Leadership of change in South Africa public sector turnarounds

dc.contributor.authorKumalo, Mampe
dc.contributor.authorScheepers, Caren Brenda
dc.contributor.emailscheepersc@gibs.co.zaen_ZA
dc.date.accessioned2018-11-26T12:09:42Z
dc.date.available2018-11-26T12:09:42Z
dc.date.issued2021-01
dc.description.abstractPURPOSE : Organisational decline has far-reaching, negative emotional and financial consequences for staff and customers, generating academic and practitioner interest in turnaround change processes. Despite numerous studies to identify the stages during turnarounds, the findings have been inconclusive. The purpose of this paper is to address the gap by defining these stages, or episodes. The characteristics of leaders affect the outcome of organisational change towards turnarounds. This paper focusses, therefore, on the leadership requirements during specific episodes, from the initial crisis to the full recovery phases. DESIGN/METHODOLOGY/APPROACH : A total of 11 semi-structured interviews were conducted with executives from the public sector in South Africa who went through or were going through turnaround change processes and 3 with experts consulting to these organisations. FINDINGS : Contrary to current literature in organisational change, this study found that, in these turnaround situations, leadership in the form of either an individual CEO or director general was preferable to shared leadership or leadership distributed throughout the organisation. This study found four critical episodes that occurred during all the public service turnarounds explored, and established that key leadership requirements differ across these episodes. The study shows how these requirements relate to the current literature on transactional, transformational and authentic leadership. PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS : The findings on the leadership requirements ultimately inform the selection and development of leaders tasked with high-risk turnaround change processes. ORIGINALITY/VALUE : Four episodes with corresponding leadership requirements were established in the particular context of public sector turnaround change processes.en_ZA
dc.description.departmentGordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS)en_ZA
dc.description.librarianhj2018en_ZA
dc.description.urihttps://www.emeraldinsight.com/journal/jocmen_ZA
dc.identifier.citationKumalo, M. and Scheepers, C.B. (2021), "Leadership of change in South Africa public sector turnarounds", Journal of Organizational Change Management, Vol. 34 No. 1, pp. 137-157. https://doi.org/10.1108/JOCM-04-2017-0142.en_ZA
dc.identifier.issn0953-4814
dc.identifier.other10.1108/JOCM-04-2017-0142
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/2263/67327
dc.language.isoenen_ZA
dc.publisherEmeralden_ZA
dc.rights© Emerald Publishing Limited 2018en_ZA
dc.subjectChange managementen_ZA
dc.subjectChange phasesen_ZA
dc.subjectLeadershipen_ZA
dc.subjectPublic serviceen_ZA
dc.subjectTransformational turnaroundsen_ZA
dc.titleLeadership of change in South Africa public sector turnaroundsen_ZA
dc.typePostprint Articleen_ZA

Files

Original bundle

Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
Loading...
Thumbnail Image
Name:
Kumalo_Leadership_2021.pdf
Size:
930.19 KB
Format:
Adobe Portable Document Format
Description:
Postprint Article

License bundle

Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
Loading...
Thumbnail Image
Name:
license.txt
Size:
1.75 KB
Format:
Item-specific license agreed upon to submission
Description: