Leadership As Meaning-Making

Leadership as Meaning-Making The Evolution of the Leadership Principle in the Post-Industrial Era: Dominance to Meaning-Making Guest Lecturer American Studies & Interdisciplinary Studies University of California at Berkeley Summer 2010 Carlos F. Camargo, PhD

Taken-for-granted Assumptions
Leadership is a quality or ability of a person
Leadership & authority are closely linked: authority confers leadership, while leadership is the exercise of authority
When leadership needs to change, it is leaders who change
Carlos F. Camargo, PhD

Difficult ideas
shared leadership
everyone is a leader
distributed leadership
leadership teams
self-managing teams

Questions raised by the junction of new ideas and old assumptions
If everyone is a leader, does this mean that everyone needs to possess special leadership qualities and abilities?
If leadership is shared, what happens to authority and accountability?
If leadership is a function of teams, how do you change leadership?

Evolving Leadership Principles Carlos F. Camargo, PhD dominance influence meaning- making Personal Leadership Relational Leadership

Dominance
Most basic of all leadership frames
Master of the House
Protection and guidance
“ authoritative utterance”
Controls & limits conflict
Leadership is what the leader does

Some Limits of Dominance
The ability of the leader to provide guidance and protection is limited
The ability of people to believe in the leader’s personal power is limited
The capacity of people to rely on someone else for guidance and protection is limited

Overcoming the Limits of Dominance
Take into account the limitations of the leader
Connect the leader to the concerns of followers
Include followers in the process of leadership

Influence
Flowing from leader to follower
Interpersonal negotiation
Human reason, empiricism replaces “authoritative utterance”
“ Leader should first serve as a follower to understand the follower’s mind ” -- Hegel
Get others to do what they don’t want to do & like it

Some Limits of Influence
The ability of any one person to understand multiple meaning-making “worlds”
The ability of any one person to influence people in different “worlds”
The ability of people to be influenced by ideas, feelings, and values based on a “world” different from their own

Overcoming the Limits of Influence
See meaning as a shared creation of people working together
De-center leadership from the person to the process of shared meaning-making
See people as taking part in leadership together
Learn to make leadership work across “worlds”

Meaning Making
Brings meaning into being
Meaning, knowledge, & reality are shared creations
Leadership is the shared search for and construction of meaning and understanding
People participate in leadership together
“ Leader” & “follower” represent ways of participating in leadership and do not define it

Assumptions of the Meaning-Making Principle
An individual person cannot create meaning alone
Meaning is a shared, reciprocal achievement
Meaning is embedded in communities and cultures
power, authority, influence, & values are outcomes of a meaning-making process
Therefore, leadership creates leaders, not the other way around.

Not Assumptions of the Meaning-Making Principle
That leadership is always distributed
That power, authority, & responsibility are always distributed
That everyone is equally capable of participating in leadership
That strong personal leadership is ruled out

Shifts in Leadership Development
Dominance principle = Prepare the leader for the challenges of mastery
Influence principle = Enhance Self-knowledge and interpersonal skill to enable the person to effectively exercise leadership
Meaning-making principle = Increase the capacity of the community to make meaning through inter-relationships

Highly Developed Leadership Participants of the Future . . .
will understand the “self” as incomplete & interdependent
will be able to appreciate multiple and conflicting “worlds”
will be able to link differing perspectives and translate among “worlds”
will have the capacity to engage in dialogue

To evolve to the next principle, ideas that need letting go . . .
That an individual is the source of leadership
That authority & power are sources of leadership
That some people have more leadership than others
That individuals develop “their” leadership

& ideas that need taking on . . .
That the work of every person includes participating in leadership in some way
That authority & power, as community resources, are open to inquiry and contingent on need
That people are responsible for their job in relation to the whole
That dialogue is a key tool of leadership

Leadership As Meaning-Making

by cfcamargo

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