Educational Middle Change Leadership in New Zealand: The ;eat in the Sandwich
Keywords:
Quality, Effectiveness, Change, Improvement, Equity, Innovation.Copyright (c) 2016 REICE. Revista Iberoamericana sobre Calidad, Eficacia y Cambio en Educación
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Abstract
The purpose of this paper is to report findings from a larger study into the role of middle leaders of change in New Zealand higher education. In total, ten middle leaders from the New Zealand higher education sector took part in a recent
research project which examined successful change leadership in higher education. As part of that larger study, each middle leader answered questions about their views on being in the “middle” in their change leadership roles and their views on middle leadership in general. The ten middle leaders all described their place in their respective organisations in terms of being “caught in between”, or “sandwiched between” senior management to whom they were accountable, lecturers whom they described as colleagues or peers, and subordinates for whom they had some functional and often moral responsibility. The paper discusses the perceptions of being in the “middle” and how change leaders reconcile their position as a subordinate, an equal and a superior. Insight is gained into how educational leaders reconcile their position in the “middle” as they hold management responsibility for both academic and general staff who are hierarchically, beneath them; lead teams of colleagues in collegial decision making; and answer to higher authority in the form of senior organisational leadership.
The participant contributions of personal observations and unfolding real life stories which meld personal common sense with local meaning have formed a unique local ontology therefore allowing for a deeper understanding of the contributing factors toward being in the “middle”. Some of these perspectives have been used by the author’s own organisation in the development of leadership training for future organisational change, particularly those aspects concerning communication and participation that are tailored to meet the unique needs of management and staff. For middle change leaders the focussed examination of the working relationship between middle change leaders and staff groups might prove to be a rich area of further study. These relationships take a variety of forms, including where a staff member has risen through the ranks (off the shop floor as it were) to take on the mantle of leadership, or simply where there is a shared understanding based on subject or professional backgrounds which binds the two together. Further investigation into these relationships may provide perspectives that enable leaders to develop a greater understanding of how change occurs. The paper shows how the participants locate themselves as being “very much” in the middle in terms of line management of both resources and academic matters and often as being caught between competing imperatives, institutional dynamics and institutional structures.
Downloads
References
Ahn, M., Adamson, J.S.A. y Dornbusch, D. (2004). From leaders to leadership: managing change. Journal of Leadership and Organizational Studies, 10(4), 112-123.
Alvesson, M. y Sveningsson, S. (2003). Managers doing leadership: the extra-ordinarization of the mundane. Human Relations, 56(12), 1435-1459.
Bassey, M. (2007). Case study research. En M. Coleman y A.R.J. Briggs (Eds.), Research Methods in Educational Leadership and Management (pp.108-121). Londres: Paul Chapman.
Bennett, N. (2003). Structure, culture and power in organisations En N. Bennett, M. Crawford, M. y M. Cartwright (Eds.), Effective Educational Leadership (pp.44-61). Londres: Paul Chapman.
Bennis, W.G. (1997). Change agents. En W.G. Bennis, Managing People is Like Herding Cats (pp.165-170). Provo, UT: Executive Excellence Publishing.
Bennis, W.G. (2005). Seven stages of leadership. Leadership Excellence, 22(2), 3-4.
Bennis, W.G. (2009). On Becoming a Leader. Philadelphia, PA: Perseus Books Group.
Bennis, W.G. y Nanus, B. (2005). Management vs. leadership. En Jossey-Bass Inc. (Ed.), Management Skills: A Jossey-Bass Reader (pp. 41-52). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Bensimon, E.M., Neumann, A. y Birnbaum, R. (1991). Higher education and leadership theory. En M.W. Peterson, E.E. Chaffee y T.H. White (Eds.), Organization and Governance in Higher Education: An ASHE Reader (pp.389-398). Boston, MA: Ginn.
Birnbaum, R. (2000), “The life cycle of academic management fads”. Journal of Higher Education, 71(1), 1-16.
Bolden, R., Gosling, J., Marturano, A. y Dennison, P. (2003). A Review of Leadership Theory and Competency Frameworks. Exeter: University of Exeter.
Briggs, A. (2004). Middle managers in further education colleges: the ‘new professionals’. Journal of Educational Administration, 42(5) 586-600.
Brinkerhoff, R.O. y Dressler, D.E. (2003, mayo). Using the success case impact evaluation method to enhance training value and impact. Comunicación presentada en el congreso The Learning Alliance. San Diego, CA.
Bruhn, J.G. (2004). Leaders who create change and those who manage it: how leaders limit success. The Health Care Manager, 23(2), 132-40.
Brundrett, M. (1998). What lies behind collegiality, legitimation or control?. Educational Management & Administration, 26(3) 305-16.
Brunetto, Y. y Farr-Wharton, R. (2004). Does the talk affect your decision to walk: a comparative pilot study examining the effect of communication practices on employee commitment post-managerialism. Management Decision, 42(3/4), 579-600.
Bush, T. y Middlewood, D. (2005). Leading and Managing People in Education. Londres: Chapman.
Caldwell, R. (2003). Change leaders and change managers: different or complementary? Leadership & Organization Development Journal, 24(5) 285-293.
Carr, A.N. y Hancock, P. (2006). Space and time in organizational change management. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 19(5), 545-557.
Carroll, B. y Lester, L. (2008). Defaulting to management: leadership defined by what it is not. Organization, 15(1), 75-96.
Clegg, S. y McAuley, J. (2005). Conceptualising middle management in higher education: a multifaceted discourse. Journal of Higher Education Policy & Management, 27(1), 19-34.
Cohen, M.D. y March, J.G. (1991). Leadership in organized anarchy. En M.W. Peterson, E.E. Chaffee y T.H. White (Eds), Organization and Governance in Higher Education: An ASHE Reader (pp. 399-420). Boston, MA: Ginn.
Curzon-Hobson, A. (2004). The marginalization of higher learning: an interpretation of current tertiary reform policy in New Zealand. Teaching in Higher Education, 9(2), 210-224.
Czarniawska-Joerges, B. (2004). Narratives in Social Science Research. Londres: Sage.
Czarniawska-Joerges, B. y Gagliardi, P. (2003). Narratives We Organise by. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Danzig, A.B. (1997). Leadership stories: what novices learn by crafting the stories of experienced school administrators. Journal of Educational Administration, 35(2), 122-137.
Densten, I. y Gray, H. (2001). Leadership development and reflection: what is the connection? International Journal of Educational Management,15(3),119-124.
Denzin, N. y Lincoln, Y. (2000). Handbook of Qualitative Research, 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Dimmock, C. (1999). The management of dilemmas in school restructuring: a case analysis. School Leadership & Management, 19(1), 97-113.
Dixon, N. (1998). The responsibilities of members in an organization that is learning. The Learning Organization, 5(4), 161-167.
French, R. (2001). Negative capability: managing the confusing uncertainties of change. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 14(5), 480-492.
Fullan, M. (2000). Educational leadership for the twenty-first century: breaking the bonds of dependency. En Jossey-Bass Inc. (Ed.), The Jossey-Bass Reader on Educational Leadership (pp. 156-163). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Fullan, M. (2002). The change leader. Educational Leadership, 59(8), 16-20.
Fullan, M. (2007). Understanding change. En Jossey-Bass Inc. (Ed.), The Jossey-Bass Reader on Educational Leadership (pp. 169-182). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Fullan, M., Cuttress, C. y Kilcher, A. (2005). 8 forces for leaders of change. Journal of Staff Development, 26(4), 54-9.
Fusarelli, L.D. (2002). Tightly coupled policy in loosely coupled systems: institutional capacity and organizational change. Journal of Educational Administration, 40(6), 561-575.
Gabel, S. (2002). Leading from the middle: surviving the squeeze of apparently irreconcilable forces. Leadership & Organization Development Journal, 23(7), 361-371.
Gardner, J.W. (2007). The nature of leadership. En Jossey-Bass Inc. (Ed.), The Jossey-Bass Reader on Educational Leadership (pp. 17-26). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Gewirtz, S. (2002). Learning to lead: headteachers and the new managerialism. Londres: Routledge.
Glatter, R. (1991). Developing educational leaders: an international perspective. En P. Ribbins, R. Glatter, T. Simkins y L. Watson (Eds.), Developing Educational Leaders (pp. 222-232). Harlow: Longman.
Gleeson, D. y Knights, D. (2008). Reluctant leaders: an analysis of middle manager’s perceptions of leadership in further education in England. Leadership, 4(1), 49-72.
Gleeson, D. y Shain, F. (2003). Managing ambiguity in further education. En N. Bennett, M. Crawford y M. Cartwright (Eds.), Effective Educational Leadership (pp. 229-246). Londres: Chapman.
Goleman, D. (2000). Leadership that gets results. Harvard Business Review, 78(2), 78-90.
Gravells, J. (2006). The myth of change management: a reflection on personal change and its lessons for leadership development. Human Resource Development International, 9(2), 283-289.
Grint, K. (2003).The arts of leadership. En N. Bennett, M. Crawford y M. Cartwright, Effective Educational Leadership (pp. 89-108). Londres: Chapman.
Gronn, P. (1997). Leading for learning: organizational transformation and the formation of leaders. Journal of Management Development, 16(4), 274-83.
Gronn, P. (2003a). Leadership: who needs it? School Leadership & Management, 23(3), 267-290.
Gronn, P. (2003b). Leadership’s place in a community of practice. En M. Brundrett, N. Burton, N. y R. Smith, Leadership in Education (pp.23-35). Londres: Sage.
Guba, E. y Lincoln, Y. (1998). Competing paradigms in qualitative research. En N. Denzin, N. y Y. Lincoln, The Landscape of Qualitative Research: Theories and Issues (pp. 195-220). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Gunn, B. (1995). The paradigm shift in university management. International Journal of Educational Management, 9(1), 28-40.
Gunter, H. (1995). Jurassic management: chaos and management development in educational institutions. Journal of Educational Administration, 33(4), 5-20.
Gunter, H. y Ribbins, P. (2002). Leadership studies in education: towards a map of the field. Educational Management & Administration, 30(4), 387-416.
Hancock, N. y Hellawell, D.E. (2003). Academic middle management in higher education: a game of hide and seek? Journal of Higher Education Policy & Management, 25(1), 5-12.
Hannabuss, S. (2000). Telling tales at work: narrative insight into managers’ actions. Library Review, 49(5), 218-229.
Hannay, L.M. y Ross, J.A. (1999). Department heads as middle managers? Questioning the black box. School Leadership & Management, 19(3), 345-358.
Heifetz, R.A. y Laurie, D.L. (2001). The work of leadership. Harvard Business Review, 79(11), 131-41.
Hellawell, D. y Hancock, N. (2003). Between hierarchical control and collegiality: the academic middle manager in higher education. En N. Bennett, M. Crawford y M. Cartwright (Eds.), Effective Educational Leadership (pp.247-264). Londres: Chapman.
Huy, Q.N. (2001). In praise of middle managers. Harvard Business Review, 79(8), 72-79.
Huy, Q.N. y Mintzberg, H. (2003). The rhythm of change. MIT Sloan Management Review, 44(4), 79-84.
Jaeger, D. y Pekruhl, U. (1998). Participative company management in Europe: the new role of middle management. New Technology, Work and Employment, 13(2), 94-103.
Jones, D.R. y Holdaway, E.A. (1996). Post-secondary department heads: expectation for academic leadership and authority. International Journal of Educational Management, 10(3), 10-20.
Joseph, E.E. y Winston, B.E. (2005). A correlation of servant leadership, leader trust, and organizational trust. Leadership & Organization Development Journal, 26(1), 6-22.
Kanter, R.M. (1979). Power failure in management circuits. Harvard Business Review, 57(4), 65-75.
Kanter, R.M. (1982). The middle manager as innovator. Harvard Business Review, 60(4), 95-105.
Kanter, R.M. (2005). The new managerial work. En J-B Publishers (Ed.), Management Skills: A Jossey-Bass Reader (pp.91-112). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Kanter, R.M., Stein, B.A. y Jick, T.D. (2005). How change really comes about. En J-B Publishers (Ed.), Management Skills: A Jossey-Bass Reader (pp.179-314.). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Kaplan, R.S. y Norton, D.P. (2005). Organization capital II: leadership, alignment, and teamwork. En Harvard Business School Press (Ed.), Managing Change to Reduce Resistance (pp. 73-88). Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press.
King, A.W., Fowler, S.W. y Zeithaml, C.P. (2001). Managing organizational competencies for competitive advantage: the middle management edge. Academy of Management Executive, 15(2), 95-106.
Kogler-Hill, S.E. (1997). Team leadership theory. En P.G. Northouse (Ed.), Leadership: Theory and Practice (pp. 159-183). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Kotter, J.P. (2007). Leading change: why transformation effort fail. Harvard Business Review, 85(1), 96-103.
Kouzes, J.M. y Posner, B.Z. (2007). The five practices of exemplary leadership. En Jossey-Bass Inc. (Ed.), The Jossey-Bass Reader on Educational Leadership (pp. 63-74). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Lapp, C.A. y Carr, A.N. (2006). To have to halve to have: ‘Being’ in the middle in changing time’s space. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 19(5), 655-687.
McKenna, P.J. y Maister, D.H. (2002). First Among Equals: How to Manage a Group of Professionals. Nueva York: The Free Press.
Marshall, S. (2008). Leading change at the middle: stories of higher education middle leaders ‘success’. Tesis Doctoral. Unitec Institute of Technology, Auckland (New Zealand).
Meek, V.L. (1988). Organizational culture: origins and weaknesses. Organization Studies, 9(4), 453-73.
Miller, N. (2002). Insider change leadership in schools. Journal of Leadership in Education, 5(4), 343-60.
Naylor, P., Gkolia, C. y Brundrett, M. (2006). Leading from the middle: an initial study of impact. Management in Education, 20(1), 11-6.
Ogawa, R.T. y Scribner, S.P. (2002). Leadership: spanning the technical and institutional dimensions of organizations. Journal of Educational Administration, 40(6), 576-88.
Owens, R.G. (2004), Organizational Behavior in Education: Adaptive Leadership and School Reform. Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
Ramsden, P. (1998). Learning to Lead in Higher Education. Nueva York: Routledge.
Rost, J.C. y Barker, R.C. (2000). Leadership education in colleges: toward a 21st century paradigm. Journal of Leadership and Organizational Studies, 7(1), 3-12.
Ruth, D. (2006). Identity, institutions and systemic change: the case of higher education in South Africa. Educational Management Administration & Leadership, 34(4), 487-510.
Ryan, G. y Bernard, H. (2000). Data management and analysis methods. En N. Denzin e Y. Lincoln (Eds), Handbook of Qualitative Research (pp.769-802). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Sayles, L.R. (1993). Doing things right: a new imperative for middle managers. Organizational Dynamics, 21(4), 5-14.
Schein, E.H. (1992). Organizational Culture and Leadership. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Schein, E.H. (2006). Leadership competencies: a provocative new look. En F. Hesselbein y M. Goldsmith (Eds.), The Leader of the Future 2: Visions, Strategies, and Practices for the New Era (pp. 255-264). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Senge, P. (1999). The leadership of profound change: towards an ecology of leadership. En P. Senge, A. Kleiner, C. Roberts, R. Ross, G. Roth y G. Smith, The Dance of Change: The Challenges of Sustaining Momentum in Learning Organizations (pp. 10-21). Londres: Nicholas Brealey.
Thomas, R. y Linstead, A. (2002). Losing the plot?: Middle managers and identity. Organization, 9(1), 71-93.
Wallace, M. (2003). Managing the unmanageable: coping with complex educational change. Educational Management & Administration, 31(1), 9-29.
Weick, K.E., Sutcliffe, K.M. y Obstfeld, D. (2005). Organizing and the process of sensemaking. Organization Science, 16(4), 409-421.
Wetherell, M. (2003). Discourse analysis. En C. Davidson y M. Tolich (Eds.), Social Science Research in New Zealand (pp.285-295). Auckland: Pearson Education.
Witziers, B., Sleegers, P. e Imants, J. (1999). Departments as teams: functioning, variations and alternatives. School Leadership & Management, 19(3), 293-304.
Yukl, G. (1999). An evaluative essay on current conceptions of effective leadership. European Journal of Work & Organizational Psychology, 8(1), 33-48.
Yukl, G.A. (2004). Interactions in organizational change: using influence tactics to initiate change. En J.J. Boonstra (Ed.), Dynamics of Organizational Change and Learning (pp. 301-316). Hoboken, NJ: Wiley & Sons Inc.
Zaleznik, A. (2004). Managers and leaders: are they different? Harvard Business Review, 82(1), 74-81.