The Myth of Leadership

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The Myth of Leadership: Creating Leaderless Organizations [1] is a book written by former Brigham Young University lecturer Jeffrey Nielsen, who teaches philosophy at Westminster College, Salt Lake City, Utah and at Utah Valley University, Orem, Utah.

Brigham Young University private research university located in Provo, Utah, United States

Brigham Young University is a private, non-profit research university in Provo, Utah, United States completely owned by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and run under the auspices of its Church Educational System. Approximately 99 percent of the students are members of the LDS Church and one-third of its U.S. students are from Utah. The university's primary focus is on undergraduate education, but it also has 68 master's and 25 doctoral degree programs.

Jeffrey Nielsen is founder of the Democracy House Project, and a published author. He is also a philosophy instructor at Westminster College, Salt Lake City; and Utah Valley University, Orem, Utah. He is perhaps best known for being both a supporter of gay marriage and a practicing Mormon.

Utah Valley University public university in Orem, Utah, United States

Utah Valley University (UVU) is a public university in Orem, Utah. UVU offers Master's, Bachelor's, and Associate degrees. Previously called Utah Valley State College, the school attained university status in July 2008.

Contents

Basis

The book is based on Neilsen's concept of the "myth of leadership."

Professor Nielsen argues that we frequently use the words "leader" and "leadership" metaphorically to refer to some talent or skill that is needed, which use does little damage as well as little good. However he adds, when we use the words formally to designate officially someone as a leader or some position as involving leadership, then we create unhealthy and deleterious organizational and community relationships.

Leadership is both a research area and a practical skill encompassing the ability of an individual or organization to "lead" or guide other individuals, teams, or entire organizations. Specialist literature debates various viewpoints, contrasting Eastern and Western approaches to leadership, and also United States versus European approaches. U.S. academic environments define leadership as "a process of social influence in which a person can enlist the aid and support of others in the accomplishment of a common task".

Organization social entity with a collective goal; social units of people that are structured and managed to meet a need, or to pursue collective goals

An organization or organisation is an entity comprising multiple people, such as an institution or an association, that has a particular purpose.

An interpersonal relationship is a strong, deep, or close association or acquaintance between two or more people that may range in duration from brief to enduring. This association may be based on inference, love, solidarity, support, regular business interactions, or some other type of social connection or commitment. Interpersonal relationships thrive through equitable and reciprocal compromise, they are formed in the context of social, cultural and other influences. The context can vary from family or kinship relations, friendship, marriage, relations with associates, work, clubs, neighborhoods, and places of worship. They may be regulated by law, custom, or mutual agreement, and are the basis of social groups and society as a whole.

As soon as we formally designate a leader, Nielsen argues, we set up within an organization a dichotomy: two groups - to one we assign duties, and to the other we assign privileges. We confer unique and powerful privileges upon the few leaders and specify numerous duties to be obeyed by the many followers. The followers, the vast majority, are consigned to an inferior status, even to be sacrificed, if needs be, to preserve and protect the power and privilege of those designated as leaders – whether through layoffs, war, tax cuts, or even welfare reform. To the leaders, the élite few, we grant the rights and privileges to command and control the vast resources, most importantly the information and decision-making power. There are no exceptions to this split between the privileged few and the burdened many – it will occur, Nielsen believes, in any and every organization that formally designates individuals as leaders and positions as leadership positions.

Dichotomy splitting of a whole into exactly two non-overlapping parts; dyadic relations and processes

A dichotomy is a partition of a whole into two parts (subsets). In other words, this couple of parts must be

Sacrifice offering to gods

Sacrifice is the offering of food, objects or the lives of animals or humans to a higher purpose, in particular divine beings, as an act of propitiation or worship. While sacrifice often implies the ritual killing of an animal, the term offering can be used for bloodless sacrifices of food or artifacts. For offerings of liquids (beverages) by pouring, the term libation is used.

Power (social and political) ability to influence the behavior of people with or without resistance

In social science and politics, power is the capacity of an individual to influence the conduct (behaviour) of others. The term "authority" is often used for power that is perceived as legitimate by the social structure. Power can be seen as evil or unjust. This sort of primitive exercise of power is historically endemic to humans; however, as social beings, the same concept is seen as good and as something inherited or given for exercising humanistic objectives that will help, move, and empower others as well. In general, it is derived by the factors of interdependence between two entities and the environment. In business, the ethical instrumentality of power is achievement, and as such it is a zero-sum game. In simple terms it can be expressed as being "upward" or "downward". With downward power, a company's superior influences subordinates for attaining organizational goals. When a company exerts upward power, it is the subordinates who influence the decisions of their leader or leaders.

Just as soon as we call someone the leader, Nielsen says, we have created a rank-based context that defines power as “power-over", even to the extent of coercion and manipulation; authority as the right to exercise power in a command-and-control manner; and hierarchy as the means of transmission of authority from the top down through privileged delegation. There is no way to avoid this - it is inevitable. Professor Nielsen relates it to what Michel Foucault might have called the discourse formation of the concept of leadership, and it is what Stephen Austin would call the speech act of leader.[ citation needed ]

Social status position within social structure

Social status is the level of respect, honor, assumed competence, and deference accorded to people, groups, and organizations in a society. Some writers have also referred to a socially valued role or category a person occupies as a "status". At its core, status is about who members of a society believe hold comparatively more or less social value. By definition, these beliefs about who is more or less valued are broadly shared among members of a society. As such, groups use status hierarchies to allocate resources, leadership positions, and other forms of power. In so doing, these shared cultural beliefs make unequal distributions of resources and power appear natural and fair, supporting systems of social stratification. Status hierarchies appear to be universal across human societies, affording valued benefits to those who occupy the higher rungs, such as better health, social approval, resources, influence, and freedom.

Authority is the right to exercise power, which can be formalized by a state and exercised by way of judges, appointed executives of government, or the ecclesiastical or priestly appointed representatives of a God or other deities.

Command and control is a military term with several definitions.

The myth of leadership creates a rank-based culture where the leaders possess special privilege to speak and the followers possess an unreciprocated obligation to listen; where the leaders are entitled to monopolize information, control decision-making, and command obedience, thus establishing a culture of secrecy and inauthentic communication. The myth of leadership justifies an organization, whether political, religious, or corporate where:

Culture societys way of life within anthropology

Culture is the social behavior and norms found in human societies. Culture is considered a central concept in anthropology, encompassing the range of phenomena that are transmitted through social learning in human societies. Cultural universals are found in all human societies; these include expressive forms like art, music, dance, ritual, religion, and technologies like tool usage, cooking, shelter, and clothing. The concept of material culture covers the physical expressions of culture, such as technology, architecture and art, whereas the immaterial aspects of culture such as principles of social organization, mythology, philosophy, literature, and science comprise the intangible cultural heritage of a society.

Values

The implications of the peer principle [2] require that the following values be recognized, respected, and implemented:[ citation needed ]

  1. openness with information – as opposed to the secrecy allowed and considered legitimate with leaders and leadership.
  2. transparency in the decision-making process, which requires greater participation of all affected parties – as opposed to the top-down and behind closed door decision-making allowed and considered legitimate with leaders and leadership.
  3. cooperation and sharing of management roles and responsibilities, which requires the exercise of power-in-common – as opposed to the command and control nature of the exercise of power-over allowed and considered legitimate with leaders and leadership.
  4. commitment to peer deliberation as the legitimate exercise of authority – as opposed to the rank-based exercise of coercive, manipulative, or even persuasive authority allowed and considered legitimate with leaders and leadership.

Related Research Articles

Sovereignty concept that a state or governing body has the right and power to govern itself without outside interference

Sovereignty is the full right and power of a governing body over itself, without any interference from outside sources or bodies. In political theory, sovereignty is a substantive term designating supreme authority over some polity.

Central Military Commission (China) Peoples Republic of China political bodies governing the military

The Central Military Commission (CMC) refers to the parallel national defense organizations of the Communist Party of China and the People's Republic of China: the Central Military Commission of the Communist Party of China, a Party organ under the CPC Central Committee, and the Central Military Commission of the People's Republic of China, a central state organ under the National People's Congress, being the military branch of the national government.

Leadership development expands the capacity of individuals to perform in leadership roles within organizations. Leadership roles are those that facilitate execution of a company’s strategy through building alignment, winning mindshare and growing the capabilities of others. Leadership roles may be formal, with the corresponding authority to make decisions and take responsibility, or they may be informal roles with little official authority.

Charismatic authority is a concept of leadership developed by the German sociologist Max Weber. It involves a type of organization or a type of leadership in which authority derives from the charisma of the leader. This stands in contrast to two other types of authority: legal authority and traditional authority. Each of the three types forms part of Max Weber's tripartite classification of authority.

"The Three Types of Legitimate Rule" is an essay written by Max Weber, a German economist and sociologist, explaining his tripartite classification of authority. Originally published in the journal Preussische Jahrbücher 187, 1-2, 1922, an English translation, translated by Hans Gerth, was published in the journal Berkeley Publications in Society and Institutions 4(1): 1-11, 1958. Weber also refers to the three types of legitimate rule in his famous essay "Politics as a Vocation."

Weber's ideas about legitimate rule also appear in his Basic Concepts in Sociology and The Theory of Social and Economic Organization.

The translation of the German word Herrschaft is at the heart of understanding Weber's point about political legitimacy. The translation Rule was employed in the 1958 essay translation by the key early Weber translator Hans Gerth, and is in the title of the essay as translated here. Other translators of Weber including Alexander M. Henderson and Talcott Parsons, translated Herrschaft as authority. Weber translators Tony Waters and Dagmar Waters discuss the difficulties in translating Herrschaft as well, typically using "dominion" and "domination" in addition to the original German Herrschaft

Rational-legal authority form of leadership in which the authority of an organization or a ruling regime is largely tied to legal rationality, legal legitimacy and bureaucracy

Rational-legal authority is a form of leadership in which the authority of an organization or a ruling regime is largely tied to legal rationality, legal legitimacy and bureaucracy. The majority of the modern states of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries are rational-legal authorities, according to those who use this form of classification.

The Constitution of the State of Hawaii refers to various legal documents throughout the history of the Hawaiian Islands that defined the fundamental principles of authority and governance within its sphere of jurisdiction. Numerous constitutional documents have been promulgated for the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi, Republic of Hawaiʻi, Territory of Hawaiʻi and State of Hawaiʻi. The first constitution was drafted by Kamehameha III. A few notable constitutions are the Bayonet Constitution of 1887 which stripped King Kalakaua of some decision making abilities without concurrence of his cabinet, and the Proposed 1893 Constitution of the Kingdom of Hawaii, a replacement of the Bayonet Constitution promulgated by Queen Liliuokalani, which set off a chain of events that eventually resulted in the overthrow of the Kingdom of Hawaii. Other notable documents include the Constitution of 1978 that created the Office of Hawaiian Affairs and declared the Hawaiian language to be one of the official languages of the state.

Max Weber distinguished three ideal types of legitimate political leadership, domination and authority. He wrote about these three types of domination in both his essay The Three Types of Legitimate Rule which was published in his masterwork Economy and Society, and in his classic speech "Politics as a Vocation".

  1. charismatic authority,
  2. traditional authority and
  3. legal authority.

Leaderless resistance, or phantom cell structure, is a social resistance strategy in which small, independent groups, or individuals, challenge an established institution such as a law, economic system, social order, or government. Leaderless resistance can encompass anything from non-violent protest and civil disobedience to vandalism, terrorism, and other violent activity.

A toxic leader is a person who has responsibility over a group of people or an organization, and who abuses the leader–follower relationship by leaving the group or organization in a worse condition than when they first found them. The phrase was coined by Marcia Whicker in 1996 and is linked with a number of dysfunctional leadership styles. Other names include the little Hitler, manager from hell, the toxic boss, boss from hell or toxic manager. Their leadership style is both self-destructive and ultimately corporately harmful as they subvert and destroy organizational structures.

Robert K. Greenleaf (1904–1990) was the founder of the modern Servant leadership movement and the Greenleaf Center for Servant Leadership.

Democracy House Project is a non-profit organization founded by Professor Jeffrey Nielsen of Westminster College, Salt Lake City and Utah Valley University, Orem, Utah.

In a notable study of power conducted by social psychologists John R. P. French and Bertram Raven in 1959, power is divided into five separate and distinct forms. In 1965 Raven revised this model to include a sixth form by separating the informational power base as distinct from the expert power base.

Narcissistic leadership is a leadership style in which the leader is only interested in him/herself. Their priority is themselves – at the expense of their people/group members. This leader exhibits the characteristics of a narcissist: arrogance, dominance and hostility. It is a sufficiently common leadership style that it has acquired its own name. Narcissism is most often described as unhealthy and destructive. It has been described as "driven by unyielding arrogance, self-absorption, and a personal egotistic need for power and admiration".

Followership is the actions of someone in a subordinate role. It can also be considered as a specific set of skills that complement leadership, a role within a hierarchical organization, a social construct that is integral to the leadership process, or the behaviors engaged in while interacting with leaders in an effort to meet organizational objectives. As such, followership is best defined as an intentional practice on the part of the subordinate to enhance the synergetic interchange between the follower and the leader.

Authority bias is the tendency to attribute greater accuracy to the opinion of an authority figure and be more influenced by that opinion. This concept is considered one of the so-called social cognitive biases or collective cognitive biases. The Milgram experiment in 1961 was the classic experiment that established its existence.

References

  1. ↑ Nielsen, Jeffrey (2011) [2004]. The Myth of Leadership: Creating Leaderless Organizations (reprint ed.). Boston, Massachusetts: Nicholas Brealey Publishing. ISBN   9780891063261 . Retrieved 2017-08-15.
  2. ↑ Compare: Nielsen, Jeffrey (2008-01-01). "The Challenge of Building a Religious Learning Community". Salt Lake City: Sunstone Education Foundation, Inc. Retrieved 2017-08-15. We each possess equal privilege to speak and share equal and reciprocal obligation to listen. This peer principle can lead to meaningful dialogue, deliberation, and ultimately to a place of mutual trust.
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