Schneider, 1997; Drazin, Glynn, & Kazanjian, 1999; Tushman & O’Reilly, 1997)
. For
example,
have shown that a firm’s ability to exploit new
technologies depends on the availability of ‘‘in-house’’ research and development staff.
have shown that firms initiating technological change tend to
grow more rapidly and are more likely to survive discontinuous change.
has
provided evidence indicating that profit and growth may be related to creativity and
innovation. Given these findings, it is hardly surprising that organizations place a premium
on innovation under conditions of rapid technological change, global competition, and the
emergence of new production technologies
(Dess & Pickens, 2000; Drazin & Schoonhoven,
1996; Gryskiewicz, 2000)
.
Given the apparent impact of creativity and innovation on organizational performance, it is
not surprising that scholars from a number of disciplines have sought to understand the
factors that shape creativity and innovation. Innovation has been studied with respect to
strategy
(Hitt, Hoskisson, Johnson, & Mosel, 1996; Parnell, Lester, & Menefee, 2000)
structure
(Burns & Stalker, 1961; Damanpour, 1991, 1998; Pierce & Delbecq, 1977)
, climate
(Amabile & Gryskiewicz, 1989; Isaksen, Laver, Ekvall, & Britz, 2001)
, dissemination
practices
(Abrahamson, 1991; Rodgers & Adhikurya, 1979)
, group interactions
Anderson, 1990; Mumford, Feldman, Hein, & Nago, 2001)
, and individual performance
capabilities
(Mumford, Marks, Connelly, Zaccaro, & Johnson, 1998; Runco & Sakamoto,
1999)
. Conspicuously absent from the list of potential influences, however, is leadership:
leadership as evident as the exercise of influence to increase the likelihood of idea generation
by followers and the subsequent development of these ideas into useful products.
As
pointed out, leadership, at least traditionally, has not been held to be a
particularly significant influence on creativity and innovation. One reason we tend to discount
leader influences may be found in our romantic conception of the creative act—a conception
where ideas and innovation are attributed to the heroic efforts of the individual. Within this
framework, leaders, like Rockefeller, are, at best, a hindrance. Another reason we tend to
discount leader influences may be found in current models of leadership. More specifically,
one can argue that the professionalism, expertise, and autonomy that seem to characterize
creative people act to neutralize, or substitute for, leadership
Mumford, Scott, & Gaddis, in press)
.
These propositions, however plausible, are simply not borne out by the available evidence.
In one early study examining the relationship between leadership and creativity,
obtained judgmental assessments of potential, productivity measures, and indices of article
impact for 300 scientists working in 20 different laboratories at the National Institutes of
Health. The organizational variables related to these indices of creativity were examined. It
was found that the intensity of interaction with group leaders was positively related to
creativity particularly for more junior scientists. Moreover, exposure to poor supervision or
poor role modeling, as manifest in the leaders capability for scientific work, tended to result
in unusually poor performance.
Along similar lines,
Tierney, Farmer, and Graen (1999)
examined creativity among 191
research and development employees of a large chemical company. Leader behavior was
assessed using
Graen, Novak, and Sommerkamp’s (1982)
measure of leader – member
M.D. Mumford et al. / The Leadership Quarterly 13 (2002) 705–750
706