Mastering the Innovation Paradox: The Five Unexpected Qualities of Innovation Leaders
From an organizational perspective, leaders are a
variation of the same talent pool in that they all score a larger than
average value on the bell curve that maps leadership behaviors and
characteristics, namely competence, vision, communication,
confidence, cultural sensibility, stewardship, empowerment,
authenticity, reinforcement, and creativity. The question that remains
unanswered and essentially unresolved is how to explain the irony
that leaders are so much alike yet their organizations diverge so
noticeably in their ability to innovate. Leadership intersects with
innovation at the point where human interactions get exceedingly
complex and where certain paradoxical forces cohabit: conflict with
conciliation, sovereignty with interdependence, and imagination with
realism. Rather than accepting that leadership is without context, we
argue that leaders are specialists of their domain and that those
effective at leading for innovation are distinct within the broader pool
of leaders. Keeping in view the extensive literature on leadership and
innovation, we carried out a quantitative study with data collected
over a five-year period involving 240 participants from across five
dissimilar companies based in the United States. We found that while
innovation and leadership are, in general, strongly interrelated (r =
.89, p = 0.0), there are five qualities that set leaders apart on
innovation. These qualities include a large radius of trust, a restless
curiosity with a low need for acceptance, an honest sense of self and
other, a sense for knowledge and creativity as the yin and yang of
innovation, and an ability to use multiple senses in the engagement
with followers. When these particular behaviors and characteristics
are present in leaders, organizations out-innovate their rivals by a
margin of 29.3 per cent to gain an unassailable edge in a business
environment that is regularly disruptive. A strategic outcome of this
study is a psychometric scale named iLeadership, proposed with the
underlying evidence, limitations, and potential for leadership and
innovation in organizations.c
[1] T. Kelley and D. Kelley, Creative Confidence: Unleashing the Creative
Potential within us all. New York, NY: Random House, 2013.
[2] N. N. Taleb, The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable.
New York, NY: Random House, 2010.
[3] C. M. Christensen, The Innovator’s Dilemma: The Revolutionary Book
that will Change the Way You do Business. New York, NY:
HarperBusiness, 2003.
[4] I. Nonaka and R. Toyama, "The knowledge-creating theory revisited:
Knowledge creation as a synthesizing process,” Knowledge
Management Research in Practice, 2011, vol. 1, pp. 2-10.
[5] T. Kelley, The Art of Innovation. New York: Doubleday, 2001.
[6] M. Marquard and M. A. Lakhani, "An existential-humanistic process
model of knowledge creation: Evidence, limitations, and potential for
innovation in virtual organizations,” eLmL 2014, The Sixth International
Conference on Mobile, Hybrid, and Online Learning, 2014, pp. 1-12.
[7] J. Green and C. Hymowitz, "CEO turnover in the US climbing to highest
since financial crisis,” Financial Post, December 23, 2013, np.
[8] M. Sashkin and M. G. Sashkin, Leadership that Matters: The Critical
Factors for Making a Difference in People’s Lives and Organizations’
Success. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., 2003.
[9] C. Handy, Beyond Certainty: The Changing Worlds of Organizations.
Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Publishing, 1996.
[10] R. Goffee and G. Jones, "Why should anyone be led by you?” in
Leadership for New Managers (2nd Ed.), Boston: Harvard Business
School Publishing, 2000, pp: 73-80.
[11] T. Kuhn, The Structures of Scientific Revolution (3rd Ed.). Chicago, IL:
The University of Chicago Press, 1996.
[12] N. N. Taleb (2012), Antifragile: Things that Gain from Disorder. New
York, NY: Random House, 2012.
[13] M. S. Gazzaniga, The Mind’s Past. Berkeley, CA: University of
California Press, 1998.
[14] L. A. Hill, "Exercising influence,” in Leadership for New Managers (2nd
Ed.), Boston: Harvard Business School Publishing, 2000, pp: 19-31.
[15] M. D. Watkins, "The power to persuade,” in Leadership for New
Managers (2nd Ed.), Boston: Harvard Business School Publishing, 2000,
pp: 35-55.
[16] A. Neal and K. Conway, Leading from the Edge: Global Executives
Share Strategies for Success. Alexandria, VA: ASTD Press.
[17] B. M. Bass, Bass & Stogdill’s Handbook of Leadership: Theory,
Research, and Managerial Applications. New York, NY: The Free Press
1990, Ed. 3.
[18] F. E. Fiedler, A Theory of Leadership Effectiveness. New York, NY:
McGraw Hill, 1967.
[19] M. Weber, The Theory of Social and Economic Organization (T. Parson,
Ed., T. Parsons & A. M. Henderson, Trans.). New York, NY: The Free
Press, 2012.
[20] R. J. House, "A path goal theory of leader effectiveness,” in
Administrative Science Quarterly, 1967, 16, pp. 321-338.
[21] N. Machiavelli, The Prince (W. K. Marriot, Trans.) London, U.K.: J. M.
Dent & Sons. 1513/1958.
[22] D. C. McClelland, Human Motivation. Cambridge, U.K.:Cambridge
University Press, 1987.
[23] J. M. Burns, Leadership. New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1978.
[24] E. P. Hollander, Leadership Dynamics: A Practical Guide to Effective
Relationships. New York, NY: The Free Press, 1978.
[25] P. Hersey, K. H. Blanchard, and D. E. Johnson, Management of
Organizational Behavior: Leading Human Resources. Upper Saddle
River, NJ: Prentice Hall, Inc., 2001.
[26] J. O’Toole, Leading Change: The Argument for Values-Based
Leadership. New York, NY: Jossey-Bass, 1996.
[27] P. Block, Stewardship: Choosing Service over Self-Interest. San
Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 1996.
[28] R. K. Greenleaf, The Servant as a Leader. Westfield, IN: The Greenleaf
Center for Servant Leadership, 2008.
[29] W. Bennis, On Becoming a Leader. Philadelphia, PA; Basic Books,
2009.
[30] N. M. Tichy and M. A. Devanna, Transformational Leader: The Key to
Global Competitiveness. New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.,
1990.
[31] H. M. Trice and J. M. Beyer, "Cultural leadership in organizations,” in
Organization Science, 1991, 2, pp 149-169.
[32] E. H. Schein, Organizational Culture and Leadership (4th Ed.). San
Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2010.
[30] N. M. Tichy and M. A. Devanna, Transformational Leader: The Key toGlobal Competitiveness.New York,NY: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1990.
[31] H. M. Trice and J. M. Beyer, "Cultural leadership in organizations,” in Organization Science, 1991, 2, pp 149-169.
[32] E. H. Schein, Organizational Culture and Leadership (4th Ed.).San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2010.
[33] C. Handy, Beyond Certainty: The Changing Worlds of Organizations.Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Publishing, 1996.
[34] W. Bridges, "Leading the de-jobbed organization,” in F. Hesselbein, M. Goldsmith, and R. Beckhard (Eds.), The Leader of the Future: New Visions, Strategies, and Practices for the New Era.San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1996.
[35] S. R. Covey, The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness.New York, NY: The Free Press, 2004.
[36] J. Collins, Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap…and Others Don’t.New York, NY: HarperCollins Publishers, Inc., 2001.
[37] W. Isaacson, Steve Jobs.New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 2011.
[38] M. A. Lakhani, "CALIBER leadership assessment scale: A psychometric report,” retrieved January 7, 2014, from http://magnaleadership.com/docs/caliberpsychometricreport.pdf, 2007.
[39] J. Dyer, H. Gregerson, and C. Christensen, The Innovator’s DNA: Mastering the Five Skills of Disruptive Innovators.Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Publishing, 2011.
[40] A. A. Gawande, "Slow ideas,” retrieved January 7, 2014, from http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2013/07/29/130729fa_fact_gawande, 2013.
[41] Booz, "The 10 most innovative companies of 2013,” retrieved January 21, 2014, from http://www.booz.com/global/home/what-we-think/global-innovation-1000, 2013.
[42] R. D. Putnam, Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 2000.
[43] E. M. Rogers, Diffusion of Innovations (5th Ed.).New York, NY: The Free Press, 2003.
[44] D. W. McMillan and D. M. Chavis, "Sense of community: A definition and theory,” in Journal of CommunityPsychology, 1986, Vol. 14, np.
[45] W. B. Miller and J. L. Rodgers, The Ontogeny of Human Bonding Systems: Evolutionary Origins, Neural Bases, and Psychological Manifestations.New York,NY: Springer.
[46] L. Wiseman and G. McKeown, Multipliers: How the Best Leaders Make Everyone Smarter.New York, NY: HarperCollins, 2010.
[47] V. Nayar, Employees First, Customers Second: Turning Conventional Management Upside Down.Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Publishing, 2010.
[48] L. Nonaka and H. Takeuchi, The Knowledge-Creating Company: How Japanese Companies Create the Dynamics of Innovation.New York,NY: Oxford University Press, 1995.
[49] J. W. Creswell, Research Design: Qualitative, Quantitative, and Mixed Method Approaches.Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, Inc., 2014.
[50] R. F. DeVellis, Scale Development: Theory and Applications (3rd Ed.).Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, Inc., 2012.
[51] P. Drucker, "The coming of the new organization,” in Harvard Business Review on Knowledge Management, Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press, 1988/1999, pp. 1-19.
[52] C. Rose, "An hour with Tim Cook, CEO of Apple Inc.” Retrieved Sep 12, 2014, from http://www.charlierose.com/watch/60444569, 2014.
[53] N. Wade, A Troublesome Inheritance: Genes, Race and the Rise of the West.New York, NY: The Penguin Press, 2014.
[54] M. Porter, On Strategy.Harvard Business School Publishing, 2011.
[55] D. Kumar, The Substance and the Shadow: An Autobiography (Narrated to U. Nayar).India: Hay House, 2014.
[56] R. Dawkins, The Magic of Reality: How We Know What’s Really True.New York, NY: Free Press, 2011.
[1] T. Kelley and D. Kelley, Creative Confidence: Unleashing the Creative
Potential within us all. New York, NY: Random House, 2013.
[2] N. N. Taleb, The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable.
New York, NY: Random House, 2010.
[3] C. M. Christensen, The Innovator’s Dilemma: The Revolutionary Book
that will Change the Way You do Business. New York, NY:
HarperBusiness, 2003.
[4] I. Nonaka and R. Toyama, "The knowledge-creating theory revisited:
Knowledge creation as a synthesizing process,” Knowledge
Management Research in Practice, 2011, vol. 1, pp. 2-10.
[5] T. Kelley, The Art of Innovation. New York: Doubleday, 2001.
[6] M. Marquard and M. A. Lakhani, "An existential-humanistic process
model of knowledge creation: Evidence, limitations, and potential for
innovation in virtual organizations,” eLmL 2014, The Sixth International
Conference on Mobile, Hybrid, and Online Learning, 2014, pp. 1-12.
[7] J. Green and C. Hymowitz, "CEO turnover in the US climbing to highest
since financial crisis,” Financial Post, December 23, 2013, np.
[8] M. Sashkin and M. G. Sashkin, Leadership that Matters: The Critical
Factors for Making a Difference in People’s Lives and Organizations’
Success. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., 2003.
[9] C. Handy, Beyond Certainty: The Changing Worlds of Organizations.
Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Publishing, 1996.
[10] R. Goffee and G. Jones, "Why should anyone be led by you?” in
Leadership for New Managers (2nd Ed.), Boston: Harvard Business
School Publishing, 2000, pp: 73-80.
[11] T. Kuhn, The Structures of Scientific Revolution (3rd Ed.). Chicago, IL:
The University of Chicago Press, 1996.
[12] N. N. Taleb (2012), Antifragile: Things that Gain from Disorder. New
York, NY: Random House, 2012.
[13] M. S. Gazzaniga, The Mind’s Past. Berkeley, CA: University of
California Press, 1998.
[14] L. A. Hill, "Exercising influence,” in Leadership for New Managers (2nd
Ed.), Boston: Harvard Business School Publishing, 2000, pp: 19-31.
[15] M. D. Watkins, "The power to persuade,” in Leadership for New
Managers (2nd Ed.), Boston: Harvard Business School Publishing, 2000,
pp: 35-55.
[16] A. Neal and K. Conway, Leading from the Edge: Global Executives
Share Strategies for Success. Alexandria, VA: ASTD Press.
[17] B. M. Bass, Bass & Stogdill’s Handbook of Leadership: Theory,
Research, and Managerial Applications. New York, NY: The Free Press
1990, Ed. 3.
[18] F. E. Fiedler, A Theory of Leadership Effectiveness. New York, NY:
McGraw Hill, 1967.
[19] M. Weber, The Theory of Social and Economic Organization (T. Parson,
Ed., T. Parsons & A. M. Henderson, Trans.). New York, NY: The Free
Press, 2012.
[20] R. J. House, "A path goal theory of leader effectiveness,” in
Administrative Science Quarterly, 1967, 16, pp. 321-338.
[21] N. Machiavelli, The Prince (W. K. Marriot, Trans.) London, U.K.: J. M.
Dent & Sons. 1513/1958.
[22] D. C. McClelland, Human Motivation. Cambridge, U.K.:Cambridge
University Press, 1987.
[23] J. M. Burns, Leadership. New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1978.
[24] E. P. Hollander, Leadership Dynamics: A Practical Guide to Effective
Relationships. New York, NY: The Free Press, 1978.
[25] P. Hersey, K. H. Blanchard, and D. E. Johnson, Management of
Organizational Behavior: Leading Human Resources. Upper Saddle
River, NJ: Prentice Hall, Inc., 2001.
[26] J. O’Toole, Leading Change: The Argument for Values-Based
Leadership. New York, NY: Jossey-Bass, 1996.
[27] P. Block, Stewardship: Choosing Service over Self-Interest. San
Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 1996.
[28] R. K. Greenleaf, The Servant as a Leader. Westfield, IN: The Greenleaf
Center for Servant Leadership, 2008.
[29] W. Bennis, On Becoming a Leader. Philadelphia, PA; Basic Books,
2009.
[30] N. M. Tichy and M. A. Devanna, Transformational Leader: The Key to
Global Competitiveness. New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.,
1990.
[31] H. M. Trice and J. M. Beyer, "Cultural leadership in organizations,” in
Organization Science, 1991, 2, pp 149-169.
[32] E. H. Schein, Organizational Culture and Leadership (4th Ed.). San
Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2010.
[30] N. M. Tichy and M. A. Devanna, Transformational Leader: The Key toGlobal Competitiveness.New York,NY: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1990.
[31] H. M. Trice and J. M. Beyer, "Cultural leadership in organizations,” in Organization Science, 1991, 2, pp 149-169.
[32] E. H. Schein, Organizational Culture and Leadership (4th Ed.).San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2010.
[33] C. Handy, Beyond Certainty: The Changing Worlds of Organizations.Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Publishing, 1996.
[34] W. Bridges, "Leading the de-jobbed organization,” in F. Hesselbein, M. Goldsmith, and R. Beckhard (Eds.), The Leader of the Future: New Visions, Strategies, and Practices for the New Era.San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1996.
[35] S. R. Covey, The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness.New York, NY: The Free Press, 2004.
[36] J. Collins, Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap…and Others Don’t.New York, NY: HarperCollins Publishers, Inc., 2001.
[37] W. Isaacson, Steve Jobs.New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 2011.
[38] M. A. Lakhani, "CALIBER leadership assessment scale: A psychometric report,” retrieved January 7, 2014, from http://magnaleadership.com/docs/caliberpsychometricreport.pdf, 2007.
[39] J. Dyer, H. Gregerson, and C. Christensen, The Innovator’s DNA: Mastering the Five Skills of Disruptive Innovators.Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Publishing, 2011.
[40] A. A. Gawande, "Slow ideas,” retrieved January 7, 2014, from http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2013/07/29/130729fa_fact_gawande, 2013.
[41] Booz, "The 10 most innovative companies of 2013,” retrieved January 21, 2014, from http://www.booz.com/global/home/what-we-think/global-innovation-1000, 2013.
[42] R. D. Putnam, Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 2000.
[43] E. M. Rogers, Diffusion of Innovations (5th Ed.).New York, NY: The Free Press, 2003.
[44] D. W. McMillan and D. M. Chavis, "Sense of community: A definition and theory,” in Journal of CommunityPsychology, 1986, Vol. 14, np.
[45] W. B. Miller and J. L. Rodgers, The Ontogeny of Human Bonding Systems: Evolutionary Origins, Neural Bases, and Psychological Manifestations.New York,NY: Springer.
[46] L. Wiseman and G. McKeown, Multipliers: How the Best Leaders Make Everyone Smarter.New York, NY: HarperCollins, 2010.
[47] V. Nayar, Employees First, Customers Second: Turning Conventional Management Upside Down.Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Publishing, 2010.
[48] L. Nonaka and H. Takeuchi, The Knowledge-Creating Company: How Japanese Companies Create the Dynamics of Innovation.New York,NY: Oxford University Press, 1995.
[49] J. W. Creswell, Research Design: Qualitative, Quantitative, and Mixed Method Approaches.Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, Inc., 2014.
[50] R. F. DeVellis, Scale Development: Theory and Applications (3rd Ed.).Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, Inc., 2012.
[51] P. Drucker, "The coming of the new organization,” in Harvard Business Review on Knowledge Management, Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press, 1988/1999, pp. 1-19.
[52] C. Rose, "An hour with Tim Cook, CEO of Apple Inc.” Retrieved Sep 12, 2014, from http://www.charlierose.com/watch/60444569, 2014.
[53] N. Wade, A Troublesome Inheritance: Genes, Race and the Rise of the West.New York, NY: The Penguin Press, 2014.
[54] M. Porter, On Strategy.Harvard Business School Publishing, 2011.
[55] D. Kumar, The Substance and the Shadow: An Autobiography (Narrated to U. Nayar).India: Hay House, 2014.
[56] R. Dawkins, The Magic of Reality: How We Know What’s Really True.New York, NY: Free Press, 2011.
@article{"International Journal of Business, Human and Social Sciences:68105", author = "Murtuza Ali Lakhani and Michelle Marquard", title = "Mastering the Innovation Paradox: The Five Unexpected Qualities of Innovation Leaders", abstract = "From an organizational perspective, leaders are a
variation of the same talent pool in that they all score a larger than
average value on the bell curve that maps leadership behaviors and
characteristics, namely competence, vision, communication,
confidence, cultural sensibility, stewardship, empowerment,
authenticity, reinforcement, and creativity. The question that remains
unanswered and essentially unresolved is how to explain the irony
that leaders are so much alike yet their organizations diverge so
noticeably in their ability to innovate. Leadership intersects with
innovation at the point where human interactions get exceedingly
complex and where certain paradoxical forces cohabit: conflict with
conciliation, sovereignty with interdependence, and imagination with
realism. Rather than accepting that leadership is without context, we
argue that leaders are specialists of their domain and that those
effective at leading for innovation are distinct within the broader pool
of leaders. Keeping in view the extensive literature on leadership and
innovation, we carried out a quantitative study with data collected
over a five-year period involving 240 participants from across five
dissimilar companies based in the United States. We found that while
innovation and leadership are, in general, strongly interrelated (r =
.89, p = 0.0), there are five qualities that set leaders apart on
innovation. These qualities include a large radius of trust, a restless
curiosity with a low need for acceptance, an honest sense of self and
other, a sense for knowledge and creativity as the yin and yang of
innovation, and an ability to use multiple senses in the engagement
with followers. When these particular behaviors and characteristics
are present in leaders, organizations out-innovate their rivals by a
margin of 29.3 per cent to gain an unassailable edge in a business
environment that is regularly disruptive. A strategic outcome of this
study is a psychometric scale named iLeadership, proposed with the
underlying evidence, limitations, and potential for leadership and
innovation in organizations.c
", keywords = "Innovation, leadership, ileadership, stewardship,
communication, empowerment, creativity, vision, influence,
emotional connection, group membership, sense of community,
knowledge creation.", volume = "8", number = "10", pages = "3258-9", }
