ArticleLeadership A communicativeperspectiveGail T .docx

Article
Leadership: A communicative
perspective
Gail T Fairhurst
Department of Communication, University of Cincinnati,
Cincinnati, US
Stacey L Connaughton
The Brian Lamb School of Communication, Purdue University,
West Lafayette, US
Abstract
This paper reviews the literature on communication in
organizations most relevant to the study of
leadership. Although leadership communication research has a
history of significant overlap with
leadership psychology, the value commitments of a
communicative orientation now find expres-
sion in a large body of extant literature that this paper reviews.
These value commitments, which
cross several theoretical paradigms, serve as the organizing
framework for this paper. The paper
concludes with a research agenda for future leadership

communication research.
Keywords
Leadership, communication, management of meaning,
sensemaking, reflexivity, relational leader-
ship, team leadership, global leadership
Introduction
Contemporary studies of leadership give meaning to the old
adage, ‘‘Everything old is new
again.’’ Leadership has been a topic of interest since antiquity
(Grint, 2011), although it
commenced in earnest in the 20th century when the dominant
lens of psychology took hold
and remains strong until this day, especially in North America.
In the last several years,
however, an increasing number of voices are challenging
leadership psychology’s emphasis
on a strong inner motor of leader traits, cognitions, and styles
(Collinson and Hearn, 1996;
Fairhurst, 2007a; Grint, 2000). These voices are clamoring to
know how leadership distrib-
utes itself across time and task, site and situation, and people—
along with their bodies and
other leadership-making materialities (e.g., technology)
(Connaughton and Daly, 2005;
Gronn, 2000; Sinclair, 2005). They are also questioning the
bromides of the business press
This paper is based on a chapter in The Sage Handbook of
Organizational Communication (2013). Putnam LL and Mumby
D

(eds). Thousand Oaks: Sage.
Corresponding author:
Gail T Fairhurst, Department of Communication, University of
Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH 45221-0184, US.
Email: [email protected]
Leadership
2014, Vol. 10(1) 7–35
! The Author(s) 2014
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DOI: 10.1177/1742715013509396
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prone to reduce the complexity of leadership to common sense
rules-of-thumb or the amus-
ing anecdote (Guthey et al., 2009).
Enter the field of organizational communication, European and
Australasian manage-
ment studies, and other social sciences greatly impacted by the
linguistic turn in social theory

emphasizing the constitutive role of language, discourse and
communication in society and
its institutions (Mumby, 2007; Rorty, 1967). Just as important
has been a rapidly changing
world in which the traditional bureaucratic form is quickly
becoming a thing of the past. The
swift and shifting tides of global market conditions,
technological advance, and hyper-
entrepreneurialism are forcing the ‘‘rational organization’’ and
its views on leadership out
to sea. In its stead, we find complexity, irrationality, and
continuous change—not as anoma-
lies to be explained away, but the new normal demanding
acceptance on its own terms
(Trethewey and Ashcraft, 2004).
In light of these observations, what exactly is a communication-
centered view of leader-
ship? What should a research agenda for a communication-
centered view of leadership be?
These are the two central questions guiding this review of
literature. Although leadership
communication research has a history of significant overlap
with leadership psychology
(Fairhurst, 2001), the value commitments of a distinctly
communicative orientation now
find expression in a large body of extant literature that this
paper will review.
In articulating a communication orientation, we have
intentionally crossed paradigms
(e.g., post-positivist, social constructionist, critical,
postmodern, and so on), disciplines
(e.g., management, communication, psychology, sociology and
so on), countries and cul-
tures (e.g., U.S., European, Australasian, and so on), scouring

the literature for research that
places ‘‘communication’’ at the center of leadership study. The
discovery of these value
commitments strongly suggests that there is indeed a
communicative lens or, more accur-
ately, series of lenses that, taken collectively, shows
communication to be central, defining
and constitutive of leadership. We certainly do not dismiss the
cognitive aspects of leader-
ship, but merely reverse the longstanding figure-ground
arrangement in the literature that
prioritizes the cognitive over the social. Thus, we use the
communication value commitments
that we have gleaned from the literature as the organizing
framework for this paper. They
include the following:
(1) Leadership communication is transmissional and meaning-
centered.
(2) Leadership (communication) is relational, neither leader-
centric nor follower-centric.
(3) Influential acts of organizing are the medium and outcome
of leadership
communication.
(4) Leadership communication is inherently power-based, a site
of contestation about the
nature of leadership.
(5) Leadership (communication) is a diverse, global
phenomenon.
(6) Leadership communication is alive with the potential for
reflexivity, moral accountabil-
ity and change.

This literature review makes no attempt to be comprehensive,
only representative of a still
emerging communicative lens. We also do not advocate a
universal definition of leadership.
Following Wittgenstein (1953), leadership qualifies as a
‘‘blurred concept,’’ and following
Gallie (1956), an essentially contested one. Leadership is thus
best conceived as a family
resemblance among power and influence-oriented language
games whose features are the
subject of this review (Kelly, 2008; Wittgenstein, 1953).
8 Leadership 10(1)
Leadership communication is transmissional and meaning-
centered
Transmissional view of communication
A transmissional view of communication, with roots in
industrial and organizational psych-
ology and (post) positivistic science, has historically dominated
leadership studies.
Leadership was examined from the perspective of individuals
with strong inner (i.e., cogni-
tive) motors where ‘‘communication is incidental or, at best,
intervening’’ (Fairhurst, 2001:
383). Some contemporary leadership scholars hold a similar
view. Indeed, when the lens is
individual and cognitive and the accompanying methods are

surveys and experiments, there
is often little choice but to view communication as a simple
transmission, a process variable,
or a behavioral outcome. Under these conditions,
communication becomes a conduit, and
researchers may examine issues pertaining to transmission and
channel effects, such as mes-
sage directionality, frequency, and fidelity; disruptions to
effective transmission; and ways in
which messages are (improperly) received (Axley, 1984).
Work embracing a transmissional view of communication often
sees the world in terms of
inputs, processes and outputs—following Shannon and Weaver’s
(1949) familiar
Sender!Message!Receiver model. Communication becomes a
variable(s) that may be a
part of, or relate to, leadership processes or outcomes. For
example, consider Neufeld et al.,
(2010) who conceived of communication holistically (but did
not problematize issues of mean-
ing). They examined the relationship between perceived leader
performance and: (a) physical
distance, (b) communication effectiveness, and (c) leadership
style. In their study of 138
remote employees and 41 leaders, communication effectiveness
was cast as the quality of
interactions between leaders and followers as perceived by the
followers. Communication
effectiveness was positively related to perceived leadership
performance, but physical distance
had little influence on communication effectiveness or
perceived leader performance.
Scholars adopting a transmissional view of communication
often conceive of communi-

cation as essential to team or organizational functioning,
although communication may be
just one of many variables studied. For example, in their
experimental study, Marks et al.,
(2000) found that the quality and quantity of team
communication processes was essential to
overall team performance. Researchers interested in leadership
in teams are also shifting
their focus from individual leaders to leadership processes
needed for team effectiveness.
Morgeson et al. (2010) proposed a team leadership model of
several leadership functions
needed for teams to be effective. Here, too, communication
becomes just one of many
variables.
Other scholars who adopt a transmissional view treat
communication as a behavioral
outcome. Shockley-Zalabak et al. (2010) and Burke et al. (2007)
proposed models of trust in
leadership and viewed communication not only as an input to
trust in leadership, but cast
upward communication as a behavioral outcome of such trust.
Burke et al. (2007) nicely
voiced the language of a transmission view:
Taken together, by creating a sense of trust towards the team
leader, communication lines will be
opened up to transmit needed information to lead to innovation,
error remediation/prevention,
and an ever growing and reciprocated sense of trust between the
team leader and the subordinate
(p. 623).
Neo-charisma research. A transmissional view of

communication can also be found in studies
combining transformational leadership and communication. For
example, Purvanova and
Fairhurst and Connaughton 9
Bono’s (2009) experimental study found that transformational
leadership behaviors impacted
virtual teams’ performance more than face-to-face teams. A
simpler, transmissional view of
communication assisted their advanced analytical techniques,
which was to gather data at two
levels of analysis and then utilize WABA
1
analytic techniques to justify their aggregation
decisions to determine the appropriate level of analysis for the
relationships studied. By con-
trast, communication was cast more complexly in Balthazard et
al.’s (2009) study of the traits
and behaviors of emerging transformational leaders in both co-
located and virtual teams.
They focused on the influences of personality characteristics,
activity level (frequency and
timing of participation), and communication/expression quality
(operationalized as idea dens-
ity and grammatical complexity) on perceptions of
transformational leadership. This study
had all team members rate each other along several emergent

leadership lines and used lan-
guage sample analysis to assess the multiple aspects of
communication.
A number of transmissional studies can be found in the related
area of vision communi-
cation. For example, Berson and Avolio (2004) studied
transformational leadership and the
articulation of strategic organizational goals in an Israeli
communication organization.
Utilizing qualitative and quantitative data, they studied whether
those reporting to trans-
formational leaders articulated goals in alignment with them,
and whether transformational
leaders were considered more effective communicators (e.g.,
whether they were open, careful
listeners and transmitters, and so on). Hunter et al. (2011)
tested Mumford’s charismatic,
ideological, and pragmatic model of leadership and found
support for eight of the 10 com-
ponents of the model. One of the communicative components—
use of emotions—yielded
particularly strong results. Moreover, researchers have studied
variables related to vision
formation (Shipman et al., 2010) and vision communication
(Stam et al., 2010).
To summarize, a transmissional view of communication appears
optimal when the
researcher’s goal is to understand leadership communication
amidst other relational and
cognitive dynamics. Issues of meaning are problematized
narrowly (if at all) even though,
ironically, the shift to neo-charisma models in the 1980s cast
leaders as ‘‘managers of mean-
ing’’ (Smircich and Morgan, 1982). However, they were often

the primary (read, only)
symbolizing agents. The models were largely monologic,
excluding a dialogic emphasis on
feedback, mutual effects, and co-constructed meaning amidst
possible contestation (Cunliffe,
2009; Fairhurst, 2001). In a dialogic view of the visioning
process, organizational visions
become products of multiple and evolving conversations, each
with the capacity to maximize
a vision’s fit to local conditions (Fairhurst and Sarr, 1996).
Observations such as these and
the linguistic turn in social theory paved the way for more
meaning-centered models of
leadership communication to take hold as the next section
reveals.
Meaning-centered view of communication
Meaning is one of the most essential components of human
communication, but it took the
rise of postmodernism, poststructuralism, and the so-called
‘‘linguistic turn’’ in social theory
for many organizational scholars with communication interests
to appreciate that language
more than mirrors or represents reality, but constitutes it
(Alvesson and Kärreman, 2000a;
Rorty, 1967). With a language focus comes a meaning-centered
view of communication with
its emphasis on authorship and the formative power of language
(e.g., the ability to cat-
egorize and label vaguely sensed feelings and thoughts);
understanding the dynamics of co-
construction including discursive struggles over meaning; and
the role of the socio-historical
in sourcing ways of thinking and talking (Deetz, 1992;
Foucault, 1972; Shotter, 1993).

10 Leadership 10(1)
It is also with the linguistic turn that the term ‘‘discourse’’ was
popularized and, at times,
conflated with ‘‘communication.’’ While the meanings of both
terms are multifarious, Jian
et al., (2008) distinguished them by suggesting that
organizational actors operate in com-
munication and through discourse: ‘‘In communication, there is
a dynamic connection
among actors, action, meaning, and context, such that actions
modify and elaborate existing
connections or create new ones. . .By contrast it is through
discourse that language and
communication meet because discourse is ‘language that is used
for some communicative
purpose’’’ (Ellis, 1992:84, cited in Jian et al., 2008: 314). Use
of the term ‘‘discourse’’ here
may mean language use in social interaction (Ellis, 1992) or
thought/language systems à la
Foucault that source communicating actors (Alvesson and
Kärreman, 2000b). Two areas of
study below have adopted a discursive and meaning-centered
view of communication.
Sensemaking, framing, and identity work
A meaning-centered view of communication is sine qua non to
the study of leadership

sensemaking, framing and identity work. Often aided by the
theorizing of Weick (1979,
1995), what leadership actors (i.e., formal or informal leaders,
followers, or other stake-
holders) do when confronted with the uncertain or unexpected is
the focus here. As Drazin
et al. (1999) explained, ‘‘Meaning—or sense—develops about
the situation, which allows the
individual to act in some rational fashion; thus meaning—or
sensemaking—is a primary
generator of individual action’’ (p. 293).
Leadership actors’ meanings for people and situations have also
been termed frames
(Bateson, 1972; Goffman, 1974), enactments (Weick, 1979),
schemas (Lord and Hall,
2003), and cognitive maps (Drazin et al., 1999). Frames and
framing have been particularly
popular concepts, the former designated by a cognitive meaning
structure, the latter a com-
munication process (Fairhurst, 2011; Fairhurst and Sarr, 1996).
‘‘Sensemaking’’ and ‘‘sen-
segiving’’ have similarly been distinguished on these grounds in
a leadership context (Foldy
et al., 2008; Gioia and Chittipeddi, 1991).
Sensemaking and identity work co-occur because actors usually
locate themselves in their
cause-maps of the world (Drazin et al., 1999). Identity work for
individuals or collectives
emerges in the categorizing and framing of linguistic activity in
response to such questions
as, ‘‘Who am I (in this context)?’’ and ‘‘Who are we?’’ For
example, Sheep (2006) studied the
dispute over the first openly gay U.S. Episcopalian bishop and
found that category elasticity

or ‘‘stretch’’ enabled Episcopalian leaders to embrace multiple,
conflicting, and ambivalent
identities in talk. There are also studies of middle managers’
identity work in their sense-
making over organizational change (Balogun and Johnson,
2004, 2005; Stensaker and
Falkenberg, 2007), while Lewis (2011) examined sensemaking
and stakeholder identities in
strategic change. Martin (2004) revealed female middle
managers’ use of humor when nego-
tiating their identities amidst paradoxical circumstances, while
other studies featured the
sensemaking and identity work of employees who resisted
management (Laine and Vaara,
2007; Sonenshein, 2010; Tourish and Robson, 2006). In
addition, Alvesson and Spicer (2011)
explored the metaphorical basis of leader sensemaking and
identity work (e.g., leaders as
‘‘saints,’’ ‘‘buddies,’’ ‘‘gardeners,’’ ‘‘cyborgs,’’ and
‘‘bullies’’).
Framing studies are heavily meaning-focused, which we see in
Fairhurst’s (2011) treat-
ment of leadership actors who use language and other means to
create meaning and con-
struct the realities to which they must then respond. Work by
Liu (2010) and Craig and
Amernic (2004) examined the ‘‘failure framing’’ strategies of
U.S. leaders Al Dunlap and

John Berardino, respectively. Berardino, in particular, peppered
his testimony before the U.S.
Congress with a glut of accounting details to deflect
responsibility for Arthur Anderson’s role
in the Enron scandal. Finally, work by Foldy et al. (2008) and
Carroll and Simpson (2012)
focused on framing strategies associated with problem and
solution formulations highlighting
planned ‘‘cognitive shifts’’ in collective identity and
organizational change.
Leadership aesthetics. Aesthetics is an emerging area of
meaning-centered leadership research.
As Riley (1988) portrayed it, ‘‘The notion of charisma, vision,
and culture all share a sense of
the aesthetic—the art form of leadership. . .This requires forms
of analysis. . .sensitive to
style, to the creation of meaning, and to the dramatic edge of
leadership’’ (p. 82, emphasis
added). Grint (2000) likewise cast leadership as a series of art
forms: philosophical, fine,
martial, and performing. Eisenberg (2007) wrote about the
ambiguity, contingency and
aesthetics of meaning, while Harter et al. (2008) examined the
tensions between aesthetic
sensibilities and instrumental rationalities in the collaborative
management of an arts
organization.
A growing emphasis on conceptualizing aesthetics vis-à-vis the
extra-linguistic, including
leadership bodies, has also emerged. For instance, Cunliffe
(2002) and Shotter and Cunliffe
(2003) wrote about a (managerial) ‘‘social poetics’’ involving a

‘‘precognitive understanding
in which poetic images and gestures provoke a response as we
feel the rhythm, resonance,
and reverberation of speech and sound’’ (Cunliffe, 2002: 134).
For Hansen et al., (2007),
‘‘aesthetics’’ was about felt meaning, tacit knowing, and
emotions integral to leading and
following. For Ladkin (2008), ‘‘leading beautifully’’ required
mastery of the context, coher-
ent (authentic) message congruence between speech and actions,
and a sense of purpose to
display one’s ethical commitments. Finally, for Sinclair (2005),
leadership researchers must
begin to ‘‘hold bodies, in their fleshy version, prominent, and to
focus on bodies as possi-
bilities,’’ for example, in the ways they may interrupt systemic
power (p. 388). Too often, she
argued, the bodies of leaders, ‘‘disappear under the weight of
theorizing’’ (p. 387).
To summarize, a meaning-centered view of communication has
historically been slighted
in favor of a transmissional view, but that is no longer true.
Leadership communication has
both meaning-centered and transmissional aspects and, as a
result, researchers are using
them to ask very different questions about leadership. Favoring
the former, Ashcraft
et al. (2009) argued that what is at stake in the communication
process is much greater
than what a transmissional model allows. That may be true, and
while meaning-centered
models of leadership communication are now prominent,
transmissional views continue on
in post-positivist genres and in contributory ways (Craig, 1999).

Leadership (communication) is relational, neither leader-centric
nor follower-centric
Historically, leadership researchers neglected followers and
focused on leaders as trans-
formative agents. Gronn (2000) labeled this kind of thinking
‘‘belief in the power of one’’
and argued that it led to an exaggerated sense of agency for
leaders (p. 319). More recently,
however, followers have become the focus of leadership
research (Stam et al., 2010; Uhl-Bien
and Pillai, 2006), while LMX is one relational leadership theory
that has stood the test of
time (Graen, 2012; Graen and Uhl-Bien, 1995). With relatively
few exceptions (Coglister
et al., 2009), these data are mainly individual leaders’ or
followers’ perceptions collected
through survey research (Fairhurst and Hamlett, 2003).
12 Leadership 10(1)
Such data have legitimate uses, but they have also been used as
a proxy for interaction
process—as if a single relational reality can be presumed
(Rogers et al., 1985). When inter-
action per se is the focus, relational patterns are inescapably co-
defined (Fairhurst, 2004a).
McDermott and Roth (1978) conceptualized interaction analysis
as essentially relational
when they said, ‘‘a person’s behavior is best described in terms

of the behavior of those imme-
diately about that person, those with whom the person is doing
interactional work in the con-
struction of recognizable social scenes or events’’ (p. 321;
emphasis in the original).
McDermott and Roth were actually describing a number of
approaches originating in the
1970s including ethnomethodology, conversation analysis,
sociolinguistics, exchange theory,
and network analysis.
These ideas took root in the 1980–1990s in relational control
analyses of Fairhurst and
colleagues (Courtright et al., 1989; Fairhurst et al., 1995) in
which the ‘‘interact’’ (two con-
tiguous control moves) was the basic unit of analysis in coded
manager–subordinate inter-
actions. It also took root in the work of Boden (1994) and other
conversation analysts where
the focus was on how organizational action (and, by
implication, leadership or management)
cohered as a sequence in social interaction. Additionally, the
work of Hosking and Morley
(Hosking, 1988; Hosking and Morley, 1988) lent considerable
conceptual clarity to the need
to study leadership interactions per se. However, current
meanings for ‘‘relational’’ leader-
ship appear to hinge on one’s philosophy of science.
To understand the multifarious meanings for the word
‘‘relational,’’ Uhl-Bien et al. (2011)
suggested drawing a distinction between post-positivist and
social constructionist views of
relationships. The former is marked by theories of leadership
relationships and its qualities,
such as LMX (Graen and Uhl-Bien, 1995) and Hollander’s

(2009) inclusive leadership. The
latter focuses on relational leadership processes and practices
and is often studied qualita-
tively, discursively, and/or ethnographically (Fairhurst and
Grant, 2010; Ospina and
Hittleman, 2011). We maintain this distinction below, but add
to the work Uhl-Bien et al.
(2011) include in these categories.
Post-positivist relational study. Supervisory style, relationship
development, team leadership, and
methodological advances have all been the focus of recent post-
positivist relational leader-
ship research. For example, research into supervisory
communication style (Sager, 2008),
impression management strategies/social influence (Sosik and
Jung, 2003), and tests of
Situational Leadership Theory (Thompson and Vecchio, 2009)
all reflected the traditional
style-oriented concerns of this post-positivist genre. Sias’
(2009) literature review of super-
visor–subordinate communication, informed by post-positivism,
emphasized supervisor–
subordinate communication functions (i.e., information
exchange, feedback and appraisal,
including upward and downward feedback); supervisor–
subordinate relationship develop-
ment; and various relational outcomes.
Regarding relationship development (and the relational nature
of leadership more gen-
erally), several researchers have focused on the role of
communication in LMX (Sparrowe
et al., 2006). For instance, drawing on LMX and assimilation
research, Kramer (1995) found
that the quality of the supervisor relationship significantly

influenced the perceptions and job
satisfaction of those transferring jobs, while Lee (2001)
examined the relationships among
members’ perceptions of fairness and LMX quality as well as
cooperative communication.
He found that members who perceived less distributive and
procedural justice also tended to
demonstrate less cooperative communication with other
members. Members also reported
fewer interactions and shared fewer ideas and resources as well
as less information with
each other. Olufowote et al., (2005) found that the quality of
LMX moderated the relation-
ship between the magnitude of role change and rationality, one
of four upward influence
tactics examined. Graen (2012) also recast LMX in terms of
strategic interpersonal alliances.
Finally, LMX researchers have demonstrated how other dyadic
relationships, in conjunction
with LMX, may impact various outcomes (Sluss et al., 2008;
Tangirala et al., 2007).
Underscoring the relationalities of leadership in teams and
networks, Connaughton and
Daly (2004a, 2004b, 2005) examined leadership in virtual
teams. They found positional
leaders in a multi-national technology organization evaluated

several aspects of communica-
tion as crucial to virtual team functioning, including
information adequacy, information
equity, and communication frequency (at key moments), among
others. These communica-
tive features were also linked to trust, perceptions of isolation,
and other process issues and
outcomes. Similarly, network studies of leadership in teams and
organizations also studied
the relationalities among leaders and members and their impact
(Dionne et al., 2010).
Huffaker’s (2010) study of online leaders is particularly
noteworthy as ‘‘influencers’’ were
found to communicate more often, were deemed more credible
and central in the network,
and exhibited assertiveness and linguistic diversity in their
messages. Over a two-year period,
Huffaker (2010) analyzed an impressive 632,000 messages from
over 34,000 participants in
16 online discussion groups, utilizing multiple methods
including automated text analysis,
social network analysis, and hierarchical linear modeling.
Methodologically, there is a continued push to study multiple
levels of analysis, including
the individual (leader or member), leader-member pairings, and
other dyadic relationships,
teams, and organizations. Correspondingly, we are also seeing
analytic methods that permit
multiple levels of analysis. For example, Bakar and
Connaughton (2010) used WABA I and
II analytic techniques to examine supervisory communication
(as informed by LMX theory)
and its relationship with workgroup commitment.
Constructionist relational leadership. Although relationality has

a long history in the commu-
nication literature (Rogers and Farace, 1975), several
management writers have joined the
cause (Uhl-Bien, 2006; Uhl-Bien and Ospina, 2012). The lens is
typically social construc-
tionist (Cunliffe, 2009; Fairhurst, 2007a), for example, in the
ways in which leadership actors
shape and are shaped by their communication with others
(Berger and Luckman, 1966); how
leadership is brought off in generative processes of interaction
(Bradbury and Lichtenstein,
2000; Hosking, 2007); a constructionist science heavily
weighted towards discourse, mean-
ing, and reflexivity (Barge, 2004a; Cunliffe and Jun, 2005); and
a more general interest in
fields of relationships, not just dyads (Foldy et al., 2008;
Ospina and Sorensen, 2006).
Increasingly, analysts label this work ‘‘relational leading’’
specifically to emphasize dialogue
over monologue (Cunliffe and Eriksen, 2011; Uhl-Bien and
Ospina, 2012).
In many ways, constructionist relational underpinnings can be
found in each of the value
commitments that organize this chapter; however, one particular
observation is crucial. In a
review of the literature, Fairhurst and Grant (2010)
distinguished among social construc-
tionist leadership approaches using Pearce’s (1995) distinction
between the construction of
social reality and the social construction of reality. The former
emphasizes the cognitive
products of social construction, including categories, implicit
theories, attributions, narra-
tives, and as examined previously, frames and sensemaking
accounts (Gioia and Chittipeddi,

1991; Lord and Hall, 2003; Meindl et al., 1985; Pye, 2005;
Tourish and Robson, 2006).
The latter emphasizes the interactions themselves, although
some foreground interaction
processes more than others (Biggart and Hamilton, 1987;
Boden, 1994; Du Gay et al.,
14 Leadership 10(1)
1996; Fairhurst and Cooren, 2004). Fairhurst and Grant (2010)
drew further distinctions
based on the treatment of power, praxis, and materialities (e.g.,
the body), which also can be
found throughout this paper.
To recap, post-positive relational leadership has focused on
supervisor–subordinate com-
munication behaviors, effective leadership communication from
afar, and further LMX
theorizing. In constructionist relational leadership, actors do not
relate and then commu-
nicate, they relate in communication (Bateson, 1972).
Constructionist views of leadership
thus tend to adopt a relational ontology, further seen below in
terms of the organizing
potential of leadership communication.
Influential acts of organizing are the medium and
outcome of leadership communication

For some time now, communication-oriented scholars have
embraced the ontology that
organizations are communicatively and/or discursively
constituted (Cooren, 2001;
Fairhurst and Putnam, 2004; Taylor and Van Every, 2000).
Identified as the communicative
constitution of organizations or ‘‘CCO’’ perspective (Ashcraft
et al., 2009), it draws from a
wide, multi-disciplinary body of work spawning different
streams of research (Brummans
et al., in press). Two of them specifically relate to leadership
study: structuration theory and
the Montréal School of organizational communication.
In structuration theory, Giddens (1979, 1984) argued for the
‘‘duality of structure’’ in
which both structure and agency are endemic to social practices
and the (re)production of
social systems. Structure, in the form of rules and resources, is
the medium and outcome of
action. The title of this section is a translation of this maxim
using Hosking’s (1988) termi-
nology to characterize leadership as ‘‘influential acts of
organizing’’ (p. 147). Influential acts
(e.g., communication surrounding an organizational mission,
vision, or values), in effect,
serve as both rule and resource for leadership actors to draw
upon to navigate ‘‘the situation
here and now’’ while reproducing or renegotiating them with
each deployment.
The Montréal School of organizational communication and its
scholars (Brummans,
2006; Cooren, 2001; Taylor and Van Every, 2000) draw from
actor-network theory
(Callon and Latour, 1981; Latour, 1994, 2005), among others, to

view the organization as
a plenum of agencies. These agencies can be textual,
mechanical, architectural, natural and
human (Cooren, 2006). When paired together, human and
nonhuman agents create ‘‘hybrid
agency’’ and ‘‘networks’’ with their own structuring
affordances wrought by the situatedness
of interaction (Cooren et al., 2008). As such, structure is not the
driver of action, but
something to be explained (Latour, 2002).
The section to follow explains how structuration theory and the
Montréal School con-
tribute to the study of leadership. Neither structuration theory,
nor the Montréal School is
about leadership per se. Instead, they both impart a view of
leadership actors-in-action
describing, in effect, micro-processes and influential acts of
organizing as the following
sections reveal.
Structurationist studies. Two themes in Ashcraft et al.’s (2009)
recent review of structurationist
research find relevance in leadership study: (a) structuration
and discursive struggle, and
(b) a structurational rendition of CCO theory. The former is
based on Giddens’ (1984)
‘‘antagonism of opposites’’ view of systems and the dialectic of
control in which the less
powerful always maintain a measure of control over the
managerial class. While the dialectic

of control has been studied in settings involving social or
organizational change (Papa et al.,
1995; Putnam, 2003), more recent work uses Giddens’ insight
about the antagonism of
opposites in all social systems as a touchstone to examine the
identification of tension,
contradiction and paradox and their management by leadership
actors (Jian, 2007; Real
and Putnam, 2005; Sherblom et al., 2002; Sillince, 2007; Sydow
et al., 2011). For example,
Tracy (2004) used a structurational lens to study employee
reactions to organizational ten-
sions in a prison setting, while Fairhurst et al. (2002) adopted
that lens to study leadership
tensions, tension management strategies, and their unintended
consequences in successive
downsizings at an environmental remediation site.
McPhee and colleagues’ (McPhee and Zaug, 2000; Putnam et
al., 2009) structurational
rendering of CCO theory forms a second strain of structuration
research with a leadership
emphasis. Here, four interrelated processes constitute
organizations: (1) membership nego-
tiation, (2) organizational self-structuring, (3) activity
coordination, and (4) institutional
positioning. Work by McPhee and Iverson (2009) demonstrated
a number of leadership
applications of these four processes in a Mexican community
organization in which land
and water rights were negotiated by its many stakeholders. They
showed how the ‘‘organi-

zation is a medium of agency by its designing managers’’ by
demonstrating reflexive struc-
turing through surveillance and performance monitoring at one
site that reverberates
throughout a system working to sustain management interests
(p. 74). Yet, the less powerful
managed to also assert their ‘‘local knowledgeability’’ with the
power to rationalize and
reflexively monitor ongoing conditions (p. 75). Browning et al.
(2009) demonstrated activity
coordination and institutional positioning with US Air Force
technicians and the civilian
review boards charged with their oversight.
The Montréal School. Work on leadership from the Montréal
School of organizational com-
munication has examined the distributed nature of leadership in
a high reliability organiza-
tion, its episodic structuring, and the manner in which
‘‘command presence’’ emerged
sequentially in an unfolding crisis (Cooren and Fairhurst, 2004;
Fairhurst and Cooren,
2004). Cooren (2007) and colleagues’ analyses of a corporate
board meeting charged with
leadership succession likewise demonstrated how leadership
attributions emerged and were
acted upon in sequential fashion (Fairhurst, 2007b).
The role of nonhuman agency in leadership has been the subject
of other studies from the
Montréal School. Fairhurst’s (2007a) analysis of New York
Mayor Rudy Giuliani during
9/11 demonstrated how the charisma attributed to him emerged
as a distributed network of
human and nonhuman agents, including emotion-laden objects,
texts, and spaces. Likewise,

Fairhurst and Cooren (2009) explored leadership presence and
hybrid agency in U.S.
Governors Kathleen Blanco’s management of Hurricane Katrina
in 2005 and Arnold
Schwarzenegger’s management of the 2007 California wildfires.
Successful crisis manage-
ment appeared dependent on frequent hybridizing and
networking with nonhuman agents of
varying size and importance, yet responsive to conditions on the
ground. Cooren et al. (2012)
examined nonhuman agency in a building manager’s job and the
manner in which such
agency boldly asserted itself in construction matters in one
moment, yet fell silent in the next.
Finally, Spee and Jarzabkowski (2011) used Taylor and Van
Every’s (2000) notion of
text-conversation to examine iterative talk-to-text cycles in a
strategic planning process of
university leaders and academics. While such texts became
increasingly authoritative as
meanings converged over time, amending the strategic plan’s
content was the sole province
of the hierarchy.
16 Leadership 10(1)
In sum, the Montréal School studies are testimony to Grint’s
(1997) wry observation that,
‘‘naked, friendless, money-less, and technology-less leaders are

unlikely to prove persuasive’’
(p. 17). The role of nonhuman agency and its structuring
potential with human hybrids in
leadership situations is not only crucial in this genre, but among
the first leadership research to
take materiality seriously. Like the Montréal School,
structurationist research also examines
leadership actors-in-action. However, it eschews nonhuman
agency in favor of the structuring
potential of rules and resources, which enables less powerful
leadership actors a measure of
control based on access. In both genres, leadership can be a
simple role assignment and thus
interchangeable with management (Real and Putnam, 2005;
Spee and Jarzabkowski, 2011),
although leadership can be specifically attributional in others
(Fairhurst, 2007a, 2007b). In the
section to follow, we continue with this latter view of
leadership.
Leadership communication is inherently power-based, a site of
contestation about the nature of leadership
In his criticism of the mainstream leadership literature,
Collinson (2006) argued that scholars
often treat power as a negative and repressive property
exercised in a top-down manner
(perhaps to avoid having to deal with power issues). By
contrast, influence usually embodies
the very definition of leadership (Antonakis et al., 2004), a
‘‘positive process of dispropor-
tionate social influence’’ (Collinson, 2006: 181–182). The
dichotomizing of power and influ-
ence here explains scholars’ interest in forced versus voluntary
compliance between leaders
and followers and lends itself to the study of leadership with an

individual and cognitive lens
(Fairhurst, 2007a). Work by Kipnis and Schmidt (1988, 1985)
and Hirokawa and colleagues
(Hirokawa and Miyahara, 1986; Hirokawa et al., 1990) is
exemplary.
However, a very Western conception of the self as autonomous
from society dominates
this view of power. More discursive, constructionist leadership
approaches adopt a post-
structuralist view in which the self and society are inseparable
(Collinson, 2006), shifting the
lens to social and cultural influences on leadership (Fairhurst,
2007a). Drawing heavily from
Foucault (1983, 1995), this view of power is much more
encompassing because it interlaces
various forms of power and influence and conceives of them in
both positive and negative
terms. However, such orientations vary in terms of how much
they foreground power
processes. More general constructionist approaches leave open
the opportunity for power
and politics, while it is the starting premise for critical
management studies (CMS).
Constructionist approaches. In this genre, leadership is cast as
attributional (Calder, 1977),
context-dependent (Fairhurst, 2009), and grounded in social
constructionist processes
(Berger and Luckman, 1966) such as language games
(Wittgenstein, 1953) and discourse
(Fairhurst, 2007a). Leaders must persuade themselves and
others of their leadership, leaving
open the possibility of discursive struggle. Struggle implies that
some views weigh more
heavily than others by virtue of skill or hierarchical advantage

(Ashcraft et al., 2009),
although power concerns are not always foregrounded in this
body of work depending
upon the focus of analysis.
For example, Grint’s (2000; 2005) writings on constructionist
leadership portrayed leader-
ship as a series of art forms mastered to create believable
leadership performances. His work
on problem-centered leadership focused on wicked and tame
problems (Rittel and Webber,
1973) along with crises (Grint, 2005; 2010). Each requires a
different kind of decision maker
(leader, manager, or commander, respectively), yet may result
in individuals depicting
problems in a certain way to justify their preferred decision
making style (e.g., George W.
Bush’s characterization of the ‘‘crisis’’ over weapons of mass
destruction leading to the U.S.
invasion of Iraq). Power issues are present in Grint’s work
though not always emphasized.
Drawing from Wittgenstein (1953), Kelly and colleagues (Kelly,
2008; Kelly et al., 2006)
argued that leadership is best seen as a family resemblance
among language games. To
decipher these games, analysts must use ethnomethodologically-

informed methods in
order to understand the logics and labeling of situated
applications of the term ‘‘leadership’’
(and related constructs) (Kelly et al., 2006). Reminiscent of
Grint’s emphasis on persuasion,
Kelly and colleagues cast leadership as a ‘‘design problem’’ in
which actors must figure out
what leadership is in the context of what they do and persuade
themselves and others that
they are doing it.
Finally, Shotter’s (1993) influential chapter on ‘‘The Manager
as a Practical Author’’
continued with his work on relational-responsiveness and social
poetics (Shotter, 2005;
Shotter and Cunliffe, 2003); Cunliffe’s (2009; Cunliffe and
Eriksen, 2011) leadership and
CMS work described below; and Holman and Thorpe’s (2003)
compendium focusing on
leaders as ‘‘practical narrators’’ or translators (Cooren and
Fairhurst, 2003) and collabora-
tive processes involved in authoring (Deetz, 2003).
Critical management studies. CMS perspectives all focus on the
power and politics of meaning
(Cunliffe, 2009). For example, Marxist and neo-Marxist
perspectives focus upon forms of
control that privilege elites such as shareholders, owners, and
managers (Deetz, 1992;
Willmott, 1993, 1997); leadership is a little used term here or
counts as a form of domination.
Post-colonial studies, another CMS concern, critique Western
views of leadership and man-
agement in a global business society (Bhabba, 1994; Hall, 2010;
Said, 1993), a topic we
address below. A final CMS approach, post-structuralist studies,

is most relevant to leader-
ship studies because of its focus on denaturalization and
dialectics and resistance.
Denaturalization studies make that which appears ‘‘natural’’ or
‘‘the way things are’’
problematic (Alvesson and Willmott, 1996; Fournier and Grey,
2000). They focus on discur-
sive practices involving language systems, texts, and ways of
talking and thinking along with
non-discursive practices such as institutionalized structures,
social practices and techniques
regulating what is normal or appears natural (Cunliffe, 2009:
25). For example, Fairhurst and
colleagues (Fairhurst, 2007a; Fairhurst et al., 2011) examined
‘‘discursive leadership’’ at the
intersection of little ‘‘d’’ discourse languaging practices (e.g.,
sequentiality, membership cate-
gorization, narrative, and so on) with big ‘‘D’’ Discourses that,
following Foucault (1972,
1995), are more enduring socio-historical systems of thought
influencing the communication
process. They interrogated executive coaching Discourses and
the manner in which Foucault’s
(1990) confessional and examination technologies operate
within them to ‘‘other’’ female
leaders and normalize alpha males as senior leaders even while
disciplining them.
Yet another example comes from Parker (2005) who wrote about
race neutrality in (U.S.)
leadership studies and the way it subjugated black women
leaders through unquestioned
assumptions about superiority and inferiority; excluded them
from the site or sources of
knowledge production; and contained them by silencing those

who would speak out.
Gordon’s (2010) analysis of a police organization likewise
demonstrated how certain histor-
ical practices (read, Discourses) were accepted as the natural
order of things, reinforced
hierarchy, and undermined efforts to facilitate empowerment
and disperse leadership.
Western (2008) also demonstrated the ways in which four
Discourses of
leadership—Controller, Therapist, Messiah, and Eco-leader—
privileged certain views of
18 Leadership 10(1)
the world; impacted leadership practices and organizational
culture; and possessed different
degrees of emancipatory potential. Collinson’s (2012) ‘‘Prozac
leadership’’ examined the
deleterious effects of positive psychology (Discourses) and the
manner in which leaders’
excessive positivity distorts decision making, minimizes
dissent, and masks operations of
power and identity politics.
Also relevant to this body of work is the critique of mainstream
leadership approaches
(e.g., charismatic and transformational leadership) by Alvesson
and Sveningsson (2003a) for
portraying leadership as something special when it often loses
itself amidst the everyday

aspects of work. They preferred an agnostic stance following
CMS scholars’ traditional
suspicion of (popular Discourses of) leadership as a mechanism
of domination (Hardy
and Clegg, 1996) and as overly reductionist (Cunliffe, 2009).
Alvesson and Sveningsson
(2003b) further argued that the mundane job of managers is
socially shaped by the hierarchy
such that managers become ‘‘highly responsive subjects’’
willing to buy into managerialist
attempts to inflate the job of managing. However, Kelly (2008)
heavily criticized Alvesson
and Sveningsson’s view of leadership as a disappearing act on
social constructionist grounds,
while several scholars have proposed a rapprochement between
critical theory and leadership
studies (Collinson, 2012; Tourish, 2013; Western, 2008; Zoller
and Fairhurst, 2007).
The second CMS area involves leadership dialectics and
resistance where we find post-
structuralist CMS scholars speaking out against casting views of
power and control as a
simple binary (to privilege one pole or the other) in order to
capture resistance and control in
more complex terms (Banks, 2008; Fleming and Spicer, 2008;
Mumby, 2005). Collinson
(2005) argued that the very nature of leadership is ‘‘discursive,
dialectical, contested, and
contradictory’’ (p. 1427). He explored three leadership
dialectics—control/resistance, dis-
sent/consent, and men/women, which Zoller and Fairhurst
(2007) added to in order to
understand dissent leadership. They included fixed/fluid
meaning potentials, overt/covert
behavior, and reason/emotion to suggest how position in the

hierarchy matters little regard-
ing who emerges as ‘‘leader’’ when these dialectics are
managed well. On the rise, however, is
also a growing number of discursive dialectical analyses
focusing on tension, contradiction
and paradox in leadership/management contexts more generally
(Andriopoulos and Lewis,
2009; Huxham and Beech, 2003; Martin, 2004; Real and
Putnam, 2005; Tracy, 2004).
By viewing leadership as inherently power based and open to
conflict, as the foregoing
discussion reveals, two observations emerge. First, who
becomes a leader appears to be less a
function of position in the hierarchy and more a function of the
ability to manage key
dialectical tensions. Second, leadership actors are not just
managers of meaning; they are
also ‘‘managed’’ receptors of meaning based on the Discourses
to which they are subject
(Fairhurst, 2007a). In the section below, power continues to be
a theme when considering
several global leadership issues.
Leadership (communication) is a diverse, global phenomenon
Global/international leadership research emerged from the rise
of the multi-national cor-
poration and the need to know what makes (positional) leaders
effective in these contexts.
This body of work reflects two themes. First, scholars
conceptualize and measure what
global leadership is primarily by focusing on the relationships
between leadership and cul-
ture (Triandis, 1993) and their relationships to performance.
Second, scholars sought to

learn whether there are some universal attributes of leadership
across cultures and what
aspects are culturally contingent. The GLOBE project (Den
Hartog et al., 1999) is
representative here as a series of large scale data studies, which
have contributed to scale
development on cultural dimensions and to theory development
(Scandura and Dorfman,
2004). Reporting on the GLOBE project, Den Hartog et al.
(1999) found that communica-
tion skills contributed to perceptions of
transformational/charismatic leadership across
national cultures; however, what is considered effective
communication likely differs
across national cultures (Trompenaars, 1993).
What makes leaders effective in global contexts? Drawing from
Hofstede (1980), Triandis
(1993) argued that the collectivist or individualist nature of
cultures would determine leader-
ship effectiveness. Likewise, Adler et al. (2001) focused on
women and global leadership
effectiveness. In their study of Latin American expatriates,
Osland et al. (1999) examined
cultural literacy based on expats’ understanding of nine cultural
contingencies, some of
which were communicative (e.g., humor and joy) or had

implications for communication
(i.e., in-group/out-group; trust). Moreover, in their model of
cultural sensemaking, Osland
and Bird (2000) encouraged practitioners to embrace cultural
paradoxes and consider con-
text in order to help detangle them and work effectively around
the world. Collectively, this
research has often focused on positional leaders; been
comparative in nature; concentrated
on the relationship between national culture and leadership; and
utilized mixed methods.
More recent leadership forays in a global context have
examined diverse ways of under-
standing leadership through national culture, noting leadership’s
communicative constitu-
tion. Different conceptualizations of leadership have emerged
based on entrenched cultural
beliefs. For instance, Lin and Clair (2007) studied the
leadership implications of Mao
Zedong Thought in organizations in contemporary China, while
Brummans and Hwang
(2010) studied Buddhist philosophy and its influence on
organizing practices in a
Taiwanese nonprofit voluntary organization. Xu (2011)
developed an instrument to measure
the leadership of Chinese academic leaders, finding that
Confucian values still permeate
Chinese understandings of leadership, while Shi and Wilson
(2010) examined upward influ-
ence processes in China. Likewise, Botero and Van Dyne (2009)
found that LMX and power
distance in U.S. versus Columbian contexts relate to different
conceptualizations of voice.
Recent research has also examined the influence of larger

societal structures and values on
leadership in various parts of the world. For example, Hall’s
(2010) work on Jamaica’s
postcolonial context examined Jamaican managers’ notions of
leading vis-à-vis U.S. influ-
ences. Similarly, Bakar and Connaughton (2010) studied the
national cultural values of
Malaysian society, finding them to be essential to understand
supervisory communication
in that country.
To summarize, a more globalized view of leadership pushes
researchers to go beyond
Western views of this construct. It is also emphasizing an
appreciation for context and the
ways in which structure and/or culture influences how
leadership is understood. Taken
together, we might say that this body of research exhibits a
functionalist tendency with
social constructionist sensibilities as researchers try to
understand leadership through a
non-Western lens and in non-Western organizational contexts.
Leadership communication is alive with the potential for
reflexivity,
moral accountability and change
Research on organizational development or ‘‘change
management’’ has been a historical
concern of the post-positivist tradition. Increasingly, however,
social constructionist views of
change, including action science and practical theory, are
moving discussions about leading
20 Leadership 10(1)

change to topics like reflexivity and moral accountability.
Similar to our discussion of
relational leadership, we divide the research into post-positivist
and social constructionist
approaches to leading change.
Post-positivist change research
In one approach to leading change, leaders are the primary
change implementers and com-
municators. For example, Hearn and Ninan (2003) equated
leading change with leaders’
management of meaning. Lewis’ (2011) research over the years
has demonstrated that man-
agement’s planned change implementation is indeed a
communicative endeavor (Lewis,
2006, 2007; Lewis et al., 2001). Lewis (2006) wrote:
‘‘Communication represents not only
the primary mechanism of change in organizations, but for many
types of change may
constitute the outcome as well (e.g., management programs
which are evidenced in styles
of supervision)’’ (p. 46). Lewis and colleagues’ work has
revealed why change implementers
communicatively attend to some stakeholders more so than
others (Lewis et al., 2003) and
led to a testable model of change implementation
communication (Lewis, 2011).
Constructionist change research

Fairhurst and Grant (2010) referred to these studies as ‘‘applied
social constructionism’’ with
three interrelated influences. The first involves communication
scholars’ turn towards prac-
tical theory (Barge, 2001; Barge and Craig, 2009; Craig, 1999),
which is rooted in the action
science tradition of Chris Argyris and Don Schön (Argyris and
Schön, 1996; Schön, 1983)
and the theorizing of Dewey (1938). Here theory becomes a
method or instrument, in Craig’s
(1995) words, ‘‘not just to learn what communication is, but
what it should be’’ (p. ix).
Critical management education is the second influence with its
focus on the operations of
power and the emancipatory goal of critical theory (Perriton and
Reynolds, 2004). The third
and final influence is discursive, which Marshak and Grant
(2008) described as an interest in
narrative, text, and conversation and the ways they shape and
are shaped by organizational
processes, power structures, and change.
These influences have inspired an emerging grammar for
applied social constructionism,
which includes the following paired terms: meaning and
framing; reflexivity and moral
accountability; and relationality and dialogue (Fairhurst and
Grant, 2010). For instance,
an emphasis on meaning and framing counters the tendency of
managers and others to view
communication as a simple transmission; heightens a sensitivity
to language as a basis for
reality construction; and instills a sense in which the seed of
change lies in every commu-
nicative encounter (Eisenberg, 2007; Fairhurst, 2011). The

studies under leadership aes-
thetics (Hansen et al., 2007) and social poetics (Cunliffe, 2001,
2002; Shotter and Cunliffe,
2003) reviewed earlier follow naturally from this work—as does
work on leadership narra-
tives (Barge, 2004b; Boje et al., 2001; Shamir and Eilam, 2005;
Watson, 2001) and appre-
ciative inquiry where the power of language is used to construct
more positive, life-affirming
ways to lead organizations (Barge and Oliver, 2003).
A second important pairing, reflexivity and moral
accountability, is focused on the role of
introspection in ethical behavior. The work of Barge and
colleagues (Barge, 2004a, 2004b,
2007; Barge and Little, 2002; Barge and Fairhurst, 2008) and
Cunliffe and colleagues (2004,
2009; Cunliffe and Jun, 2005) is exemplary here. Both focus on
the opportunities for reflexivity
and change in present moments and ‘‘re-storying’’ to affect
more ethically and relationally
responsive leadership in action. Such work complements more
general treatments of leader-
ship ethics in the literature (Christensen et al., 2008; Clegg et
al., 2007; Johnson, 2009; Nkomo,
2003) and case analyses of ethical breakdowns by
organizational leaders (Craig and Amernic,

2004; McKenna and Rooney, 2008; Seeger and Ulmer, 2003;
Tourish and Vatcha, 2005).
Work by McKenna and Rooney (2008) similarly recast
reflexivity as ontological acuity to
stress leaders’ need to understand the cognitive and discursive
basis of knowledge.
The final pairing is relationality and dialogue (Anderson et al.,
2004; Forester, 1999;
Isaacs, 1999), where relationality emphasizes relational
responsiveness (Cunliffe, 2002;
Cunliffe and Eriksen, 2011; Shotter and Cunliffe, 2003) and
systemic sensitivity (Barge,
2007; Barge and Fairhurst, 2008). Relationality partners well
with dialogue, which is
expressed by Gergen et al., (2004) as an ‘‘intersubjective
connection or synchrony. . .a
form of coordinated action. . .dialogic efficacy that is bodily
and contextually embedded. . .
(while) historically and culturally situated. . .(and may) serve
many different purposes, both
negative and positive’’ (pp. 42–44). A dialogic perspective has
quickly become the basis for
leadership praxis from a communication perspective (Anderson
et al., 2004; Barge and
Little, 2002; Deetz, 2006).
We can summarize a constructionist view of change
management by noting that leader-
ship actors are reflexive practitioners who shape and are shaped
by realities they co-create.
They also have the capacity for morally grounded, relationally
responsive action as they
account for their actions to themselves and others (Cunliffe,
2009; Shotter, 1993). On the
post-positivist side, researchers have focused on implementing

change as a management
communication endeavor and on understanding and explaining
how communicative pro-
cesses relate to change implementation and their influences on
outcomes.
Discussion and conclusions
Early work in leadership was largely derivative of leadership
psychology as the communica-
tion implications of individualist and cognitive theories were
the primary focus (Fairhurst,
2001). As this article has revealed, a unique series of
communicative lenses has emerged,
advancing a perspective in which leadership communication is
transmissional and meaning-
centered; relational and co-constructive of reality; structured
and structuring; contestable
even amidst asymmetric power dynamics; context-dependent
and multi-leveled; and capable
of change through reflexivity.
Views of leadership itself do vary accordingly. Leadership as
the management of meaning
expands to all leadership actors (formal or informal leaders,
followers or other stakeholders)
who can be transformative agents, but also passive receptors of
meaning and disciplined
products of culture. Leadership is, by definition, performative
in which reflexivity is routine
and moral grounding thus becomes possible. Leadership is also
attributional and contest-
able, emerging in the joint, relationally responsive actions of
actors whose views on leader-
ship may not coincide. Finally, leadership can be a simple role
assignment interchangeable

with management or shifting and distributed especially when
interaction processes are fore-
grounded. As the introduction makes clear, leadership is best
characterized as a family
resemblance among power and influence-oriented language
games whose situatedness is
paramount for understanding.
That said, there is much we still do not know about the
communicative aspects of leader-
ship. Thus, we encourage researchers to consider the following
in future research in the
following six areas.
22 Leadership 10(1)
First, scholars have expressed an increasing interest in the
tensions, contradictions, and
paradoxes of organizational life due to turbulent environments,
the fast pace of change, and
evolving markets. There is every reason to expect that this kind
of change will continue in the
future and that leadership actors will be squarely in the middle
of it. As such, there is much to
learn regarding leadership actors’ sensemaking, problem
setting, and tension management
strategies. Indeed, work by Sheep et al. (2010) suggests that the
discovery of counter-rational
forms of thinking reflects the new normal of contemporary
organizational life. Work by Grint

(2005, 2010) suggests that the problems that yield these
counter-rationalities are rarely tame,
but mostly of the wicked variety (Rittel and Webber, 1973).
Grint argues that tame problems
require managers who can implement known processes to solve
them, while wicked problems
require leaders who must ask the right questions to mobilize the
collective to address the
wickedness—despite the lack of credit they may be given when
collaborative efforts succeed.
Second, for this reason and others, the complexities of
distributed leadership are many.
Grint (2010) argues that even the best collaborations require
strong individual contributors,
but just how ‘‘leadership’’ figures in likely depends on the
language games of the actors and
analysts involved—not to mention a host of contextual factors.
These are likely to include
issues of space, distance and time; the nature of virtual
environments and new technologies;
and culture and the multicultural, just to name a few.
Connaughton and Daly (2005) have
called for more systematic and multi-methodological
examination of leadership over dis-
tance, in particular, encouraging researchers to explore
leadership’s spatial, temporal, and
geographic considerations. In doing so, future research should
examine and theorize dis-
tanced and distributed leadership (the latter implying a
democratic, emergent conceptualiza-
tion of leadership) from several meta-theoretical perspectives as
well as consider the social
and ethical implications of leadership over distance in various
organizational contexts.

Third, the subject of multiple methodologies raises the specter
of cross-paradigm work,
which is still relatively infrequent in leadership study. The
recent push towards relational
leadership is a not-so-thinly veiled attempt to get more
traditional leadership scholars to
accept more constructionist methodologies in addition to, not
instead of, post-positivist
methods (Uhl-Bien and Ospina, 2012). It is also an attempt to
challenge the dominance of
individualist, cognitive, and masculine views of leadership and
transmissional views of
human communication. Only time will tell if this will be
successful or not, but communica-
tion-oriented scholars are uniquely positioned to do cross-
paradigm work. One can imagine
contributions to understanding leadership from perspectives in
which analysts describe and
critique the discursive features/constitution of leadership
(communication); attend to how
meanings are created, contested, or negotiated; and explain how
the nature of this leadership
(communication) predictively relates to various other processes
and outcomes.
Fourth, research on the positive aspects of leadership vis-à-vis
appreciation (Barge and
Little, 2002; Barge and Oliver, 2003), spirituality (Frye et al.,
2007; Holmer Nadesan, 1999),
ethics (Clegg et al., 2007; Kornberger and Brown, 2007), and
courage (Jablin, 2006) must go
forward. Indeed, in a lecture delivered at Rutgers University,
Jablin (2006) argued that
courage is a central aspect of leadership, one that is under-
examined and under-theorized,
yet definitively communicative. He encouraged researchers to

refine conceptualizations of
courage and to conduct empirical research from a host of meta-
theoretical perspectives on
this topic, focusing particularly on instances in which everyday
leaders exemplify courage.
We echo his call in noting the dearth of research on this topic.
However, Collinson’s (2012)
warnings about excessive positivity must also be heeded lest we
contribute further to roman-
ticizing leadership (Meindl et al., 1985).
Fifth, like Tourish (2013), we must also ask, is leadership only
positive? What is leader-
ship’s dark side(s), and what are its effects? Just as we are
interested in studying destructive
organizational communication (Lutgen-Sandvik and Sypher,
2009), we too should examine
destructive leadership communication. Indeed, Mayseless
(2010) urged researchers to study
individuals’ attachment to destructive leaders, while Tourish
(2013) and Tourish and Vatcha
(2005) examine the dark side of charismatic leadership at Enron
and other places. We have
learned all too well that there is a dark side associated with the
negotiation of difference in
organizational life, whether it be issues of gender, race,
sexuality, age, or culture (Mumby,
2011; Parker, 2005). Future research must bring bad behavior

and good, inequities and
remedies to light in equal measure.
Finally, do we overemphasize the symbolic and the linguistic
and neglect the materialities
of leading and following? This is a question being posed
throughout the organizational
sciences (Ashcraft et al., 2009; Dale, 2005; Iedema, 2007), but
has no less relevance for
leadership and management processes. A focus on materialities
in leadership contexts is
beginning to shed light on concepts like ‘‘presence’’ (Fairhurst
and Cooren, 2009), once
thought too abstract to study. However, the potential is also
there to understand more
embodied ways of knowing about leading and following
(Sinclair, 2005), but also the tech-
nological transformation of such processes (Leonardi, 2008).
We began this article with the premise that leadership is both
new and old, a timeless
concept that must simultaneously reflect the times yet stay
ahead of them. To do so is no
small feat, but it is most worthy of pursuit in contemporary
organizational life.
Note
1. ‘‘WABA’’ stands for ‘‘within and between (group) analysis’’
(Dansereau et al., 1984).
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