Ann Gilley

Organizational Change and Characteristics of Leadership Effectiveness

The existing literature suggests that numerous variables affect a leaders effectiveness. In this study, the authors examine behaviors associated with leadership effectiveness in driving change. Results indicate that specific leader behaviors—the ability to motivate, communicate, and build teams—are predictors of successful implementation of organizational change.

Groups, Teams, and Communities of Practice: A Comparison

Groups, teams, and communities of practice (CoPs) are becoming ubiquitous on the modern landscape. However, the organizational conditions under which these structures are most appropriate and when they are of little or no use have received little attention. This article compares and contrasts groups, teams, and CoPs, and offers guidelines and a word of caution for HRD professionals and their organizations attempting to orchestrate the transition to CoPs.

Developmental Leadership: A New Perspective for Human Resource Development

Research indicates that numerous variables influence an organization’s ability to change and innovate. There is a need to understand a leadership model that focuses on the aspects of human resource development (HRD). Furthermore, it is important for the HRD model of leadership to foster and support creativity and innovation in organizations. In response to this need, this article identifies and explains a developmental leadership model rooted within the HRD framework of organized learning, change, interventions, and development. The focus of this work is to discuss how a developmental leadership style can generate new perspectives in HRD that translate to innovation for the organization. Consequently, this article shares a theoretical model for different roles that make up developmental leadership in practice activities, while exploring the construct of development leadership, its purpose, roles, core values, characteristics, and impact on innovation and creativity. This article explores the potential of Developmental Leadership in HRD as a driver of organizational innovation. The stakeholders involved are organizations, leaders, and followers. A clear understanding of developmental leadership and innovation informs ways of doing business at many levels.

The Competencies Used by Effective Managers to Build Teams: An Empirical Study:

Despite the abundance of research on teams and their benefits to organizations, little attention has been paid to management’s role in building effective teams. This study investigated the relationship between specific managerial competencies and building teams, and identified the primary predictors of a manager’s success in facilitating teams to be able to involve employees in decision making, coach others, and communicate effectively.

Means vs ends: theorizing a definition of human resource development

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the extant human resource development (HRD) definition research literature and theorizes a new definition of HRD.,The authors adopted keyword and content analyses to examine selected 32 HRD definitions in relation to different organizational and sociopolitical contexts base on theory development criteria and methodology for definition research.,From a theoretical perspective, the extant definitions were mostly empirical descriptions of HRD practice with conceptualization being absent. From a context perspective, the definitions were based on HRD phenomena indigenous to the western world, especially the USA and Western Europe. They can hardly explain HRD phenomena in a non-western context. The glaring gaps lead to theorizing a new definition by focusing on the hard core of HRD in defining and criterial attributes. The defining attribute of HRD is its host-system-dependence, and the criterial attributes are its shaping and skilling mechanisms.,This study unveils that HRD is a means to support the ends defined by the corresponding host system, and not an end in itself. This definition is applicable to different sociopolitical, cultural, and organizational contexts. It provides clear criteria and boundaries to gauge the relevance of HRD research and shows the unique identity of HRD, thus offering new directions to expand the landscape of HRD research.,The new definition can help human resources practitioners better understand the role and mechanism of HRD that the worldwide practitioners can resonate in various sociocultural and political contexts. Communicating the definition and goals of HRD will enhance internal clients’ understanding and appreciation of the value of HRD.,This study fills important research gaps in HRD definition research. It is the first HRD definition derived through a rigorous theory development process. The new definition connects the HRD research niche to the general human resource literature and lead to new HRD research.