International Journal of Complexity in Leadership and Management http://www.inderscience.com/browse/index.php?journalID=345&year=2011&vol=1&issue=4 Inderscience Publishers Ltd en-uk International Journal of Complexity in Leadership and Management 1759-0256 1759-0264 © 2011 Inderscience Publishers Ltd editor@inderscience.com https://www.inderscience.com/images/files/coverImgs/ijclm_scoverijclm.jpg http://www.inderscience.com/browse/index.php?journalID=345&year=2011&vol=1&issue=4 http://www.inderscience.com/link.php?id=46436 Aircraft maintenance can be described as a complex and interactive technical system. The ever increasing complex system of aircraft maintenance places much greater demands on the professionals carrying out this work including the leadership and management roles. This ethnographical study analyses this complex and intelligent aircraft maintenance work. Sharing of professional knowledge is of vital importance enhancing the innovative and creative work done in this domain. The aim of this paper is to highlight the challenges for the leadership and the management teams to effectively link complexity to the highly collective human intelligence that flourishes in this military domain. The challenges will be based on the empirical findings showing how the intrinsic leadership, collective intelligence and social dimensions such as cooperation, professional knowledge and management skills are played out within the communities of aircraft maintenance. Professional knowledge sharing in aircraft maintenance: a new complexity dynamics
Ann Svensson
International Journal of Complexity in Leadership and Management, Vol. 1, No. 4 (2011) pp. 322 - 338
Aircraft maintenance can be described as a complex and interactive technical system. The ever increasing complex system of aircraft maintenance places much greater demands on the professionals carrying out this work including the leadership and management roles. This ethnographical study analyses this complex and intelligent aircraft maintenance work. Sharing of professional knowledge is of vital importance enhancing the innovative and creative work done in this domain. The aim of this paper is to highlight the challenges for the leadership and the management teams to effectively link complexity to the highly collective human intelligence that flourishes in this military domain. The challenges will be based on the empirical findings showing how the intrinsic leadership, collective intelligence and social dimensions such as cooperation, professional knowledge and management skills are played out within the communities of aircraft maintenance.

]]> 10.1504/IJCLM.2011.046436 International Journal of Complexity in Leadership and Management, Vol. 1, No. 4 (2011) pp. 322 - 338 Ann Svensson Jönköping International Business School, P.O. Box 1026, SE-551 11, Jönköping, Sweden knowledge sharing professional knowledge professions complex work aircraft maintenance intrinsic leadership collective intelligence complexity management ethnography military aircraft social dimensions cooperation management skills. 2012-04-08T23:20:50-05:00 1 4 322 338 2012-04-08T23:20:50-05:00 http://www.inderscience.com/link.php?id=46439 Complexity science has the potential to explain emergence; unfortunately most management applications of complexity rarely define emergence. We develop a typology that defines four increasingly demanding definitions of emergence, and use this typology to organise a review of the complexity literature, focusing on computational models that have been utilised by management scholars. We generate propositions addressing the value of emergence and complexity for integrating theory and practise in the field. Self-organisation and emergence offer methods for integrating a variety of management frameworks, allowing researchers to draw together some of the disparate threads of management theory and practise. An expansion of 'emergence' processes in organisations fosters adaptive bottom-up innovation and change. Four types of emergence: a typology of complexity and its implications for a science of management
Benyamin B. Lichtenstein; Bill McKelvey
International Journal of Complexity in Leadership and Management, Vol. 1, No. 4 (2011) pp. 339 - 378
Complexity science has the potential to explain emergence; unfortunately most management applications of complexity rarely define emergence. We develop a typology that defines four increasingly demanding definitions of emergence, and use this typology to organise a review of the complexity literature, focusing on computational models that have been utilised by management scholars. We generate propositions addressing the value of emergence and complexity for integrating theory and practise in the field. Self-organisation and emergence offer methods for integrating a variety of management frameworks, allowing researchers to draw together some of the disparate threads of management theory and practise. An expansion of 'emergence' processes in organisations fosters adaptive bottom-up innovation and change.

]]> 10.1504/IJCLM.2011.046439 International Journal of Complexity in Leadership and Management, Vol. 1, No. 4 (2011) pp. 339 - 378 Benyamin B. Lichtenstein; Bill McKelvey College of Management, University of Massachusetts, Boston; 100 Morrissey Blvd., Boston, MA 02125, USA. ' Euromed Management School, Domaine de Luminy, BP 921, 13288 Marseille Cedex 9, France complexity science emergence self-organisation typology organisation science heterogeneous agents agent-based modelling computational modelling epistemology social science social structure agent-based systems innovation organisational change management science. 2012-04-08T23:20:50-05:00 1 4 339 378 2012-04-08T23:20:50-05:00 http://www.inderscience.com/link.php?id=46440 A classic debate faced by management scholars is whether organisational life is determined by intractable environmental constraints or is it actively created by strategic managerial choice? Such polarising perspectives however fail to account for co-evolutionary processes in which individual choice and their environment jointly shape organisational life processes. Specifically, recent developments in institutional research have called for a greater attention to bridging micro and macro level processes to explaining ordering and disordering tendencies of institutions. In drawing on complexity science, Austrian economics, social network and related institutional research, a conceptual model is developed to explain such tendencies in a nested institutional system. Such an approach offers three contributions/implications to complexity science and institutional research. The entrepreneurship of nested systems: a socially complex approach
Desmond Ng
International Journal of Complexity in Leadership and Management, Vol. 1, No. 4 (2011) pp. 379 - 394
A classic debate faced by management scholars is whether organisational life is determined by intractable environmental constraints or is it actively created by strategic managerial choice? Such polarising perspectives however fail to account for co-evolutionary processes in which individual choice and their environment jointly shape organisational life processes. Specifically, recent developments in institutional research have called for a greater attention to bridging micro and macro level processes to explaining ordering and disordering tendencies of institutions. In drawing on complexity science, Austrian economics, social network and related institutional research, a conceptual model is developed to explain such tendencies in a nested institutional system. Such an approach offers three contributions/implications to complexity science and institutional research.

]]> 10.1504/IJCLM.2011.046440 International Journal of Complexity in Leadership and Management, Vol. 1, No. 4 (2011) pp. 379 - 394 Desmond Ng Texas A&M University, 377 Agricultural and Life Sciences Building, College Station, Texas, USA institutional entrepreneurship nested institutions social networks innovation individual choice work environment organisational life complexity science Austrian economics conceptual modelling institutional research. 2012-04-08T23:20:50-05:00 1 4 379 394 2012-04-08T23:20:50-05:00 http://www.inderscience.com/link.php?id=46438 The topic of leadership is exciting with a mysterious undertone. It has long remained one of the most overanalysed, frantically debated, and yet frustratingly underspecified areas of research within management and organisational studies. Using Japan as an example, this paper attempts to bring anthropological perspectives to bear on the unravelling of the leadership conundrum. Of great significance is the contextualisation of leadership in space and time; what it means to be leadership varies from nation/organisation to nation/organisation and changes over time. Although the complex nature of context is now often invoked, confusion and chaos continue to abound. It is suggested that a holistic understanding of cross-cultural context, combined with commitment to empirically-based, qualitative methods, can serve as an alternative approach to clarifying the jumbled field of leadership research, as well as throwing fresh insights into practical application and future direction. Anthropologising the complexity of leadership: a holistic understanding of cross-cultural context
Huiyan Fu
International Journal of Complexity in Leadership and Management, Vol. 1, No. 4 (2011) pp. 395 - 410
The topic of leadership is exciting with a mysterious undertone. It has long remained one of the most overanalysed, frantically debated, and yet frustratingly underspecified areas of research within management and organisational studies. Using Japan as an example, this paper attempts to bring anthropological perspectives to bear on the unravelling of the leadership conundrum. Of great significance is the contextualisation of leadership in space and time; what it means to be leadership varies from nation/organisation to nation/organisation and changes over time. Although the complex nature of context is now often invoked, confusion and chaos continue to abound. It is suggested that a holistic understanding of cross-cultural context, combined with commitment to empirically-based, qualitative methods, can serve as an alternative approach to clarifying the jumbled field of leadership research, as well as throwing fresh insights into practical application and future direction.

]]> 10.1504/IJCLM.2011.046438 International Journal of Complexity in Leadership and Management, Vol. 1, No. 4 (2011) pp. 395 - 410 Huiyan Fu Aalen University, Beethovenstraße 1, Aalen D-73430, Germany leadership anthropology cross-cultural context holism complexity chaos empirical methods qualitative methods ethnography Japan. 2012-04-08T23:20:50-05:00 1 4 395 410 2012-04-08T23:20:50-05:00 http://www.inderscience.com/link.php?id=46437 Given that many modern problems are complex and even wicked, and that actual variables are hidden underneath dynamics that are socially moderated and ever changing, it is difficult for any research tool to take into account all these factors. However, existing tools can be improved or augmented with a view to encourage open discussions to elicit subtle points, but must be simple and resource efficient enough to be conducted at various stages to take into account emerging dynamics. Due to the culture of the organisation, when sensitive issues need to be researched, most people display an unwillingness to speak their mind – thus, affecting management and leadership. Many elect to keep mum about their true feelings and prefer to say only the politically correct things. This paper presents the Paper Dialogue as a qualitative research tool that can help to address these issues, thus improving the quality of data collected. Paper dialogue: a qualitative research tool for complexity management and leadership
Pak Tee Ng; Thow Yick Liang
International Journal of Complexity in Leadership and Management, Vol. 1, No. 4 (2011) pp. 411 - 418
Given that many modern problems are complex and even wicked, and that actual variables are hidden underneath dynamics that are socially moderated and ever changing, it is difficult for any research tool to take into account all these factors. However, existing tools can be improved or augmented with a view to encourage open discussions to elicit subtle points, but must be simple and resource efficient enough to be conducted at various stages to take into account emerging dynamics. Due to the culture of the organisation, when sensitive issues need to be researched, most people display an unwillingness to speak their mind – thus, affecting management and leadership. Many elect to keep mum about their true feelings and prefer to say only the politically correct things. This paper presents the Paper Dialogue as a qualitative research tool that can help to address these issues, thus improving the quality of data collected.

]]> 10.1504/IJCLM.2011.046437 International Journal of Complexity in Leadership and Management, Vol. 1, No. 4 (2011) pp. 411 - 418 Pak Tee Ng; Thow Yick Liang National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, 1 Nanyang Walk, 637616, Singapore. ' Lee Kong Chian School of Business, Singapore Management University, 50 Stamford Road, 178899, Singapore research methodology qualitative data paper dialogue focus group discussions FGDs interviews communication complexity management leadership emergence complex problems culture non-communication. 2012-04-08T23:20:50-05:00 1 4 411 418 2012-04-08T23:20:50-05:00