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Portrait of Mats Alvesson. Photo.

Mats Alvesson

Professor

Portrait of Mats Alvesson. Photo.

Leadership : Convergence and Divergence in Leadership Relations

Author

  • Mats Alvesson

Summary, in English

The article argues for theorizing and studying the significance of how so-called leaders and followers converge or diverge in their views and understandings of the leadership/followership relations they may be part of. Divergence or misfits may be common yet missed by the researcher who takes only one party’s view of leadership into account and/or assumes that people involved define the relationship in a similar way. The article identifies and illustrates four typical forms of shared/diverse meanings regarding leadership: high-alignment leadership (shared meanings), value misfit (diverse assessment), construction misfit (different views of what goes on), and multiple breakdowns (high level of confusion of what goes on and how to assess it). Given variations in views of leadership, this article makes a case for considering “divergent relationalities”—in some opposition to common ideas about “smooth” leadership/followership relations based on convergent meanings.

Department/s

  • Department of Business Administration

Publishing year

2019

Language

English

Pages

319-334

Publication/Series

Journal of Management Inquiry

Volume

28

Issue

3

Document type

Journal article

Publisher

SAGE Publications

Topic

  • Business Administration

Keywords

  • leadership
  • power and politics
  • qualitative research

Status

Published

ISBN/ISSN/Other

  • ISSN: 1056-4926