Journal of Leadership and Management
Vol. 1 No. 1 (2014): Journal of Leadership and Management
Articles

Leadership and Strategy. The Vital but Evasive Role of Cooperation and Clarity of Expectations during Strategic Change

PDF
  • Simon A. Moss,
  • Ivan Butar Butar,
  • Giles Hirst,
  • Matt Tice,
  • Michael Craner,
  • Jade Evans,
  • Charmine E. J. Hartel
Simon A. Moss
1. Department of Management, Monash University, Australia 2. School of Psychological and Clinical Sciences, Charles Darwin University, Australia
Ivan Butar Butar
Department of Management, Monash University, Australia
Giles Hirst
Department of Management, Monash University, Australia
Matt Tice
The Palladium Group Asia-Pacific, Australia
Michael Craner
The Palladium Group Asia-Pacific, Australia
Jade Evans
The Palladium Group Asia-Pacific, Australia
Charmine E. J. Hartel
School of Business, Queensland University, Australia
Published August 25, 2014
How to Cite
Moss, S. A., Butar, I. B., Hirst, G., Tice, M., Craner, M., Evans, J., & Hartel, C. E. J. (2014). Leadership and Strategy. The Vital but Evasive Role of Cooperation and Clarity of Expectations during Strategic Change. Journal of Leadership and Management, 1(1). Retrieved from http://leadership.net.pl/JLM/article/view/21

Copyright (c) 2014 Author & JLM

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

Abstract

Strategic change evokes a shift in the distribution of power and, therefore, often impairs cooperation and obscures the standards that employees must achieve. Yet, unless employees perceive the work environment as cooperative and their responsibilities as unambiguous, they tend to feel too unsafe to embrace the uncertainty that change entails. To examine the significance of this cooperation and clarity of standards, in Study 1,223 executives assessed workplace cooperation, clarity of standards, meaning at work, impediments to strategic change, and firm performance. Workplace cooperation and clarity of standards were inversely related to impediments to change – a relationship that was mediated by meaning at work. To clarify how organizations cultivate this workplace cooperation and clarity of standards in the midst of change,
35 executives were interviewed. Thematic analyses revealed that leaders should first inculcate a vivid, shared vision but then gradually encourage individuals to assume distinct responsibilities that match their preferences.

PDF

References

  1. Affleck, G., and Tennen, H. (1996). Construing benefits from adversity: Adaptational significance and dispositional underpinnings. Journal of Personality 64 (4): 899-922.
  2. Alexander, L.D., (1985). Successfully implementing strategic decisions. Long Range Planning 18 (3): 91-97.
  3. Bartholomew, K., and Horowitz, L.M. (1991). Attachment styles among young adults: A test of a four-category model. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 61 (2): 226-244.
  4. Baumeister, R.F. (1991). Meanings of life. New York: Guilford.
  5. Britt, T.W., Castro, C.A., and Adler, A.B. (2005). Self-engagement, stressors, and health: A longitudinal study. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 31: 1475-1486. doi: 10.1177/0146167205276525.
  6. Buchan, N.R., Brewer, M.B., Grimalda, G., Wilson, R.K., Fatas,
  7. E., and Foddy, M. (2011). Global social identity and global cooperation. Psychological Science 22: 821-828. doi:10.1177/0956797611409590.
  8. Cannon-Bowers, J.A., Salas, E., and Converse, S. (1993). Shared mental models in expert team decision-making. In N.J. Castellan Jr. (Ed.), Individual and group decision-making: Current issues. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
  9. Cocks, G. (2010). Emerging concepts for implementing strategy. The TQM Journal 22: 260-266.
  10. De Dreu, C.K.V., Koole, S.L., and Oldersma, F.L. (1999). On the seizing and freezing of negotiator inferences: Need for cognitive closure moderates the use of heuristics in negotiation. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 25: 348-362.
  11. Dijksterhuis, A. (2004). Think different: The merits of unconscious thought in preference development and decision making. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 87: 586-598.
  12. Dijksterhuis, A., Bos, M.W., van der Leij, A. and van Baaren, R.B. (2009). Predicting soccer matches after unconscious and conscious thought as a function of expertise. Psychological Science 20: 1381-1387.
  13. Dijksterhuis, A., and Nordgren, L.F. (2006). A theory of unconscious thought. Perspectives on Psychological Science 1 : 95-180.
  14. Eyal, T., Sagristano, M.D., Trope, Y., Liberman, N., and Chaiken,
  15. S. (2009). When values matter: Expressing values in behavioural intentions for the near vs distant future. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 45: 35-43.
  16. Forster, J., and Denzler, M. (2012). Sense creative! The impact of global and local vision, hearing, touching, tasting and smelling on creative and analytic thought. Social Psychological and Personality Science 3: 108-117. doi:10.1177/1948550611410890.
  17. Franken, A., Edwards, C. and Lambert, R. (2009). Executing strategic change: Understanding the critical management elements that lead to success. California Management Review 51: 49-73.
  18. Freedman, M. (2003). The genius is in the implementation. Journal of Business Strategy 24: 26-31.
  19. Gagne, M. (2003). The role of autonomy support and autonomy orientation in prosocial behavior engagement. Motivation and Emotion 27: 199-223.
  20. Galinsky, A.D., Magee, J.C., Inesi, M.E., and Gruenfeld, D.H. (2006). Power and perspectives not taken. Psychological Science 17: 1068--1074.
  21. Getz, G., Jones, C., and Loewe, P. (2009). Migration management: an approach for improving strategy implementation. Strategy and Leadership 37: 18-24.
  22. Hart, W., and Burton, A. (2013). Transcending the physical: Being social and identifying transcendental meaning in behavior. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 49: 588-590. 10.1016/j.jesp.2012.10.005.
  23. Heilman, C.M., Nakamoto, K., and Rao, A.G. (2002). Pleasant surprises: Consumer response to unexpected in-store coupons. Journal of Marketing Research 39: 242-252.
  24. Heine, S.J., Proulx, T., and Vohs, K.D. (2006). Meaning maintenance model: On the coherence of human motivations. Personality and Social Psychology Review 10: 88-110.
  25. Higgins, E.T. (1987). Self-discrepancy: A theory relating self and affect. Psychological Review 94: 319-340.
  26. Higgins, E.T. (1999). When do self-discrepancies have specific relations to emotions? The second-generation question of Tangney, Niedenthal, Covert, and Barlow (1998). Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 77: 1313-1317.
  27. Hrebiniak, L.G. (2006). Obstacles to effective strategy implementation. Organizational Dynamics 35: 12-31.
  28. Hrebiniak, L.G. (2008). Making strategy work: Overcoming the obstacles to effective execution. Ivey Business Journal 72: 1-6.
  29. Judt, T. (2010). Ill fares the land. New York: Penguin.
  30. Kahn, W.A. (1990). Psychological conditions of personal engagement and disengagement at work. Academy of Management Journal 33: 692-724.
  31. Kahn, W.A. (1992). To be fully there: Psychological presence at work. Human Relations 45: 321-349.
  32. Kelley, H.H. (1973). The process of causal attribution. American Psychologist 28: 107-128.
  33. Keltner, D. and Robinson, R. (1997). Defending the status quo: Power and bias in social conflict. Personality and Social psychology Bulletin 23: 1066-1077.
  34. Krueger, J. I. (2007). From social projection to social behaviour. European Review of Social Psychology 18: 1-35. doi: 10.1080/10463280701284645.
  35. Kruglanski, A.W., and Freund, T. (1983). The freezing and unfreezing of lay inferences: Effects of impressional primacy, ethnic stereotyping, and numerical anchoring. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 19: 448-468.
  36. Kruglanski, A.W., and Webster, D.M. (1996). Motivated closing of the mind: “Seizing” and “freezing”. Psychological Review 103: 263-283.
  37. Kuhl, J., and Kazen, M. (2008). Motivation, affect, and hemispheric asymmetry: Power versus affiliation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 95: 456-469.
  38. Lee, L., Amir, O., and Ariely, D. (2009). In search of homo economicus: Cognitive noise and the role of emotion in preference consistency. Journal of Consumer Research 36: 173-187.
  39. Lippit, M. (2007). Fix the disconnect between strategy and execution. T&D Magazine 61 (8): 54-57.
  40. Maner, J.K., and Mead, N.L. (2010). The essential tension between leadership and power: When leaders sacrifice group goals for the sake of self-interest. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 99: 482-497.
  41. Mast, M.S., Jonas, K., and Hall, J.A. (2009). Give a person power and he or she will show interpersonal sensitivity: The phenomenon and its why and when. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 97: 835-850.
  42. May, D.R., Gilson, R.L., and Harter, L.M. (2004). The psychological conditions of meaningfulness, safety and availability and the engagement of the human spirit at work. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology 77: 11-37.
  43. Mikulincer, M., and Shaver, P.R. (2005). Attachment theory and emotions in close relationships: Exploring the attachment-related dynamics of emotional reactions to relational events. Personal Relationships 12: 149-168.
  44. Mikulincer, M., Shaver, P. R., Bar-on, N., and Ein-Dor, T. (2010). The pushes and pulls of close relationships: attachment insecurities and relational ambivalence. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 98: 450-468. doi: 10.1037/a0017366
  45. Mikulincer, M., Shaver, P. R., and Rom, E. (2011). The effects of implicit and explicit security priming on creative problem solving. Cognition and Emotion 25: 519-531. doi: 10.1080/02699931.2010.540110
  46. Miller, S. Wilson, D. and Hickson, D. (2004). Beyond planning strategies for successfully implementing strategic decisions. Long Run Planning 37: 201-218.
  47. Moller, A.C., and Deci, E.L. (2009). Interpersonal control, dehumanization, and violence: A self-determination theory perspective. Group Processes and Intergroup Relations 13: 41-53.
  48. Moreau, E., and Mageau, G.A. (2011). The importance of perceived autonomy support for the psychological health and work satisfaction of health professionals: Not only supervisors count, colleagues too! Motivation and Emotion 36: 268-286. doi:10.1007/s11031-011-9250-9
  49. Moss, S.A. (2012). Where should I work? Tilde Press.
  50. Newell, B.R., Wong, K.Y., Cheung, J.C.H., and Rakow, T. (2008). Think, blink or sleep on it? The impact of modes of thought on complex decision making. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology 62: 707-732. doi: 10.1080/17470210802215202
  51. O’Driscol, M.P., Pierce, J.L., and Coghlan, A. (2006). The psychology of ownership: Work environment structure, organizational commitment, and citizenship behaviors. Group and Organization Management 31: 388-416.
  52. Pierce, J.L., Kostova, T., and Dirks, K.T. (2001). Toward a theory of psychological ownership in organizations. Academy of Management Review 27: 298-310.
  53. Pierce, J.L.,O’Driscoll, M., and Coghlan, A. M. (2004).Work environment structure and psychological ownership: The mediating effects of control. Journal of Social Psychology 144: 507-534.
  54. Popper, M., and Amit, K. (2009). Attachment and leader’s development via experiences. Leadership Quarterly 20: 749-763. doi:10.1016/j.leaqua.2009.06.005
  55. Proulx, T., and Heine, S. J. (2006). Death and black diamonds: Meaning, mortality, and the Meaning Maintenance Model. Psychological Inquiry 17: 309-318.
  56. Proulx, T., and Heine, S.J. (2008). The case of the transmogrifying experimenter: Affirmation of a moral schema following implicit change detection. Psychological Science 19: 1294-1300.
  57. Proulx, T., and Heine, S. J. (2009). Connections from Kafka: Exposure to meaning threats improves implicit learning of an artificial grammar. Psychological Science 20: 1125-1131.
  58. Randles, D., Proulx , T., and Heine, S.J. (2010). Turn-frogs and careful-sweaters: Non-conscious perception of incongruous word pairings provokes fluid compensation. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 47: 246-249.
  59. Raps, A. (2004). Implementing strategy: Tap into the power of four key factors to deliver success. Strategic Finance 85: 48-53.
  60. Rhoades, L., and Eisenberger, R. (2002). Perceived organizational support: A review of the literature. Journal of Applied Psychology 87: 698-714.
  61. Rios, K., Ybarra, O., and Sanchez-Burks, J. (2013). Outgroup primes increase unpredictability tendencies under conditions of distrust. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 49: 372-377.
  62. Roets, A., Van Hiel, A., and Cornelis, I. (2006). The dimensional structure of the need for cognitive closure scale: Relationships with “seizing” and “freezing” processes. Social Cognition 24: 22-45.
  63. Rowe, W.G. (2001). Creating wealth in organizations: The role of strategic leadership. The Academy of Management Executive (1993--2005) 15: 81-94.
  64. Ryan, R.M. (2005). The developmental line of autonomy in the etiology, dynamics, and treatment of borderline personality disorders. Development and Psychopathology 17: 987- 1006.
  65. Savolaine, J., and Granello, P.F. (2002). The function of meaning and purpose for individual wellness. Journal of Humanistic Counseling, Education and Development 41: 178-189.
  66. Seppala, P., Mauno, S., Kinnunen, M., Feldt, T., Juuti, T., Tolvanen, A., and Rusko, H. (2012). Is work engagement related to healthy cardiac autonomic activity? Evidence from a field study among Finnish women workers. Journal of Positive Psychology 7: 95-106. doi: 10.1080/17439760.2011.637342
  67. Shaver, P.R., Schachner, D.A., and Mikulincer, M. (2005). Attachment style, excessive reassurance seeking, relationship processes, and depression. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 31: 343-359.
  68. Shea,T. Cooper, B., De Cieri, H., andSheehan, C. (2012). Evaluation of a perceived organisational performance scale using Rasch Model Analysis. Australian Journal of Management 37: 507-522.
  69. Speculand, R. (2009). Six necessary mind shifts for implementing strategy.Business Strategy Series 10: 167-172.
  70. Stillman, T.F., Baumeister, R.F., Lambert, N.M., Crescioni, A.W., DeWall, C. D., and Fincham, F.D. (2009). Alone and without purpose: Life loses meaning following social exclusion. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 45: 686-694.
  71. Tajfel, H., and Turner, J.C. (1986). The social identity theory of intergroup behavior. In S. Worchel and W. G. Austin (Eds.), The psychology of intergroup relations. Chicago: Nelson-Hall.
  72. Tierney, P., and Farmer, S.M. (2004). The Pygmalion process and employee creativity. Journal of Management 30: 413-432. doi: 10.1016/j.jm.2002.12.001
  73. Trope, Y., Liberman, N., and Wakslak, C.J. (2007). Construal levels and psychological distance: Effects on representation, prediction, evaluation, and behavior. Journal of Consumer Psychology 17: 83-95.
  74. Van Tongeren, D., and Green, J.D. (2010). Combating meaninglessness: On the automatic defense of meaning. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 36: 1372-1384.
  75. Waugh, C.E., and Fredrickson, B.L. (2006). Nice to know you: Positive emotions, self-other overlap, and complex understanding in the formation of a new relationship. Journal of Positive Psychology 1: 93-106.
  76. Zadro, L., Williams, K. D., and Richardson, R. (2004). How low can you go? Ostracism by a computer is sufficient to lower self-reported levels of belonging, control, self-esteem, and meaningful existence. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 40: 560-567.
  77. van Zomeren, M., Leach, C. W., and Spears, R. (2010). Does group efficacy increase group identification? Resolving their paradoxical relationship. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 46: 1055-1060.