scholarly journals From the Cottage to the Cage – Exploring the Efficacy of Complexity Leadership Theory in Addressing 21st Century Workplace Toxicity.

Author(s):  
Morgan Danaher

The issue of workplace toxicity constitutes a major problem for employers, employees and society at large. Toxicity in a workplace context relates to damaging behaviours perpetrated by individuals and organisations that netatively impact on the health and wellbeing of others. Workplace toxicty is habitually associated with activities such as bullying, harrassment, unethical and even illegal acts. In this article, today’s workplace is likenened to a cage where ambition and greed drive people to engage in toxic behaviour to fight for whatever scarce rewards are on offer. Set against a backdrop of continuous demands on employees in a era of constant change and challenge, leadership practice in the 21st century is understandably seeped in complexity. Whilst conditions of scarcity are in fact constructed by employers in today’s lean environments, workplace toxicity has significant implications for organisational leaders in terms of work place disputes, absenteeism and litigation etc. Twentieth century hierarchial and autocratic leadership models are now deemed to be both obsolete and wholly inadedgate to inform leadership practice in the knowledge era. This conceptual article looks at the efficacy of complexity leadership theory (CLT) in empowering today’s leader to better understand and address 21st century workplace toxicity.

Author(s):  
Leanne Gibbs ◽  
Frances Press ◽  
Sandie Wong

Author(s):  
Francis Donkor ◽  
Isaac Sekyere

Criticisms of bureaucratic leadership in the public sector literature are increasing, and as such, a growing number of scholars in public administration are calling for a more complex and conceptually sound theoretical models of leadership that are collaborative and reduce the power of the leader and create hybrid governance models. With a multifaceted perspective, detailed conceptual underpinning and a growing body of empirical study support complexity leadership theory (CLT) as a potential to address many of the issues where an individual is seen to possess all the knowledge in the organizational goals. The intent for proposing the importation of CLT in PSOs is to offer a paradigm for thinking about leadership to explore issues that confound those from the traditional view to the shared and adaptive leadership process. In conclusion, the HR practitioners within the entity should be seen to be responsible for their actions. Therefore, adopting complexity leadership theory in today's PSOs will enhance the performance of employees.


2018 ◽  
Vol 40 (2) ◽  
pp. 219-238 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dennis Tourish

Scholars are increasingly seeking to develop theories that explain the underlying processes whereby leadership is enacted. This shifts attention away from the actions of ‘heroic’ individuals and towards the social contexts in which people with greater or lesser power influence each other. A number of researchers have embraced complexity theory, with its emphasis on non-linearity and unpredictability. However, some complexity scholars still depict the theory and practice of leadership in relatively non-complex terms. They continue to assume that leaders can exercise rational, extensive and purposeful influence on other actors to a greater extent than is possible. In effect, they offer a theory of complex organizations led by non-complex leaders who establish themselves by relatively non-complex means. This testifies to the enduring power of ‘heroic’ images of leader agency. Without greater care, the terminology offered by complexity leadership theory could become little more than a new mask for old theories that legitimize imbalanced power relationships in the workplace. This paper explores how these problems are evident in complexity leadership theory, suggests that communication and process perspectives help to overcome them, and outlines an agenda for further research on these issues.


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