Leadership behaviours and capabilities in Syria: an exploratory qualitative approach

The impact of digital leadership on sustainable performance: a systematic literature review

Purpose

In today's constantly changing workplace, leaders encounter new challenges consequent to rising digitization. Tackling these problems effectively requires digital leadership, a prominent idea in discussions about what abilities the managers need to be developed in the digital age. The study analyses the leadership elements needed and determines the impact of digital leadership on sustainable performance. The aim of this systematic literature review (SLR) is to identify the relationship between digital leadership concepts and leadership development by proposing digital leadership for management development to ensure sustainable performance in an organisation.

Design/methodology/approach

ROSES (RepOrting Standards for Systematics Evidence Syntheses) was used as the publication standard for this systematic literature review, which incorporated a variety of research approaches. For this study's article selection, one of the most important scientific databases, Scopus, was used. Only articles published between 2001 and 2021 were reviewed. The focus of the article was on digital leadership and performance.

Findings

This review identified five main themes: leadership styles, measurements of leadership, antecedents to good leadership, outcomes of good leadership and gaps in current research areas. An additional ten sub-themes were derived from the five primary topics.

Originality/value

This paper systematically reviewed two decades of literature related to digital leadership and its impact on sustainable performance. The findings allow leaders to better understand the leadership trend and develop appropriate leadership practices to overcome future challenges for sustainable performance.

Leadership development trends and challenges in the twenty-first century: rethinking the priorities

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to understand challenges facing organizations in the twenty-first century and address these challenges through suggesting future leadership development based on relevant leadership theories, which would motivate and guide future research directions in a streamlined manner.

Design/methodology/approach

The present study adopted the exploratory literature review, using the integrative method, to review the theoretical and empirical literature on leadership development published since the 2000s, primarily focusing on research published in the Journal of Management Development.

Findings

The findings of the current review confirmed that leadership theories are the base for leadership development theories, particularly if the purpose is to address and overcome the current challenges facing organizations. The authors suggest that leadership theories and leadership development theories do not exist in isolation from one another, nor do they exist in isolation from challenges facing organizations.

Research limitations/implications

This review does not cover all studies before the 2000s nor other journals in the field of leadership.

Originality/value

Given that most organizations are suffering from one or more of the following issues: sexual scandals, unethical behaviors, individualism, crises and a low level of performance or productivity, the development of particular leadership skills has become a priority. This study is one of few studies guiding both future leadership development research directions and leadership development initiatives.

Leadership and management development post-war: exploring future trends

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to explore and understand current challenges and future trends in leadership and management development that can help practitioners in post-wars periods, using evidence from Syrian public sector.

Design/methodology/approach

Qualitative method design is used for data collection: semi-structured interviews with 24 senior managers in the public sector.

Findings

The findings revealed that the current challenges includes egos, technological hurdles, financial constraints, instability and the different expectations of new and old staff; future trends include developing collective leadership, technology literacy applications for effective leadership development, focusing on self-learning and development, focusing on creativity and innovation for transferring learning and development and targeting both vertical and horizontal learning and development.

Research limitations/implications

Research data have been collected with managers working in an unstable environment. Only the public sector has been involved in the study. There were a number of limitations, e.g. selection of participant sample size and exploratory methodology, which affect generalizing the findings.

Practical implications

The implication of the current study is practical in nature. Essentially, post-war governments can use the results of the current study to help leaders and managers develop and implement effective strategies to meet their enormous and urgent needs.

Originality/value

Leadership/management development has become a strategic issue in post-war countries, acting as the key element in the stage of extensive reconstruction of damaged infrastructure, and the restoration and restructuring of social services in former conflict zones, and the restoration and restructuring of economy and many other roles.

Women’s leadership development in sport settings

Purpose

This study explores the positive and negative factors influencing transformational learning experiences of female leaders in women’s leadership development programmes in sports and examines the differences in learning/change factors cited by those who successfully addressed them and those who failed.

Design/methodology/approach

The study adopted a qualitative research method, using phone interviews with women leaders in a sports setting.

Findings

The findings revealed that participants presented clear progress in terms of leadership skills, but they failed to report whether this progress can be achieved if the programme is running within a specific sports organisation, targeting a specific kind of sports leadership in the long term.

Research limitations/implications

There were a number of limitations for this study, e.g. selection of participants, sample size, exploratory methodology, which affected generalising the findings to other sports organisations or other countries.

Originality/value

The study provides a starting point for the exploration of the effectiveness of women leadership development programmes and how designers can evaluate the outcome of such initiatives in the UK.