Dialectical Conditions. Leadership Structures As Productive Action Generators**

Zusammenfassung

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This article introduces a model of productive leadership structures. It is based on the idea that structures should stimulate dialectical processes which activate functional and simultaneously restrict dysfunctional behavioural tendencies of the management team. The structural dialectics are part of a more comprehensive concept called "tensegrity", which, besides the dialectic part, embraces the socio-political conditions in the leadership system which enable dialectic structures to unfold their positive energy. In the second part of the article I present the results of an empirical study conceived to test some basic hypotheses of the theoretical approach.

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Auszug

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Dialectical Conditions. Leadership Structures As Productive Action Generators**

1. The Problem

The conventional view of social and organizational structures is as some kind of scaffolding, as static and passive frames that define and restrict the space for human action. Despite the fact that the classic texts in social theory as well as in organizational theory (from Marx to Weber, Parsons, Merton, Gouldner and Selznick), draw quite another picture of the effects and functions of social and organizational structures, this static image is nevertheless still prevalent in modern textbooks on organizational behaviour and organization theory (e.g. Pfeffer 1997; Furnham 1997; Picot/Dietl/ Franck 1999; Robbins 2005). Yet in contrast to this view, social and organizational structures have eminent, dynamic properties. They not only restrict and enable but they stimulate, reinforce and amplify behaviours. In particular they possess the capability to reproduce themselves. How is this possible? To give a satisfactory answer to this question, it is necessary to develop a clear conception of the nature of the relationship between structural properties and individual action, something that notoriously accompanies and heats up social science debates (Blau 1960; Coleman 1991; Esser 1993; Matiaske 1999). In reality one is confronted with a plethora of methodological and logical considerations concerning the whole issue, but at the same time it is worth noting a remarkable lack of contributions regarding the substantial mechanisms which connect structural properties of the social system with the formation of individual behavioural processes. This article puts forward suggestions for the development of a theory about the effects that a special sort of structures, namely leadership structures in enterprises, have on the well-being of those enterprises.

So called top management teams (TMT) have been the subject of many empirical investigations since the early 1980's. These studies actually deal with structural properties, but with very particular ones. They concentrate primarily on the composition of the top management team with regard to demographic attributes such as age, sex, length of membership, ethnic background, education and training. The benefits of this kind of research are meagre. One reason for this lies in the narrow focus. Demographics are a somewhat superficial property with, from the outset, limited bearing on the fortune of organizations. Another reason lies in the great abstinence of the TMT research from theoretical reasoning. This is evident from the broad-based references to concepts such as similarity, complementarity, conflict and communication (Nienhuser 1991; Lawrence 1997; Priem/Lyon/Dess 1999), which are used to explain the (at best, moderate) empirical relationships. (Williams/O'Reilly 1998; Jans 2003; Carpenter/Geletkanycz/Sanders 2004; Certo et al. 2006).

In order to achieve a more fundamental level of analysis of the functioning of leadership structures, we need to look firstly for structural features that are more profound than those in the TMT literature. secondly we should try to identify some crucial mechanisms that connect structural properties and behavioural processes. Thirdly we need a theoretical frame of refer...

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