Leading Change in Multiple Contexts:

Concepts and Practices in Organizational,

Community, Political, Social, and Global
Change Settings
Conclusion: Connecting Concepts and Practices in
Multiple Contexts

Contributors: By: Gill Robinson Hickman

Book Title: Leading Change in Multiple Contexts: Concepts and Practices in Organizational, Community,
Political, Social, and Global Change Settings
Chapter Title: "Conclusion: Connecting Concepts and Practices in Multiple Contexts"
Pub. Date: 2010
Access Date: February 8, 2020
Publishing Company: SAGE Publications, Inc.
City: Thousand Oaks
Print ISBN: 9781412926782
Online ISBN: 9781452274706
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781452274706.n12
Print pages: 299-303
© 2010 SAGE Publications, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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Conclusion: Connecting Concepts and Practices in Multiple Contexts

Jean Lipman-Blumen (1996) made the following projection at the end of the 20th century:

All signs indicate that global interdependence is accelerating at a furious pace. Politically, economi-
cally, and environmentally, we are living in a world where leadership decisions anywhere now affect
everything and everyone everywhere. (p. 4, italics in original)

Now more than ever the effects of change can be seen reverberating across multiple contexts. The Venn
diagram in the opening figure illustrates interdependence among organizational, community, political, social,
and global change. Examples of interdependence between contexts in several chapters are highlighted in the
vignettes featuring microcredit to rural women, the Sikh Coalition, and the global civil society.

Interdependence among contexts becomes even more apparent as one witnesses examples such as the col-
lapse of financial institutions and major companies that fosters economic recession and a decline in the U.S.
stock market, which in turn, generate similar recessions and declines across the globe. Communities weaken
and crime rates soar as people experience job losses and housing foreclosures.

President Barack Obama, his team of advisors and cabinet members, and members of Congress are called
on to lead change—intentionally modify, alter, or transform human social systems—with the purpose of finan-
cially reinforcing businesses, boosting the economy, and putting people back to work. To achieve change of
this magnitude, these actors may well consider many of the analytical and contextual elements presented in
the introductory chapters and examined throughout the book.

Table 12.1 reiterates these analytical and contextual elements and incorporates examples of concepts and
practices of leading change that correspond to elements from preceding chapters. Long-term contextual
forces of history, culture, and society (macroforces)—such as forming and restructuring nation-states with
their diverse political and economic systems, cultures and ethnic groups, and societal norms and cus-
toms—promote and constrain change across and within immediate (micro)contexts. Immediate contexts influ-
ence the purpose, participants, source of authority, and affected groups in the change process. The vignettes
throughout the text—about Technology Solutions (organizational); Citizens for the Responsible Destruction of
Chemical Weapons (community); Extraordinary Rendition (political); OASIS/mental health consumer move-
ment (social change/movements); and the Chad-Cameroon pipeline (global)—illustrate immediate contextual
influences.

Examining precursors to change allows individuals in the change process to consider the field or totality of co-
existing factors (causality), often dialectical, complex, and turbulent, that contribute to the change at hand and
see them as an interdependent system. Individuals in the leadership process contemplate ethical issues and
values along with potential consequences of taking one set of actions over another before moving forward
(mindfulness). Actors in the Chad-Cameroon pipeline situation, for example, did not adequately consider the
implications of change in one part of the system (building an oil pipeline) on the other parts (e.g., environmen-
tal impact, revenues used for military weapons rather than poverty relief) prior to beginning the project.

Participants in the leadership process must consider the social tensions and conditions that prompt change.
For instance, a decline in the high-tech industry (conditions for change) contributed to a downturn in business
for Technology Solutions and ultimately led to a reduction in profits and five rounds of layoffs. This situation
exacerbated social tensions with regard to previously established relations between employees and senior
managers. As a result, power relationships shifted from inclusive leadership to executive authority, and social
capital among members declined. Even after the crisis subsided at Technology Solutions, a culture of resis-
tance persisted among long-term employees.

Leadership can function as intended change, the cause of change, or the action for change in a particular
process. In the vignette about Citizens for the Responsible Destruction of Chemical Weapons (CRDCW), all
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three functions of leadership were evident in the community's effort to keep a facility out of their area that
posed an environmental threat. Community residents formed the CRDCW with the aim of producing teleolog-
ical (purposeful) change. They used nonconstituted and convening leadership, expert advice, and systems
thinking to lead intended change in Jefferson Township. Their use of social power along with invisible, gener-
ative, and transforming leadership and practices of signalizing, resource mobilization, and advocacy led to the
army's decision to issue stop-work orders to Perma-Fix (leadership as the cause of change and leadership as
action for change).

Assessment of the outcomes of change entails a willingness by participants to evaluate intended conse-
quences (anticipated change), unintended consequences (positive and negative outcomes that actors did not
foresee), and the impact of these

TABLE 12.1 Analytical and Contextual Elements With Concepts and Practices
of Leading Change

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outcomes on future events (an evaluation of how the past outcomes and actions affect future prospects for
change). In the vignette involving extraordinary rendition, for instance, U.S. government officials needed to
consider the ethics of responsibility, cultures of resistance, and effect of exposure by the media and non-
governmental organizations (NGOs) on the country's reputation with regard to cases such as Masri's and Abu
Ghraib. An assessment of outcomes is essential to revising or establishing future policies and practices con-
cerning extraordinary rendition.

The framework and content of this book bring together concepts of change, concepts of leadership, and
change practices in an attempt to provide a more comprehensive approach to understanding and leading
change in multiple contexts. There is more work to be done. Scholars and practitioners from various disci-
plines must contribute new and existing theories, research, and practices to this effort.

One of the most essential reasons for leadership is to bring about change in human conditions and systems.
Throughout the years, people of the world have witnessed major injustices become moral victories, techno-
logical change connect people across the globe, and political change renew hope and inspire confidence
worldwide; people have also seen the opposite outcome of change. Humanity can least afford the latter. Using
concepts and practices of leading change, people have an opportunity to make a meaningful difference in the
human condition and, in the words of James MacGregor Burns, bring about “real, intended change.”

Reference
Lipman-Blumen, J. (1996). The connective edge: Leading in an interdependent world. San Francisco: Jossey-
Bass.
http://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781452274706.n12

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