3 LEADERSHIP AT DIFFERENT ORGANIZATIONAL LEVELS..................................................................................
3.1 INTRODUCTION
Zaccaro and Klimoski (2001) argued that the organizational level of the leader matters a lot more as a
context variable affecting the manifestation, interpretation and outcomes related to leadership, than the
leadership field acknowledges. Few academic leadership models account for instance, for leadership
behaviors at higher levels of the organization (Zaccaro, 2001), most likely due to the relative
inaccessibility of higher organizational levels for research purposes. Whether it is due to the
inaccessibility of higher levels or to the current academic neglect of organizational level, leadership
theory hardly differentiates on the basis of organizational level. Zaccaro and Klimoski (2001) claimed
that the lack of consideration to organizational level has contributed to a dearth of good empirical
research on organizational leadership. Most leadership theories have focused on lower-level managers
(House & Aditya, 1997). Day and Lord (1988) argued that the common practice of ³DSSO\LQJ
leadership theories developed at lower levels to explain leadership at upper levels assumes
isomorSKLVPDFURVVOHYHOVWKDWLVSUREDEO\QRWWUXH ́(p.212).
The notion of organizational level stems from the idea of hierarchy. Organizational hierarchy is
generally understood as the formal, documented system according to which people in an organization
are ranked in terms of authority along a vertical axis (Lundholm et al., 2012). For most people, the
word hierarchy carries a pejorative connotation (Diefenbach & Sillince, 2011; Dipadova & Faerman,
1993; Gernert, 2011). It conjures up images of unnecessary layers of organizations where decision
making is centralized at the top of the organization, and communication must follow a downward
chain of command. In response to this image of organizations, as well as to an increasingly turbulent
economic-socio-political organizational environment, organizations have begun exploring the benefits
of flattening organizations by eliminating layers of hierarchy and instituting alternative ways of
organizing people (Barry, 1991; Daft, 2009; Lawler III, 1988; Peters, 1987; Rajan & Wulf, 2006;
Ramos, 2011; Semler, 1989; Whitford).
Firms today are claimed to be complex, social systems (Kuhn, 2008) characterized by
distributed/collective leadership (Fairhurst, 2008; Gronn, 2002), increasingly intent on creating
worker participation (Stohl & Cheney, 2001), teamwork (Cohen & Bailey, 1997), and empowerment
(Styhre, 2001). This characterization is particularly relevant with respect to so-FDOOHG μμNQRZOHGJH