To Örebro University

This article surveys the literature on the impact of managerial successions on team performance in professional sports and assesses ten studies on the effect of managerial succession. They cover 80 years (1920-2000) with data from four different sports and two countries. From these studies, three lessons emerge when teams perform poorly: (i) a change of coach or manager during the season is not helpful; (ii) if succession is deemed necessary, change the manager between seasons; and (iii) if the choice is between a manager from inside the organization and one from the outside, choose the former. What is critical is that whichever manager is replaced or for whatever reason, the performance of the team will most likely not improve for that reason alone. In short, a new manager does not make a better team.

Purpose: This paper aims to demonstrate the efforts of Hay Youssef and Tang (2019) to reaffirm the importance of managerial discretion is unsuccessful.

Design/methodology/approach: Theoretical frameworks from traditional and recent literature on the concept of managerial discretion are related to corporate governance scholarship.

Findings: There are in fact no studies on managerial discretion based on explicit theoretical and empirical definitions and thus no studies published which have measured the degrees of managers’ discretion. The conclusion is that the inability to define the notion of managerial discretion is tantamount to the inability to research it.

Practical implications: Research on managerial discretion does not provide any advice to owners and directors of boards on granting top executives a high or a low degree of discretion.

Originality/value: This paper reaffirms the conclusion ofAndersen (2017) that corporate governance scholarship will improve if it abandons the concept of managerial discretion.

Leadership has been a scientific discipline for over 100 years. The magnitude of research has increased tremendously. Many different objects of study related to leadership have been investigated with the ambition to solve a variety of problems that appear to be more or less relevant for those in leadership positions. In the current article, the author provides one person's description of eight specific areas of leadership scholarship throughout all these years and how he has reflected upon these theories in light of this fundamental question: what has leadership research really accomplished? These considerations on leadership theories are a product of a lifetime spent on leadership research.

Purpose: Anthropomorphism is the attribution of human characteristics to gods, plants, animals or inanimate objects (the wind, rocks, etc.). This paper sets out to disprove the association of anthropomorphic characteristics with individual organizations.

Design/methodology/approach: This paper discusses anthropomorphism in organization theory because many scholars argue that organizations are human or like human beings. Some examples of “An organization called Harry” in organization literature are presented.

Findings: Three causes of anthropomorphism can be traced. The negative, rather than any positive, consequences of anthropomorphism in organization literature are discussed.

Originality/value: A new agenda for organizational studies is suggested where anthropomorphism is avoided together with the fallacy of the human metaphor. Anthropomorphism creates confusion rather than advancing the field of organization theory.

This article presents a concept and a measurement of managers' change-oriented behavior related to the initiation and implementation organizational change. It is argued that managers have an optimal potential for achieving organizational changes if they have the change-centered leadership style, are intuitive, recognize demands for change, and have power-motivated behavior. Public and private managers are significantly different in relation to change-oriented behavior based on data from 343 managers in two public organizations and one private. One result was unexpected: public managers are more change-oriented than managers in business organizations. As expected, there is no significant difference in change-oriented behavior among managers in public agencies. Possible explanations for these outcomes are presented.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to illustrate that the magnitude of interest in and of enthusiasm for transformational leadership is out of proportion with its weaknesses.

Findings: The theory has some grave problems: there are conceptual limitations; managerial leadership is conflated with political leadership; the theory is presented as a universal as well as a contingency theory; the claim that transformational leaders are more effective is not empirically supported; and the use of the term “followers” rather than “subordinates” creates confusion in the study of formal organizations. Finally, and perhaps most fundamentally, does transformational leadership theory qualify as a managerial leadership theory?

Research limitations/implications: Transformational leadership is a political leadership theory and thus less relevant for managerial leadership.

Originality/value: This paper addresses the theoretical limitations of the transformational leadership theory as well as the lack of empirical support regarding the effectiveness of transformational leaders.

Purpose – This paper aims to show how organisation theory can be used to understand the controversy between the shareholder and the stakeholder perspectives. Rationalistic and open system theories may enhance research on corporate governance by offering well-defined concepts and by specifying core relationships.

Design/methodology/approach – This paper applies descriptions of the two perspectives in organisation theory as a “method” for illustrating how they are linked to and support the shareholder versus the stakeholder perspectives.

Findings – The controversy stems from the fact that the shareholder and the stakeholder perspectives address different relationships. The shareholder perspective captures two relationships that accord with rationalistic organisation theory: shareholders are managing the managers and the organisation, and managers are managing the corporation on behalf of the owners. The stakeholder perspective focuses on three relationships that are not concordant with system theory: managers are managing the shareholders (i.e. the symbolic management of stockholders), managers are managing the corporation (i.e. general management theory) and managers are managing the stakeholders.

Research limitations/implications – Organisation theory provides suggestions for more fruitful definitions of the often-used concepts of direction, control, administration and influence. These terms may be substituted with the well-defined concepts of management, power and control.

Practical implications – Proponents of organisation theory find it theoretically difficult to deal with the topic of corporate governance, if they do at all. When they do, they do it only perfunctorily.

Originality/value – Organisation theory may strengthen research on corporate governance if we insist on both theoretical clarifications of major relationships and on the use of more strictly defined concepts.

Do managers have the creative and innovative ability needed for their organisations to survive in an increasingly competitive environment? A study of 200 managers from eight companies gives an answer to this question. If intuition is an indication of creativity and innovation, we find that almost 25 per cent of all managers were primarily intuitive when solving problems and making decisions. The concept of intuition and other decision functions is based on Jung’s typology. Is intuition in managers an important asset to their organisations? An investigation of problem‐solving and decision‐making styles of 33 managers related to organisational effectiveness throws some light on this question. What is called the “creative‐innovative” decision‐making style was found in 23 per cent of the managers. This article suggests that intuition as decision‐making style appears to be related to organisational effectiveness. Several managers are intuitive. Whether the intuitive managers are more effective than others remains to be seen.

The purpose of this article is to show that three basic concepts in the fields of organization research, corporate governance, management and leadership research come together theoretically. The concepts of goal, activity and goal-attainment constitute a commonality between them. The theoretical bounds are, however, not evident in all writings. The field of organizational research contains as basic concepts owners and goal, while corporate governance deals with the relationship between owners (shareholders), executives and stakeholders. Additionally, the management discipline pertains to an organization to be managed on behalf of the owners. Numerous leadership theories address the behaviors and activities of managers related to goal-attainment. Highlighting these common grounds could help progress in research in one field to be beneficial in the other research areas. They all come together: the fields of organization, corporate governance, management, and theories of leadership. It all starts with the goal of the owners, and it ends with goal-attainment.

Leadership scholars tend to conflate managerial leadership with leadership of political, humanitarian or religious movements. Thus, definitions of formal leadership (management) versus political leadership are called for. For theoretical development and empirical research, it is imperative to distinguish managerial leadership from political leadership. What properties must exist for leadership to exist and to be what it is? The argument here is that leader, subordinates and tasks are the properties that must exist for managerial leadership to exist. Political leadership, however, contains the properties of leader, leader's goals and followers. The political leadership concept does not specify any tasks assigned to the followers. Additionally, some leadership researchers argue that we need to rethink leadership by making or changing leadership into a question of the science of philosophy, as though questions of ontology and epistemology were especially imperative or crucial for leadership research. Some argue that leadership scholars should be philosophers and supreme experts on scientific methods. Finally, an answer is given to those few researchers who have questioned the very existence of leadership.

This survey article is about leadership and personality, as it appears to be a renewed interest in thistopic. Even when traditional research is re-examined and new research performed the most basic conclusionremains the same. Studies of how personality traits relate to leadership give inconsistent answers. Traditionaland contemporary research shows that personality cannot explain leadership. Traits of leaders cannot explainorganizational effectiveness. Leadership appears to have a minor impact on organizational effectiveness. Thepersonality approach is less relevant to management. Management and leadership in formal organizationsare not about possessing special traits. It is about acting.

In management and leadership scholarships, organisations are often regarded as entities established as vehicles for the owners so that the owners can achieve their goals. Arguably, the purpose of managerial leadership research is to provide managers with knowledge which benefits organisations. The purpose of this article is to assess whether current managerial leadership research is relevant and helpful to managers or not. Five studies (March & Sutton, 1997; Collins, 2001; Richard et al., 2009; Hiller et al., 2011; Andersen, 2013), which contain data from a total of 2,479 articles, have revealed that the relationship between formal leadership (management) and organisational effectiveness is seldom studied. When effectiveness is addressed it is rarely defined and almost never measured. It is, indeed, no surprise that six studies (Burack, 1979; Calas & Smircich, 1988; Astley & Zamuto, 1992; House & Aditya, 1997; Ghoshal, 2005; Brownlie et al., 2008) have shown that managers regard leadership research both irrelevant and useless.

Is contemporary managerial leadership research relevant and helpful to managers? Arguably, managers’ main task and prime concern is to contribute to the attainment of organisational goals, i.e., to enhance organizational effectiveness. On the basis of this premise of relevance, a survey of 105 research articles published in two international journals year 2011 reveals that researchers did not address this question. In these articles the term ‘effectiveness’ occurred about one time for every 1000 words. In the 105 articles effectiveness was seldom defined and never measured. If managers‘ prime concern is to contribute to organizational effectiveness, then there is no surprise that several scholars have found that managers regard leadership research irrelevant and useless.

The aim of this article is to enhance the understanding of the present state of leadership scholarship by describing similarities between leadership theories and underlining significant differences between them. Based on four criteria, two broad groups of leadership theories are identifiable. These two groups are fundamentally different with respect to the conceptions of both organisations and leadership. While one group of theories concentrates on descriptions and understandings of leadership processes, the other group emphasises causal relationships between leadership and organisational outcomes. A critical result of the divergent emphases is that the theoretical relationships between these two groups of scholarship appear to have ended. Advancements in one area may no longer be beneficial to other areas. This article stresses that it is necessary to come to grips with the consequences of the present fissured state in leadership research.

In discussing a management topic, scholars, educators, practitioners, and the media often toss out the name of a theorist (Taylor, Simon, Weber) or make a sideways reference to a particular theory (bureaucracy, total quality management, groupthink) and move on, as if assuming their audience possesses the necessary background to appreciate and integrate the reference. This is often far from the case. Individuals are frequently forced to seek out a hodgepodge of sources varying in quality and presentation to provide an overview of a particular idea. This work is designed to serve as a core reference for anyone interested in the essentials of contemporary management theory. Drawing together a team of international scholars, it examines the global landscape of the key theories and the theorists behind them, presenting them in the context needed to understand their strengths and weaknesses to thoughtfully apply them. In addition to interpretations of long-established theories, it also offers essays on cutting-edge research as one might find in a handbook. And, like an unabridged dictionary, it provides concise, to-the-point definitions of key concepts, ideas, schools, and figures.   

To promote leadership research on managers' motivation, a measurement (Andersen Motivation Profile Indicator [AMPI]) has been developed and tested that (a) measures achievement, affiliation, and power motivation; (b) measures the relative strengths of these factors; (c) rests explicitly on the definitions of McClelland; and (d) measures managers' work motivation. The questionnaire has been tested for reliability and validity with responses from 580 managers. The application of the instrument in four studies with responses from 565 managers in other organizations supported McClelland's theoretical claims: (a) managers have motivation profiles, (b) there are differences in motivation profiles between managers across organizational types, (c) there are no significant differences in motivation profiles between female and male managers, and (d) managers who are predominantly power motivated enhance organizational effectiveness. Arguably, the application of the instrument may be an indicator of its quality. The instrument facilitates leadership research on the relationship between managers' motivation profiles and organizational specifics, gender, sociocultural factors, and organizational outcomes.

Purpose: Scholars’ability to do research based on the notions of “follower” and “followership” is questioned when studying formal leadership in organizations. The paper aims to discuss this issue.

Design/methodology/approach: Critical comments are presented on the usefulness of the notions of followers and followership.

Findings: There are no evidence that followership exists other than some scholars’ perception of something that they have been unable to define. The conclusion is that the inability to define these notions is tantamount to the inability to research them.

Research limitations/implications: The literature review contains no new empirical data.

Originality/value: The paper stresses that study objects which are not theoretically and empirically defined cannot be investigated

This paper addresses two problems related to learning and the use of knowledge at work. The first problem is the theoretical shortcomings stemming from the controversy between three different concepts of ‘organisational learning.’ In order to enhance scholarship in this field the notion that organisations - as organisations - can learn need to be rejected for theoretical and empirical reasons. The metaphorical use of ‘organisational learning’ creates only confusion. Learning is a process and knowledge is the outcome of that process. It is argued that learning and knowledge is only related to individuals. Knowledge is thus the individual capability to draw distinctions, within a domain of action, based on an appreciation of context or theory. Consequently, knowledge becomes organisational when it is created, developed and transmitted to other individuals in the organisation. In a strict sense knowledge becomes organisational when employees use it and act based on generalisations due to the rules and procedures found in their organisation. The gravest problem is practical challenges due to the fact that the emphasis on learning, knowledge and competence of the working force do not materialize in the application of the knowledge acquired. It is evident that employees do not use their increased knowledge. However, we do not know why they do not use it. An enormous waste of money is spent on learning and knowledge in organisations which does not yield what is expected. How can managers act in order to enhance the application of increased knowledge possessed by the workforce?

There are two lessons to learn before reorganizing, that is, introducing a new organizational design. Lesson one: all organizations are hierarchical. The article aims at clarifying the difference between hierarchy and bureaucracy. Searching for non-hierarchical design alternatives will be futile. Lesson two: irrespective of whatever organizational design chosen and implemented it does not determine the way the organization will function. The main purpose is to explain why form does not determine function. We know little about how function affects organizational performance. That is why it is difficult to know in advance whether a new design will improve organizational performance or not.

Purpose Some scholars have claimed that CEOs make decisions, while boards of directors control these decisions by applying the concepts of decision management and decision control. These concepts were suggested more than 30 years ago and are still applied in corporate governance research. They are now challenged on the basis of scholarship on corporate governance and management. Design/methodology/approach Corporate governance addresses the authority and responsibility that boards of directors and executives have. Management theory addresses planning and control in corporations. Findings The relationship between the owners (the boards of directors) and the top managers is hierarchical. This paper concludes that owners or boards of directors make decisions on main and strategic goals. Decisions cannot be controlled, but the implementation and outcomes of plans can. The latter is managers' responsibility. The terms "decision management" and "decision control" are undefined and do not describe what takes place in organizations. Originality/value Management theory offers clear definitions of decisions, decision-making and control. The concepts of decision management (initiation and implementation) and decision control (ratification and monitoring) neither properly describe who makes major and strategic decisions nor how and who controls the consequences of these decisions.

This survey article addresses three questions based on the assumption that significant differences exist between public and private organizations. If this assumption is correct managerial and leadership behavior will differ between public and private managers. Additionally, the propensity to change will also differ between public and private managers. Since a number of studies indicate that managers’ leadership behavior in public organizations differ from that of private managers, difference and similarities in leadership behavior between women and men in public organizations are examined. Three studies are presented here which show that public and private managers have different behavioral patterns of leadership. However, public managers turn out to be more change-oriented than business managers. In the public organizations investigated no differences in leadership behavior between women and men were found.

This article aims to find out whether there are behavioral differences between public and private sector managers. Two groups of public managers (managers of social insurance agencies and public school principals) and a group of private managers (two samples) are investigated. Behavioral dimensions are investigated including leadership style (task, relationship, and change orientation), decision‐making style (the functions of sensing, intuition, thinking, and feeling), and motivation profile (achievement, affiliation, and power motivation). An analysis of data from 459 managers in four organizations in Sweden reveal significant differences in behavior between public and private managers. However, no significant differences in leadership behavior are discovered among public managers. Possible explanations for such differences and similarities are explored.

This article illustrates that contemporary literature on organisation and leadership attributes little attention to the topic of corporate governance. Textbooks on organisation and leadership theory yield no or few listings of corporate governance and owner (ownership). This paper does not deal with corporate governance and the agency theory as such, but rather the way in which these theories are linked to organisation and leadership theory. Additionally, several incidents from business and private organisations have shown the problems and dramatic consequences of inadequate corporate governance, which in itself call for more research on this topic. The main reason why corporate governance has been marginalised in the literature appears to be the prevalence of the open system theory, in which ownership and organisational goals are not essential theoretical concepts. According to this theory the owners are but one of many stakeholders. Some scholars even claim that organisations do not have any owners. Moreover, the organisational goals are not the goals of the owners, but the goals of the stakeholders or goals of the managers. In order to promote corporate governance a sound theoretical foundation is called for. The rationalistic organisation theory constitutes a sound theoretical foundation for the principal agency theory and thus for the study of corporate governance. In the rationalistic theory the owners and their goals are given as the reason for the establishment of an organisation. The chief execute officer is hired to run the organisation on behalf of the owners in order to achieve organisational goals as decided by the owners. The principal and agency theory is based on the rationalistic organisation theory in which owners play a central role in the formulation of goals and establishing as well as controlling the organisation and its managers. Both corporate governance and agency theory need to regain a dominant place in organisation theory textbooks and in organisation, management, and leadership research. In present-day literature on organisation, management and leadership theories - based on the open system theory - the owner has disappeared. The time has come to reinstate the owner.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to question the usefulness of comparisons between theories on servant leadership and transformational leadership.

Design/methodology/approach: A review of scholarly works on these two theories is presented from the original works of Greenleaf, Burns and Bass to the current research.

Findings: Based on the four categories of construct clarity, two competing alternatives are identifiable in the scholarship of both servant and transformational leadership. There are thus 16 versions of each theory.

Research limitations/implications: The literature review contains no new empirical data. The many versions available today of each theory do not make comparisons meaningful. The prevalence of several versions of theories on servant leadership and transformational leadership implies that they are no longer specific and useful theories.

Originality/value: Critical comments are presented on the usefulness of comparisons between servant leadership and transformational leadership. Thus, the value of these theories is also questioned.

Current organisation literature is rife with several incorrect and confusing assertions which continually create problems for students and researchers alike. Seven of these unfortunate beliefs are presented here and provocatively called ‘pitfalls’. The aim of this article is to draw attention to some of these theoretically incorrect assertions and how they can be avoided in scholarly work. The implications for managers are also presented.

Purpose: This paper aims to assess the concept of managerial discretion with respect to itstheoretical and empirical usefulness for corporate governance research.

Design/methodology/approach: This paper scrutinises applied theoretical claims, definitions andmethods, as well as a number of empirical studies on managerial discretion.

Findings: To date, no empirical definition of the concept has been presented and no measurementhas been developed and tested for reliability and validity that contains all three factors of the managerialdiscretion concept, as proposed by Hambrick and Finkelstein (1987).

Practical implications: Research on managerial discretion does not provide owners and directors ofboards with any advice on granting top managers a high or low degree of discretion.

Originality/value: This paper concludes that corporate governance scholarship will improve if itabandons the concept of managerial discretion.

What impact do managers have on successful implementation of organisational change? A model is suggested to assess the strength of managers to initiate and implement organisational change and development. The model rests on leadership theories and factors that describe and explain various change aspects of managers’ behaviour. It is assumed that managers who have a change‐centred leadership style, who are intuitive combined with power motivation and see urgent demands for change and development, have an optimal capacity for implementing major changes in their organisations. This model has been tested on a sample of 153 vicars, each facing a radically new situation. The Church of Sweden was disestablished this year breaking a structure, which has lasted for 500 years. As expected, very few of the vicars (as managers) exhibited change and development related behaviour described by the model. In fact, only one percent of the vicars appears to have maximum capacity to implement organisational changes. Whether the model can predict successful implementation of major organisational change remains to be tested.

The first purpose of this paper is to find the reasons why subordinates trust their managers in private organizations. The second purpose is related to whether there are national differences in the degree of subordinates’ trust in their managers. Studies from two European countries are presented which were based on the same instrument for measuring subordinates’ trust. These studies concluded that managers’ actions are the antecedent to trust. Managers are, however, trusted to different degrees. It appears that managers need to show by their actions that they trust their subordinates, offer help and guidance, show appreciation to the subordinates, and solve problems adequately. The antecedent was the managers’ proximity to the subordinates. Other studies found more antecedents. Additionally, a number of positive consequences of trust in managers – reported in other studies – are work performance, job satisfaction, and subordinates’ motivation. Some questions regarding trust in managers still need answers. They are formulated but not answered in this paper. 

The purpose of this study is to find out whether there are behavioural differences between two groups of formal leaders—managers and vicars. The behaviour dimensions investigated are leadership style (task, relationship, and change orientation), decision-making style (the functions of sensing, intuition, thinking, and feeling), and motivation profile (achievement, affiliation, and power motivation). It is hypothesised that vicars and managers show considerable differences in leadership behaviour. An investigation based on data from managers and vicars in Sweden reveals significant differences in behaviour between these groups. Six out of seven tests yield significant differences in leadership behaviour. Possible explanations for the differences are explored. The leadership variables applied appear to be equally relevant for describing the behaviour of managers and vicars.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to scrutinise the concept of servant leadership from a business administration (management) point-of-view.

Design/methodology/approach: A review of scholarly works on servant-leadership is presented.

Findings: A generally accepted definition of servant-leadership is not available. There are no generally accepted instruments for measuring servant-leadership. It is unclear whether some leaders are servant-leaders while others are not, and whether leaders can be servant-leaders to different degrees. The positive effects of servant-leadership on organisational outcomes, a consideration highly relevant to management, have not been empirically established. Some studies have shown negative effects of servant-leadership on organisational effectiveness.

Research limitations/implications: This literature review contains no empirical data.

Practical implications: The argument that servant-leaders should be in charge of private companies and public organisations appears to be contrary to theoretical and empirical considerations. Servant-leaders, whose concerns are primarily focused on subordinates rather than customers (or citizens), are hardly able to attain organisational goals.

Originality/value: The paper offers critical comments on the conceptual and empirically usefulness of servant-leadership when applied to business enterprises and public agencies.

Purpose: When subordinates are asked what kind of manager they prefer, the answers are virtually the same. Subordinates have a different focus than managers, as the latter focus on organisational goal attainment. The purpose of this paper is to pinpoint the consequences of the subordinates' leadership preferences for organisational performance.

Design/methodology/approach: This paper draws conclusions based on previous research and empirical data collected to illustrate the likely outcome of subordinates having the managers they prefer.

Findings: Subordinates favour the type of manager who has a relationship oriented style of leadership, and who is predominantly motivated by affiliation. Additionally, subordinates appear to prefer a servant leader to be their boss. Research has shown that relationship oriented and affiliation motivated managers, as well as servant leaders are detrimental to organisational effectiveness.

Research limitations/implications: The data refer only to Swedish samples of private and public managers regarding leadership styles and motivation profiles. Data have not yet been published on the occurrence of popular managers and the prevalence of servant leaders.

Practical implications: Both managers and subordinates need to acknowledge the conflicting issues in management. The manager that the subordinates want is precisely what they should not get.

Originality/value: This paper supplies theoretical as well as empirical arguments needed to warn organisations against having managers whose behaviour is preferred by subordinates, but also impedes organisational effectiveness.

Purpose – This study aims to explore behavioural differences between women and men in managerial positions and suggest explanations for differences and similarities.

Design/methodology/approach – In order to eliminate any effects of organizational differences on leadership behaviour, this study had public managers responding to questionnaires that measured their leadership style, decision-making style, and motivation profile.

Findings – Statistical analyses of data from three groups of Swedish public managers (n=385) revealed virtually no significant differences in behaviour between female and male managers. Regardless of whether there is a female or male majority of employees or a female or male majority of managers, no effect on leadership behaviour occurs.

Originality/value – A number of studies indicate that managers' behaviour is different in different types of organizations. This study suggests, therefore, that, independent of gender, organizational and demographic characteristics modify leadership behaviours, thus explaining similarities in leadership behaviour.

Managers often see new organizational design as the solution to many problems. This paper explores the relationship between organization structure (design), functioning of organizations, and effectiveness. A study of 320 companies showed that the structural variable, decentralization, marginally affected the way in which organizations function. Functional variables had a minor impact on profitability. No direct relationship between structure and effectiveness was found. When functioning is conceptualized as a mediating factor no direct causality between structure and effectiveness is implied, but a relationship between structure, function and effectiveness. To improve effectiveness, reorganizing is probably not the first option to consider.

This article addresses the problem of why subordinates trust their managers based on the responses from 108 subordinatesof seven Slovenian managers and from 138 subordinates of eight Swedish managers. The subordinates of these managersresponded to a 20-item instrument tested for reliability and validity. In both samples the managers enjoyed different degreesof trust. The level of trust vested in Slovenian managers was higher than in Swedish ones. The kinds of managers’ actions thatenhanced trust were similar amongst Swedish and Slovenian subordinates. Different socio-cultural contexts may theoreticallyexplain why some other kinds of actions had contrasting effects between the samples. On the whole, the actions of managersexplain trust in both countries. Subordinates’ trust in managers declines with the increasing hierarchical distance in bothnational samples. Managers need to show in action that they trust their subordinates, promote their interests, demonstrateappreciation of their subordinates, and solve problems.

In the Scandinavian countries, policy documents have been developed to strengthen leadership practices in the public sector. The policy documents ‘Code for Chief Executive Excellence’ (Denmark) and ‘Leadership in Norway’s Civil Service’ pertain to how the public sector ought to be managed. This article addresses two problems concerning these documents. To what degree does New Public Management (NPM) influence them? To what degree does management and leadership theory and research support the principles proposed by these documents? This article concludes that NPM has had a significant impact on public management in the Scandinavian countries. These policy  documents are based on leadership research and are in accordance with mainstream management theory. The idea of formulating a principle of management that would characterize the classical contributions is also evident in these documents.

The Swedish schools have been under pressure for change for several decades. How leaders behave can be of vital importance in times of change. The principal is responsible for both the educational program and for the school budget. Two hundred Swedish principals (male and female) responded to questionnaires concerning their leadership style, decision-making style and motivation profile. The results show that 49% of the principals have a change centered leadership style, 38% were primarily intuitive when making decisions, and 44% were achievement motivated. No significant gender differences were found. The results indicate that many principals have fair prospects of leading their schools successfully in times of change.

The Church of Sweden (Lutheran) was disestablished on January 1, 2000. The new situation in the Church clearly calls for organizational change. 

Using well-known test instruments, 240 Swedish vicars were asked about their leadership style, decision-making style, motivation profile and perceived operational demands. The questionnaires were related to a model of leadership strength for initiating and implementing organizational change. The results indicate that most vicars have a relationship-oriented leadership style. Most are feeling types in their decision-making style. Almost 60% were affiliation motivated. Almost 80% perceived relational operational demands to be most important. It is assumed that managers who have a change-centered leadership style, who are intuitive in decision-making style, power motivated and see urgent demands for change and development, will have an optimal capacity for implementing major changes in their organizations. This means that only 1% of the vicars seem to have a propensity for change at a time when many think that change is crucial for the Church.