Title: The myth of rational objectivity and leadership: the realities of a hospital merger from a CEO's perspective

Authors: John H. Tobin

Addresses: Waterbury Hospital, 64 Robbins Street, Waterbury, Connecticut 06708, USA

Abstract: Executive power and status depends on others| belief in the executive|s capacity for control via rational decision-making, |by the numbers| and above the fray of day to day minutia. By exploring his own experience in the complex social dynamics of a long, complicated merger process – characterised by misunderstanding, incomplete information, conflicting agendas, power struggles – the author argues the real world of executive praxis is one of paradoxically being in control and not in control at the same time. One strategy to cope with the anxieties inherent to the ambiguities of complex processes and to better influence the evolving trajectories of processes one cannot control is to attain a degree of mental distancing through the paradoxical dynamic of detached involvement.

Keywords: complex responsive processes; detached involvement; emergence; leading; lived experience; mergers; status; organisational change; paradox; executive power; rational objectivity; rational leadership; rational decision making; social dynamics; ambiguities; mental distancing; hospital merger; CEO.

DOI: 10.1504/IJLC.2009.024691

International Journal of Learning and Change, 2009 Vol.3 No.3, pp.248 - 263

Published online: 15 Apr 2009 *

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