Leadership Voice Research Articles

Voice of leadership: Prosodic features as predictors of leadership perception.

Voice of leadership: Prosodic features as predictors of leadership perception.

Students as game designers and developers: developing cooperative strategy board games to teach team leadership skills

Purpose The purpose of this manuscript is to highlight how gamification is transforming recruitment, retention and training to resolve employee engagement challenges in the ever-changing workplace. In collaborating with game industry experts and designers, the authors taught students team leadership skills by demonstrating how to design and play their own original cooperative strategy games. In doing so, students learn what gamification is and how it can be used to train our multigenerational workforce; how designing board games teaches team leadership skills (e.g. communication, conflict management, power, decision-making); and how to develop cooperative strategy game elements (player characters, roles and actions) that motivate engaging gameplay with successful learning outcomes. Design/methodology/approach In this paper, the authors discuss the practical implications of a three-phase semester-long experiential learning experience, where game design demonstrates to students how employees can work collaboratively together in teams. Students’ developed storylines (i.e. strategic objectives) including motivation challenges, social media communication breakdowns, sabotage, global sustainability and other real-world challenges. In Phase 1, students learn about how companies are using gamification in training high-performing teams. In Phase 2, students play a cooperative strategy game Forbidden Island with their student teams. In Phase 3, students design (and play) their original cooperative strategy game, instructions booklet and build a facilitation guide. Findings Approximately, 400 students developed 48 original cooperative strategy games that can be used to teach team leadership skills. These student teams designed cooperative strategy board games – in which the entire team either wins or loses based on their control of valued resources and player actions as key decision-making points. The data and feedback indicate that the learning experience helped them practically consider team interdependence in making effective decisions, and in creating creative self-efficacy, resilience and self-confidence in their own leadership voice. In this manuscript, the authors focus on providing an overview and implementation plan for our semester-long experiential learning exercise. Originality/value This experiential exercise was implemented from 2019 to 2023 in different learning modalities (face-to-face, hybrid, 100% synchronous online learning) and during challenging times (prepandemic, pandemic and postpandemic learning environments). These varying experiences provided them with a challenge to persevere and learn about their own interpersonal skills and resilience in a creative engaging way with limited resources. Students developed 26 original games during 100% synchronous remote learning due to COVID. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, no other business school is working with gaming industry experts and game designers to teach team leadership to this degree during pre- and postpandemic environments.

Voices of Leadership

Previous research shows that voice pitch plays a significant role in leadership selection (Mayew et al., 2013) and that moremasculine traits, including voice pitch, are typically associated with successful individuals in leadership roles. The present studyextended prior research by examining how sex and gender characteristics of voices influence the perception of leadershipqualities within a military environment. Specifically, the design of the study was a 2 (sex of voice: male, female) × 2 (gender ofvoice: masculinized, feminized) × 2 (sex of participant; man, woman) mixed model design, with the sex and gender of voiceserving as the within subjects factors, sex of participant as a between subjects factor, and ratings of military leadership potentialserving as the dependent variable. Results from an analysis of variance showed that participants rated men’s voices significantlyhigher than women’s voices for leadership potential. However, feminine voices were rated significantly higher than masculinevoices. Additionally, there was a significant interaction between sex of voice and gender of voice that showed that the masculinefemale voice received the lowest ratings of leadership potential. Male participants also provided lower ratings on average to allvoices when compared to female participants. We discuss these findings in terms of gender role congruity and the influence ofandrogyny and gender norms on perceptions of women’s leadership potential in a male-dominated, hierarchical environment.

Collective Indigenous approaches to centring Pacific voices of leadership for our futures

Education systems in western nations are often built on a long history of centralising the western canon of knowledge and colonial norms. These norms are perpetuated and reinforced via western research which amplifies the voices of the dominant, while working to silence the values, practices, and knowledges of minority groups. As a colonial nation, Aotearoa New Zealand continues to be impacted by its colonial histories, where colonial (read white) ways of being, knowing, and understanding dominate initial teacher education, schools, tertiary institutions, research, and our everyday lives. However, within education and research more generally, Indigenous and Pacific researchers and practitioners have been working hard to carve out space in institutions to challenge colonial hierarchies of knowledge and make space for Indigenous ways of being, knowing, seeing, doing, and feeling. This article contributes to the work being done by Indigenous and Pacific scholars in Aotearoa New Zealand by detailing our collective, relational approach to convening the special issue of Shifting the System for the Ethnographic Edge journal. Convening a special issue is not unique and groups of academics do it regularly across a range of academic journals and fields. However, our experiences of convening this special issue were quite different. Here we share the journey and reflect on how our focus on privileging the often-marginalised voices of Pacific school leaders was underpinned by an Indigenous, collective approach embedded in the pedagogical practice of Indigenous Storywork. Employing collaborative critical autoethnography, we articulate the ways in which our engagement with each other and the authors within this special issue disrupted western power relations often present in interactions between ‘researchers’ within the university and ‘practitioners’ at the coalface. Furthermore, we demonstrate how engaging in relational practices builds a space that encourages the principles of respect, responsibility, reverence, reciprocity, holism, interrelatedness, and synergy.

In search of a cross-level mechanism linking paternalistic leadership to employee voice behavior

PurposeDrawing upon social-exchange, social-cognitive and leadership theory, this study explores whether and how a cross-level mechanism connects team-level traditional Chinese leadership (i.e. paternalistic leadership) to individual-level voice behavior.Design/methodology/approachSurvey data were collected from 421 employees of 108 branches of four service-industry chains in Taiwan. Multilevel path models and hypotheses were tested using Mplus structural equation modeling software.FindingsOne subtype of team-level paternalistic leadership, benevolent leadership, was positively related to voice behavior, whereas another – authoritative leadership – had a negative relationship to it. Additionally, employees' voice self-efficacy and felt accountability each played a cross-level mediating role between team-level paternalistic leadership and voice behavior.Practical implicationsIt is recommended that team leaders behave benevolently, and avoid excessive authoritativeness at work, as this will tend to encourage their employees to voice opinions. Organizations, meanwhile, are advised to introduce training and development sessions aimed at improving both felt accountability and voice self-efficacy among their employees, so that such voice behavior can be stimulated and strengthened.Originality/valueThis study provides a useful social-cognitive analysis of the mechanism underlying paternalistic leadership and employee voice behavior, and specifically, reveals that employees' felt accountability and voice self-efficacy play a mediating role in that relationship. This extends understanding of the leadership–voice relationship and adds value to traditional Chinese leadership literature.

New Zealand’s rural hospitals in 2021: findings from an exploratory questionnaire survey.

Introduction There is a gap in our knowledge of the place and contribution of rural hospitals in the New Zealand health system. There is no current description of rural hospital services, no national policies and little published research regarding their value. Aim To explore rural hospital leader perspectives of the role of rural hospitals. Methods An on-line survey of rural hospital leaders conducted to capture perspectives on areas including facility nomenclature; access and equity; funding and the health reforms. Results Fifty-five rural hospital leaders representing 19/24 rural hospitals responded. 'Rural Hospital' was the most common term used to describe facilities with 80% of respondents indicating this as their preferred term. Other descriptive terms varied widely from primary through to secondary care. Respondents indicated that the loss of rural hospital in-patient beds would be unacceptable to communities (median 0, IQR 0, 1). Scores on questions about 'range of services' (median 7, IQR 6, 8), 'accessibility' (median 7, IQR 6, 8) and how rural hospitals were addressing health equity (median 6, IQR 5, 7) were variable. The process for allocating funds to rural hospitals was perceived as lacking transparency (median 3, IQR 2, 5). National strategy and 'local governance and control' were both rated as important (median 9, IQR 7, 10 and median 9, IQR, 8, 10) for a rural hospital's future. Discussion By capturing a collective national rural hospital leadership voice, this study facilitates the understanding of the rural hospital concept. The findings inform subsequent research needed to gain a clearer picture of New Zealand rural hospital provision.

Convey a Consistent Leadership Voice

Convey a Consistent Leadership Voice

ELEVATING LATINA VOICES OF LEADERSHIP: Latina Student Leaders’ Beliefs, Approaches, and Influences to Leadership

There is a recent call for and emergence of leadership research that purposefully centers students’ social identities and lived experiences in order to gain more nuanced understandings of college student leadership development and elevate marginalized voices in the leadership narrative. In this qualitative study, the researchers focused on the leadership approaches of Latina college student leaders at Hispanic Serving Institutions and the influences that shape their approaches to leadership. The findings reveal participants’ unique forms of capital as well as sources of on-campus support that shape and influence their leadership beliefs and styles, including a focus on community, a commitment to making a positive impact, and non-hierarchical approaches to leadership.

Factors influencing the career interest of SENCOs in English schools

A named professional with responsibility for overseeing and coordinating the educational inclusion of pupils with special educational needs and disabilities has become an important school role in many countries. In England, the SENCO (special educational needs coordinator) became a mandatory role in 1994, and associated mandatory training was introduced in 2009. A questionnaire survey of 618 in‐training and actual SENCOs revealed that their motivating interest in becoming a SENCO varied. An exploratory factor analysis of 32 items covering different interests in the role yielded four interest factors in becoming a SENCO: outward‐facing factors (‘inclusion’ and ‘high‐quality provision’) and inward‐facing factors (‘educational and professional development’ and ‘leadership voice and status’). The outward‐facing factors were viewed as more important to respondents than the inward‐facing factors. Interest factors did not interact with organisational variables, including age group taught and school quality. Nevertheless, younger SENCOs and those engaged in training were more motivated by educational and professional development. SENCOs holding school leadership contracts were more motivated in developing leadership voice and status compared with their classroom teacher peers. Moreover, there was a significant overall difference with women reporting a higher interest than men across all factors.

Book Review—Social and Emotional Learning in Out-of-School-Time: Foundations and Futures

Social and Emotional Learning in Out-of-School Time: Foundations and Futures (Delaney & Moroney, 2018) offers a rich volume of experiences and voices of leadership in social and emotional learning (SEL) in out-of-school time (OST) settings. From various vantage points and with unique voices, the chapters address all stages of intentional SEL programming, including progress made in the field in clarifying and measuring the strength of SEL outcomes and identifying needed professional development. This is an important resource for students and practitioners of positive youth development, SEL, and OST learning environments.

Moving from the supply chain to the digital supply network

Real-time, digital information has become critical to the success of both today’s 24/7, business-to-consumer (B2C) and business-to-business (B2B) operations, and to their suppliers, manufacturers and partners. Traditionally, companies have operated supply chains with a linear, sequential paradigm, following a model made popular and accessible by the Supply Chain Operations Reference (SCOR) model. Digital technology capabilities such as artificial intelligence (AI), Internet of Things (IoT), machine learning, robotics, additive manufacturing and advanced analytics are not only driving changes to the SCOR standard, but are also raising a new set of questions regarding the nature and relationship of more complex and tightly integrated supply networks. These dynamic, interconnected systems concurrently plan, execute and enable digital supply ‘chains’ — we refer to this next generation model as a digital supply network (DSN). This paper lays the foundation for this transformational journey, by introducing key disruptions that are enabling organisations to move beyond the limitations of traditional supply chains and explaining the core characteristics of DSNs. With the intent of providing a voice of leadership as supply networks become more digital, Deloitte Consulting and the Association of Supply Chain Management will release an initial version of the DSN Capability Model in September 2019 to provide an overview of DSNs. In subsequent releases, we will expand the body of knowledge, helping organisations to understand and build digitally enabled operational capabilities.

Developing Authentic Leadership Voice: Novice Faculty Experience.

The aim of this study was to determine the perceptions of 14 novice nurse faculty of a 20-month experiential leadership academy on the leadership development. Managing the complexities of nursing faculty roles requires significant leadership skills that often are hard won. Evidence suggests that leadership preparation to prepare nursing faculty through guided mentoring can enhance faculty recruitment, satisfaction, and retention. Participants completed open-ended questions about their experiences in Sigma Theta Tau International's Nurse Faculty Leadership Academy. Data analysis revealed a meta-theme of "Finding Authentic Leadership Voice." Four subthemes emerged to shape the meta-theme: Identifying Inner Strengths and Areas for Improvement, Increasing Self-Confidence and Self-Awareness, Increasing Focus on Others, and Clarifying Aspirations for a Leadership Future. Reflecting on their experiences, participants recognized changes in their leadership roles as they found an authentic voice that helped them persist and thrive amid the complexities of their faculty roles.

Building and sustaining a postgraduate student network: The experience of oncology nurses in Canada.

Networking with individuals on a similar journey through graduate studies has been identified as an important influence in the experience of doctoral and postdoctoral students. Through the Board of Directors of the Canadian Association of Nurses in Oncology/Association canadienne des infirmières en oncologie (CANO/ACIO), student members were encouraged to establish a Doctoral Student Network (DSN) that would enable a connection through education and common interest in oncology and cancer care. Since its inception, the DSN has been dynamic in how it has addressed the evolving needs of members and in providing development opportunities to group members. To uncover and describe key aspects of its evolution, a document analysis was undertaken to reveal themes pertaining to capacity development and leadership voice as paths to leadership for DSN members. The results of this study suggest that the DSN provides a supportive environment for postgraduate nurses across Canada to connect with others in their peer group to foster engagement in educational, professional, and scholarly activities, as well as highlighting opportunities for other professional organizations interested in establishing a support network for graduate student members.

Voices of leadership: wisdom from women leaders in neuropsychology

Objective: Inspired by panel discussions at various neuropsychology conferences, the aim of this paper is to share wisdom that women in neuropsychology acquired from their leadership experiences. Method: We identified 46 women leaders in governance and academic research through reviews of organizational websites and journal editorial boards, and requested their response to brief questions via email. Twenty-one leaders provided responses to three questions formulated by the authors. Results: This paper summarizes the primary themes for the following questions: (1) What advice would you give to a woman neuropsychologist who is seeking to move into a leadership role? Responses included: increase visibility, make connections, know yourself, be confident, and gather information. (2) What leadership style(s) works best? No respondents endorsed a ‘best’ leadership style; however, they suggested that leaders should know their own personal style, be open and transparent, find a shared mission, and most importantly – use a collaborative approach. (3) What helps a woman earn respect as a leader in neuropsychology? Respondents recommended that leaders should: get involved in the work, demonstrate integrity, do your homework, be dependable, and keep meetings focused. Conclusions: It is the authors’ intent that by gathering and distilling advice from successful women leaders in neuropsychology, more women may be catalyzed to pursue leadership roles in our profession.

Leadership Voice and Style

This technical note is employed in MBA, executive education, and undergraduate courses that cover the art of persuasion. It is used in the core Management Communication course at Darden. Employing the canons of rhetoric devised by Aristotle and his classical contemporaries, the objective of the note is to provide students with a clear and usable map to guide them as they seek to understand the dynamics involved in persuading others. Persuasion is a critical management skill that must be mastered at all levels of the organization, but it is especially important for those at the leadership level. Most managerial communication goes beyond the sharing of information and involves elements of persuasion. Along with the five canons—invention, arrangement, memory, style, and delivery—this note also outlines the three primary modes of persuasion: ethos (an appeal to values), pathos (an emotional appeal), and logos (a logic-based appeal). This note often is used in conjunction with the technical note, Leadership Voice and Style. Excerpt UVA-BC-0265 Mar. 16, 2018 Leadership Voice and Style Managing and Directing Energy Leadership is about managing and directing energy—both your own energy and the energy of others. Mental and emotional energy is created, managed, and directed through communications. Wise leaders are perpetually developing a keener understanding of what energizes them through internal dialogue or self-reflection. By taking the time to understand their own intrinsic motivators, these leaders become more capable of using these resources when engaging team members. Their interactions help to uncover and foster the energy and capabilities of others, while guiding them in unison toward a common goal. This is what it means to have a leadership voice. Every person is unique, not only with respect to our genetic makeup, but also with regard to our personalities, cultural backgrounds, experiences, and understandings of the world. These points of differentiation are expressed or signified in part by how we communicate and interact with others. The same is true for exceptional leaders. It is the highly skilled employment of these leaders' unique voices that marks them as outstanding communicators. . . .

Pat Greene: From Jarhead to Egghead

This case challenges the adage, “You can take a man out of the Marines, but you can't take the Marines out of the man.” Newly transitioning as a Marine officer into his first civilian job, Pat Greene will need to learn how to flex his leadership communication style to meet the demands of his new work culture. The case illustrates the contingent and situational nature of effective communication, or in other words, how a communication style that may be highly effective in one context can be a real misfit in another. This case is designed to introduce a model for communication strategy that takes into account the influence of context, work culture, and role expectations on leadership voice and style. The model can be used to (1) analyze how things got to where they are, and (2) coach Greene to modify his style intentionally for better results in the future. Key discussion points may include (1) contrasting communicating out of habit to communicating with awareness and intention; (2) the value of style flexing effectively across contexts, audiences, and situations; and (3) the pros and cons of “tell/sell” and “consult/join” approaches. This case is suitable for traditional MBA and executive audiences, particularly ones that include a significant number of transitioning military and/or “career switching” learners. Excerpt UVA-BC-0271 Rev. Dec. 1, 2020 Pat Greene: From Jarhead to Egghead As Pat Greene climbed into his car, he smiled wryly to himself. Only a moment before, his wife had playfully reminded him: “You know, Pat, today you go from being a jarhead to an egghead. I know you can do it. Good luck today!” With that she had given him a big kiss, and he was on his way. Today, in late September 2016, would be Greene's first day as director of content development at DoDApps, a small start-up in Tyson's Corner, Virginia, that contracted with the US Department of Defense (DoD). “So much change at once,” he thought to himself. “Business school, separating from the Marines, and now a new job, all in a matter of months.” And Stacy's baby bump was just starting to show; in five more months, he would be a new dad. In his driveway in Ashburn, Virginia, Greene studied alternate routes on his car's GPS. Normally, he would want to choose the fastest route to work. Today, however, he wanted to give himself plenty of time. Washington metro traffic was notoriously hard to predict. But more importantly, he wanted to use his drive time for putting on his game face. He'd heard stories from other transitioning military members, so he knew leading in the civilian world would be different. But just how different remained to be seen. . . .

The Voice of Leadership: Models and Performances of Automatic Analysis in Online Speeches

We introduce the automatic determination of leadership emergence by acoustic and linguistic features in online speeches. Full realism is provided by the varying and challenging acoustic conditions of the presented YouTube corpus of online available speeches labeled by 10 raters and by processing that includes Long Short-Term Memory-based robust voice activity detection (VAD) and automatic speech recognition (ASR) prior to feature extraction. We discuss cluster-preserving scaling of 10 original dimensions for discrete and continuous task modeling, ground truth establishment, and appropriate feature extraction for this novel speaker trait analysis paradigm. In extensive classification and regression runs, different temporal chunkings and optimal late fusion strategies (LFSs) of feature streams are presented. In the result, achievers, charismatic speakers, and teamplayers can be recognized significantly above chance level, reaching up to 72.5 percent accuracy on unseen test data.

Perspectives on Leadership

Perspectives on leadership developed through a career as a nurse leader are shared, including the author's guiding vision, a valuing of nursing as knowledge work, how to create a learning organization that supports professional practice, and other lessons learned through experience. Readers are urged to find the leadership voice within, be courageous, engage surrounding opportunities, and be guided by their vision of what nursing should be in the future.

Leading and following together — leading leadership and leading leaders

This short paper raises the question of ‘how can a leadership development centre provide leadership for established and experienced leaders in the care sector?’ Leadership development needs to attract and retain the commitment and interest of existing senior leaders, while at the same time providing a development experience and a direction that is clear and progressive. The National Skills Academy for Social Care intends to support the development of a stronger leadership voice for the social care sector and this paper sets out a partnership approach between the Academy and leaders from across the private, not‐for‐profit and statutory elements of the sector. The notion of ‘leading leadership’ is discussed and a way of working that both leads and follows is outlined, together with detail of the Academy's planned leadership development activity.

Authentic Leadership Development in the Classroom: A Narrative Approach

This paper examines how a classroom designed process of constructing narratives about oneself, a group, and others helps students develop an authentic leadership voice. We begin by describing the theoretical framework behind our paper, which includes an overview of the notion of authenticity and the linkage between narrative and authentic leadership. Next, we provide an account of a transformative class called Leadership and Storytelling. Following this is a response to the question that inspired our paper: What was it about the course that made it such a meaningful leadership experience for students? The authors offer three key ingredients to the nature of this powerful classroom experience: space, authorship, and taking students to the edge of knowing. We conclude with an exploration of how others can incorporate narrative into their own work to become better leadership educators.