Wise Leadership Research Articles

Blueprint for a Green Recovery

As British Prime Minister Gordon Brown notes in this section, we are witnessing the birth pangs of a new global order in this deepest financial and economic crash since the Great Depression. There will be plenty of pain all around for a while. And when the quarter‐century leveraged‐debt bubble of the United States—the explosion of which detonated the crash—is finally unwound, the new global balance will favor an Asia flush with cash. The G‐20 will replace the G‐7 as the executive committee of globalization. And, if wise leadership stays the course, there will be a “green lining” to the recovery as the fiscal stimulus is imbued with an environmental sensibility.

In Bailing Out Detroit, Break US Oil Dependence

As British Prime Minister Gordon Brown notes in this section, we are witnessing the birth pangs of a new global order in this deepest financial and economic crash since the Great Depression. There will be plenty of pain all around for a while. And when the quarter‐century leveraged‐debt bubble of the United States—the explosion of which detonated the crash—is finally unwound, the new global balance will favor an Asia flush with cash. The G‐20 will replace the G‐7 as the executive committee of globalization. And, if wise leadership stays the course, there will be a “green lining” to the recovery as the fiscal stimulus is imbued with an environmental sensibility.

Crisis Is Endemic to the Financial System

As British Prime Minister Gordon Brown notes in this section, we are witnessing the birth pangs of a new global order in this deepest financial and economic crash since the Great Depression. There will be plenty of pain all around for a while. And when the quarter‐century leveraged‐debt bubble of the United States—the explosion of which detonated the crash—is finally unwound, the new global balance will favor an Asia flush with cash. The G‐20 will replace the G‐7 as the executive committee of globalization. And, if wise leadership stays the course, there will be a “green lining” to the recovery as the fiscal stimulus is imbued with an environmental sensibility.

Practically wise leadership: toward an integral understanding

This paper presents a model of practical wisdom that integrates various dimensions of experience and multiple levels of analysis, providing a meta‐theoretical framework through which to understand wise leadership practice in contemporary organizations. Drawing on phenomenological accounts of embodiment and emotion, we seek to overcome limitations in organizational research due to methodological individualism, exclusively cognitivist assumptions about human knowledge, and a lack of sensitivity to the complexity and dynamism associated with wisdom as it unfolds in organizations. In an effort to enact the processual aspect of wisdom in relation to the community of leadership scholars and practitioners, we additionally discuss various stages and lines of development relevant to wise leadership practice in organizations.

Wise Leadership and the Capacity for Ontological Acuity

Everything can be reduced to discourse, including leadership, or so it seems. The same can be said of psychology, although its epistemological tributaries are more diverse than those of discourse theory. The challenge for discourse theorists is to rigorously define their discipline and develop methodologies that link theory to practice. Fairhurst (2007) has considerably contributed to this endeavor and has as well set up a conversation between psychology and discourse analysis. This article adds to this conversation by examining agency in wise leadership through discussing the concept of ontological acuity. In doing so, we extend Fairhurst’s discussion of reflexive agency because we agree that leadership theories generally fail to adequately theorize agency and the ontological complexity of organizational life. By showing the role of discourse analysis in understanding agency in leadership research, this article indicates how discourse analysis and psychology research at the level of social cognition can contribute significantly to leadership research. Leaders constantly have to deal with the complexity of organizational knowledge inscribed in organizational discourse. Underlying this discourse is an episteme, comprising “the total set of relations that unite, at a given period, the discursive practices that give rise to epistemological figures, sciences, and possibly formalized systems” (Foucault, 1972, p. 191). Because this episteme is an “a priori organising principle” (Bannet, 1989, p. 164) regulating what people think and say in discursive sites, leaders need to be able to reflexively understand and critique the inherent ontologies that regulate these sites. We call this capacity ontological acuity. Possessing this capacity, wise leaders become critical discourse analysts, even if unwittingly

Petroleum Industry 2020: Positioning Our Industry for the Future

As SPE President this year, I have had the privilege to visit many countries and meet thousands of our members, including senior leaders and professional engineers. I have felt the strength of our industry through its wise leadership, professional workforce, and cutting-edge technologies, which reinforced my belief that we will continue to supply adequate hydrocarbons to meet increasing human needs in the future. Our future landscape will be different from the current one, however. Hydrocarbon resources will be a mixed portfolio, from conventional to very unconventional, from shallow to very deep, from light to extra-heavy, and so on. The human crew will be very international, one that is culturally open, flexible, nimble, and mobile. Our industry leaders will continue to pay more attention to human values and live the values of fairness and integrity while satisfying all stake holders, including asset owners (host government), share holders, customers, and the workforce. A role model for this leadership is Ali bin Abi Taleb, who once said, "Had I been offered the seven heavens, so I suppress an ant, sneak her little food, I would not do it."* Such leadership will ensure that performance appraisal, promotional opportunities, and career growth are pursued in a fair, transparent manner, which in turn will accelerate excellence and technology innovation throughout the industry. As part of SPE's preparation for the future, the Industry Summit was held in London in June 2007. All attendees clearly supported an SPE role in enhancing industry collaboration and facilitating high-level involvement in industry-wide initiatives such as talent development and carbon capture and sequestration. The June 2007 SPE Board approval to form an Industry Advisory Council was a step forward to meet this objective. The council will further engage industry leadership and secure their support. This council will have senior-level representatives from 20 companies, including international majors, nationals, independents, and service companies. The council is expected to meet twice a year, initially for a 2-year period. We plan to hold the council kickoff meeting during the Annual Technical Conference and Exhibition in Anaheim in November 2007. At the SPE leadership level, the Board has begun holding a strategic planning session along with each Board meeting. The first facilitated strategy session was held during the June Board meeting. The session included senior staff leaders along with the SPE Board members. These sessions will maintain a constant review of the Long Range Plan and will focus on major trends that affect SPE's mission. We aim to explore new means of fulfilling our mission in the most effective and expeditious manner. I am happy to report that this initiative is highly supported by the incoming 2008 SPE President, William Cobb. These initiatives and others will ensure that SPE will continue to be vibrant in the future. *Ali Bin Abi Taleb, Nahj Al Balagah, http://www.al-islam.org/nahj/.

Lessons from Oprah

We are educating the nurses who will influence health care for the next century. The only questions are, What influence will these nurses have? What intellectual capital will they contribute? Is it not time for us - leaders in the house of nursing - to take an Oprah moment and focus on providing the best? It is my pleasure to warmly welcome Beverly Malone back to the United States as the new chief executive officer for the National League for Nursing. At this time, we poignantly wish Dr. Ruth Corcoran warm winds, calm seas, and a wonderful retirement. Ruth, thank you for your wise leadership, stewardship, and laser-sharp focus on the mission of the NLN. For those who do not yet know the NLN's newest CEO, Dr. Malone was a staff nurse, clinical specialist, assistant administrator for nursing, dean, and vicechancellor before serving two terms (1996-2000) as president of the American Nurses Association. While ANA president, Beverly served on President Clinton's Advisory Commission on Consumer Protection and Quality in the Health Care Industry and the Health Care Quality Measurement and Reporting Committee. At the end of her second term as ANA president, she was appointed deputy assistant secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services and became the highest ranking nurse to serve in the United States government. From this post, she went to London to serve six years as general secretary of the Royal College of Nursing. With a membership of more than 390,000, the RCN is the largest professional nursing organization in the world. In England, Beverly was also a board member of the Higher Education Funding Council for the United Kingdom. She is the first person to have been appointed to represent two different nations (the US and later the UK) at the World Health Assembly. And she has been included in the Ebony Magazine list of the 100 most influential African Americans and the Daily Mail list of the 100 most influential women in Britiain. Beverly, welcome back and welcome home! Dr. Malone takes the helm of the NLN in its 114th year. At this time, educational issues in nursing are remarkably similar to those in 1893, when this organization first came into being. At the turn of the 20th century, nursing schools had multiplied from approximately 30 to more than 400. The reason for this rapid proliferation was that hospitals had learned that nurses were important to patient outcomes and to quality health care. So began a recurrent cycle. Through the years of the 20th century and now into the 21st, nursing shortages begat numerous commissions on nursing and numerous reports to Congress. …

The ‘Inevitability’ of Same-Sex Marriage in South Africa’s Post-Apartheid State

This article argues that the adoption of the Civil Union Act, extending marriage rights to same-sex couples, does not represent the inevitable and triumphant victory of a long legal and political struggle for the emancipation of gay men and lesbians in South Africa. A combination of luck, wise strategic leadership and fortitude eventually led to the adoption of full marriage rights for same-sex couples. The article traces the roots of this legal and political victory back to the debates about the inclusion of the sexual orientation clause in the South African Constitution and points to the importance of the distinct (conservative) legal strategy employed by the National Coalition for Gay and Lesbian Equality in achieving full partnership rights for all. The initial jurisprudence developed by the Constitutional Court created the basis for later legal victories and brought along judges who might have had some misgivings about the extension of marriage rights to same-sex couples had the issue arisen earlier on. The Constitutional Court’s judgment in Fourie left very little room for Parliament to manoeuvre because it emphasised the symbolic value of marriage and confirmed that a ‘separate but equal’ partnership law for same-sex couples would not pass constitutional muster. However, this important legal victory will not have any direct and immediate bearing on the lives of many gay men and lesbians in South Africa as they face social, cultural and economic hardship in ways that cannot be easily addressed through the legal reform of partnership laws. The improvement of the lives of ordinary gay men and lesbians will go hand in hand with changes in societal attitudes towards minority sexualities, which to a large extent will be dependent on grassroots activism and organisation. Because the battle for full marriage rights was a well directed, elite-based legal battle, it failed to build a sustainable, vibrant, grassroots movement to take on this task but the symbolic space created by the same-sex marriage reform may well begin to allow for the fostering of such a movement and thus for true emancipation of gay men and lesbians.

Familism, Socialism and Political Religion in North Korea

In the eighth volume of Kim Il Sung’s ‘autobiography’, published posthumously in 1998, Kim attributes the successful development of the Soviet Union into a great power to the wise leadership of Sta...

Leadership lessons from Canada geese

PurposeThe purpose of this article is to discuss the implications of three lessons that leaders can learn from Canada geese to leadership and teamwork in organizations.Design/methodology/approachMigratory behavior of Canada geese is compared to widespread behavior among leaders and teams in organizations.FindingsThe first lesson is: work as a team: Canada Geese migrate long distances flying in V‐formation. This formation results in lesser wind resistance, which allows the whole flock to add around 70 percent greater flying range than if each bird flew alone. Geese find out quickly that it pays handsomely to be team players. Second, wise leadership: when the leader at the apex of the V gets tired, it is relieved by another goose. Leaders rotate, empower, delegate, and even step down when it's in the best interest of the team. How often do we see this taking place among organizational leaders? Wise leaders ensure that their followers are well trained and developed in order to achieve true empowerment and smooth succession processes. Third, humane behavior: if a goose drops to the ground when it gets hurt or sick, two of its colleagues go down with it to take care of it until it either gets healthier or dies. In this fast‐paced and competitive age, we seldom see managers going out of their way to help colleagues who are in trouble. In organizations, morale, productivity, and loyalty increase when employees are treated humanely.Originality/valueThis paper discusses ways that leaders, teams, and organizations can improve performance by applying three lessons learned from Canada geese.

Strategic maintenance-management in Nigerian industries

A developing society needs to adapt to change and foster creativity. In the pursuit of continual improvement (e.g., reducing fossil-fuel consumption and waste, better service performance, greater availability and improved reliability), implementing wise maintenance-schedules is essential for contemporary organisations. Several studies of a wide range of Nigerian industries indicate that indigenous low availability and low productivity are endemic. The resulting closure of some of these industries has triggered off a realisation of the strategic challenges in maintenance management. In addition, the increasingly-competitive business environment in Nigeria has raised the strategic importance of maintenance functions, especially in organisations with significant investments in physical assets. Five strategic aspects of maintenance management have been identified, namely: maintenance methodology; support processes; organisation and work structuring; comparable culture; and general management policy. Three factors that permeate these dimensions are wise leadership, excellent communications and an understanding of the human factors involved.

The Dance of Revolution: Yangge in Beijing in the Early 1950s

Yangge is a popular rural dance in north China. In the Yan'an era (1936–47) the Chinese Communist Party used the art form as a political tool to influence people's thinking and to disseminate socialist images. During the early years of the People's Republic of China, the Communists introduced a simpler form of yangge in the cities. In three major yangge musicals performed in Beijing, the Party attempted to construct “a narrative history through rhythmic movements” in an effort to weave the developments of the Party's history into a coherent success story, affirming various themes: the support of the people, the valour of the Red Army, the wise leadership of the Party and the country's bright future. However, urban yangge's simplicity as an art form, the professionalization of art troupes, the nation's increasing exposure to a variety of alternative dance forms and, worse still, stifling government control all contributed to the rapid decline of this art form in urban China.

Be rational! But what does it mean?

An ancient, and most influential, concept in management thought is the idea of rationality. Criticism with regard to a rational approach to management seems to focus on the importance of value issues. It is argued in this article that from a historical‐philosophical perspective values and rationality are not simply each other’s opposites, but closely related. The article sketches the conceptual development of the idea of rationality in philosophical thinking. The adopted focus is to consider the major changes in the meaning of the idea of rationality, and the kind of criticism the idea has encountered. Schematically, the article approaches the conceptual development of a current‐day comprehension of “rationality” by using four episodes: ancient thinking towards wise leadership; the Greek idea of logos; the nineteenth century modernist belief in positivism; and the twentieth century “postmodernist” debate which culminates in Habermas’ “communicative” rationality. An assessment of the meaning of rationality in management thought is undertaken by an initial appraisal of the roots of management thought prior to the emergence of rationality as an idea. This illustrates the often neglected normative basis of management thought, and stresses the importance of managerial “values”. It enables a perspective on the ancient Greek development of meaning for logos, which is the classical precursor for modern day rationality. By appraising the development of rationality as a particular conceptual type, rather than a specific philosophical idea, the non‐normative approach adopted in modernist management writings emerges as being a severely constrained concept. From a philosophical perspective, a reduction of rationality to some kind of “goal‐oriented” action is inadequate. This is because rationality and valuation have traditionally been, and remain, closely linked. As such, the three Es of goal‐rationality (economy, efficiency, and effectiveness) acquire a counterpart that refers to value‐rationality ‐ ethics.

Visit of Egyptian President Mubarak

President Clinton. I am delighted to welcome my friend, President Mubarak, and his delegation from Egypt back to the White House to reaffirm the close partnership between the United States and Egypt. Under the wise and courageous leadership of President Mubarak, Egypt has been a key partner with the United States in working to build both regional security and global peace. I commend him for his vision and his dedication. Nowhere has that been more crucial than in Egypt's own region.

Present dangers to science and society

AbstractAlthough science has been controversial since its beginnings in classical Greece, the present dangers to it go beyond the financial threats of reduced funding. A few particularly sensitive individuals feel that science has done much to harm the human spirit. The author argues here that science is the new American frontier and that a continuous pursuit of knowledge is essential if further advance is to be achieved. Difficulties and dangers are discussed, such as the loss of interest by most private foundations in the progress of science. It is concluded that an extension of regulations through bureaucracy must be avoided and that common sense and wise leadership are needed.

To the Archives. A grand salute from surgery.

THIS MUST be a first! In a highly competitive field, the Editor of a most successful venture, theArchives of Surgery, has invited his competitors to celebrate the success of his journal with him. His prestige and the success of theArchives of Surgeryon its 75th anniversary have encouraged, even compelled, a cohort of other editors to respond to this event. Sir Thomas Beecham is reputed to have said that an organ is merely a mechanical box of whistles. This Claude Organ is no mechanical box of whistles, however, but an outstanding leader of the surgical symphony. His prestige has spanned well over a generation and his wise leadership, excellent clinical judgment, and superb teaching skills have made him a role model for others to emulate. It is with this in mind that we congratulate the Editor-in-Chief of theArchives of Surgeryand the American Medical Association itself for

Postwar Stalinism

The first postwar elections to the USSR Supreme Soviet on 10 February 1946 took place in an atmosphere of great voter activity. The Soviet people voted harmoniously for the representatives of the indissoluble bloc of Communists and nonparty members. The lead article in Pravda the next day was headlined To the Complete Victory of Communism in our Country Under the Leadership of the Great Stalin! It spoke of the terrible sufferings of the war years, the difficulties of making the transition to peacetime, and the faith of the Soviet people, rallying closely around their beloved Leader, father, and teacher, … under his wise leadership, of their faith in the building of a communist society.

War and Peace: Education for Survival, Sustainability, and FlourishingArmageddon in the Classroom: An Examination of Nuclear Education. Herbert I. LondonComprehensive Peace Education: Educating for Global Responsibility. Betty A. ReardonEducating for Global Responsibility: Teacher Designed Curricula for Peace Education. Betty ReardonPerspectives on Nuclear War and Peace Education. Robert Ehrlich

most frightful wars in history .... The peoples of the earth face the future with grave uncertainty, composed almost equally of great hopes and great fears. In this time of doubt, they look to the United States as never before for good will, strength, and wise leadership. The American people desire ... and are determined to work for peace on earth-a just and lasting peace-based on genuine agreement freely arrived at by equals.... In the pursuit of these aims, the United States and other likeminded nations find themselves directly opposed by a regime with contrary aims and a totally different concept of life. That regime adheres to a false philosophy....

Les défis de l'Administration Bush

The Challenges of the Bush Administration, by Charles William Maynes Four fundamental problems face the United States in the 1990s. They are : the economie challenge, the security challenge, the Latin challenge, and the global challenge. In short, the challenges that seem likely to confront U.S. policymakers in the 1990s appear so grave that it does not seem wise to allow events themselves to set the nation's agenda. With wise leadership, the United States should also be able to protect its security and enhance its welfare in the very différent world that will arise in the 1990s.

Gruber on the Discernment of True and False Inspiration

The religious community of True Inspired at Amana, Iowa acknowledges and reveres as its two “old country” founding fathers the Württemberg theologian, Eberhard Ludwig Gruber (1665–1728) and his younger friend the saddler, Johann Friedrich Rock (1678– 1749). While Gruber is credited with providing wise religious and organizational leadership, Rock was endowed with the gift of inspiration that characterized the budding movement in the early eighteenth century. Karl Barth wrote of him, “Inspiration … seized Rock and made him a seer and a prophet, to whose curious message half if not all of Germany listened.”