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Unit 6 LDRSHP

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Leadership as vision
Author: Tony Morden
Date: September-October 1997
From: Management Decision(Vol. 35, Issue 9-10)
Publisher: Emerald Group Publishing, Ltd.
Document Type: Article
Length: 6,412 words

Abstract:
Organizational leadership requires vision to attain management objectives. This visionary leadership approach is exemplified by
General Electric CEO Jack Welch. According to a study by Tichy and Sherman (1994), Welch instituted a management philosophy at
General Electric guided by vision and shared values. He also stimulated positive emotional energy in employees by allowing them to
have a dialogue with their bosses. Kay (1993), on the other hand, analyzed visionary leadership in terms of relational contracts within
an organization. These relational contracts, termed by Kay as architecture, are fostered by the ability of corporate leaders to build and
sustain long-term trust and the pursuit of mutual benefit. In other words, visionary leadership requires consistency, trust, emotional
energy, holism, social architecture and relational contracts.

Full Text:
Contends that in addition to the role of leadership as a fundamental organizational competence, leadership may be defined in terms
of vision and shared values. Vision is conceptualized in holistic terms. Defines vision as an imagined or perceived but consistent
pattern of communal possibilities to which others can be drawn, and whose values they will wish to share. Explains visionary
leadership and analyses its implementation within the context of social architecture and trust. Describes Collins and Porras’ (1996)
analysis of the visionary company. Concludes with a summary of Hickman’s (1992) analysis of the relationship between the visionary
capacity of the leader, and the practical implementation approach of the manager, as the two opposite ends of a spectrum.
Concludes that a basic holistic objective should be to blend strong visionary leadership with effective management into one integrated
whole, in which the strengths of both combine synergistically to the advantage of the enterprise.

Introduction

This article contends that leadership is a visionary concept. It analyses leadership in terms of vision. Vision is holistic; and is defined
as an imagined or perceived pattern of communal possibilities to which others can be drawn, which they will wish to share, and which
will constitute a powerful source of energy and direction within the enterprise.

Vision and holism

Hampden-Turner and Trompenaars (1994) comment on the holistic character of French attitudes towards issues of organization and
management. The French describe such concepts as:

* solidarisme (mutual responsibility and interdependence);

* l’elan vital (the vital impulse, energizing source, or driving force);

* vision;

as key motivations for any organized community.

Mary Parker Follett (1987) describes leadership in holistic terms when she states that it is the leader who “can organize the
experience of the group … it is by organizing experience that we transform experience into power. The task of the chief executive is to
articulate the integrated unity which his business aims to be … the ablest administrators do not merely draw logical conclusions from
the array of facts … they have a vision of the future” (quoted in Hampden-Turner and Trompenaars, 1994, pp. 341-2).

Hampden-Turner and Trompenaars (1994) suggest that vision comes most easily to the holistically operating mind, while those with
an analysing bias admit, like ex-President Bush of the USA, to not being “good at the vision thing”.

Vision can be defined as an organized perception or phenomenon. It is an imagined or perceived pattern of communal possibilities to

which others can be drawn, given the necessary enthusiasm and momentum on the part of the leader who is promulgating that
vision.

Bennis (Bennis and Nanus, 1985) defines leadership in terms of the capacity to create a compelling vision, to translate it into action,
and to sustain it. Bennis’s 1985 study of 90 successful US public figures identified the following leadership skills:

* The ability to create a vision that others can believe in and adopt as their own. Such vision is long term in its orientation (while
market imperatives are short term). The leader uses vision to build a bridge from the present to the future of the organization.

* The capacity to communicate that vision (for instance through the process of management by wandering around or MBWA
described in the first of these two linked articles), and to translate it into practicalities. Its implementation, for example, might be based
on the enterprise mission statement; the organization’s culture and values; its mechanisms of socialization, training and development;
or its systems of incentive, status and reward.

* The ability to create a climate of organizational trust. Trust acts as an emotional glue that unites leaders and followers in a common
purpose, and helps achieve the outcomes of that vision. The issue of trust is dealt with in a later section of this article.

Tichy and Sherman’s analysis

Tichy and Sherman (1994) first published their bestselling account of the US General Electric (GE) corporation in 1993. This in-depth
and influential work describes the transformation of GE under its CEO, Jack Welch, and sparked a major renewal of academic and
practitioner interest in corporate leadership. The following section of this article is based upon direct quotations from Tichy and
Sherman (1994) and from Jack Welch.

Jack Welch and leadership

“Managing doesn’t interest Welch much. Leadership is what he values, because that’s what enhances his control over the
organization” (Tichy and Sherman, 1994, pp. 195-6). “Welch’s six rules:

1 control your destiny, or someone else will

2 face reality as it is, not as it was or as you wish it were

3 be candid with everyone

4 don’t manage, lead

5 change before you have to

6 if you don’t have a competitive advantage, don’t compete”. (Tichy and Sherman, 1994, p. 15)

“You don’t get anywhere if you keep changing your ideas. The only way to change people’s minds is with consistency. Once you get
the ideas, you keep refining and improving them; the more simply your idea is defined, the better it is. And you keep communicating.
Consistency, simplicity, and repetition is what it’s all about” (Tichy and Sherman, 1994, pp. 255-6).

Vision and leadership

“Somehow, the leader and the led have to define a vision that everyone can share” (Tichy and Sherman, 1994, p. 181).

“A company should define its vision and destiny in broad but clear terms” (Tichy and Sherman, 1994, p. 298).

“Look at Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt: they said, This is what it’s going to be. And then they did it. Big, bold changes,
forcefully articulated. When you get leaders who confuse popularity with leadership, who just nibble away at things, nothing changes”
(Tichy and Sherman, 1994, p. 298).

“In the new culture, the role of a leader is to express a vision, get buy-in, and implement it. That calls for open, caring relations with
employees, and face-to-face communication. People who cannot convincingly articulate a vision won’t be successful” (Tichy and
Sherman, 1994, p. 248).

Vision and emotional energy

“In the years ahead, corporations will sort themselves out into those that can compete on the playing field of global business, and
those that either sell out or fail. Winning will require the kind of skill, speed, and dexterity that can only come from an emotionally
energised work force”. Bureaucratic corporations instead respond sluggishly to environmental changes. “Businesses organized on
the old scientific model still build their best ideas into systems instead of encouraging employees to think for themselves. You can
recognize such companies by the listlessness of their workers, who lack the conviction, spirit, and drive that characterizes champions
in any field of endeavour” (Tichy and Sherman, 1994, p. 73).

“The old managerial habit of imposing ideas on employees transforms concepts into rules, stripping them of their vitality. Workers
change their behaviour but not their minds” (Tichy and Sherman, 1994, p. 73).

“The world of the 1990s and beyond will not belong to `managers’ or those who can make the numbers dance. The world will belong
to passionate, driven leaders — people who not only have enormous amounts of energy but who can energise those whom they lead”
(Tichy and Sherman, 1994, p. 182).

“Executives have substantial power over employees, but they can’t tell people what to believe. Creating the pumped-up, turned-on …
workforce that Welch envisions requires an honest intellectual exchange between bosses and subordinates — conducted as a
dialogue of equals. Welch calls this `leading while being led'” (Tichy and Sherman, 1994, p. 75).

“One of Welch’s main goals as a manager has been to stimulate positive emotional energy in subordinates. He says he wants `turned
on people'” (Tichy and Sherman, 1994, p. 62).

The values represented by the vision

“The goal was to implant and nourish the values Welch cherishes: self-confidence, candour, and an unflinching willingness to face
reality, even when it’s painful” (Tichy and Sherman, 1994, p. 4).

“The new organization at GE … depends on shared values … the values-based organization… derives its efficiency from consensus:
workers who share their employer’s goals don’t need much supervision” (Tichy and Sherman, 1994, p. 4).

“The most effective competitors in the twenty-first century will be the organizations that learn how to use shared values to harness the
emotional energy of employees. As speed, quality, and productivity become more important, corporations need people who can
instinctively act the right way, without instructions, and who feel inspired to share their best ideas with their employers. That calls for
emotional commitment. You can’t get it by pointing a gun. You can’t buy it, no matter how much you pay, You’ve got to earn it, by
standing for values that other people want to believe”, want to identify with, “and by consistently acting on those values” (Tichy and
Sherman, 1994, p. 195).

Welch “pushes values because that’s the way to get results. Delegating more of the control function to individuals … reduces the
need for reports, reviews, and other external mechanisms. A boundaryless organization can achieve the same level of control as a
hierarchical one — but at less cost, with less friction, and faster” (Tichy and Sherman, 1994, p. 195).

Architecture and trust

Bennis and Townsend (1995) suggest that a key to competitive advantage in the years to come will be the visionary capacity of
leaders to create a social architecture that is capable of generating intellectual and social capital, and capable of adding value. This
capital will be manifest in the value addition that results from the generation of ideas, knowledge, expertise, and innovation. Such
social architecture is likely to be based on high levels of trust.

Architecture

Kay (1993) identifies four sources (or “foundations”) of corporate success. These are:

1 architecture;

2 innovation (which may be imitated), and additionally an architecture that is capable of sustaining a process of ongoing innovation
(which may be much more difficult, or even impossible for competitors to imitate);

3 brands and corporate reputation;

4 the possession of, or access to some key strategic asset.

Kay suggests that the key measure of corporate success is that of added value. Added value is the difference between the value of
outputs and the relative cost of the inputs required to create them. Kay contends that the purpose of enterprise activity is to put
together a set of relationships (architecture), to innovate, to develop the long-term value of brands and reputation, and to seek
strategic assets such that the generation of added value is achieved within the prevailing conditions.

The enterprise is defined by its contracts and relationships. Added value is created by the success in putting together these contracts
and relationships, so it is the quality and distinctiveness that enterprise leadership can bring to these contracts and relationships that
determine the amount of value addition (and hence the degree of corporate success).

Architecture is defined by Kay as the network of relational contracts (defined below) within and around the enterprise. Organizations
may establish these relationships with and among their employees (internal architecture); with their customers and suppliers (external
architecture); and among groups of institutions engaged in related activities (networks; partnerships; value adding partnerships;
holonic networks and virtual companies [which are defined as configurations of independent organizations that act in an integrated
manner to meet emerging business opportunities]; etc).

The value-adding potential of enterprise architecture will derive from the relative success of those who establish it to create and
sustain organizational knowledge and competence; to create and sustain experience; to achieve flexible and ongoing responses to
changing circumstances; to create open and useful exchanges of information; and to create internalized cultural disciplines of
motivation, quality, and control.

A key part of Kay’s analysis is that architecture and social capital can only be created, sustained, and protected from imitation if it is
contained within a framework of relational contracts. What can be written down in a standard or classical contract can be reproduced.
Architecture therefore depends:

* on the ability of enterprise leadership to build and sustain long-term relationships characterized by trust and the pursuit of mutual
benefit (for instance as described elsewhere by Ouchi, 1981 as “Theory Z”); and

* on the ability of enterprise leadership to establish an environment that discourages (or makes unnecessary) “opportunistic” short-
term behaviour. Opportunistic behaviour by individuals is likely by definition to be counter-productive to long-term value generation
(especially where the individual has been able to appropriate some of the value they has generated to themself).

Long-term enterprise relationships must therefore be mutually profitable, for instance taking the form of the offer of “noticeably fatter
paychecks” (Tichy and Sherman, 1994, p. 217), employment guarantees, or significant length-of-service based bonuses, in return for
personal flexibility and commitment. They might instead take the form of long-term supply contracts framed within partnership
sourcing agreements, etc).

Trust

Fukuyama (1995), like Tichy and Sherman (1994), suggests that the most effective organizations are based on communities of
shared ethical values. These communities do not require extensive contractual or legal regulation of their relations and social
architecture because prior moral consensus gives members of the group a basis for mutual trust. Fukuyama comments that

social capital has major consequences for

the nature of the industrial economy that

society will be able to create. If people who

have to work together in an enterprise trust

one another because they are all operating

according to a common set of ethical norms,

doing business costs less. Such a society will

be better able to innovate organizationally,

since the high degree of trust will permit a

wide variety of social relationships to

emerge. Hence the…sociable Americans

pioneered the development of the modern

corporation… (while) the Japanese have

explored the possibilities of network organizations

… By contrast, people who do not

trust one another will end up co-operating

only under a system of formal rules and

regulations, which have to be negotiated,

agreed to, litigated, and enforced (if necessary

by coercive means). This legal apparatus,

serving as a substitute for trust, entails

what economists call “transaction costs”.

Widespread distrust in a society, in other

words, imposes a kind of tax on all forms of

economic activity, a tax that high-trust

societies do not have to pay” (Fukuyama,

1995, pp. 27-8).

Fukuyama (1995) suggests that a high degree of trust increases economic efficiency by reducing these transaction costs that would
otherwise be incurred, for instance in:

* maintaining and sustaining an effective enterprise relationship architecture;

* holding together large-scale and impersonal organizations or networks whose relationships must have a wider basis than that
restricted to family or kin;

* dealing with inter-party disputes;

* finding trustworthy and reliable suppliers, buyers, or creditors;

* negotiating and implementing contractual arrangements;

* complying with government, trade, or environmental regulations;

* identifying, and dealing with malpractice or fraud.

Such transactional arrangements are made easier (and less expensive) if the relationship architecture is characterized by honesty.
For instance, there will be::

* less need for control mechanisms within the management process;

* less need to specify matters contractually;

* there will be fewer grounds for dispute; and hence fewer disputes;

* less need for litigation (which consumes wealth but adds little or no value; destroys relationships; and reduces trust);

* less need to hedge against unexpected contingencies and unpredictable issues.

At the same time, Fukuyama (1995) contends that societies manifesting a high degree of communal solidarity and shared values may
be more efficient than their more individualistic counterparts in that they may lose less value from “free riders”. Free riders benefit
from value generation by an organization or a society, but do not contribute proportionately (or at all) to the effort by which that value
is generated. The free rider problem is a classic dilemma of group behaviour.

One solution to the free rider problem involves the group imposing some sort of coercion or discipline on its members to limit the
amount of free riding that they can do. This might involve the classical use of frequent and close monitoring and supervision (which is
expensive; and which as a form of control may be resented by the “non free riders” in the community who are pulling their weight).

Equally, but more efficiently, the incidence of free riding could instead be mitigated if the group possesses a high degree of social
solidarity. People become free riders where they put their individual interests ahead of the group. But if they strongly identify their own
well-being with that of the group, or put the group’s interests ahead of their own in the relative scale of priorities, they may be less
likely to shirk work or avoid responsibilities. Hence, within business organizations, sensitive leaders will attempt to establish a culture
of pride, equality, a sense of belonging, and a sense of esprit de corps among their employees such that these people believe that
they are part of a worthwhile enterprise which has a valuable purpose.

The high-trust workplace

Fukuyama describes lean manufacturing, for instance as found in the automobile industry, as an example of the organization and
management of a high-trust workplace. It can be contrasted with the classic low-trust manufacturing system created by F.W. Taylor
and the School of Scientific Management (for instance, see Morden, 1996).

Lean manufacturing systems require a high level of trust because, for example:

* the fragility of the system, which can easily be disrupted, calls for responsible behaviour throughout the network upon which it is
based, at all times. This applies equally to suppliers and employees;

* people are trusted to deal with problems, where and when they happen, at source.

This is because:

* people are trusted with high levels of responsibility and discretion at all points of the supply and operational process. This implies a
significant degree of the delegation of authority and responsibility throughout the workforce and the supply chain;

* the use of collective and team/cell-based operational structures means that free-riding behaviour becomes unacceptable. Group
norms become dominant (particularly if pay is also based on them) over individualistic priorities;

* the abandonment by employees of traditional lines of demarcation and trade union involvement in the establishment of work
practices must be reciprocated by management. This may mean making available the necessary multi-skill and quality assurance
training; providing employment guarantees (at least to core workers); implementing single employee status, and the
downgrading/elimination of hierarchical privilege; increased remuneration resulting from increased productivity, etc);

* there will be an expectation of totally cooperative and trustworthy behaviour by suppliers and intermediaries throughout the value
chain. This is related to the requirement that open information flows are needed to make the system work. The free exchange of
information will only occur where there is adequate trust between the parties to that exchange. This is particularly true of the supply
chain; and of network structures/relationship architectures.

Collins and Porras’ analysis

Collins and Porras’ (1996) influential study, Built To Last, may be described as an inheritor of a lengthy (and US dominated) tradition
of the study of corporate performance. This tradition is based on the work of such academics, consultants, and corporate leaders as
Frederick Taylor, Alfred Sloane, Peter Drucker, Tom Peters, and Rosabeth Moss Kanter.

Collins and Porras (1996) suggest that their study identifies the main characteristics of what they call “visionary companies”. These
companies are all American, with the exception of the Sony Corporation. These companies are described as being characterized by
excellence. Collins and Porras (1996) define such companies, which include 3M, Hewlett-Packard, Johnson and Johnson, and
Boeing, as “premier institutions — the crown jewels — in their industries, widely admired by their peers and having a long track record
of making a significant impact on the world around them.., visionary companies prosper over long periods of time, through multiple
product life cycles and multiple generations of active leaders” (Collins and Porras, 1996, pp. 1-2).

Company sample and research methodology

Collins and Porras (1996, p. 2) note that “in a six-year research project, we set out to identify and.., research the historical
development of a set of visionary companies, to examine how they differed from a carefully selected control set of comparison
companies, and to thereby discover the underlying factors that account for their … long term position”.

The primary objectives for the research project were to:

1 identify the underlying characteristics common to visionary companies (that distinguish them from other companies), and to
translate these findings into a useful conceptual framework;

2 communicate these concepts and findings so that they may influence the practice of management and prove beneficial to people
who want to create, develop, and maintain visionary companies.

The survey was based on a sample of 18 companies, all founded before 1950. These were compared with an equivalent set of
comparison companies, in order to establish what distinguishes one set of companies from another.

These sample companies were analysed in depth across their entire history. The researchers sought “underlying, timeless,
fundamental principles and patterns that might apply across eras” (Collins and Porras, 1996, p. 17). This analysis was based on the
study of:

nine categories of information over the

entire history of each company. These categories

encompassed virtually all aspects of a

corporation, including organization, business

strategy, products and services, technology,

management, ownership structure,

culture, values, policies, and the external

environment. As part of this effort, we systematically

analysed annual financial statements

back to the year 1915 and monthly

stock returns back to the year 1926. In addition,

we did an overview of general and

business history in the United States from

1800 to 1900, and an overview of each industry

represented by the companies in our

study (Collins and Porras, 1996, p. 19).

Collins and Porras’ proposition

Collins and Porras (1996) propose a model of a visionary company. This model is characterized by:

* Clock building, not time-telling, by which the company itself is the ultimate creation. The builders of such companies take an
architectural approach and concentrate on developing the key organizational traits of the visionary company. Building a vision and a
company that can prosper far beyond the presence of any single leader and through multiple life cycles is described as “clock
building”.

* More than profits. The visionary company is driven by a powerful internal core ideology, which comprises core values and a sense
of purpose which extend far beyond simply making money. This “pragmatic idealism” guides and inspires people, and remains
relatively fixed for long periods of time. The core ideology is seen as a primary element in the historical development and success of
the visionary company.

* Preserve the core but stimulate progress. The visionary company protects and preserves its core ideology, but puts in place a
relentless drive for progress that implies development and change in all of the activities inspired by that core ideology. Visionary
companies are characterized by strong drives for exploration and discovery, for creativity and innovation, for improvement, and for
change.

* Big hairy audacious goals (or BHAGs). Visionary companies will deliberately set themselves audacious and risky objectives, some
of which will “bet the company” (Deal and Kennedy, 1988). Such objectives (for example the development of the Boeing 747) will
challenge the whole company and force change upon it, as well as reinforcing the market leadership typically enjoyed by these
premier companies.

* Cult-like cultures. The company’s core ideology is translated into clear cultural and behavioural patterns. These cultural and
ideological patterns are imposed on people in the organization, who are screened and indoctrinated into conformity and commitment
to them. There are high levels of expected commitment; those who cannot accept the prevailing culture will leave or be fired.
Visionary companies tend to be more demanding of their employees and managers than other companies. But those who can cope
may develop a strong sense of working for an elite organization, which in turn has an effect on the calibre of people who can be
attracted and recruited. Visionary companies may be regarded as ultimate employers who are in a position to recruit “the best”.

* Try a lot of stuff and keep what works. Visionary companies exhibit high levels of action and experimentation — often unplanned or
undirected — that produce new or unexpected paths of progress. This evolutionary progress is opportunistic in character; accepts the
value of trial-and-error and chance discovery; and rejects `Not Invented Here’ limitations on the strategic management of technology
and innovation. Individual employees are encouraged and empowered to seek new paths and new ways of doing things.

* Home-grown management. Visionary companies select, develop, and promote managerial talent from inside the company to a
greater degree than other organizations. This brings to senior levels only those who have spent considerable time being socialized
into, and internalizing the core ideology of the company. This has the effect of preserving and reinforcing the core ideology, and
bringing about continuity. For instance, in commenting on the track record and succession planning of the US General Electric
corporation (GE), Collins and Porras (1996, p. 171) comment that “to have a Welch-calibre CEO is impressive. To have a century of
Welch-calibre CEOs all grown from inside … that is one key reason why GE is a visionary company”.

* Good enough never is. The visionary companies are characterized by an ethic of continuous self-improvement, with the aim of
doing better and better in the future. This helps to stimulate progress. The search for improvement becomes a way of life — a habit of
mind and action. Collins and Porras (1996) suggest that excellent performance comes naturally to the visionary company as a result
of a never-ending cycle of self. stimulated improvement and investment for the future. One consequence of this ethic is that visionary
companies tend to install powerful mechanisms to create discomfort and to obliterate complacency. As a result, such companies may
not be “comfortable” places in which to work!

Mind of a manager, soul of a leader

Hickman’s (1992) influential study Mind of a Manager, Soul of a Leader was first published in 1990. Hickman compares and inter-
relates the competences and mind-sets of managers and those of leaders. He notes that as a result of the growing pressures on
contemporary organizations, “executives find themselves confronted with an escalating conflict… between the managerial and
leadership requirements of organizations. An `either/or’ mentality dominates at a time when organizations most desperately need the
best of both” (pp. vii-viii). Hickman (1992) attempts to put to rest fruitless “debate about `managers’ and `leaders’ … (suggesting that)
what companies need are the skills of both; the practical, analytical, orderly mind of a manager; and the experimental, visionary,
creative soul of a leader” (endpapers).

Hickman (1992, p. 7) suggests that “the words `manager’ and `leader’ are metaphors representing two opposite ends of a spectrum.
`Manager’ tends to signify the more analytical, structured, controlled, deliberate, and orderly end of the continuum; while `leader’

tends to occupy the more experimental, visionary, flexible, uncontrolled, and creative end”.

A fundamental holistic objective should be to blend strong management and strong leadership into one integrated whole, where the
strengths of both combine synergistically, and offset each other’s weaknesses. This synergy might be achieved by any or all of the
permutations described below.

Authority plus influence

Authority gives someone the legitimate right to order and command behaviour. Managers use authority to get people to take action.
Influence involves the use of indirect or intangible means to prompt thought, opinion, attitude, and behaviour.

Leaders apply influence rather than authority to get people to take action. They are able to rally others behind the vision or purpose
they have articulated.

Hickman (1992, p. 102) comments that the organization “needs leaders with strong influence and managers who use authority to get
things done. Balanced attention to both allows an organization to focus on the key issues facing it, as well as on the nuts and bolts of
daily operation”.

Art plus science

Leaders may value the fluid, intuitive, and qualitative side of their work, thinking of it as an art. This may cause them to think and
communicate in terms of visions and beliefs.

Managers will often conceptualize their work as a precise, rational, and qualitative science. Given this tendency, managers typically
study, define, and attempt to clarify the concrete, measurable aspects of organization and management. Some will dismiss the
concept of organizational leadership as a “soft” issue, of little worth compared with the “hard” matters of management science.

The enterprise in reality needs both approaches to be effective and responsive, even if these approaches co-exist in a state of
tension.

Simplicity plus complexity

Hickman (1992) notes in this context McNamara’s First Law of Analysis, which states that a person should “always start by looking at
the grand total. Whatever problem you are studying, back off and look at it in the large”. Hickman suggests that when a leader wishes
to view this full picture, they may do so by simplifying it. The leader searches for patterns, connections, frameworks, or concepts that
encompass all the confusing details surrounding a particular issue. As a result of this inclination, leaders tend to create simple visions
or perceptions of reality, encouraging a philosophy of keep it simple (KIS). Leaders use the detail to find patterns and frameworks in
order to simplify the complexity,

When looking at the same situations, managers may tend to see complexity. When attempting to conceptualize and understand the
whole picture, the manager’s mind may turn to the detail, digging for additional data that may not be readily apparent. Given this
inclination (reinforced by the tendency of Western managers to receive analytical, deconstructionist, and problem-orientated
education and training), managers may create complex analyses of reality that contain all of the detail they can muster. Managers
use details to paint the most realistic picture possible, with all its complexity.

Hickman (1992, p. 163) comments that “in cases of complexity versus simplicity, it may be easier for the manager to embrace some
or part of the orientation of the leader than for the leader to assume some or part of the orientation of the manager”. He suggests that
“organizations should look for complexity first and then find ways to simplify that complexity Both orientations are … important, but
simplicity alone carries much more risk … in an increasingly global and complex world. However, complexity in and of itself can fail
because it obscures simple strategic priorities and cultural values that need to be clearly… communicated to people throughout the
organization. In a balanced and integrated organization, managers work to bring the full picture with all its complexity into focus, while
leaders complement their efforts by taking that complex picture and finding simple patterns and frameworks to make it easy to use
and communicate” (Hickman, 1992, p. 164).

Dreams plus duties

Hickman (1992) suggests that when leaders want to enhance their effectiveness, they pursue dreams because dreams represent
new visions and new possibilities. Leaders may evaluate their performance on the basis of dreams achieved.

In their drive to become effective, managers will instead focus on duties because duties represent concrete and finite tasks. Hickman
suggests that when managers appraise and evaluate their performance, they instinctively use current duties as their measurement
standards.

Hickman (1992) comments that both dreams and duties are needed, because both “are inexorably linked” (p. 223).

Inspiration plus instruction

Because managers want to ensure that their people know what to do and how to do it, they tend to take an instructional approach to
their subordinates. Such an approach emphasizes the “how” of individual and organizational performance; and relies on training to
make sure the “how” can be turned into capability.

On the other hand, leaders, wanting to make sure that their people know “why” their jobs are important, may try harder to inspire.
Inspiration, as a form of motivation, is seen as the best way of helping people grasp the meaning and outcome of their work. Leaders
will be well advised to ensure that people are properly instructed and trained in the “hows”, but only after focusing on the “whys” and
their attendant vision and inspiration.

Fasten plus unfasten

Hickman suggests that the management process tends to fasten matters in two ways:

1 managers fasten their attention on specific issues;

2 managers then attempt to fasten resolutions to those issues onto people and organization.

As a result, managers will set performance and behaviour priorities, objectives, policies, expectations, milestones, assignments and
tasks that will lead towards the resolution of these matters.

Leaders tend instead to unfasten matters in two ways: 1 they will tend to focus their gaze away from immediate concerns, and
visualize the larger context or wider picture;

2 they like to unfasten apparent narrowly focused or “tied-down” aspects of their people and organization.

In this way, leaders may disdain existing direction, immediate priorities, prevailing expectations, and current objectives. They may
question the “received wisdom”, challenging what they perceive as potentially myopic, conservative, or static views of the market,
technology, competitors, culture, etc; and past organizational responses to these variables. Their objective may be to evaluate and
review, to create or innovate, to challenge self-imposed “not-invented-here” restrictions, to change the parameters of the enterprise,
or to achieve breakthroughs in their critical success factors.

Compromise plus polarize

A manager’s mind may seek compromise, whether with superiors, peers, or subordinates, in order to ensure that policies, plans and
programmes get implemented. Compromising may become a way of life for managers, for without it the organization may get
enmeshed in a rising tide of conflicts and differences. Compromise is used to reduce or eliminate conflict.

The leader may instead seek to polarize. Leaders may deliberately attempt to elicit strong, diametrically opposed responses from
superiors, peers, and subordinates. Polarization of viewpoints is useful because it reveals the multiplicity of perspectives that enrich
an undertaking, and demonstrates alternative visions or possibilities.

Hickman (1992) contends that both compromise and polarization are needed. He comments that “there is a time for iron-willed
polarizing, and there is a time for flexible compromising. If you only know how to compromise, you miss the tonic effect of polarizing;
if you only know how to polarize, you miss those opportunities where … bending could save the day” (p. 158).

Vision plus version

A prime leadership skill will be to envision some desired future state of being, and to inspire others to understand and share that
vision. However, after the leader has envisioned and conceptualized that desired future state of being, someone else usually has to
create a version of that desired state in order to implement it. This raises two issues:

1 the developing relationship between what was envisioned and what can be realistically implemented;

2 the leader’s perception of(and satisfaction with) the process of versioning and implementation; and his/her capacity to leave the
versioning of vision to others.

Hickman comments that the enterprise needs both visioning and versioning capabilities to sustain it over the long term.

Present plus future

Hickman suggests that managers’ minds typically think about and act on the present. When managers do look into the future, they
may do so by extrapolating from the past and present. For these managers, the present represents the boundary of their
accountability. They perceive that the only way to create the future is to manage the present.

Leaders’ souls, on the other hand, reside in the future, viewing the present in terms of its long-term implications. The present
functions primarily as a measure of progress towards some future envisioned state. Leaders perceive their accountability to be
defined in terms of future change, progress, or results.

In reality, the direction of the enterprise depends on the effective management of both present and future, not one or the other.

Short term plus long term

Managers tend to focus on short-term, immediate results. They may view such results as the key measure of whether or not they are
doing a good job.

Leaders will tend to think in the long-term of wider issues and results. They believe that focusing on the long-term places the short-
term in its proper perspective.

In reality, both short and long-term results are important considerations for any organization. Hickman (1992) comments that “while
the company should not pursue short-term results at the expense of long-term results, neither should it use the pursuit of long-term
results to justify poor performance in the short-term” (p. 256).

Summary

The model of leadership described in this article is illustrated in Figure 1. The diagram summarizes the key variables described in this
article that comprise the model of leadership as vision. A related article, published in Management Decision, Vol. 35 No. 7, analysed
leadership as competence.

Application questions

1 How well are we developing, training, schooling leaders as opposed to managers? What are or should be the main differences in
developing leaders as distinct from developing managers?

2 Can a leader lead with a vision?

3 What would be the ideal characteristics of a leader in your organization in the near future? How would they spend their days at
work?

References

Bennis, W. and Nanus, B. (1985), Leaders: the Strategies for Taking Charge, Harper & Row, New York, NY.

Bennis, W. and Townsend, R. (1995), Reinventing Leadership, Piatkus, London.

Collins, J. C. and Porras, J. I. (1996), Built to Last, Century Business, London.

Deal, T. E. and Kennedy, A. A. (1988), Corporate Cultures, Penguin, London.

Follett, M E (1987), Freedom and Co-ordination: Lectures in Business Organization, Garland, New York, NY.

Fukuyama, F. (1995), Trust: The Social Values And The Creation Of Prosperity, Hamish Hamilton, London.

Hampden-Turner, C. and Trompenaars, F. (1994), The Seven Cultures of Capitalism, Piatkus, London.

Hickman, C. R. (1992), Mind of a Manager, Soul of a Leader, Wiley, New York, NY.

Kay, J. (1993), Foundations of Corporate Success, Oxford University Press, Oxford.

Morden, A. R. (1996), Principles of Management, McGraw-Hill, London.

Ouchi, W. (1981), Theory Z, Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA.

Tichy, N. M. and Sherman, S. (1994), Control Your Own Destiny or Someone Else Will, Harper Business, New York, NY.

Copyright: COPYRIGHT 1997 Emerald Group Publishing, Ltd.
http://www.emeraldinsight.com.libraryresources.columbiasouthern.edu/
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Morden, Tony. “Leadership as vision.” Management Decision, vol. 35, no. 9-10, Sept.-Oct. 1997, p. 664+. Gale OneFile: Business,

https://link-gale-
com.libraryresources.columbiasouthern.edu/apps/doc/A20531638/ITBC?u=oran95108&sid=ITBC&xid=101285d6. Accessed 16
Aug. 2020.

Gale Document Number: GALE|A20531638

http://www.emeraldinsight.com.libraryresources.columbiasouthern.edu/

Global leadership: women leaders
Author: Nancy J. Adler
Date: Annual 1997
From: Management International Review(Vol. 37)
Publisher: Gabler Verlag
Document Type: Article
Length: 9,255 words

Abstract:
This article looks at the nature of global leadership and the role that women will play at the level of the world’s most senior leaders,
including both women presidents and prime ministers of countries and CEOs of major global companies. The article argues that
global leadership theory is concerned with the interaction of people and ideas among cultures; global leadership is not merely an
extension of domestic or multidomestic leadership. A definition of global leadership is developed which is intended to guide us in
treating each other and our planet in a more civilized way in the 21st century than we have in the twentieth century. The experience
of senior women leaders to date and the qualities often labelled as feminie qualities meet many of the challenges specified by the
global leadership model. (Reprinted by permission of the publisher.)

Abstract:
This article looks at the nature of global leadership and the role that women will play at the level of the world’s most senior leaders,
including both women presidents and prime ministers of countries and CEOs of major global companies. Key Results The article
argues that global leadership theory is concerned with the interaction of people and ideas among cultures; global leadership is not
merely an extension of domestic or multidomestic leadership. A definition of global leadership is developed which is intended to guide
us in treating each other and our planet in a more civilized way in the 21st century than we have in the twentieth century. The
experience of senior women leaders to date and the qualities often labelled as feminine qualities meet many of the challenges
specified by the global leadership model.

Full Text:
Global Leadership and the Twenty-first Century

In his speech accepting the Philadelphia Liberty Medal, Vaclav Havel (1994, p. A27), President of the Czech Republic, eloquently
explained that:

There are good reasons for suggesting that the modern age has ended. Many

things indicate that we are going through a transitional period, when

it seems that something is on the way out and something else is

painfully being born. It is as if something were crumbling, decaying

and exhausting itself, while something else, still indistinct, were

arising from the rubble.

Havel’s appreciation of the transition that the world is now experiencing is certainly important to each of us as human beings. None of
us can claim that the twentieth century is exiting on an impressive note, on a note imbued with wisdom. As we ask ourselves which of
the twentieth century’s legacies we wish to pass on to the children of the twenty-first century, we are humbled into shameful silence.
Yes we have advanced science and technology, but at the price of a world torn asunder by a polluted environment, by cities infested
with social chaos and physical decay, by an increasingly skewed income distribution that condemns large proportions of the
population to poverty (including people living in the world’s most affluent societies), and by rampant physical violence continuing to kill
people in titulary limited wars and seemingly random acts of violence. No, we do not exit the twentieth century with pride. Unless we
can learn to treat each other and our planet in a more civilized way, is it not blasphemy to continue to consider ourselves a civilization
(Rechtschaffen 1996)?(1)

The dynamics of the twenty-first century will not look like those of the twentieth century; to survive as a civilization, twenty-first century
society must not look like the twentieth century. For a positive transition to take place, the world needs a new type of leadership.

Where will society find wise leaders to guide it toward a civilization that differs so markedly from that of the twentieth century? While
many people continue to review men’s historic patterns of success in search of models for twenty-first century global leadership, few
have even begun to appreciate the equivalent patterns of historic and potential contributions of women leaders (Adler 1996). My
personal search for leaders who are outside of traditional twentieth century paradigms has led me to review the voice that the world’s
women leaders are bringing to society. This article looks at the nature of global leadership and the role that women will play at the
most senior levels of world leadership.

Leadership: A Long History

To lead comes from the latin verb “agere” meaning to set into motion (Jennings 1960). The Anglo-Saxon origins of the word to lead
come from “laedere”, meaning people on a journey (Boman/Deal 1991). Today’s meaning of the word leader therefore has the sense
of someone who sets ideas, people, organizations, and societies in motion; someone who takes the worlds of ideas, people,
organizations, and societies on a journey. To lead such a journey requires vision, courage, and influence.

According to U.S. Senator Barbara Mikulski, leadership involves “creating a state of mind in others” (Cantor/Bernay 1992, p. 59).
Leaders, therefore, are “individuals who significantly influence the thoughts, behaviors, and/or feelings of others” (Gardner 1995, p.
6). Beyond strictly focusing on the role of the leader, leadership should also be thought of as interactive, as “an influence relationship
among leaders and followers who intend real changes … [reflecting] their mutual purposes” (Rost 1991, p. 102). In addition,
according to Bolman and Deal (1995, p. 5), true leadership also includes a spiritual dimension:

Two images dominate [concepts of leadership]: one of the heroic champion

with extraordinary stature and vision, the other of the policy wonk,

the skilled analyst who solves pressing problems with information,

programs, and policies. Both images miss the essence of leadership.

Both emphasize the hands and heads of leaders, neglecting deeper and

more enduring elements of courage, spirit and hope.

Thus leadership must be viewed as something more than role and process – something more than the extent to which a particular
leader has been influential. To fully appreciate leadership, we must also ask the ends to which a leader’s behavior is directed. From
this process and outcome perspective, leaders can be viewed as people whose vision, courage, and influence set ideas, people,
organizations, and societies in motion toward the betterment of their organization, their community, and the world.

While comprehensive, this definition of leadership cannot be considered historically agreed-upon; indeed, no such agreed-upon
definition exists. After reviewing more than 5000 published works on leadership, neither Stogdill (1974) in the 1970s nor Bass (1991)
in the present decade succeeded in identifying a commonly agreed upon definition of leadership. As Bennis and Nanus (1985, p. 4)
concluded:

Decades of academic analysis have given us more than 350 definitions of

leadership. Literally thousands of empirical investigations of leaders

have been conducted in the last 75 years alone, but no clear and

unequivocal understanding exists as to what distinguishes leaders from

non-leaders and, perhaps more important, what distinguishes effective

leaders from ineffective leaders…

Rather than adding once again to the already over-abundant supply of leadership definitions, this article simply adds two dimensions
to the historical definitions of leadership; the first is a global perspective and the second is the inclusion of women leaders and their
experience in a field that has heretofore focused almost exclusively on men.(2)

Global Leaders: Global Leadership

Global leadership involves the ability to inspire and influence the thinking, attitudes, and behavior of people from around the world.
Thus from a process and an outcome perspective, global leadership can be described as “a process by which members of… [the
world community] are empowered to work together synergistically toward a common vision and common goals … [resulting in an]
improv[ment in] the quality of life” on and for the planet (based on Astin/Leland 1991, p. 8; Hollander 1985). Global leaders are those
people who most strongly influence the process of global leadership.

Whereas there are hundreds of definitions of leadership, there are no global leadership theories. Most leadership theories, although
failing to state so explicitly, are domestic theories masquerading as universal theories (Boyacigiller/ Adler 1991, 1996). Most
commonly, they have described the behavior of leaders in one particular country, the United States (and, as will be discussed later, of
one particular gender, men). This is particularly unfortunate for understanding global leadership since “Americans’ extreme
individualism combined with their highly participative managerial climate, may render U.S. management practices [including
leadership] unique; that is, differentiated from the approaches in most areas of the world” (Dorfman 1996, p. 292; also see Dorfman

1991; Dorfman/Howell 1988; Hofstede 1991). Recent research on leadership supports this conclusion in finding that the United
States is unique in several respects among all of the Eastern and Western cultures that have been studied (Howell et al. 1994). For
example, based on 221 definitions of leadership from the twentieth century, Rost (1991) concluded that leadership has most
frequently been seen as rational, management-oriented, male, technocratic, quantitative, cost-driven, hierarchical, short-term,
pragmatic, and materialistic. Not surprisingly, many of these listed descriptors reflect some of the core values of American culture.
For example, relative to people from most other cultures, Americans tend to have a more short-term orientation (e. g., they
emphasize this quarter’s results and daily reported share prices), a more materialistic orientation (e. g., forty percent of American
managers still think that “the bottom line” is the criterion for corporate health, whereas in no other nation can find even thirty percent
of its managers who take this view; see Hampden-Turner 1993), and a more quantitative orientation (e.g., emphasizing measurable
contributions and results rather than relying on less easily quantified qualities such as success in relationship-building).(3)

Of those leadership studies and theories that are not U.S.-based, most still tend to be domestic, with the only difference from the
American theories being that their cultural locus reflects the values and context of a country other than the United States; such as
descriptions of Israeli leaders in Israel (e. g., Vardi 1980) or Indian leaders in India (e. g., Kakar 1971) The fundamental global
leadership question is not “Do American Leadership Theories Apply Abroad?” (Hofstede 1980b), nor is it the comparative question of
attempting to determine the extent to which behaviors of leaders in one culture replicate those of leaders in other cultures. Both
questions frame leadership within a domestic context; the only distinction being that the former focuses on a single country
(descriptive domestic theories) whereas the later focuses on multiple countries (comparative multidomestic theories) (see
Boyacigiller/Adler 1991, 1996).

Global leaders, unlike domestic leaders, address people worldwide. Global leadership theory, unlike its domestic counterpart, is
concerned with the interaction of people and ideas among cultures, rather than with either the efficacy of particular leadership styles
within the leader’s home country or with the comparison of leadership approaches among leaders from various countries — each of
whose domain is limited to issues and people within their own cultural environment. A fundamental distinction is that global leadership
is neither domestic nor multidomestic; it focuses on cross-cultural interaction rather than on either single-culture description or multi-
country comparison. The Secretary General of the United Nations cannot change his message for each of the U.N.’s more than 100
member states. Similarly the CEO of a global company cannot change her message for each of the countries and cultures in which
her company operates. As we move toward the twenty-first century, the domain of influence of leadership is shifting from
circumscribed geographies to globally encompassing geographies; from part of the world — e. g., a nation or domestic economy — to
the whole world. Historically, such transnational leadership “… that goes beyond the nation-state and seeks to address all human
beings” has been “… the most important, but rarest and most elusive, variety of leadership” (Gardner 1995, p. 20). However, the
essence of such transnational leadership was captured already centuries ago by Diogenes in his assertion to his fellow Athenians, “I
am not an Athenian or a Greek but a citizen of the world” (as cited in Gardner 1995, p. 51), and again much more recently by Virginia
Woolf (1938), one of the twentieth century’s thought leaders:

As a woman, I have no country.

As a woman, I want no country.

As a woman, the whole world is my country.

Within this emerging cross-culturally interactive context, global leaders must articulate a vision which, in and of itself, is global; that is,
global leaders articulate the meaning within which others from around the world work and live. According to Britain’s Anita Roddick
(1991, p. 226), founder and CEO of the highly successful global firm, The Body Shop:

Leaders in the business world should aspire to be true planetary citizens.

They have global responsibilities since their decisions affect not just

the world of business, but world problems of poverty, national security

and the environment. Many, sad to say, [have] duck[ed]

these responsibilities, because their vision is material rather than moral.

Roddick’s view of global leaders as “true planetary citizens” echoes Bolman and Deal’s (1995, p. 5) observation that strictly
emphasizing the hands and the head of leaders misses the essence of leadership by neglecting the deeper and more enduring
elements of courage, spirit, and hope. The vision of a global leader, by definition, must be broader than the particular organization or
country that he or she leads.

Beyond having a worthy vision, global leaders must be able to communicate their vision in a compelling manner to people from
around the world. According to leadership expert Howard Gardner (1995, p. 8 et seq.), “Leaders achieve their effectiveness chiefly
through the stories they relate,” both by communicating the stories and by embodying them. “Nearly all leaders are eloquent in voice,
” with many being “eloquent in writing as well” (Gardner 1995, p. 34). As leaders, “they do not merely have a promising story; they
can [also] tell it persuasively” (Gardner 1995, p. 34).

Gardner (1995, p. 11) goes on to distinguish between leaders of a domain and leaders of a society. Leaders of a domain address an
audience which “… is already sophisticated in the stories, the images, and the other embodiments of that domain. To put it simply,
one is communicating with experts” — such as when a medical doctor addresses other physicians. Leaders of a society “… must be
able to address a public in terms of the commonsense and commonplace notions that an ordinary inhabitant absorbs simply by virtue
of living for some years within a society” (Gardner 1995, p. 12). According to Ireland’s President, Mary Robinson (as described in
Pond 1996, p. 59):

A woman leader often has a distinctive approach as the country’s chief

“storyteller, [personifying] a sense of nationhood and [telling] a story that

also [helps] shape people’s sense of their own identity.” This is leadership

by “influencing [and] inspiring” rather than by commanding.

As society goes global, the audience of a leader also goes global. What members of a global audience have in common is only that
which is most fundamentally human to each individual. Global leaders, to a much greater extent than their domestic counterparts,
must be able to communicate in terms of what is commonsense and commonplace for people worldwide; they therefore must
communicate in the most fundamental terms of humanity. Global leaders do not enjoy the simplified reality that their domestic
predecessors enjoyed of speaking primarily to people from one culture, one country, one organization, or one discipline.

Global Leaders: Women Leaders

The feminization of leaders and of leadership is a significant development in our understanding and in the governance of global
political, economic, and societal structures.(4) As we approach the end of the twentieth century, the number of women in the most
senior global leadership positions is increasing and, at the same time, the style of global leadership is increasingly incorporating
approaches most frequently labelled as feminine. It appears that “the economic exigenc[ies] of global competition … [are making]
feminine characteristics admirable in both men and women” (Calas/Smircich 1993).

This article focuses on women with positional power, women in the most senior leadership roles in major global companies and
nations. The focus goes beyond the assumption that scholarship on women leaders must limit itself to women’s historically more
traditional mode of influence — that of influencing, primarily from behind the scenes, the men who hold society’s most elite positions of
power while the women themselves hold no positional power. See, for example, contemporary discussions of the influence on their
respective presidential husbands of American first ladies, including the more than 50 books published on Hillary Rodham Clinton and
the extensive literature on Eleanor Roosevelt (Goodwin 1995). While the feminist literature has tended to champion the
nonhierarchical notion of broadly dispersed leadership — that is, the empowerment of many leaders within society (see Astin/Leland
1991, among many other) — in contrast to traditional, role-based, hierarchical, and more exclusive notions of leadership, this article
attempts to bring the two notions back together. It asks what the nature of elite role leadership, as exhibited by women, will be in the
organizationally flattened world of the twenty-first century.

Women Leaders: Numbers Increasing

The “feminization of an occupation or a job refers to women’s disproportionate entry into a customarily male occupation” (Fondus
1997, pp. 258 based on Cohn 1985 and Reskin/Roos 1990). Thus the feminization of global leadership would be the disproportionate
entry of women into the most senior political and business leadership roles in the world. Is there reason to believe that we will see the
feminization of global leadership in the twenty-first century? Yes. While rarely recognized or reported in the media, one inescapable
trend is that the number of the most senior global women political leaders — presidents and prime ministers of countries — is rapidly
increasing, albeit from a negligible starting point. As shown in Figure 1, no women presidents or prime ministers came to office in the
1950s, three came to office in the 1960s, five in the 1970s, eight in the 1980s, and to date in the 1990s twenty-one have already
come to office. More than half of all women who have ever served as political leaders — 21 of 37 — have come into office since 1990.
At the current rate of increase, we would expect to have almost twice as many women become president or prime minister in this
decade as have ever served before. As shown in Table 1, countries as dissimilar as Sri Lanka, Ireland, and Rwanda have had
women lead them.(5)

Table 1. Global Women Leaders: A Chronology Country Name Sri Lanka (*)Sirimavo Bandaranaike India (Indira Gandhi) Israel
(Golda Meir) Argentina (Maria Estela [Isabel] Martinez de Peron) Central African Rep. Elizabeth Domitien Portugal Maria
de Lourdes Pintasilgo Bolivia Lidia Gveiler Tejada Great Britain Margaret Thatcher Dominica Mary Eugenia Charles Iceland
Vigdis Finnbogadottir Norway Gro Harlem Brundtland Yugoslavia Milka Planinc Malta Agatha Barbara Netherland-Antilles
Maria Liberia-Peters The Philippines Corazon Aquino Pakistan Benazir Bhutto Lithuania Kazimiera-Danute Prunskiene Haiti
Ertha Pascal-Trouillot Myanmar (Burma) Aung San Suu Kyi East Germany Sabine Bergmann-Pohl Ireland (*)Mary Robinson
Nicaragua Violeta Barrios de Chamorro Bangladesh Khaleda Zia France Edith Cresson Poland Hanna Suchocka Canada Kim
Campbell Burundi Sylvia Kinigi Rwanda (Agatha Uwilingiyimana) Turkey Tansu Ciller Bulgaria Reneta Indzhova Sri Lanka
(*)Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga Haiti Claudette Werleigh Switzerland (*)Ruth Dreifuss Bangladesh (*)Hasina Wajed
Liberia (*)Ruth Perry Ecuador Rosalia Artega Bermuda (*)Pamela Gordon Guyana (*)Janet Jagan Country Office Sri Lanka
Prime Minister India Prime Minister Israel Prime Minister Argentina President Central African Rep. Prime Minister
Portugal Prime Minister Bolivia Interim President Great Britain Prime Minister Dominica Prime Minister Iceland President
Norway Prime Minister Yugoslavia Prime Minister Malta President Netherland-Antilles Prime Minister The Philippines
President Pakistan Prime Minister Lithuania Prime Minister Haiti President Myanmar (Burma) Opposition Leader(**) East
Germany President of the Parliament Ireland President Nicaragua President Bangladesh Prime Minister France Prime Minister
Poland Prime Minister Canada Prime Minister Burundi Prime Minister Rwanda Prime Minister Turkey Prime Minister Bulgaria
Interim Prime Minister Sri Lanka Executive President & former Prime Minister Haiti Prime Minister Switzerland State
Councillor(***) Bangladesh Prime Minister Liberia Chair, Ruling Council Ecuador President Bermuda Premiere Guyana Prime
Minister Country Date Sri Lanka 1960-1965; 1970-1977, 1994-(*) India 1966-1977, 1980-1984 Israel 1969-1975 Argentina
1974-1976 Central African Rep. 1975-1976 Portugal 1979 Bolivia 1979-1980 Great Britain 1979-1990 Dominica 1980-1995
Iceland 1980-1996 Norway 1981; 1986-1989; 1990-1996 Yugoslavia 1982-1986 Malta 1982-1987 Netherland-Antilles 1984;
1989-1994 The Philippines 1986-1992 Pakistan 1988-1990; 1993-1996 Lithuania 1990-1991 Haiti 1990-1991 Myanmar (Burma)
1990-(**) East Germany 1990 Ireland 1990-(*) Nicaragua 1990-1996 Bangladesh 1991-1996 France 1991 – 1992 Poland 1992-1993
Canada 1993 Burundi 1993-1994 Rwanda 1993-1994 Turkey 1993-1996 Bulgaria 1994-1995 Sri Lanka 1994-(*) Haiti 1995-1996
Switzerland 1995-(*) Bangladesh 1996-(*) Liberia 1996-(*) Ecuador 1997 Bermuda 1997-(*) Guyana 1997-(*)

() = No longer living

(*) = Currently in office

(**) = Party won 1990 election but prevented by military from taking office; Nobel Prize laureate

(***) = Switzerland governed by Council of (7) Ministers, rather than a president or prime minister

Source: Adapted from Adler, N. J. Global Women Political Leaders: An Invisible History, An Increasingly Important Future,”
Leadership Quarterly, 7, 1, 1996, p. 136.

[C] Nancy J. Adler 1997

Do we see similar increases in the number of women leading major world businesses as we see among women presidents and prime
ministers? Whereas the pattern among global business leaders is not yet clear, initial surveys suggest that there are not very many
women CEOs.(6) According to the United Nations’ 1995 report, The World’s Women, there are no women running the world’s largest
corporations (as reported in Kelly 1996, p. 21). Catalyst reports that only 2.4% of the chairmen and CEOs of Fortune 500 firms are
women (Wellington 1996). Moreover, only in 1997 did Britain gain its first woman chief executive of a Financial Times (FT-SE) 100
firm, Marjorie Scardino at Pearson Plc (Pogrebin 1996).

Contrary to popular belief, however, women’s scarcity in leading major corporations does not mean that they are absent as leaders of
global companies. Unlike their male counterparts, most women chief executives have either created their own businesses or
assumed the leadership of a family business. A disproportionate number of women have founded and are now leading
entrepreneurial enterprises. According to the Small Business Administration, for example, women currently own one-third of all
American businesses. These women-owned businesses in the United States employ more people than the entire Fortune 500 list of
America’s largest companies combined (Aburdene/Naisbitt 1992). As the list of women business leaders in Table 2 attests, the reality
is that women from around the world are leading major companies. Moreover, contrary to what many people believe, these global
women business leaders neither come strictly from the West nor predominantly from the West (see Adler 1997a).

[TABULAR DATA 2 NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]

There is, of course, a fallacy in assuming that because global women leaders are still so few in number that they are not important
(Bunch 1991, pp. xi et seq.). In fact, as Charlotte Bunch (1991, p. xii), Director of the Center for Global Issues and Women’s
Leadership suggests, perhaps the most important question to ask is “why so little attention has been paid to the women who have
become [global] leaders and why the styles of leading more often exhibited by women are particularly useful at this critical moment in
history.”

The Feminization of Global Leadership

In addition to increasing numbers, feminization also refers to “the spread of traits or qualities that are traditionally associated with
[women] … to … people [and processes] not usually described that way” (Fondas 1997, p. 258 based on Douglas [1997] and
Ferguson [1984]). Hence, the feminization of global leadership — beyond strictly referring to the increasing numbers of women who
are global leaders — refers to the spread of traits and qualities generally associated with women to the process of leading
organizations with worldwide influence. Whereas this certainly has not been true of traditional twentieth century leadership models
which have primarily reflected American men and their norms, it appears that twenty-first century global leadership is increasingly
being described in terms that neither reflect the masculine ideal nor the American ethos.

What is a feminine style of leadership? “Feminine is a word that refers to the characteristics of females” (Fondas 1997, p. 260). Many
authors argue that “… there are character traits, interaction styles, and patterns of reasoning, speaking, and communicating that are
culturally ascribed as feminine attributes” (Fondas 1997, p. 260). Although theorists debate whether these traits are biologically given
or socially constructed, most researchers credit women “with some or all of the following qualities: empathy, helpfulness, caring, and
nurturance; interpersonal sensitivity, attentiveness to and acceptance of others, responsiveness to their needs and motivations; an
orientation toward the collective interest and toward integrative goals such as group cohesiveness and stability; a preference for
open, egalitarian, and cooperative relationships, rather than hierarchical ones; and an interest in actualizing values and relationships
of great importance to community (Belenky et al. 1986; Chodorow 1978; Dinnerstein 1976; Eisler 1987; Ferguson 1984; Gilligan
1982; Glennon 1979; Grace 1995; Hartsock 1983; Iannello 1992; Klein 1972; McMillan 1982; Miller 1976; Scott 1992; Spender 1983;
Tannen 1990, 1994)” (as cited in Fondas 1997, p. 260). By contrast, as Fondas (1997, p. 260) summarizes, “traits culturally ascribed
to men include an ability to be impersonal, self-interested, efficient, hierarchical, tough minded, and assertive; an interest in taking
charge, control, and domination; a capacity to ignore personal, emotional considerations in order to succeed; a proclivity to rely on
standardized or “objective” codes for judgment and evaluation of others; and a heroic orientation toward task accomplishment and a
continual effort to act on the world and become something new … (cf. Brod/Kaufman 1994; Gilligan 1982; Glennon 1979; Grace
1995; Kanter 1977; Seidler 1994).”

Studies focusing specifically on women managers — as opposed to women in general or senior-level women leaders (on whom there
is as yet no body of literature) — document their “orientation toward more participative, interactional, and relational styles of leading”
(Fondas 1997, p. 259 based on Helgesen 1990; Lipman-Blumen 1983; Marshall 1984; Rosener 1990). Frequently labelled as the
feminine advantage (Chodorow 1978; Helgesen 1990; Rosener 1990, among others), some authors have suggested that all
managers today need to incorporate a more feminine leadership style (Fondas 1997, p. 259). As Fondas (1997, p. 259) observes,
these findings, “when juxtaposed against calls for companies to improve their competitiveness by transforming themselves into
learning, self-managing, empowering, and continuously improving organizations — transformations that rely upon more interactional,
relational, and participative management styles — lead some writers to conclude that … [women] are well-suited for managerial roles
in contemporary organizations and that male [managers] need to cultivate feminine leadership traits (Aburdene/Naisbitt 1992;
Godfrey 1996; Grant 1988; Peters 1989).” The current implication is that both female and male leaders also need to cultivate such
feminine characteristics in their styles of leadership.

However, leadership approaches that frequently have been labelled as feminine in the North American management literature —
including more cooperative, participative, interactional and relational styles — appear to reflect male/female patterns specific to the
American culture, rather than broader, universally valid patterns. Relative to American men, male managers in many other parts of
the world, including in the fastest growing economies of Asia, exhibit a more supposedly feminine style that do American men. As
Cambridge management scholar Charles Hampden-Turner (1993, p. 1) notes:

America’s ultra-masculine corporate value system has been losing

touch progressively with the wider world. It needs a change of values,

desperately, or it will continue to under-perform, continue to lose

touch with the value systems of foreigners, which ironically are much

closer to the values in which American women are raised…

American women, who are socialized to display values antithetical

yet complementary to American men, have within their culture vitally

important cures for American economic decline.

It appears that some of the male/female cultural distinctions documented in the United States among domestic American women and
men have been overgeneralized.

For example, as the economy shifts from the twentieth century’s emphasis on mass production capitalism to the twenty-first century’s
emphasis on mass customization — that is, from the twentieth century’s machine age emphasis on huge production runs of
essentially undifferentiated products to the emerging era of products and services made in short runs and in great variety — the
importance of interactional and relational styles increases. Why? Because “the future for developed economies lies in products [and
services] uniquely fashioned for special persons” (Hampden-Turner 1993, p. 6). Whereas the more typically male (from a North
American perspective) universalistic approach of treating everyone the same according to codified rules worked well for mass
producing products such as jeans, cokes, and hamburgers sold to a mass domestic market, a more typically feminine (from a North
American perspective) particular approach works best for developing products and services — such as software — which must be
tailored to the individual client and his or her particular needs. To understand particular markets and particular clients well enough to
fashion suitable products and services to their needs, one must develop deep relationships. Not surprisingly, relational skills (labelled
by the anthropologists as particularism and by North Americans as typically feminine) outperform the seemingly more objective
approach of following the same rules with everyone (labelled as universalism by the anthropologists and as typically male by North
Americans). The distinction does not appear to be strictly male/female, but rather a difference between the approach of most
American male managers and that of most other managers around the world. Results of research by Trompenaars (1993) and
Hampden-Turner (1993) show that American male managers strongly prefer universalism (the less relational style), whereas
executives from many very strong economies, such as Hong Kong, Japan, and South Korea, emphasize more relational values which
are opposite to those of their American male colleagues (Hampden-Turner 1993). As Hampden-Turner (1993, p. 6) summarizes, at
the close of the twentieth century:

Most American male executives suddenly find themselves ill-suited to the

wider world, trying to codify the uncodifiable, flanked by a huge surplus

of lawyers using cumbersome rules where other nations enter trusting

relationships with subtle communications.

According to the research, American women display a relational style of communicating that is closer to the style of most non-
American managers around the world than to that of most American male managers. Given American women managers’
concurrence with the relational styles of their non-American colleagues, it is not surprising that, on average, American women
expatriate managers outperform their American male counterparts (Adler 1994). It is not that the distinction between women and men
identified in the American managerial literature is either incorrect or inconsequential, but only that it is incomplete. Without
appreciating American male managers as outliers, it is impossible to begin to appreciate what men’s and women’s approaches can
bring to global leadership in the twenty-first century.

Global Women Leaders: An Emerging Portrait

Beyond knowing that their numbers are increasing and that their approaches to leadership appear to differ from those of men, what
do we know about the women who are global leaders that might help us to better plan for the twenty-first century?(7)

Diversity Defines Pattern. The dominant pattern in the women leaders’ backgrounds as well as in the countries and companies that
select them to lead is diversity. As highlighted in Tables 1 and 2, the 37 women political leaders and their business counterparts span
the globe. They come from both the world’s largest and smallest countries, the richest and poorest countries, the most socially and
economically advantaged and disadvantaged countries, and from every geographical region. Countries led by women represent six of
the major world religions, with four women prime ministers having led predominantly Muslim countries (see Adler 1996, 1997a).

Many people believe that female friendly countries and companies select more women leaders. They do not. Seemingly female
friendly countries (for example, those that give equal rights to women) do not elect a disproportionate number of women presidents
and prime ministers. Similarly, companies that select women for their most senior leadership positions are not those that implement
the most female-friendly policies, such as day-care centres and flextime (Wellington 1996 as reported in Dobrzynski 1996). For
example, among the 61 Fortune 500 companies employing women as chairmen, CEOs, board members, or one of the top five
earners, only three are the same companies that Working Woman identified as the most favorable for women employees (Dobrzynski
1996).

The fact that the countries that elect women presidents and prime ministers or have women serving as CEOs of major companies are
so diverse suggests that the overall pattern is toward selecting more women as senior leaders, rather than toward a particular group
of supposedly female-friendly countries and companies (such as the Scandinavian countries, companies such as Avon Products, or
organizations such as Britain’s National Health Service) valuing women per se. The dominant pattern is that women are increasingly
being selected to serve in senior leadership positions, not that a few countries, companies, or organizations with particularly feminine
cultures are choosing to select women to lead them.

People’s Aspirations: Hope, Change, and Unity. Why would countries and companies, for the first time in modern history, increasingly
choose to select women for senior leadership positions? It appears that people worldwide increasingly want something that women
exhibit (e. g., feminine values and behavior) and/or something that they symbolize.

Women leaders’ most powerful and most attractive symbolism appears to be change. Women’s assumption of the highest levels of
leadership brings with it the symbolic possibility of fundamental societal and organizational change. The combination of women being
outsiders at senior leadership levels previously completely controlled by men and of beating the odds to become the first woman to
lead her country or company produces powerful public imagery about the possibility of broad-based societal and organizational
change.

As “firsts”, women assuming senior leadership positions literally bring change. When a woman is visibly chosen to become president,
prime minister, or CEO when no other woman has ever held such an office and when few people thought that she would be selected,
other major organizational and societal changes become believably possible. Mary Robinson’s presidential acceptance speech
captures the coupling of the unique event of a woman being elected Ireland’s first non-male president with the possibility of national
change:

I was elected by men and women of all parties and none, by many with great

moral courage who stepped out from the faded flags of Civil War and voted

for a new Ireland. And above all by the women of Ireland… who instead of

rocking the cradle rocked the system, and who came out massively to make

their mark on the ballot paper, and on a new Ireland (RDS, Dublin, 9

November 1990 as reported in Finlay 1990, p. 1).

In addition to symbolizing change, women leaders appear to symbolize unity. For example, both Nicaragua’s Chamorro and the
Philippines’ Aquino became symbols of national unity following their husband’s murders. Chamorro even claimed “to have no
ideology beyond national `reconciliation'” (Benn 1995). Of Chamorro’s four adult children, two are prominent Sandanistas while the
other two equally prominently oppose the Sandanistas, not an unusual split in war-torn Nicaragua (Saint-Germain 1993, p. 80).
Chamorro’s ability to bring all the members of her family together for Sunday dinner each week achieved near legendary status in
Nicaragua (Saint-Germain 1993, p. 80). As “the grieving matriarch who can still hold the family together” (Saint-Germain 1993, p. 80),
Chamorro gives symbolic hope to the nation that it too can find peace based on a unity that brings together all Nicaraguans. That a
national symbol for a woman leader is family unity is neither surprising nor coincidental.

Based on similar dynamics in the Philippines, former president Corazon Aquino, as widow of the slain opposition leader, was seen as
the only person who could credibly unify the people of the Philippines following Benigno Aquino’s death. Although Aquino was widely
condemned in the press for naivete when she invited members of both her own and the opposition party into her cabinet, her choice
was a conscious decision to attempt to reunify the deeply divided country.

Given that women leaders symbolize unity, it is perhaps not surprising that a woman business leader, Rebecca Mark, chief executive
of Enron Development Corporation, and not a male executive, was the first person to successfully negotiate a major commercial
transaction following the Middle East peace accords. Mark brought the Israelis and Jordanians together to build a natural gas power
generation station.

When, as Vaclav Havel (1994, p. A27) says, the world is “going through a transitional period, when something is on the way out and
something else is painfully being born”, it is not surprising that people worldwide are attracted to women leaders’ symbolic message
of bringing change, hope, and the possibility for unity.

Driven by Vision, Not by Hierarchical Status. What brings the women themselves into the most senior levels of leadership? Most
women leaders are driven by a vision, mission, or cause. They are motivated by a compelling agenda that they want to achieve, not
primarily by either a desire for the hierarchical status of being president, prime minister, or CEO, or a desire for power per se. Power
and the presidency are means for achieving their mission, not the mission itself.

As children, none of the women leaders dreamed about becoming her country’s leader, as have so many male politicians, including

America’s Bill Clinton and Bob Dole, and Britain’s Michael Hesseltine. For example, Golda Meir’s mission was to create the state of
Israel and to ensure its survival as a Jewish state. Not only did she not dream of becoming prime minister, she rejected the position
when it was initially offered to her. Similarly, Anita Roddick (1991, p. 126), CEO of the Body Shop, describes her contemporary vision
as “corporate idealism.” Her vision transcends traditional, narrowly defined economic goals; she is neither motivated to be a
traditional CEO nor to focus singularly on maximizing either profits or shareholder wealth.

That women have not imagined, let alone dreamed about, leading a country or a major company is not surprising. For all of the
women political leaders — except Sri Lanka’s current executive president, Chandrika Kumaratunga, who followed her prime minister
mother Sirimavo Bandaranaike into office, and Bangladesh’s Hasina Wajid — and most of the women corporate leaders, there have
been no women predecessors and therefore no women role models. What is important for twenty-first century leadership is that
society, if it is to survive as a civilization, can no longer tolerate nor support the leadership of self-aggrandizement at the expense of
the greater, now highly interrelated whole — at the expense of the world’s entire population and its physical, spiritual, and natural
environment.

Source of Power: Broadly-based. Who supports women in becoming senior leaders’? Women leaders tend to develop and to use
broadly-based popular support, rather than relying primarily on traditional, hierarchical party or structural support. This is particularly
apparent among the women who become political leaders who often are not seriously considered as potential candidates by their
country’s main political parties. They are consequently forced to gain support directly from the people, and thus foreshadow the
dynamics of leadership in an organizationally flattened world.

Mary Robinson, for example, campaigned in more small communities in Ireland than any previous presidential candidate before
either her party or the opposition would take her seriously. The opposition now admits that they did not seriously consider Robinson’s
candidacy until it was too late to stop her (Finlay 1990). Similarly, Corazon Aquino, whose campaign and victory was labelled the
People’s Revolution, held more than a thousand rallies during her campaign, while incumbent Ferdinand Marcos held only thirty-four
(Col 1993, p. 25). Likewise, Benazir Bhutto, who succeeded in becoming Pakistan’s first woman and youngest-ever prime minister,
campaigned in more communities than any politician before her. Her own party only took her seriously when more people showed up
upon her return to Pakistan from exile than either they, the opposition, or the international press had ever expected (Weisman 1986;
Anderson 1993).

In business, the disproportionate number of women who choose to become leaders of entrepreneurial businesses rather than
attempting to climb the corporate ladder and break through the glass ceiling to senior leadership positions in established corporations
echoes the same pattern of broadly-based popular support — as opposed to traditional hierarchical support — that women political
leaders enjoy, except that the entrepreneurs’ support comes from the marketplace rather than from the electorate. In both cases, the
base of support is outside of the traditional power structure and therefore more representative of new and more diverse opinions and
ideas. The source of support, and therefore of power, more closely reflects the flattened network of emerging twenty-first century
organizations and society than it does the more centralized and limited power structure of most twentieth century organizations.

Path to Power: Lateral Transfer. How do the women leaders gain power? Rather than following the traditional path up through the
hierarchy of the organization, profession, or political party, most women leaders laterally transfer into high office. For example, Gro
Harlem Brundtland was a medical doctor; six years later she became Norway’s first woman prime minister. Similarly, Charlotte Beers
became both Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide’s first woman chief executive as well as their first CEO brought in from outside of the firm
(Sackley/Ibarra 1995). Marjorie Scardino, Pearson’s first woman chief executive, is a double outsider. As the first American CEO
brought in to lead this traditional British firm, she is a cultural outsider. In addition, because the Economist, where Scardino previously
served as managing director, is only fifty percent owned by Pearson, she is an organizational outsider. The general public was so
surprised by Pearson’s selection of Scardino that Pearson’s stock dropped initially on the announcement of her appointment
(Pogrebin 1996).

Today’s global organizations and society can only benefit from the dynamics of lateral transfers. The twenty-first century needs
integration across geographies, sectors of society, and professions. It can no longer tolerate leaders with “chimney stack” careers
that, in the past, have resulted in deep expertise in one area, organization, or country without any understanding of the context within
which their particular organization or country operates. Transferring across organizations, sectors of society, and areas of the world
allows leaders to develop alternative perspectives and an understanding of context that is almost impossible to acquire within a single
setting. Due to the historic pattern of promoting men and failing to promote women to the most senior leadership positions from within
organizations — most often referred to as the “glass ceiling” — women appear to have inadvertently become the prototypes of a career
pattern that is needed more broadly among all twenty-first century leaders.

Global Leadership: Global Visibility. What difference does it make that a global leader is a woman? For the women who become
global leaders, it is always salient that they are women. For example, the single most frequently asked question of former British
prime minister Margaret Thatcher (1995) was “What is it like being a woman prime minister?” (to which Thatcher generally responded
that she could not answer because she had not tried the alternative).

Women are new to the most senior levels of leadership. As mentioned previously, of the 37 women presidents and prime ministers,
only two — in Bangladesh and Sri Lanka — followed another woman into office. All the rest of the women leaders are “firsts.” Because
women leaders are new, they have the advantage of global visibility. Their unique status as their countries’ first woman president or
prime minister attracts worldwide media attention, thereby leveraging historically domestic leadership positions into ones with global
visibility and the concomitant potential for worldwide influence. For example, following the election of Mary Robinson as Ireland’s first
woman president:

Newspapers and magazines in virtually every country in the world carried

the story … [T]he rest of the world understood Ireland to have made a huge

leap forward … Mary Robinson had joined a very small number of women…

who had been elected to their country’s highest office. It was, quite

properly, seen as historic (Finlay 1990, p. 149 et seq.).

Similarly, President Francois Mitterrand purposely created a worldwide media event by appointing Edith Cresson as France’s first
woman prime minister. Likewise, in contrast to Benazir Bhutto’s male predecessor who not only complained about receiving
insufficient worldwide press coverage while abroad but also fired the Pakistani embassy’s public relations officer when too few
journalists showed up to cover his arrival in London, Pakistan’s former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto always received extensive
media coverage no matter where in the world she travelled.

Because of the worldwide media attention given to women leaders, women today are becoming global, rather than domestic, leaders
as they assume roles that were primarily domestic when previously held by men. Whether by intention or consequence, the senior
women leaders are at the forefront of learning how to move beyond a domestic focus to communicate on the world stage to a global
audience.

Whereas many of the dynamics affecting senior women leaders are quite different from those that affect women managers (see Adler
1997a), it should be noted that international business women also receive more visibility than their male colleagues. Women
expatriate managers as well as women on international business trips, for example, report being remembered more easily than their
male counterparts (Adler 1994). Compared with businessmen, global business women gain access more easily to new clients,
suppliers, and government officials; receive more time when meeting with international contacts; and are more frequently
remembered (Adler 1994).

The Future: Global Leaders, Women Leaders

The confluence of twenty-first century business, political, and societal dynamics gives leaders a chance to create the type of world
that they, and we, would like to live in. It demands, as Vaclav Havel (1994, p. A7) reflected, that leaders find “the key to insure the
survival of … [our] civilization[,] … a civilization that is global and multicultural.” The increasing number of women political and
business leaders brings with it a set of experiences and perspectives that differ from those of the twentieth century’s primarily male
leaders. The interplay of women’s and men’s styles of leadership will define the contours and potential success of twenty-first century
society. The risk is in encapsulating leaders, both women and men, in approaches that worked well in the twentieth century but
foretell disaster for the twenty-first century. As Dr. Frene Ginwala, Speaker of the South African National Assembly, states “… the
institutions that discriminate are man-shaped and must be made people-shaped. Only then will women be able to function as equals
within those institutions …” Ginwala’s fundamental belief is that “women’s struggle is not a struggle to transform the position of
women in society but a struggle to transform society itself” (Iqtidar/Webster 1996, p. 10). Recognizing the growing number of women
leaders is the first step in creating and understanding the type of global leadership that will lead to success in the twenty-first century.

Acknowledgement

The author would like to thank Soraya Hassanali and Kirsten Martin for their research support and insight on this article.

Endnotes

(1) The opening section of this article is based on Adler’s “Societal Leadership: The Wisdom of Peace” (1997b).

(2) For contemporary discussions of some of the widely read leadership theories and approaches, see Bennis 1989; Bennis/Nanus
1985; Conger 1989; Conger/Kanungo 1988; Gardner 1995; Kotter 1988; Rosen 1996, among many others.

(3) For descriptions of American societal and managerial culture contrasted with those of many other countries, see, among others,
Hofstede 1980a; Kluckhohn/Strodtbeck 1961; Laurent 1983; Trompenaars 1993.

(4) Based on Fondas’ (1997, p. 257) observation “that the feminization of managers and managerial work is a significant development
in management thinking.”

(5) The Republic of San Marino, a city-state with a population of less than 25,000 people has been led since 1243 by a consul, the
Co-Captain Regent, who acts as both head of government and head of state, and is elected for a period of six months. In modern
history, four women have held the position of Co-Captain Regent, Maria Lea Pedini-Angelini (1981), Glorianna Ranocchini (1984,
1989-90), Edda Ceccoli (1991-92), and Patricia Busignani (1993). Due to the small size of the country and the frequency of changing
leaders, San Marino has not been included in the statistics on global women leaders.

(6) Although the results are not yet available, the author is currently involved in a major worldwide survey to identify women who head
global businesses with annual revenues in excess of $ 250 million.

(7) For a more indepth discussion of the issues raised in this section, see Adler (1997a).

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———-

Please note: Some tables or figures were omitted from this article.

Copyright: COPYRIGHT 1997 Gabler Verlag
http://www.gabler.de
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Adler, Nancy J. “Global leadership: women leaders.” Management International Review, vol. 37, Annual 1997, p. 171+. Gale OneFile:

Business, https://link-gale-

http://www.gabler.de

com.libraryresources.columbiasouthern.edu/apps/doc/A20009604/ITBC?u=oran95108&sid=ITBC&xid=cfcf6c33. Accessed 15
Aug. 2020.

Gale Document Number: GALE|A20009604

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