
Mats Alvesson
Professor

Zombie leadership : Dead ideas that still walk among us
Author
Summary, in English
Considerable progress has been made in the field of leadership in recent years. However, we argue that this is undermined by a strong residual commitment to an older set of ideas which have been repeatedly debunked but which nevertheless resolutely refuse to die. These, we term zombie leadership. Zombie leadership lives on not because it has empirical support but because it flatters and appeals to elites, to the leadership industrial complex that supports them, and also to the anxieties of ordinary people in a world seemingly beyond their control. It is propagated in everyday discourse surrounding leadership but also by the media, popular books, consultants, HR practices, policy makers, and academics who are adept at catering to the tastes of the powerful and telling them what they like to hear. This review paper outlines eight core claims (axioms) of zombie leadership. As well as isolating the problematic metatheory which holds these ideas together, we reflect on ways in which they might finally be laid to rest.
Department/s
- Organizational Studies
Publishing year
2024
Language
English
Publication/Series
Leadership Quarterly
Volume
35
Issue
3
Document type
Journal article
Publisher
Elsevier
Topic
- Business Administration
Keywords
- Great man theory
- Leadership
- Leadership theory
- Transformational leadership
- Zombie leadership
Status
Published
ISBN/ISSN/Other
- ISSN: 1048-9843