Chris P. Long

Balancing and Rebalancing in the Creation and Evolution of Organizational Control

This research examines data collected as part of a 10-year case study of the creation and evolution of organizational control during organizational founding. Past research has taken a cross-sectional approach to examining control use in mature, stable organizations. In contrast, this study examines organizational controls during the founding period and takes a longitudinal perspective on organizational control. By examining how organizational controls are created and evolve through specific phases of the founding period, the research also provides new data and insights about what drives shifts in the use of various types of control. Specifically, this research sheds light on the role of imbalance among formal and informal controls as the key driver of shifts in control configurations, and provides a step toward making organizational control theory more dynamic.

Cultivating Follower Trust: Are All Leader Behaviors Equally Influential?

We draw on the relevant extant literatures to examine the pathways to building trust through leader behaviors with three distinct emphases: the leader (personal leadership), the leader-follower relationship (relational leadership), and the situation (contextual leadership). We test this model using experimental data collected from experienced managers (Study 1) and field data collected from the peers and direct reports of business executives (Study 2). The results from these two studies both build on and challenge current views in the trust and leadership literatures about how leaders influence trust. Consistent with past literature, our findings indicate that various leadership behaviors appear to directly promote follower trust when analyzed independently. However, when these behaviors are analyzed jointly, relational leadership behaviors were found to mediate the effects of personal and contextual leadership behaviors on follower trust. The implications for theory and practice are discussed.

How controls influence organizational information processing: insights from a computational modeling investigation

In this study, we use a series of computational models to investigate an information processing perspective on organizational control use. We evaluate and compare the information processing capabilities of various formal and informal control configurations under different information uncertainty conditions. We find that a wide range of formal controls can be used to direct subordinates performing interdependent tasks while a more narrow range of informal controls are most effective for directing subordinates who perform complex tasks. Results of this study provide a basis for formalizing an information processing perspective on organizational control implementation that differs but is complementary to the current emphasis on agency in organizational control research.

Promoting fairness in the face of conflict: the moderating effect of social control

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to describe how superior-subordinate conflicts stimulate managers to promote fairness. The theory proposes that managers’ efforts to apply social controls (i.e. training and socialization activities that promote emotional connection and value congruence) moderate the influence of superior-subordinate conflicts on managers’ efforts to promote fairness. When conflicts are experienced by managers who apply social controls, those managers increase their efforts to promote fairness. Because managers who apply social controls need subordinates to endorse their directives, they promote fairness in the face of conflict to demonstrate that they manage subordinates in ways that are appropriate and deserving of their cooperation. Design/methodology/approach – These ideas are tested in two studies: a survey of managers and their subordinates and a scenario-based experiment. Findings – The results obtained from these studies demonstrate that when managers who apply social control...

Conflict Management in Leader Development: The Roles of Control, Trust, and Fairness

This chapter contributes to research on leader development by evaluating how managers can effectively address leader-employee conflicts (goal, task, personal) by applying specific forms of organizational controls (input, behavior, output), by building particular forms of trust (demonstrating their ability, benevolence, and integrity) and by promoting distinct forms of fairness (distributive, procedural, interactional). By examining how leaders can preserve, protect, and promote their legitimacy and authority through multifaceted conflict management strategies, the ideas described in this chapter are presented in an effort to move leadership research past its current focus on singular types of control, trust-building, and fairness-promotion actions to examine how complementary forms of these activities can jointly motivate employee cooperation. The discussion at the end of the chapter examines how the principles outlined in this theory can be integrated into leadership development initiatives.