Understanding and Responding to Destructive Leadership in School-Related Contexts: An Autopoietic Perspective

Leadership is integral to the health and wellbeing of individuals and organisations. Relevant literature typically assumes a conception of leadership as ethical influence for good purpose, yet it is not always so. When exercised destructively, leadership has the potential to cause personal distress, group dysfunction and cultural fracture. Although some theoretical literature discusses such leadership, there are few empirical studies. This study applies autopoietic theory to explore the existence and impact of destructive leadership in school-related contexts and suggest possible prevention and intervention strategies. The research methodology used is phenomenography, which seeks to understand a phenomenon by defining variation in collective experience. Fifteen interviews were undertaken with leaders in school-related settings who identified with having past experience of leadership practices they defined as destructive. The purposive sample population was cross-sectoral and cross–school phase. The study is framed by three research questions which aim to identify the qualitatively different ways by which the phenomenon can be understood. The findings suggest that destructive leadership causes significant, lasting and pervasive harm to individuals and organisations; that it is exercised as power and control without adequate checks and balances; derives from personality dispositions, professional inadequacy or aberrant values; and impacts in personal, interpersonal or intrapersonal cycles, mediated or mitigated through individual or social conditions. Five contributions emerge: a phenomenographically-derived framework to analyse a dysfunctional social system; an autopoietically-derived interpretation of individual, organisation and ethical impact; reinforcing vicious and virtuous circles of control and trust; a theory of ‘dysergy’, whereby the sum of the parts of a dysfunctional system constitute a diminished whole; and a whole system approach to intervention. The theoretical implication of the study is of the potential for personal and organisational learning, while the practical implication is for the application of a whole system model of leadership

The Holy Spirit and Christian Community: A Case Study in Theology and Practice.

Contemporary Christian communities often cite a scriptural basis as the justification for their shape and nature. Despite this foundation, the needs and tendencies of humanity and culture are often institutionalized and prioritized to the detriment of community effectiveness and mission. Based within the field of practical theology, this project explores the nature and possibility for Christian community when Christian community incorporates a pneumatological core that organically informs individual values, practices and relationships within and beyond the community. This organic constitution is in contrast to the contemporary top-down approach of instituting systems-based ‘one size fits all’ programs and processes. The purpose of this research is to propose enhancements to these systems-based approaches by incorporating the essential elements of the Spirit’s work such that the community becomes increasingly effective. I follow Fiddes’ integrated method in ecclesiology beginning with a case study of my experience of community formation using the Activate Small Group System within my local congregation. These experiences are dialogically challenged by contemporary and biblical community practices in order to propose a pneumatologically-shaped organic community model that serves to identify enhancements to the Activate framework. I conclude the study by proposing a series of enhancements to Activate that should be tested and evaluated for their capacity to improve community effectiveness. I argue that community is in reality a composition of numerous unique relationships between the Spirit and each individual community participant. In turn, these Spirit-shaped relationships inform the relational fabric amongst participants and between participants and their neighbours. From this Spirit-shaped organic composition, I then explore the nature and potential for fellowship and mission for participants and for the overall community. Finally, I consider the core leadership dynamics required to effectively support the community, its identity and mission. At the conclusion of this research, I suggest that if the community is to become truly effective, the role and contribution of the Holy Spirit is not only necessary, but also far more significant than is typically accepted within western Christian community culture. In fact, if there is a single critical responsive behavior within community formation, it is the continual and ongoing yielding by every participant to the direction of the Spirit who creates and sustains a fluid community relational expression that continually presents itself as a symbol of life and truth to its neighbours. Moreover, it is only through, and because of the Spirit’s engagement with these grass-roots layers, that the community can fulfill its potential of becoming an effective witness to the Gospel

Dynamic capabilities: the emperor's new clothes?

This study initially aimed to evaluate dynamic capability theory using a longitudinal empirical case of a highly successful FTSE-100 company operating within a volatile market. Using a range of rich qualitative data to open the “black box”, dynamic capabilities theory is extended through a detailed account of the process through which the case firm reconfigures and deploys their so-called zero-order or operational capabilities. Although there is a burgeoning literature, research findings remain diverse, disparate and largely conceptual. The limited examples of empirical work in the extant literature, tend to focus on what dynamic capabilities are with little attention in demonstrating how they actually operate. This study details several stages of significant change within the case firm as it moves from start up to its current MNE status. In-depth interviews with the senior team both past and present capture discussions of those factors underlying the success of this firm. Thematic development revealed examples of resource configurations and routines that matched dynamic capability as defined in literature. However, attempts to use Winter's (2003) hierarchy of capability to organize the data proved inadequate; far from being heterogeneous, the dynamic capability found looks like best practice; and whilst operational capability can be seen to evolve, the dynamic capability identified has not. Turning to the wider strategic management literature one can argue that the dynamic capability found in this firm fits better with a wider set of concepts such as knowledge management, absorptive learning, organizational change, leadership, HR practices, strategic decision making, team building, etc. Using a dynamic capability perspective, the findings might extend the under-developed notions of dynamic managerial capability and entrepreneurial fitness. Dynamic managerial capability, as described in the literature, can be articulated within the case firm. Managerial agency is key to competitive success in this firm and this study shows that the concept of agency is more encompassing than that of dynamic managerial capabilities and Teece’s (2007) vision of sensing, seizing and reconfiguring. There are cognitive aspects to creating the context for leadership action and the roles of sense-making and sense-giving to sustain the organizational culture and create the framework for innovation, learning and change. Yet, it is equally possible to account for competitive advantage within this case without recourse to dynamic capability theory. By linking the data gathered to the concept of "dominant logic" (Prahalad & Bettis, 1986; 1995), it is argued that traits and attitudes of the founders and senior managers of the case firm contribute to the “logic” that drives action. Over time these traits have been expressed as a series of simple rules that, in turn, have been operationalized in an organizational culture providing the context for the development of both routines and ad-hoc action. The thesis then demonstrates analytically how rules and their underlying traits act as a mechanism for the creation, sustenance and adaptation of operational capabilities traceable directly to actions taken in response to or in anticipation of environmental changes as well as actions taken in the context of an organizational culture which reflects these rules and underlying traits. It is through managerial agency that rules are created, the culture sustained and “entrepreneurial fitness” is achieved. As such, the research presented here contributes to the resource-based theory of the firm without recourse to the dynamic capabilities construct

Kontra I Peligru, Na'fansåfo' Ham: The Production of Military (In)Security In Guåhan

Ph.D.Ph.D. Thesis. University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa 201

Paradoxes of Interactivity

Current findings from anthropology, genetics, prehistory, cognitive and neuroscience indicate that human nature is grounded in a co-evolution of tool use, symbolic communication, social interaction and cultural transmission. Digital information technology has recently entered as a new tool in this co-evolution, and will probably have the strongest impact on shaping the human mind in the near future. A common effort from the humanities, the sciences, art and technology is necessary to understand this ongoing co- evolutionary process. Interactivity is a key for understanding the new relationships formed by humans with social robots as well as interactive environments and wearables underlying this process. Of special importance for understanding interactivity are human-computer and human-robot interaction, as well as media theory and New Media Art. »Paradoxes of Interactivity« brings together reflections on »interactivity« from different theoretical perspectives, the interplay of science and art, and recent technological developments for artistic applications, especially in the realm of sound

Paradoxes of interactivity: perspectives for media theory, human-computer interaction, and artistic investigations

Current findings from anthropology, genetics, prehistory, cognitive and neuroscience indicate that human nature is grounded in a co-evolution of tool use, symbolic communication, social interaction and cultural transmission. Digital information technology has recently entered as a new tool in this co-evolution, and will probably have the strongest impact on shaping the human mind in the near future. A common effort from the humanities, the sciences, art and technology is necessary to understand this ongoing co- evolutionary process. Interactivity is a key for understanding the new relationships formed by humans with social robots as well as interactive environments and wearables underlying this process. Of special importance for understanding interactivity are human-computer and human-robot interaction, as well as media theory and New Media Art. "Paradoxes of Interactivity" brings together reflections on "interactivity" from different theoretical perspectives, the interplay of science and art, and recent technological developments for artistic applications, especially in the realm of sound