Afhænger ledelse af øjnene, der ser? Lederes og medarbejderes vurderinger af ledelse på tværs af individer, organisationer og områder

Ledelse er blevet et væsentligt felt i forvaltningsforskningen, og studier af offentlig serviceproduktion og ledelse måles ofte gennem spørgeskemaundersøgelser af ledere og medarbejdere. Den internationale forskning peger imidlertid på, at opfattelser af ledelse påvirkes af faktorer på i hvert fald tre forskellige niveauer: det individuelle niveau mellem aktører inden for den samme organisation (leder-medarbejdere såvel som mellem medarbejdere), det organisatoriske niveau og sektorområdet. Der findes dog meget lidt empirisk viden om disse niveauers betydning, og vi vil derfor undersøge, i hvilken grad variationer i opfattelser af to centrale ledelsestilgange – transformations- og transaktionsledelse – forekommer på disse tre niveauer. Ved brug af spørgeskemadata fra 541 ledere og deres 8.515 medarbejdere fordelt på otte serviceområder demonstrerer artiklen, at hovedparten af variationen forekommer inden for organisationerne, men at der ligeledes findes væsentlig variation i ledelsesopfattelser mellem organisationer og mellem serviceområder, samt at lederne selv vurderer både transformationsledelse og transaktionsledelse højere, end medarbejderne gør

At gøre en ledelsesmæssig forskel handler også om organisationens omdømme

En organisations omdømme lever og blive genskabt blandt eksterne aktører; et omdømme er nemlig deres opfattelse af organisationen. Men hvordan kan man som offentlig leder arbejde med sin organisations omdømme, og hvordan kan omdømmeledelse være en vej til bedre resultater? Det er nogle af de spørgsmål, der behandles i den nye bog Managing for public service performance: How HRM and leadership can make a difference fra Oxford University Press, og denne artikel præsenterer hovedpointerne

Seeing eye to eye: can leadership training align perceptions of leadership?

There is a huge gap between how employees see leaders’ behavior and how leaders see themselves regardless of sector and functional area. Because this gap can be a serious problem in managing organizations, scholars have investigated how the gap can be reduced. This article focuses on leadership training and tests whether and under what conditions it narrows the gap. Using quantitative and qualitative data from a randomized field experiment with several hundred Danish leaders from public and private organizations, we find that a yearlong leadership training course decreases the differences between leader and employee perceptions of transformational and transactional leadership behaviors in public sector organizations but not in private organizations. The findings imply that leadership training can be one way for public organizations to align perceptions of leadership

In the eye of the beholder? Leader and employee ratings of leadership across individuals, organizations, and service areas

Leadership has become an important topic in public management research, and most empirical studies of leadership apply measures based on survey responses by managers and employees. A consistent finding is, nonetheless, that there is great variation in assessments of leadership, and it has been suggested that these variations can be explained by factors on three levels: the individual level within an organization, the organizational level, and the sector level. However, there is very little empirical knowledge about variation at these levels, and the article therefore investigates how two important types of leadership – transformational leadership and transactional leadership – vary at these three levels. We apply survey data from 541 managers and their 8,515 employees, from eight different service areas. The analyses show that the main variation in leadership ratings is within organizations, but significant variation also exists between organizations and service areas. Finally, leaders rate their own leadership more favorably than their employees do