'We are Family' - Distributed Leadership in the Construction of a Campus

Author(s):

Johanna Vuori(presenting / submitting)

Conference:

ECER 2016

Network:

22. Research in Higher Education

Format:

Paper

Session Information

22 SES 05 D, Leadership in Academia

Paper Session

Time:

2016-08-24

13:30-15:00

Room:

NM-J104

Chair:

Colleen Doyle

Contribution

Introduction

Distributed leadership accentuates the collective dynamics of leadership instead of focusing on the actions of appointed leaders. It offers a non-individualistic, post-heroic alternative to discuss leadership by shifting the lense from the hierarchical leader-follower relationship to the collective and context-specific processes of various actors (Bolden, 2011; Jones, 2014; Thorpe, 2010). The ideas of distributed leadership have been much discussed by school management researchers and practitioners for over a decade (eg. Harris, 2008; Tian, Risku & Collin, 2015). Although the emphasis on the collective dynamics of management could offer a welcome counterbalancing perspective against the managerialist and leaderist discourses in academia (Crevani et al., 2015; Kezar & Lester, 2011) higher education researchers have been less eager to rely on the value of distributed leadership with notable exceptions (Bolden, Petrov & Gosling, 2008; Jones et al., 2012, 2014).

One reason for the less eager adoption of distributed leadership as a framework for the study higher education leadership might be its limited ability to offer novel insights into higher education leadership due to the close similarity of its principles with the tradition of shared governance in higher education (Burke, 2010; Kezar & Lester, 2011). Moreover, the conceptual development of distributed leadership has resulted in multiple analytic models and overlapping use of terminology. No universally accepted definition of distributed leadership can be found (Thorpe, 2010). Instead, a researcher searching for non-individualistic frameworks for the study of leadership needs to clarify the differences between ‘distributed’, ‘distributive’ (Creanor, 2014; Keppel et al., 2010), ‘shared leadership’ (Fletcher & Käufer, 2003; Pearce 2004) and 'hybrid configurations' of leadership (Bolden & Petrov, 2014; Gronn, 2009).

Gosling, Bolden and Petrov (2009) argue that distributed leadership does not necessarily work as an analytic framework in higher education but serves as a rhetorical tool by highlighting what is being aspired. In so doing, however, it might blur the actual power dynamics of a higher education institution. Also Kezar and Lester (2011), suggest that shared (distributed) leadership actually serves the interests of management while the rest of the actors in higher education institution have a role of implementers of the agenda the management has set.

In order to contribute to the discussion on the merits of distributed leadership in higher education this paper intends to present an in-depth case study of an academic community that has gone through a major change and created a context specific working culture of its own. Through qualitative research this paper aims to give a thick description of how the processes of distributed leadership were enacted in constructing a new campus community and identity. Arguing that distributed leadership is not only a rhetoric but also a tool to make change in a higher education institution the paper gives voice to the community members as they share their accounts of how they participated in the planning process of the construction of a new campus building, their present views on the campus identity and their collective plans for the future.

The campus has over thousand bachelor-level students and 60 staff members of two different Finnish universities of applied sciences. The campus also has an office for local city administration. It is located in a small historic town (`Pittoresqueville’) approximately 50 km from the main campuses. There are no other higher education institutions in that area. Before the campus building was built in 2010 higher education was offered in three separate places in Pittoresqueville.

Method

This paper is a single case study. The campus at Pittoresqueville was chosen as a single case because of it offers an exceptional setting to discuss distributed leadership in higher education. The uniqueness of the case justifies the appropriateness of the single-case selection in this study. The approach of the study is interpretivist: the researcher offers her perception of the perceptions of the informants on distributed leadership. The main aim of this case study is not to produce new knowledge that could be generalized in other higher education contexts, but to understand how distributed leadership was enacted in this particular case. For this reason the campus remains anonymous in this study and the pseudonum of Pittoresqueville is used to direct the readers’ attention to narrative of distributed leadership presented by the study. The research material consists of transcribed interviews of informants from the campus and field notes of the researcher making observations on the campus. The informants represented key stakeholder groups on campus: teaching staff (lecturers and principal lecturers), management (programme and campus heads), administration (including library) and students. Each informant was interviewed individually for approximately 45 minutes. The interview protocol included questions about the past, present and the future of the campus and the informants were asked to tell a story about the campus construction, state specific features of the campus, locate the campus in its situational context and reveal their expectations of the campus future. The questions were designed to prompt the interviewee to situate and reflect their own role in the narratives. There were no direct questions about leadership nor was the term ‘distributed leadership’ presented by the interviewer at any time. The coding of the data followed an inductive strategy and was performed with NVivo. The themes and patterns emerging in the interview transcriptions and field notes were grouped and categorised through several iterative rounds to give insight into the distributed leadership processes that were enacted on Pittoresqueville Campus.

Expected Outcomes

The case narrative accentuates the elements of trust, respect, recognition and collaboration of distributed leadership (Jones et al., 2012; 2014). The paper first highlights the long planning process that preceded the construction of the mental and physical space of the Pittoresqueville Campus. The planning process lasted several years and was organised so that all community members had to participate. It involved both academic and administrative staff as well as other internal and external stakeholders. The planning stage was considered by the informants not only as long and participative, but as a back-and-forth moving journey in which the different internal groups expressed conflicting views revealing both commitment and resistance to the progress. During the process the community created a joint vision of the future their graduates face when entering labour market. Based on that vision a learning concept was developed. The chosen learning approach emphasises students’ active learning, collaboration with the local employers and teachers’ role as facilitators of the process. The campus building was constructed to support the learning vision and to make it transparent. Secondly, the case study narrative will provide a description of the campus identity perceived by informants. When exemplifying what is unique and essential in the campus identity the informants accentuated the openness of the campus and the strong community spirit of the campus. The campus was seen to welcome new ideas and people easily and thus creating a low threshold for experimentation. The piloting and agile experimenting had a special role in the description of the informants of the relationship with the campus and other parts of the institution. The community that was constructed in the planning process of the campus was seen very tight, described as a family whose members take care of each other also outside work.

References

Bolden, R. (2011). Distributed leadership in organizations: A review of theory and research. International Journal of Management Reviews, 13(3), 251-269. Bolden, R., & Petrov, G. (2014). Hybrid configurations of leadership in higher education employer engagement. Journal of Higher Education Policy and Management, 36(4), 408-417. Bolden, R., Petrov, G., & Gosling, J. (2008). Tensions in higher education leadership: Towards a multi‐level model of leadership practice. Higher Education Quarterly, 62(4), 358-376. Burke, K. M. (2010). Distributed leadership and shared governance in post-secondary education Management in Education, 24(2), 51-54. Creanor, L. (2014). Raising the profile: An institutional case study of embedding scholarship and innovation through distributive leadership. Innovations in Education and Teaching International, 51(6), 573-583. Crevani, L., Ekman, M., Lindgren, M., & Packendorff, J. (2015). Leadership cultures and discursive hybridisation: On the cultural production of leadership in higher education reforms. International Journal of Public Leadership, 11(3/4), 147-165. Fletcher, J. K., & Käufer, K. (2003). Shared leadership: Paradox and possibility. In C. L. Pearce, & J. A. Conger (Eds.), Shared leadership. reframing the hows and whys of leadership. (pp. 21-47). Thousand Oaks: Sage. Gosling, J., Bolden, R., & Petrov, G. (2009). Distributed leadership: What does it accomplish? Leadership, 5(3), 299-310. Gronn, P. (2009). From distributed to hybrid leadership practice Springer. Harris, A. (2008). Distributed leadership: According to the evidence. Journal of Educational Administration, 46(2), 172-188. Jones, S. (2014). Distributed leadership: A critical analysis. Leadership, 10(2), 129-141. Jones, S., Lefoe, G., Harvey, M., & Ryland, K. (2012). Distributed leadership: A collaborative framework for academics, executives and professionals in higher education. Journal of Higher Education Policy and Management,34(1), 67-78. Jones, S., Harvey, M., Lefoe, G., & Ryland, K. (2014). Synthesising theory and practice: Distributed leadership in higher education. Educational Management Administration & Leadership, 42(5), 603-619. Kezar, A., & Lester, J. (2011). Enhancing campus capacity for leadership: An examination of grassroots leaders in higher education Stanford University Press. Pearce, C. L. (2004). The future of leadership: Combining vertical and shared leadership to transform knowledge work. Academy of Management Executive, 18(1), 47-57. Thorpe, R., Gold, J., & Lawler, J. (2011). Locating distributed leadership. International Journal of Management Reviews, 13(3), 239-250. Tian, M., Risku, M., & Collin, K. (2015). A meta-analysis of distributed leadership from 2002 to 2013 theory development, empirical evidence and future research focus. Educational Management Administration & Leadership, 44(1), 146-164.

Author Information

Johanna Vuori (presenting / submitting)

Haaga-Helia University of Applied Sciences

Espoo

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