RESEARCH CONTEXT
The research context of the leadership literature, however is still dominated by a tripod ontology
(Bennis, 2007) including 1) the leader, 2) followers and 3) goals. Organizational context is hardly
included in the conceptualizations of leadership (Podolny et al., 2005). The focus is on the leader-
follower dyad, characterized by a vertical relationship and an internal (within the boundaries of the
organization) orientation. In other words, most research efforts are spent on studies of supervisory
(between supervisor and subordinate) leadership.
In order to anticipate the horizontal and outward move characterizing the 21st century organization, an
alternative leadership answer is warranted. The focus of leadership research needed to move beyond
the leader-follower dyad, linking external organizational objectives to leadership of organizational
members. In the strategic management literature this concept has been termed strategic leadership
(Finkelstein & Hambrick, 1996). Despite early enthusiasm, the concept has remained largely
untheorized. The primary conceptualization of strategic leadership has been in terms of the
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organizational outcomes. Hitherto, the potential for further application to other organizational levels
and the value of the concept for organizational and team development has been neglected.
This dissertation has contributed to both theory and practice by giving further content to the concept
of strategic leadership. In summary, this dissertation contained the conceptualization of a strategic
leadership model (chapter five), the operationalization (chapter six) and validation (chapter seven) of
this model, and two applications of the model in terms of effectiveness (chapters eight and nine).
BUILDING A NEW STRATEGIC LEADERSHIP MODEL
This dissertation built a conceptual model for strategic leadership on the basis of two paradoxes, i.e.
the paradox drawn from the strategy literature between the (internal) organization and the (external)
environment and the paradox between exploration and exploitation underlying the strategic leadership
literature. Most if not all references to strategic leadership literature revolve around the tension
between long-term viability of the organization which is dependent on exploring fundamentally new
competencies, and short-term financial stability, which in turn is based on the exploitation of current
organizational capabilities (chapter five and pilot study in Appendix II). In turn, this dissertation
presented a strategic leadership model composed of four dimensions, Organization - Exploitation
(Operational efficiency), Organization - Exploration (Organizational creativity), Environment -
Exploration (Business development) and Environment - Exploitation (Client centricity) (see Figure
10.1).