As identified in the discussions of the theoretical and conceptual development of shared leadership, criticisms of research into this area are often related to a lack of clarification of the concept, and of the philosophical underpinnings of the studies which necessarily influence the researchers viewpoint and the subsequent output (Fitzsimons et al., 2011). I have also noted that there are issues with the measures of shared leadership, with many of the empirical research taking place with student samples rather than authentic
Organisational conditions
Organisational support systems and rewards
Vertical transformational and empowering leadership
Complexity
Creative environments
Urgency
Service sector environments
Team conditions
High interdependence
Team size, team member ability, member maturirty, familiarilty
Climates of trust
Clearly understood direction, goal or sense of purpose
Length of tenure
Social identity in teams
Shared feelings, beliefs attitudes
Power distribution, power struggles and conflict
Fluctations in team size
Participation
Task conditions
Task cohesion
Start of task life cycle
Urgent and time bound tasks
Time bound tasks
Network
External coaching
The impact of a network of transient teams with flucating team membership
The impact of complex networks external to the team
The relationship between team and client in the service sector
Stakeholder power / stakeholder relations
organisational settings (Sweeney et al., 2019). And in chapter 7, I will draw the attention to the lack of interpretivist epistemological positions taken by shared leadership researchers to date. However, in addition to the critical perspective of shared leadership offered so far in this section, there are a number of other key criticisms to the development of the theory that must be addressed.
4.9.1 Willingness to engage in shared leadership
One of the notable issues with shared leadership literature is the implied assumption that team members will be willing to be involved. Most empirical studies include the assumption that the team members are willing to participate in the sharing of leadership, but few have advanced any clarifications as to how they established this or the impact it is likely to have. One of the challenges for shared leadership is that team members can resist participating, if they do not wish to take on additional responsibilities or become
accountable for areas outside of their usual role. This is especially true as accountability and additional responsibility are usually unrewarded (Bolden, 2011). As Locke (2003) suggests, a willingness to accept the additional responsibility that shared leadership requires needs to be pushed from the top down, as a core value. Of course, as we have seen, most scholars accept that shared leadership is an emergent property which occurs dynamically within teams and is not led – or pushed - by the organisation. So shared leadership demands that, at a team level, multiple team members are willing to act as a leader and embrace
leadership roles (Zhou & Vredenburgh, 2017) without being coerced into doing so.
There are two pieces of research that take this perspective but suggest that engagement with shared leadership may create issues. In the first of these, Shondrick, Dinh, and Lord (2010) suggest that shared leadership will be rejected if individuals don’t recognise shared leadership behaviours because of their own implicit leadership theories (i.e. that they are
usually expecting leadership to come from formal positions, in a vertical direction and don’t recognise it when it comes from team members). Chrobot-Mason et al. (2016) further this by suggesting that, consequently, individuals may be less inclined to attribute leadership identity to themselves or others and will therefore be less likely to be influenced by others, or influence others. These studies are closely related to the notions of social identity theory, which is discussed in the next section.
4.9.2 Issues of power
A key criticism of many leadership approaches is that they tend to focus on the positive nature of leadership (Alvesson & Spicer, 2012) and ignore the issues of power, influence and domination (Bolden, 2011). Leadership cannot be untangled from the dynamics that occur within and around it – critics such as Alvesson and Spicer (2012) and Bolden (2011) argue that these dynamics are always unequal, and it is impossible to overcome these inequalities, because one person is always in a stronger position than the other. This is certainly a
concern for shared leadership theory, which relies on team members accepting leadership from those who aren’t in formal leadership positions. These concerns are echoed by Harris and Muijs (2004) who discuss the problems of implementing shared leadership. They outline three causes for concern: 1) that those in formal positions of power will be
threatened by the distribution of power, and the associated need for them to relinquish this power to others, 2) that hierarchies already exist that prevent those lower down from gaining access to power and 3) that if shared leadership is implemented from the organisation’s top levels downwards, responsibility can be mis-delegated. In addition, Bolden (2011) questions whether power and influence can be shared among a team in a truly effective or fair way – and whether, at its core, shared leadership is actually all about sharing the power and influence.
Scholarly research into shared leadership has yet to fully engage with these criticisms and instead has retained a clear focus on the positive aspects of shared leadership. One reason that issues of power have largely been ignored in the extant literature might be that scholars focus on leadership solely as an influence process. The concept of leadership as power, and the power relationships that maybe be at work in these influence processes is only brought to the fore by shared leadership scholars when they tackle discussions around the role of the formal leader.
4.9.3 Role of formal leader
Scholars disagree about how much high-level leader behaviours should be considered within the theoretical development of shared leadership. Research has largely focussed on the collectivistic action of emerging leadership in teams, without acknowledging the
influence the formal leader may, or may not, have (Friedrich et al., 2016). This focus on the exchange of lateral influence among peers in non-hierarchical relationships (Sweeney et al., 2019) is problematic as it means that questions around how vertical, hierarchical and formal leadership fits within shared leadership have been largely ignored in much of the literature. And, as Locke (2003) suggests, it is risky to ignore the role of a formal leader when – in nearly every type of organisation – they are still an essential part of the structure.
Some scholars have sought, therefore, to establish the importance of the focal or formal leader in the process of sharing leadership, in order to ensure there is a fuller view of
leadership processes (Day et al., 2004; Ensley et al., 2006; Friedrich et al., 2016). The
suggestion here is that, in order to understand leadership processes, we need to consider an integrated model of both vertical (top-down leadership) and shared (or lateral) leadership (Day et al., 2004; Ensley et al., 2006; Pearce, 2004). A proponent for this integrated model of vertical and shared leadership is that of the collective leadership framework proposed by
Friedrich et al. (2009). Their model is defined as the selective utilisation of expertise within a network but emphasise the continued need for the focal leader to maintain a role. The role described is either as a leader who is explicitly willing to share aspects of their own
leadership role with others, or in creating the conditions in which individuals emerge as an informal leader.
These conceptual discussions have therefore largely agreed that there is some role for vertical leadership within shared leadership theory and, within empirical literature, there are indications that integrating both hierarchal and shared leadership into teamwork will improve overall performance (Ensley et al., 2006; Hsu, Yuzhu, & Hua, 2017). This integrated view of vertical and shared leadership forms one of the foundational principles for this thesis, which aims to explore the role of those in both formal and informal leadership positions (multi-level) in developing shared leadership in cross-organisational teams.
The approach to the study acknowledges that vertical leadership remains an important driver of shared leadership (Ensley et al., 2006; Friedrich et al., 2009; Locke, 2003; Pearce et al., 2007) and that formal leaders represent a significant contribution to team success (Ensley et al., 2006; Friedrich et al., 2016). This inclusion of the vertical leader as
contributing to, and being responsible for, shared leadership also reflects the prominent structures of an experiential agency, the empirical focus of this thesis, in which team structures typically operate with a cross-organisational structure, and often include input from members of the organisation’s leadership team.