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Publicatie

No Master of Puppets: Leading Civil Servants in Collaborative Innovation

Tijdschriftbijdrage - Tijdschriftartikel

Typologies of leadership styles indicate that there are vast differences in the way superiors guide their employees in collaborative innovation projects. In this article, we study how civil servants have a different experience of organisational leadership styles. More specifically, we aim to discover what determines how civil servants experience different types of organisational leadership in a collaborative innovation context. Therefore, we explore whether the different phases of the collaborative innovation process (preparation, idea generation and selection, implementation) affect how civil servants experience leadership. This study draws on the leadership literature in the context of public-sector collaborative innovation, and on studies identifying civil servants’ needs throughout collaborative innovation projects. In our empirical research, we interview 29 subordinates and 11 superiors engaged in collaborative innovation projects. Our study contributes to the innovation literature that civil servants’ attitudes towards innovation (being a risk-taker, rule-follower, or collaborator) affect what type of organisational leadership (facilitating, intervening and passive/avoidant leadership) they experience as most helpful when engaging in collaborative innovation. Our results show that the phases of the innovation process only determine to a limited extent what type of leadership civil servants experience as most helpful.
Tijdschrift: Innovation Journal
ISSN: 1715-3816
Issue: 3
Volume: 26
Pagina's: 1 - 20
Jaar van publicatie:2021
Toegankelijkheid:Open