Restructuring Strategy

Strategic change leadership

Fiona Graetz Bowater School of Management & Marketing, Deakin University, Melbourne Campus, Burwood, Victoria, Australia

Strategic management, Leadership, Distributed control, Instrumentalism, Organizational change

Keywords

Context of the study

Against a backdrop of increasing globalisation, deregulation, the rapid pace of technological innovation, a growing knowledge workforce, and shifting social and demographic trends, few would dispute that the primary task of management today is the leadership of organisational change (Jackson, 1997; Stace and Dunphy, 1996; Kanter et al., 1992; Limerick and Cunnington, 1993; Naisbitt and Aburdene, 1990; Ulrich and Wiersema, 1989). Key words in the lexicon of the newly emerging organisational model include novelty, quality, flexibility, adaptability, speed, and experimentation. In view of these requirements, the traditional organisational structure, with its hierarchical, top-down approach, centralised control and historically entrenched values of stability and security, is an anachronism. The impetus now is towards flatter, more ``flexible and agile organisational forms'' (Bahrami, 1992, p. 33) in which the boundaries are ``fluid and permeable'' (Useem and Kochan, 1992; Kanter et al., 1992). These changes have triggered a radical shift in the role of senior managers from the traditional authoritarian, command and control style to a more open, participative management style. With the emphasis now on cooperation, collaboration and communication, managers need to hone a completely different range of leadership skills. Traditionally, managers focused on the technical or operational dimension of management. However, to be effective leaders in an environment of change and flux, a second, interpersonal dimension becomes critical (Goleman, 1998; Javidan, 1995). This suggests that change leadership involves two roles:

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