The Influence Of Leadership On Organizational Culture And Its Effects On

Knowledge Management Initiative

Nor Hazana binti Abdullah

Associate Professor Dr. Ahmad bin Othman

Abstract

This paper attempts to highlight the significant roles of leadership in moulding the
knowledge supporting organizational culture, which in turn will stimulate the knowledge
management initiatives. Review on literatures that study the interaction between
leadership and organizational culture in response to the knowledge management
initiatives is discussed. Analysis of previous literature shows that leadership is the
single most important factor in the creation of knowledge supporting culture. Leaders
that encourage knowledge management initiatives need to possess more expert power
and encourage participative management. The supportive behaviour of leaders will
facilitate the evolution of the knowledge supporting organizational culture.

Introduction

The importance of knowledge in organization has been highlighted as early as in

1890 by Alfred Marshall. However, its popularity has been accentuated only in the
nineties (Quintas, 2002). The intensification of interest in knowledge management is
driven by a host of factors which collectively reflect the urgent need for organization to
manage knowledge. These factors include: (1) the increasing realization that wealth is
generated from knowledge and intangible assets: (2) the rediscovery that human
resource is the reservoir of organizational knowledge; (3) the rapid change in markets,
competition and technology which demand continuous learning to remain competitive;
(4) the recognition that innovation stems from knowledge creation and application; (5)
the growing importance of cross-boundary knowledge transaction resulting from the
globalisation process; and (6) the technology limitations to unearth certain types of
knowledge such as tacit knowledge (Baker and Baker, 2001; Quintas, 2002). Numerous
findings from previous literatures on the imperative value of knowledge management to
organizations have also lent support to the concept (Bollinger and Smith, 2001;
McDermott and O’Dell, 2001; Holowetzki, 2002; Chin-Loy, 2003; Chin; 2001; Crawford,
2004, Mustafa, 2002; Rowley, 1999; Gloet and Berrell, 2003).

Organizational Culture and Its Effects on Knowledge Management Initiatives

In recent article titled “Toward a Model of Effective Knowledge Management and

Direction for Future Research: Culture, Leadership and CKOs”, DeTienne, Dyer,
Hoopes and Harris (2004) proposed four major elements for effective knowledge
management initiatives. These elements are organizational culture, organizational
leadership, chief knowledge officers or CKOs, and technology. Similar with Davenport
and Prusak’s argument, they emphasize the need for the organizational culture that
cultivates cooperation and trust. Celep and Cetin (2005) also outlined seven factors that
contribute to the successful implementation of knowledge management among Turkey’s
schools which are leadership, cultural structure, knowledge hubs and centers, tacit
knowledge, explicit knowledge, knowledge vision and learning culture. A survey done by
Mason and Pauleen (2003) among 71 middle managers of New Zealand organizations
revealed that barriers to knowledge managements were internal factors such as
organizational culture, leadership and education. Forty-five percent of the responses
indicated that organizational culture is the most significant barrier following by
leadership with 22% and education with 16%. Clearly, there seems to be an agreement
that organizational culture is a key factor to successful knowledge management
implementation (Guptara, 1999; Holland, 1999; Marr; 2003; McDermott and O’Dell,
2001; Holowetzki, 2002).

As success factors to knowledge management have been identified, the next

question is why organizational culture has received such recognition. According to
DeTienne, Dyer, Hoopes and Harris (2004), organizational culture “exerts a powerful
influence on how companies manage knowledge” and thus becomes a sought-after
mechanism to promote free-flow of information among employees and across
department lines. De Long and Fahey (2000) identified four means in which
organizational culture influences the behaviors central to knowledge creation, sharing
and use. Firstly, culture and subculture shape the assumptions about what knowledge is
and which knowledge is worth managing. Secondly, culture defines the relationships
between individual and organizational knowledge, determining who is expected to
control specific knowledge, as well as who must share it and who can hoard it. Thirdly,
culture creates the context for social interaction and determines how knowledge will be
used in particular situations. And finally, culture shapes the processes by which new
knowledge is created, legitimated and distributed in organizations.

In another study by Knapp and Yu (1999), they further explained the dynamics of
organizational culture which eventually lead to cohesiveness and internalizations of
knowledge management initiatives. Specifically, they asserted that organizational
culture “provides employees with the permission, the prescription and the incentives…”
to execute the knowledge management initiatives. Guptara (1999) proposed nature of
hierarchies of the organizational culture as major obstacle to promote the ease of
communication and interpersonal relationships which are critical for knowledge
management implementation. Chin-loy (2003) reasoned that since organizational
culture influences decision-making, management style, employee relations and
behavior pattern in the organizations, any knowledge management initiatives must be
‘fit’ with the organizational culture. Davenport and Prusak (1998) asserted that values
and beliefs “… are integral to knowledge, determining the large part what the knower
sees, absorbs, and concludes from observations”. This contention is further supported
by Baker and Baker (2001) whom succinctly concluded “although a variety of
technologies can support it, knowledge management is really about changing people’s
behavior to make their experience and expertise available to others”. This implies that
organizational culture is the ‘very core’ of knowledge management. People in
organizations organize their knowledge based on their values and subsequently share
their knowledge based on these values.

In the context of knowledge management, major cultural factors that have received
considerable attention are information system, organizational structure, reward system,
processes, people and leadership (Halowetzki, 2002). The first cultural factor which is
information system is seen as a prevalent factor since technology-driven solutions were
the first approaches to developing knowledge management initiatives. In term of
organizational structure, formal and hierarchal organizational structure is claimed to
prevent effective knowledge management initiatives (Guptara, 1999). Learning
organization and the formation of communities of practice are among the highly cited
organizational structures that make knowledge management more permeable. Reward
system is a cultural factor that includes compensation system and performance
appraisal. In order for the rewards system to support the knowledge management
initiatives, it must recognize the contribution of people who create and share knowledge
(Holland, 1999; Gloet and Berrel, 2003; Bollinger and Smith, 2001). The fifth cultural
factor is process. It refers to the extent the knowledge management initiatives meet the
organizational objectives to promote knowledge sharing, knowledge transfer and
knowledge flow. Bollinger and Smith (2001) asserted the need for knowledge to be
recognized as strategic asset that must be linked with organizational objectives. As
knowledge is resided in people, the people are seen as a crucial cultural factor that is
inter-related with other cultural factors. Therefore, some researchers claimed that
effective knowledge management needs to focus on people as one of its core values
through human resource management (HRM) interventions (Salleh Yahya and Goh,
2002; Gloet and Berrel, 2003). Strong and dedicated leadership that walk the talk is
seen as a must-have cultural factor. In addition, the leadership’s role is critical to create
the vision, mission, objectives and ethics codes of the knowledge management system
(DeTienne, Dyer, Hoopes, and Harris, 2004; Holland, 1999).

DeTienne, Dyer, Hoopes, and Harris (2004) further argued that the most effective
organizational culture to support knowledge management is the culture that is
characterized with cooperative involvement and trust. These authors concentrated on
the soft aspects of the organizational culture and not so much on the structure and
system of the organizations. Other writers proposed a knowledge-supportive or
knowledge sharing culture as the most desirable organizational culture in order to
ensure knowledge management’s success (Ribiere and Sitar, 2003; McDermott and
O’Dell, 2001; Bollinger and Smith; 2001). Knowledge-supportive culture is an
environment where employees are empowered and willing to disseminate information
(Ribiere and Sitar, 2003) whereby knowledge-sharing culture refers to employee
willingness to share knowledge as part of the ways of working (McDermott and O’Dell,
2001). In this paper, both terms are used interchangeably to indicate the needs to
achieve both ends and the complementary nature of both terms.
 As evident from the above discussion, organizational culture has been in the
limelight in the context of knowledge management development. It is recognized that
organizational culture does in fact play a critical role. Yet, what is ironic is the fact that
the significant leadership’s role in the creation and management of organizational
culture that support knowledge management initiatives has been downplayed. Most
knowledge management-organizational culture literatures view leadership as part of
the cultural factors that needs to be simultaneously addressed. For example, Holland
(1999) detailed down ten ways to embed knowledge management into organizational
culture and scantly mentioned that all these actions must be “consistently applied along
with massive doses of leadership by example”. Robbins (2003) in his article titled
“Harnessing Group Memory to build a Knowledge- Sharing Culture” mentioned that
cultural change “requires a strong commitment from the top” without further elaborations
on the impacts of leaders on the knowledge sharing culture.

Other researchers proposed Chief Knowledge Officers as an important element to

overcome barriers of knowledge management (DeTienne, Dyer, Hoopes, and Harris,
2004). Nevertheless, in reality the CKOs positions would not be created without the
organizational leadership’s consent and their responsibilities are also limited to
managing knowledge as strategic assets (Nonaka, Toyama and Konna, 2002). Despite
this lack of acknowledgement and fragmented evidence of leadership roles in
numerous literatures, further scrutiny on the organizational culture literatures showed
that leadership is the single most important factor in term of creation, management and
change of any organizational culture, which includes knowledge-supportive or
knowledge-sharing organizational culture.

The Influence of Leadership on Organizational Culture

Schein (1992) in particular described in details the significant roles of leadership in

the creation and management of organizational culture throughout organizational
growth; early life, midlife and maturity and decline. During the formation of
organizations, leaders or founders have a major impact on how the early members of
the organization define and solve their “external adaptation and internal integration
problems”. Since founders or leaders are usually entrepreneurs who have a high level
of self-confidence and determination, they usually impose strong assumptions to their
invented organizations. When their assumptions survive and successful in the business
environment, the assumptions will be perceived as correct and eventually will be
internalized as part of the organizational culture. Furthermore, founders or leaders tend
to select other organizational members that have the similar assumptions and therefore
strengthen the foundation of the organizational culture. Organizational members who
have conflicting views on organizational culture tend to leave and thus creating a more
homogeneous climate for those who remains. Schein (1992) proposed two types of
mechanisms used by the leaders/founders to integrate their assumptions in the
organizational culture.

The culture-embedding mechanisms are as follows;

Primary Embedding Mechanisms Secondary Articulation and

Reinforcement Mechanisms

What leaders pay attention to, measure and control Organizational design and structure
on regular basis
Organizational systems and
How leaders react to critical incidents and procedures
organizational crises
Organizational rites and rituals.
Observed criteria by which leaders allocate scarce
resources Design of physical space, facades,
and buildings
Deliberate role modeling, teaching, and coaching
Stories, legends, and myths about
Observed criteria by which leaders allocate rewards people and events
and status
Formal statements of organizational
Observed criteria by which leaders recruit, select, philosophy, values and creed.
promote, retire, and ex-communicate organizational
members.

Adapted from Schein (1992)

In organizations, the secondary mechanisms are sometimes labeled as

organizational climate and they are a reflection and manifestation of cultural
assumptions derived from the leaders, especially at the initial formation of the
organizations. These secondary mechanisms can become a powerful reinforcement of
the primary mechanisms used by the leaders. The principles of using the secondary
mechanisms are that they must be consistent with the primary mechanisms and leaders
need to set an example.

The dynamics of midlife, maturity and declining organizations in term of the influence
of leaders are quite different from the early stage of organization formation. For
example, in the midlife organizations, the culture determines the leadership as
founders have been replaced with newer generations of CEOs. The new breed of
leaders needs to understand the organizational culture and decide which cultural
assumptions that needs to be changed. In short, they become the cultural change
agents. They can promote changes through systematic promotion of desired subculture,
use planned organizational development projects, create parallel learning structure or
unfreezing and change through technological seduction (Schein, 1992). When the
organizations enter into the maturity and decline phase, which may indicate that the
existing organizational culture becomes outdated, the leaders need to start the change
process at a more pervasive level. At this juncture, leaders with transformational
leadership style are often desirable (Politis, 2001; Schein 1992).

Drawing from the given importance of leadership roles in organizational culture

formation and management described above, it is apparent that in order to cultivate
organizational cultures that support knowledge management initiative, leadership that
favor and believe in the importance of knowledge management is mandatory.
Leadership that is not supportive of knowledge management initiatives or believe that
knowledge management is just another ‘quick-fix’ solution would not be able to mobilize
the organizational culture to knowledge supportive culture. Leaders who are
‘knowledge-conscious’ will act and think favorably in the knowledge management
direction. Accordingly, organizational resources, systems and structure will reflect the
cultural assumptions of the leaders via the use of secondary mechanisms proposed by
Schein (1992). Furthermore, leaders who plan to implement knowledge management
initiatives need to assess the stage of their organizational growth as different types of
cultural transformation mechanisms should deployed in accordance to the different
stages of organizational growth.

Viitala (2004) agreed with Schein’s contention on the significant roles played by
leadership on the knowledge-supportive organizational culture. She asserted that
leaders are “ creators of organizational climate…who make interventions to the
community of work is safe and supportive in order to facilitate learning”. She further
proposed the term knowledge leadership as the most suitable leadership in
knowledge management implementation. Knowledge leadership is a participative
leadership that create climate to promote learning, support learning process at
individual and group level and inspires employees toward continual development. The
most important principle is that the knowledge leaders must “lead by example”. Riebera
and Sitar (2003) did not propose any new breed of leadership for the knowledge
management but highlighted the imperative roles of leadership in implementation of
knowledge-supportive culture. Basing their arguments on the pivotal roles of leaders as
cultural transforming agent, they outlined the following criteria for leadership in
knowledge management;

a. Thorough understanding on the characteristics of knowledge

management.
b. Employment of the right workers and motivate them to constantly learn,
communicate more and to share their knowledge with others
c. Build authorities on professional knowledge and personal charisma.
d. Cultivate skills that build confidence and engagement as leading
knowledge workers can be attained through intellectual power, conviction,
persuasion and interactive dialogue.
 e. Actively engaged and committed to support knowledge sharing and
learning activities
f. Reward knowledge and learning activities done by employees
g. Use participative decision-making process
h. Have coaching skills.
i. Be good storytellers that incorporate the importance of knowledge
management.
j. Build a culture of trust by demonstrating concern, keeping promises,
morality, fairness, openness, honesty, discretion, consistency, integrity,
accessibility and delivering expected results.

A research worth highlighting is done by Politis (2001) on the relationship of different

types of leaderships to knowledge management. Finding of his research showed that
leadership styles that involve human interaction and encourage participative decision-
making process were positively related to the knowledge management initiatives.
Specifically, leadership styles that were characterized by mutual trust and respect for
subordinates’ ideas and feelings were particularly related to knowledge acquisition
attributes. Although Politis (2001) did not mention directly the effect of leadership on
organizational culture, he acknowledged the dynamics of leadership in fostering
knowledge management initiatives, which centers on the creation of knowledge-sharing
culture.

Leadership also forms a foundation in knowledge creation process. According to

Nonaka, Toyama and Konno (2002), leadership in the knowledge-creating process is
achieved through four basic means, which are;

a. Providing knowledge vision

b. Developing and promoting knowledge assets
c. Creating and energizing ba
d. Enabling and promoting the continuos spiral of knowledge creation.

Favoring the distributive leadership over the top-down leadership, they provide
support to Schein’s contention on the importance of leadership in shaping desirable
organizational culture. The vision articulated by the leaders is the all-encompassing
element that affects all layers of knowledge-creating process. It defines the values
system and the organizational culture of the organization, which in turn will evaluate,
justify and determine the quality of the knowledge the organization creates.

Conclusion
 From the first part of the discussion, it is apparent that organizational culture has
significant effect on the implementation of knowledge management initiatives.
Knowledge-supportive organizational culture needs to promote free flow of information
among employees across organizational hierarchies, cultivates trust for knowledge-
sharing and using and align organizational structure, rewards system and process in
congruence with the knowledge management initiatives. In the second part, we highlight
the pervasive role of leadership in shaping the desired knowledge-supportive culture.
Organizational culture is seen as a reflection of the leadership’s aspiration, especially at
the growth stage of the organization. Only leaders of the organisations are in the
position to mobilize all available organizational resources toward the desired goals.

In Malaysian context, we feel that leadership is the main issue to be tackled prior to
organizational culture. This is especially true since many organizations; especially the
small and medium enterprises are at growth stage of development. Nevertheless,
further validation through empirical studies on this issue is warranted.

REFERENCES

Baker, J.H and Baker, G.A (2001). “ Leadership, Culture and Knowledge
Management”, weLEAD Online Magazine. Leadendtoday.org.

Bollinger, A. S and Smith, R.D. (2001). “ Managing Organizational Knowledge as a

Strategic Asset.”, Journal of Knowledge Management, Vol. 5. No. 1, pp. 8-18

Celep. C. and Cetin, B. (2005). “Teachers’ Perception about the Behaviors of School
Leaders with regard to Knowledge Management”. The International Journal of
Education Management. Vol.19, No. 2, pp. 102-117

Davenport, T.H and Prusak, L. (1998). Working Knowledge: How Organizations

Manage What They Know. Harvard Business School Press. Boston.

Chin-loy, C. (2003). “Assessing the Influence of Organizational Culture on

Knowledge Management Success. The Wayne Huizeng School of Business and
Entrepreneurship. Nova Southeastern University. UMI Dissertation.

Chin, K. F. (2001). “Developing a Knowledge Management Strategy”.

Pricewaterhouse Coopers.

Crawford, C. B. (2004). “Transformational Leadership, Innovation and Knowledge

Management: Empirical Findings and Emergent Conclusions”. Fort Hays State
University, KS.

De Long, D. W. and Fahey, L. (2000). Diagnosing Cultural Barriers to Knowledge

Management. The Academy of Management Executive. Vol. 14, No. 4, pp. 113-127
 DeTienne, K.B, Dyer, G., Hoopes, C. and Harris, S. (2004). “ Toward a Model of
Effective Knowledge Management and Directions for Future Research: Culture,
Leadership, and CKOs”, Journal of Leadership and Organizational Studies, Vol. 10,
No. 4, pp. 26-43.

Gloet, M. and Berrel, M. (2003). “ The Dual Paradigm Nature of Knowledge

Management: Implications for Achieving Quality Outcomes in Human Resource
Management”, Journal of Knowledge Management, Vol. 7, No. 1, pp. 78-89.

Guptara, P. (1999). “ Why Knowledge Management Fails: How to Avoid Common

Pitfalls “. Knowledge Management Review. Issue 9, July/August, pp. 26-29.

Holowetzki, A. (2002). “The Relationship between Knowledge Management and

Organizational Culture: An Examination of Cultural Factors that Supports the Floe and
Management of Knowledge within an Organization”. University of Oregon Applied
Information Management Program

Holland, D. (1999). “ Ten Ways to Embed KM into Organizational Culture”.

Knowledge Management Review. Issue 7, March/April.

Knapp, E and Yu, D. (1999). “Understanding Organizational Culture: How Culture

Helps or Hinders the Flow of Knowledge”. Knowledge Management Review. Issue 7,
March/April, pp. 16-21

Marr, B. (2003). “ Consider the Culture mwhen Benchmarking KM Processes”. KM

Review. Vol. 5, No. 5, pp. 6-7.

Mason, D. and Pauleen, D. J. (2003). “Perceptions of Knowledge Management: A

Qualitative Analysis”. Journal of Knowledge Management. Vol. 7, No. 4, pp. 38-48

McDermott, R and O’Dell, C (2001). “Overcoming Cultural Barriers to Sharing

Knowledge”, Journal of Knowledge Management. Vol 5, No. 1, pp. 76-85.

Mustafa Mansur (2003). Entrepreneurship and Innovation in the Knowledge-based

Economy: Challenges and Strategies. Report of the APO Symposium on
Entrepreneurship in Knowledge-based Industry. Asian Productivity Organization. Tokyo,
Japan.

Nonaka, I, Toyama, R and Konno, N. (2002) “SECI, Ba and Leadership: a Unified

Model of Dynami Knowledge Creation” in Little, S., Quitas, P and Ray, T. (2002) Eds.
Managing Knowledge: An Essential Reader. Sage Publication. London.

Politis, J. D. (2001). “The Relationships of Various Leadership Styles to Knowledge

Management”. Leadership and Organization Development Journal. Vol. 22. No.8, pp.
354-364
 Quintas, P. (2002) “Managing Knowledge in a New Century”. In Little, S., Quitas, P
and Ray, T. (2002) Eds. Managing Knowledge: An Essential Reader. Sage Publication.
London.

Ribiere, V.M. and Sitar, A.S. (2003). “ Critical Role of Leadership in Nurturing a
Knowledge-supporting Culture”. Knowledge Management Research & Practice. Pp. 39-
48.

Robbins, R.F. (2003). “Harnessing Group Memory to Build a Knowledge-Sharing

Culture”. Of Counsel. Vol. 22, No. 6, pp. 7-11.

Rowley, J. (1999). What is Knowledge Management?. Library Management. Vol. 20,

No. 8, pp. 416-420

Schein, E. H. (1992). Organizational Culture and Leadership. Second Ed. Jossey-

Bass, San Francisco.

Salleh Yahya, Goh, W.K. (2002) “ Managing Human Resources towards Achieving
Knowledge Management” Journal of Knowledge Management. Vol. 6, No. 5, pp. 457-
468.

Viitala, R. (2004). “ Towards Knowledge Leadership”. Leadership and Organization

Development Journal. Vol 25, N0. 26, pp. 528-544
Organizational change and characteristics of leadership
effectiveness.
By Gilley, Ann,McMillan, Heather S.,Gilley, Jerry W.

Publication: Journal of Leadership & Organizational Studies

Date: Saturday, August 1 2009

Competent management is one source of sustainable competitive advantage in contemporary, rapidly

changing organizations (Nohria, Joyce, & Roberson, 2003; Waldman, Ramirez, House, & Puranam,
2001). The behaviors of organizational leaders directly influence actions in the work environment that
enable change (Drucker, 1999; Gilley, 2005; Howkins, 2001). Leaders and managers are responsible for
change strategy, implementation, and monitoring, thus they function as change agents (Kanter, Stein, &
Jick, 1992). As a result, the challenge of managing change is one of the most fundamental and enduring
roles of leaders (Ahn, Adamson, & Dornbusch, 2004), whereas the rapidly accelerating pace of
organizational change has made effective leadership imperative.

Organizations that support and implement continuous and transformational change remain competitive
(Cohen, 1999). Research has attempted to explain the fundamentals of change, explain why change is so
difficult to achieve, and develop models to manage the change process. Despite the proliferation of
numerous theories, models, and multistep approaches, leaders continue to lack a clear understanding of
change, its antecedents, effective processes, or the ability to successfully engage organizational
members in change initiatives (Armenakis & Harris, 2002).

Recent research indicates that change programs rarely achieve desired results. A growing body of
evidence reveals that change programs often fail or make the situation worse (Beer, Eisenstat, & Spector,
1990). In a recent study of 40 major change initiatives, 58% failed and 20% realized a third or less of the
value expected (LaClair & Rao, 2002). Other studies of change efforts have reported failure rates of one
third to two thirds (Beer & Nohria, 2000; Bibler, 1989) and as high as 80% to 90% (Cope, 2003). Gill
(2003) suggests that these results are due to a lack of effective leadership.

We extend previous research on organizational change by investigating the interrelationship of leader

behaviors and change. The purpose of this study was to explore leaders' effectiveness in implementing
change and the variables (skills/abilities) that influence that effectiveness. Our reference to leaders
implies all leaders and managers within an organization. The literature review that follows explores
change and the leadership behaviors positively associated with successful change.
Change

A large and cumulative literature explores the roles, responsibilities, and attributes of leaders with respect
to change. An increasing emphasis on change as a critical driver of organizational success has fueled
organizational and academic investigation of change practices, methodologies, and results (Drucker,
1999; Ford & Gioia, 2000; Friedman, 2005; IBM, 2008; Johansson, 2004). Recent studies have also
explored change as a variable in creating organizational competitive advantage (Florida, 2005; Friedman,
2005; Howkins, 2001). The research has been primarily descriptive and based on observations of
managers, subordinates, or peers with regard to leaders' knowledge, skills, abilities, and effectiveness.

The complexity of organizational change warrants broad examination. According to Miles (2001), any
change, regardless of its size, has a cascading effect on an organization. Organizational change at the
corporate or macro level focuses on strategy and business models (IBM, 2006), structure, processes,
culture, technology, products, and services (Lewis, 1994), often affecting multiple leadership or reporting
lines, incorporation of new technologies, acquisitions or expansion, or downsizing. More than ever,
managing the complexities of change confronts leaders at all organizational levels (Biech, 2007), whether
the manager is frontline/administrative, middle, or senior/ executive (Katz & Kahn, 1966). The pyramidal
shape of organizations reflects the largest numbers of employees in frontline ranks, with the fewest at the
top. Top management develops the organization's vision, mission, and strategic long-term plans and
corporatewide change initiatives. Middle management furthers executive strategies and plans by
developing shorter term operational plans that give life to top management directives. Frontline managers
actually implement operational plans and engage in the daily work, processes, and changes required to
satisfy middle and upper management proposals (Lussier, 2009). As a consequence, frontline supervisors
and their employees engage in significant change, bearing the brunt of its implementation.

Inherent in organizational change is uncertainty with regard to how individuals should act and the
outcomes to be expected (Rousseau, 1995). Changes that modify existing authority or role structures
generate ambiguity and confusion with regard to appropriate, effective action and in-role behavior
(Wheatley, 1992). Structural changes challenge organizational goals and desired outcomes, ultimately
affecting quality of work life as employees struggle to align business changes with their own interests
(Wrzesniewski & Dutton, 2001). Successful implementation of change ultimately results in modified
employee behavior.

An evolutionary perspective views change as transitional, transformational, or developmental. Transitional

change represents small, gradual, even incremental changes in people, policies, procedures, technology,
culture, or structures. These common changes are driven and orchestrated by management for units,
departments, divisions, or the entire organization.

Radical shifts in underlying assumptions, deep-seated mindsets, culture, strategy, or other significant
organizational paradigms involve transformational change (Kuhn, 1970). Although extreme and
sometimes revolutionary, successful transformational change has been positively linked to increased
competitiveness when firms are able to clearly differentiate themselves in the market (Denning, 2005). To
the contrary, a host of corporate results and research highlight the rarity with which organizations
successfully achieve transformational change (Beer & Nohria, 2000; Cope, 2003; IBM, 2008).

Developmental change flows from an organization-wide philosophy of continuous growth and

development that leads to increasing competitive advantage through dynamic stability--a culture of
continuous dynamic yet manageable change (Abrahamson, 2000). Developmental change occurs when
firms continually scan their internal and external environments to create work settings that encourage and
reward individual innovation, growth, and development, while avoiding radical, infrequent yet disruptive
large-scale change (Gilley & Maycunich, 2000).

Weick and Quinn (1999) described organizational change as either episodic or continuous. Episodic
change is infrequent, sometimes radical, and more likely to be experienced intensely (Matlin & Stang,
1978). Continuous change, conversely, may be incremental, emergent, and without end. Negative events
often indicate maladaptation or a threat to survival and trigger the need to change, whereas positive,
more common events are less intense and invoke a more subdued response (Cameron, 2008). Whether
continuous or radical, researchers agree that change is a nonlinear process (Coghlan, 2000; Doyle,
Claydon, & Buchanan, 2000) and that the pace of change is increasing (Quinn, 2004; Weick & Sutcliffe,
2001).

Numerous change models have been developed in an effort to understand change and its phases,
individual and organizational rates of acceptance, and processes through which leaders may guide their
organizations through the process. For example, in his research on adoption of innovations, Rogers
(2003) explains individual acceptance rates of change along with the varied ways and rates in which
individuals undertake change. In his studies, an innovation represents any large or small action, idea,
object, or procedure an individual views as new. One's response to a change depends on one's opinion of
the extent of newness associated with the change. How and when the change is accepted relies largely
on the methods of communication used and their perceived appropriateness by the individual.
Rogers (2003) explains that acceptance of change occurs in the stages of awareness, interest, trial, the
decision to continue or quit, and adoption. Individuals have been categorized based on their overall
acceptance of change as (a) innovators, (b) early adopters, (c) early majority, (d) late majority, and (e)
laggards. Those who desire change are called innovators; individuals who like change and challenges are
early adopters; those who prefer to observe the effect of change on others prior to engaging in change
themselves are the early majority; the skeptical, suspicious, and hesitant to change are the late majority;
and individuals who resist or completely reject change are called laggards or nonadopters.

Early researchers developed relatively simple change models that emphasized initial evaluation of an
organization, preparation for change, change actions, and securing change into daily organizational
operations and culture. Lewin (1951), for example, created a classic three-step change model of
unfreezing and readying workers and organizations for change, movement and active engagement in
change activities and processes, and refreezing new behaviors and procedures into routine organizational
practices and culture.

More recent, researchers have created multistep models of change that involve varied organizational
dimensions such as culture, leadership, communications, motivation, employee engagement, structure,
rewards, and teamwork, to name a few. Models by Burke and Litwin (1992), Nadler and Tushman (1980),
and Tichy (1983) indicate the importance of internal and external influences such as culture, structure,
individual needs and values, goal setting, and feedback, among others. Conceptualizations by Kotter
(1996) and Ulrich (1998) include leadership, shared need, guiding coalitions, commitment,
communicating, changing structures, empowering others, and making change last.

These models have been criticized for their linear supposition and rigid steps, inability to account for the
complexities of change, discounting of the human factor, and failure to prepare for resistance to change
(Gilley, 2005). Doyle et al. (2000) reported that change agents find the numerous models to be too
"prepackaged" while failing to address the linkages and contradictions in change. According to Nadler
(1998), "the reality of change in the organizational trenches defies rigid academic models as well as
superficial management fads" (p. 3). As a consequence, the importance of the leader's ability to
implement change is clear.

Leaders' Skills and Abilities

Organizational change does not occur unless member groups and individuals change (Coghlan, 2000;
Katz & Kahn, 1966; Sullivan, Sullivan, & Buffton, 2002) by adopting different behaviors, processes,
frameworks, routines, values, or goals. As a result, understanding the individual, group, and
organizational processes that must occur to drive positive change proves critical for leaders.

The change models previously examined suggest a relationship between change process actions and
outcomes, hence the need to review associated leader skills that underlie their behaviors and actions. A
1990s study of Fortune 1000 companies revealed that nearly half regarded their leadership capacity as
"fair to poor" (Csoka, 1997); a follow-up study indicated that leadership capacity was "good" or "excellent"
in only about one third of firms (Barrett & Beeson, 2002).

Leaders' thoughts and skills are manifested in actions, structures, and processes that enhance or impede
change, further strengthening the linkage between leader behaviors and effectiveness in implementing
change. For example, change management skills have been positively linked to successful organizational
change. Conversely, lack of change management skills or understanding of change implementation
techniques, the inability to alter one's management style, and failure to modify organizational systems or
structures have been identified as barriers to success (Bossidy & Charan, 2002; Gilley, 2005). Research
has revealed that additional barriers to change include the lack of or poor communication skills, the
inability to induce others to change, and management's failure to reward workers who try to change
(Burke, 1992; Kotter, 1996; Patterson, 1997; Ulrich, 1998).

Related leadership theories include trait, behavioral, and multiple contemporary views. Although
leadership trait theory suggests that successful leaders rely on a set of psychological traits (Ilies, Scott, &
Judge, 2006), more than 300 studies have failed to produce a definitive list of agreed-on traits common to
all effective leaders (Bass, 1990). However, several traits have been identified as significant, including
supervisory ability, intelligence, the need for achievement, decisiveness, self-assurance, and initiative
(Ghiselli, 1971). Behavioral theorists explore the relationship between distinctive leadership styles and
results, such as McGregor's (1966) Theory X and Y, and behaviors that are autocratic, democratic, or
laissez-faire (Lussier & Achua, 2007). Varied contemporary views of leadership posit leaders as being
charismatic, transformational, transactional, learning, servant, or developmental (Collins, 2001; Gilley &
Maycunich, 2000; Greenleaf & Spears, 2002; Senge, 1990).

Our research explored leadership behaviors and their effect on organizational change, with the
understanding that behaviors are grounded in one's traits and skills (Lewin, Lippert, & White, 1939). The
variables explored in the study were distilled from research on leadership skills and behaviors related to
change by Burke (1992), Conner (1992), Gill (2003), Gilley (2005), Kotter (1996), Sims (2002), and Ulrich
(1998). Comparison of these research streams and models led to a manageable set of common
variables: coaching, communicating, involving others, motivating, rewarding, and building teams. It is
within this complex myriad of variables that we approached our study of leaders and organizational
change. Our primary questions were as follows: (a) How effective are leaders in implementing change
within their organizations? and (b) What specific leader behaviors are most significantly associated with
one's ability to successfully implement change initiatives?

Method

A host of research reveals that success in change implementation is uncommon (Beer et al., 1990; Cope,
2003; LaClair & Rao, 2002), despite abundant models and theories for successful change facilitation
(Burke & Litwin, 1992; Kotter, 1996; Lewin, 1951; Ulrich, 1998). For example, a recent survey of CEOs
revealed that only 55% of them believe their recent change efforts were "quite" or "very" successful,
whereas 13% admitted that such efforts were "unsuccessful" or "a little successful" (IBM, 2006, p. 45).
Figures such as these support a negative outlook on change success. Our study explored leaders' efforts
and effectiveness in implementing change from their subordinates' perspectives.

Research Questions

To determine whether behaviors do predict leader effectiveness in implementing change, we designed a

study with a twofold purpose. First, we explored whether leaders effectively implement change in their
organizations from the perspective of employees. Second, we investigated the frequency with which
leaders exhibit skills and behaviors associated with successful organizational change. We chose to use
subordinate ratings of behavior to predict overall leader effectiveness; subordinates are thought to provide
the most accurate ratings of typical leader performance (Hogan, Curphy, & Hogan, 1994). Separate
sources eliminated common method bias.