Donald D. Davis

Women and women of color in leadership: complexity, identity, and intersectionality.

This article describes the challenges that women and women of color face in their quest to achieve and perform in leadership roles in work settings. We discuss the barriers that women encounter and specifically address the dimensions of gender and race and their impact on leadership. We identify the factors associated with gender evaluations of leaders and the stereotypes and other challenges faced by White women and women of color. We use ideas concerning identity and the intersection of multiple identities to understand the way in which gender mediates and shapes the experience of women in the workplace. We conclude with suggestions for research and theory development that may more fully capture the complex experience of women who serve as leaders.

Memory Performance of Young, Middle, and Old Adults.

Young, middle-aged, and older adults were assessed on tasks operationally defining short-term memory structural limitations and process abilities. The tasks were typical of previously related memory research with children and adolescents: monaural and dichotic word lists of variant association structure and rate of presentation. Although a number of minor chronological age-related differences were noted between monaural and dichotic word list performances, the findings indicated both structural capacity and organizational strategy deficiencies over successive adult age groups. In addition, older adults indicated significantly more heterogeneity of performance variance, both between and within age group comparisons. Results were summarized within the Cattell-Horn developmental model of fluid and crystallized abilities.

Meeting the challenge of change

Health-care organizations and the physicians who work in them today face unprecedented change. This change can be managed successfully through proper use of four organizational practices: strategy, organization design, organization culture, and human resource practices. A fifth practice, pursuit of continuous improvement and personal mastery, allows the physician to adapt personally to change. This article describes how physicians may use these practices to meet the challenge of change.

Leadership Relationships Between Center Directors and University Administrators in Cooperative Research Centers: A Multilevel Analysis

This chapter contribution to the edited volume addresses the importance of leadership relationships in cooperative research centers including industry and university members and describes how these coalitions contribute to innovation and technology transfer. The authors Donald D. Davis, Janet L. Bryant, and Julia Zaharieva report results from a study that examined the strength and effects of the leadership relationship between center directors and the university administrators to whom they report in all Industry/University Cooperative Research Centers supported by the National Science Foundation in the United States. Leader-member exchange (LMX) and trust were positively related to research center performance. University administrator ratings of center performance fully mediated the positive relationship between leader-member exchange and trust and the extent to which university administrators reported satisfaction with and commitment to the Industry/University Cooperative Research Center that reported to them. The authors discuss the manner in which leadership relationships and cooperative research center performance mutually reinforce each other at different levels of analysis and the importance of this in creating and transferring technology in industry-university research partnerships. For complementary examinations, see the chapter contribution by Craig and colleagues on leadership performance in cooperative research centers.

Determining Organizational Readiness for Advanced Manufacturing Technology: Development of a Knowledge-Based System to Aid Implementation

We describe a portion of an automated knowledge-based system designed to help managers plan the organizational change needed to implement computerized manufacturing processes.