). The dark side of behavior at work: Understanding and avoiding employees leaving, thieving and deceiving. London, England: Palgrave Macmillan.
27.
GillR. (2001). Change management or change leadership?Journal of Change Management, 3, 307-318.
28.
GlynnM. A.DowdT. J. (2008). Charisma (un)bound: Emotive leadership in Martha Stewart living magazine. 1990-2004. Journal of Applied Behavioral Science, 1, 71-93.
29.
GoffeeR.JonesG. (2000). Why should anyone be led by you?Harvard Business Review, September-October, 63-70.
30.
GolemanD.BoyatzisR. E.McKeeA. (2002). Primal leadership: Realizing the power of emotional intelligence. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press.
31.
GoodmanP. S.RousseauD. M. (2004). Organizational change that produces results: The linkage approach. Academy of Management Executive, 18, 7-19.
32.
GriffinD. (2002). The emergence of leadership: Linking self-organization and ethics. London, England: Routledge.
33.
GrobmanG. M. (2005). Complexity theory: A new way to look at organizational change. Public Administration Quarterly, 29, 350-382.
34.
HairJ. F.AndersonR. E.TathamR. T.BlackW. C. (1995). Multivariate data analysis (4th ed.). Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.
35.
HambrickD. C.BrandonG. L. (1988). Executive values. In HambrickD. C. (Ed.), Executive effectiveness. Concepts and methods for studying top managers (pp. 3-34). Greenwich, CT: JAI Press.
36.
HiggsM. (2007, April). Managing successful change: The secret of positive emotions. Paper presented at the First Applied Positive Psychology Conference, University of Warwick.
37.
HiggsM. J. (2003). Developments in leadership thinking. Leadership and Organization Development Journal, 24, 273-284.
38.
HiggsM. J. (2009). The good, the bad and the ugly: Leadership and narcissism. Journal of Change Management, 9, 165-178.
39.
HiggsM. J.RowlandD. (2000). Building change leadership capability: The quest for change competence. Journal of Change Management, 1, 116-130.
40.
HiggsM. J.RowlandD. (2001). Developing change leaders: Assessing the impact of a development programme. Journal of Change Management, 2, 47-64.
41.
HiggsM. J.RowlandD. (2005). All changes great and small: Exploring approaches to change and its leadership. Journal of Change Management, 5, 121-151.
42.
HiggsM. J.RowlandD. (2006). Leadership, change and learning. Organisations and People, 13, 23-29.
43.
HoganR.HoganJ. (2001). Assessing leadership: A view from the dark side. International Journal of Selection and Assessment, 9, 40-51.
44.
HouchinK.MacLeanD. (2005). Complexity theory and strategic change: An empirically informed critique. British Journal of Management, 16, 149-166.
45.
HouseJ. (1995). Leadership in the twenty-first century: A speculative inquiry. In HowardA. (Ed.), The changing nature of work (pp. 411-450). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
46.
HuffA. S. (2000). Changes in organizational knowledge production. Academy of Management Review, 25, 288-293.
47.
JaworskiJ. (2000). Synchronicity. New York, NY: Berrett-Koehler.
48.
JudgeT. A.PiccoloR. F. (2004). Transformational and transactional leadership: A meta-analytic test of their relative validity. Journal of Applied Psychology, 88, 755-768.
49.
Kets de VriesM. (1995). Life and death in the executive fast lane. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
50.
KotterJ. P. (1995). Leading change: Why transformation efforts fail. Harvard Business Review, May-June, 11-16.
51.
KotterJ. P. (1996). Leading change. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press.
52.
KouzesJ. R.PosnerB. F. (1998). Encouraging the heart. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
53.
KramerR. J. (2005). Developing global leaders: Enhancing competencies and accelerating the expatriate experience. New York, NY: The Conference Board.
54.
LuthansF.AvolioB. J. (2003). Authentic leadership: A positive developmental approach. In CameronK. S.DuttonJ. E.QuinnR. E. (Eds), Positive organizational scholarship: Foundations of a new discipline (Pt. 2, chap. 16). San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler.
55.
MaitlisS. (2005). The social process of organizational sensemaking. Academy of Management Journal, 48, 21-49.
56.
MilesM. B.HubermanA. M. (1984). Analyzing qualitative data: A source book for new methods. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage.
57.
MilesM. B.HubermanA. M. (1994). Qualitative data analysis (2nd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
58.
MoserC. A.KaltonG. (1972). Survey methods in social investigation. New York, NY: Basic Books.
59.
PettigrewA. M. (1997). The double hurdles for management research. In ClarkeT. (Ed.), Advancement in organizational behavior: Essays in honour of D. S. Pugh (pp. 277-296). London, England: Dartmouth Press.
60.
PettigrewA. M. (2000). Linking change processes to outcomes: A commentary on Ghoshal, Bartlett and Weick. In BeerM.NohriaD. (Eds.), Breaking the code of change (pp. 243-267). Boston, MA: Harvard Business Review Press.
61.
PettigrewA. M.WoodmanR. W.CameronK. S. (2001). Studying organizational change and development: Challenges for future research. Academy of Management Journal, 44, 697-713.
62.
RuigrokW.PettigrewA.PeckS.WhittingtonR. (1999). Corporate restructuring and new forms of organizing: Evidence from Europe. Management International Review, 39, 41-64.
63.
SeligmanM. E. P. (2002). Authentic happiness: Using the new positive psychology to realize your potential for lasting fulfillment. New York, NY: Free Press.
64.
SengeP. M. (1997). Communities of leaders and learners. Harvard Business Review, 75, 30-31.
65.
SparroweR. T. (2005). Authentic leadership and the narrative self. Leadership Quarterly, 16, 419-439.
66.
StaceD. A. (1996). Dominant ideologies, strategic change and sustained performance. Human Relations, 49, 553-570.
67.
StaceyR.GriffinD. (2005). Leading in a complex world. In GriffinD.StaceyR. (Eds.), Complexity and the experience of leading organizations (pp. 3-13). Abingdon, England: Routledge.
68.
WaldropM. M. (1992). The emerging science at the edge of order and chaos. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster.
69.
WeickK. E.SutcliffeK.ObstfeldD. (2005). Organizing and the process of sensemaking. Organization Science, 16, 409-421.
70.
WheatleyM. (1993). Leadership and the new science. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler.
71.
WhittingtonR.PettigrewA.PeckS.FentonE.ConyonM. (1999). Change and complementarities in the new competitive landscape: A European panel study, 1992-1996. Organization Science, 10, 583-596.
72.
YinP. K. (1989). Case study research: Design and methods. Newbury Park, CA: Sage.
