Instrumental leadership: An extension of the Full-Range Leadership Theory

From a theoretical perspective, an extension to the Full Range leadership Theory (FRLT) seems needed. In this paper, we explain why instrumental leadership--a class of leadership includes leader behaviors focusing on task and strategic aspects that are neither values nor exchange oriented--can fulfill this extension. Instrument leadership is composed of four factors: environmental monitoring, strategy formulation and implementation, path-goal facilitation and outcome monitoring; these aspects of leadership are currently not included in any of the FRLT's nine leadership scales (as measured by the MLQ--Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire). We present results from two empirical studies using very large samples from a wide array of countries (N > 3,000) to examine the factorial, discriminant and criterion-related validity of the instrumental leadership scales. We find support for a four-factor instrumental leadership model, which explains incremental variance in leader outcomes in over and above transactional and transformational leadership.

Patient expectations at a multicultural out-patient clinic in Switzerland.

BACKGROUND: Recognizing patient expectation is considered as an important objective for primary care physicians. A number of studies suggest that failure to identify patient expectations can lead to patient dissatisfaction with care, lack of compliance and inappropriate use of medical resources. It has been suggested that identifying patient expectations in multicultural contexts can be especially challenging. OBJECTIVES: The aim of the study was to compare health care expectations of Swiss and immigrant patients attending the out-patient clinic of a Swiss university hospital and to assess physicians' ability to identify their patients' expectations. METHODS: Over a 3-month period, all patients attending the out-patient clinic at a Swiss university hospital were requested to complete pre-consultation surveys. Their physicians were requested to complete post-consultation surveys. Outcome measures were patients' self-rated health, resort to prior home treatment, patients' expectations of the consultation, physicians' perception of their patients' expectations and agreement between patients and physicians. RESULTS: We analysed 343 questionnaires completed by patients prior to their consultation (> 50% immigrants) and 333 questionnaires completed by their physicians after the consultation. Most expectations were shared by all patients. Physicians had inaccurate perceptions of their patients' expectations, regardless of patients' origin. CONCLUSIONS: Our study found no evidence that immigrant patients' expectations differed from those of Swiss patients, nor that physicians had more difficulty identifying expectations of immigrant patients. However, physicians in our study were generally poor at identifying patients' expectations, and therefore inter-group differences may be difficult to detect. Our results point to the need to strengthen physicians' general communication skills which should then serve as a foundation for more specific, cross-cultural communication training.

The future of leadership

The good news with regard to this (or any) chapter on the future of leadership is that there is one. There was a time when researchers called for a moratorium on new leadership theory and research (e.g., Miner, 1975) citing the uncertain future of the field. Then for a time there was a popular academic perspective that leadership did not really matter when it came to shaping organizational outcomes (Meindl & Ehrlich, 1987; Meindl, Ehrlich, & Dukerich, 1985; Pfeffer, 1977). That perspective was laid to rest by "realists" in the field (Day & Antonakis, 2012a) by means of empirical re-interpretation of the results used to support the position that leadership does not matter (Lieberson & O'Connor, 1972; Salancik & Pfeffer, 1977). Specifically, Day and Lord (1988) showed that when proper methodological concerns were addressed (e.g., controlling for industry and company size effects; incorporating appropriate time lags) that the impact of top-level leadership was considerable - explaining as much as 45% of the variance in measures of organizational performance. Despite some recent pessimistic sentiments about the "curiously unformed" state of leadership research and theory (Hackman & Wageman, 2007), others have argued that the field has continued to evolve and is potentially on the threshold of some significant breakthroughs (Day & Antonakis, 2012a). Leadership scholars have been re-energized by new directions in the field and research efforts have revitalized areas previously abandoned for apparent lack of consistency in findings (e.g., leadership trait theory). Our accumulated knowledge now allows us to explain the nature of leadership including its biological bases and other antecedents, and consequences with some degree of confidence. There are other comprehensive sources that review the extensive theoretical and empirical foundation of leadership (Bass, 2008; Day & Antonakis, 2012b) so that will not be the focus of the present chapter. Instead, we will take a future-oriented perspective in identifying particular areas within the leadership field that we believe offer promising perspectives on the future of leadership. Nonetheless, it is worthwhile as background to first provide an overview of how we see the leadership field changing over the past decade or so. This short chronicle will set the stage for a keener understanding of where the future contributions are likely to emerge. Overall, across nine major schools of leadership - trait, behavioural, contingency, contextual, relational, sceptics, information processing, New Leadership, biological and evolutionary - researchers have seen a resurgence in interest in one area, a high level of activity in at least four other areas, inactivity in three areas, and one that was modestly active in the previous decade but we think holds strong promise for the future (Gardner, Lowe, Moss, Mahoney, & Cogliser, 2010). We will next provide brief overviews of these nine schools and their respective levels of research activity (see Figure 1).

Hospital antibiotic consumption in Switzerland: comparison of a multicultural country with Europe.

The consumption of antibiotics in the inpatient setting of Switzerland was assessed to determine possible differences between linguistic regions, and to compare these results with European results. Data on antibiotic consumption were obtained from a sentinel network representing 54% of the national acute care hospitals, and from a private drug market monitoring company. Aggregated data were converted into defined daily doses (DDD). The total consumption density in Switzerland was close to the median consumption reported in European surveys. Between 2004 and 2008, the total consumption of systemic antibiotics rose from 46.1 to 54.0 DDD per 100 occupied bed-days in the entire hospitals, and from 101.6 to 114.3 DDD per 100 occupied bed-days in the intensive care units. Regional differences were observed for total consumption and among antibiotic classes. Hospitals in the Italian-speaking region showed a significantly higher consumption density, followed by the French- and German-speaking regions. Hospitals in the Italian-speaking region also had a higher consumption of fluoroquinolones, in line with the reported differences between Italy, Germany and France. Antibiotic consumption in acute care hospitals in Switzerland is close to the European median with a relatively low consumption in intensive care units. Some of the patterns of variation in consumption levels noticed among European countries are also observed among the cultural regions of Switzerland.

Women in leadership: Three essays

GENDER EMPOWERMENT: EFFECTS OF GODS, GEOGRAPHY, AND GDP¦Fenley, M., & Antonakis, J.¦ABSTRACT¦We examined the determinants of women's empowerment in the economy and political leadership in 178 countries. Given the androcentric nature of most religions, we hypothesized that high degrees of country-level theistic belief create social conditions that impede the progression of women to power. The dependent variable was the Gender Empowerment index of the United Nations Development Program, which captures the participation of women in political leadership, management, and their share of national income. Controlling for GDP per capita as well as the fixed-effects of the dominant type of religion and legal origin and instrumenting all endogenous variables with geographic or historical variables, our results show that atheism has a significant positive effect on gender empowerment. These results are driven by the rule of law, which in addition to being a catalyst for economic development, appears to crowd-out the informal regulation of behavior due to religious norms.¦DEVELOPING WOMEN LEADERS: COMPARING A TRANSFORMATIONAL AND A CHARISMATIC LEADERSHIP INTERVENTION¦Fenley, M., Jacquart, P., & Antonakis, J.¦ABSTRACT¦Along with a gender imbalance in leadership role occupancy, most leadership interventions have been conducted with samples of men. We conducted an experiment wherein we assigned female participants (n = 38, mean age = 35 years) to one of two conditions: Transformational (i.e., "standard") leadership training or charismatic leadership training. The two interventions were essentially equivalent, except that we also focused on developing the "charismatic leadership tactics" (e.g., rhetorical skills) of participants in the charismatic condition. After the interventions, we randomly assigned participants into problem-solving teams that required extensive interaction. Each team had an equal number of participants having received transformational training or charismatic training. At the end of the team exercises, participants rated each of their team members on a leadership prototypicality measure. Results indicated that those who received charismatic training scored higher (a) on prototypicality (standardized  = .42) and (b) on a test of declarative knowledge of charismatic rhetorical strategies (i.e., a manipulation check, standardized  = .76). Furthermore, the score on the test fully mediated the effect of the treatment on prototypicality (standardized indirect  = .32). We discuss the importance and practical implications of these results.¦CHANGING ATTITUDES TOWARDS WOMEN IN A MALE SEX-TYPE WORK ENVIRONMENT: EVIDENCE FROM A FIELD EXPERIMENT IN EUROPEAN ATHLETICS¦Fenley, M.¦ABSTRACT¦Most sports organizations have a similar gender gap in leadership as do the majority of non-sport organizations. Women's careers sputter somewhere at coaching level positions and few women obtain top leadership positions. Greater awareness of gender inequalities in general, and in leadership in particular, could decrease gender discrimination and increase women's presence at upper levels. The goal of this study was to evaluate the impact of an intervention using an online gender awareness exercise. Participants (n = 1,001 participants, n = 32 countries) were randomly assigned to one of eight conditions in a 2 (a discriminating perspective-taking story or a non-discriminating perspective-taking story) by 2 (gender quiz or no gender quiz) by 2 (diversity quiz or no diversity quiz) factorial design. The results show that the online perspective taking exercise changed initial sexist attitudes. Participants having taken a diversity quiz had less sexist attitudes (as measured by the Modern- and Old-fashioned sexism scale) than did participants who did not take the diversity quiz (irrespective of perspective-taking story). The combination of having taken a diversity quiz with a gender quiz had the biggest impact on attitudes for the non-discriminating story.

Poverty and marginalisation : challenges to poor women's leadership in urban India

This article examines the women's quota at the local governance level in urban India, using several case studies of women municipal councillors, to question the evidently low numbers of poor and marginalised women amongst them. It examines issues of class, caste, and religion that have a direct impact on the access of poor women to quotas reserved for them at the local government level. The objective of this work is to draw attention to the specific ways in which women are constrained at the pre-election stage, resulting in an elite capture of the women's quota in India, indicating the need for further research and study on this issue.