Module 1

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Innovative Leadership in Education: An Overview

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WELCOME STATEMENT
Welcome to Module 1! In support to the vision of Bukidnon State University, you are
required to take this course on Innovative Leadership in Education. I know that it is
challenging on your part to be studying from home without my presence. However, I
will be with you every step of the way. Here you will be taught what innovative
leadership is as an emerging approach in the 21st century Education which aims to
produce learners who are creators and problems solvers in their respective fields. With
the volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous environment, you are expected to
adapt and reframe these realities and turn them into opportunities.

Course Outcome:
• Demonstrate understanding of the definition, theories and principle of
innovative leadership;

The specific learning outcomes for this module are as follows:

• Explain the meaning of innovative leadership

• Discuss the theories of innovative leadership
• Compare and contrast the two components: innovative leadership and
leadership for innovation

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 Discussion
What is Innovative Leadership?

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In the present times, innovative leadership is the type of leadership that’s given
attention due to the dynamic and fast changing times. For the most part, organizations
and institutions tend to look for leaders who can work out miracles but is innovative
leadership able to do so? Is an Innovative a miracle worker? Before we define what
innovative leadership means, we need to look at the meaning of creativity,
innovations, and leadership. These three concepts need to be carefully understood so
that we don’t confuse innovative leadership as merely creativity and the like.

Creativity

What usually comes into your mind when you encounter the word creativity? Or
when someone is considered a creative person? Do you think about a singer? Painter?
A Youtube Influencer? Or A Mover of Great Ideas? When someone is creative, we
usually identify them as people who are able to think outside of the box. People who
are able think and see beyond the status quo, though radical at times or incremental,
creative people often bring changes. Thus, creativity is often equated with the ability
to transcend traditional ideas, patterns, relationships and create meaningful new
ideas, forms, methods, interpretations, originality, progression, or imagination
(Dictionary.com, 2011). Gehani (1998) defines creativity as the art and science of
developing new meaningful associations and connections between different sub-
elements. Whether it be in business, academic, or civil institutions, we need to be
creative in order to move forward. But the question is, is creativity? Suprisingly, the
answer is NO. Creative ideas without perspective, action, and implementation is
simply lip business.

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Innovations

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The literal meaning of innovation is the introduction of something new or different.

As Drucker (1998) defines it as the effort to create purposeful and focused change in
an enterprise’s economic and social potential. This means that ideas brought about
creativity that are relevant to the time, need purpose and must be feasible so that it
will be taken to the uinnovation process (Rahman and Sultana, 2012). In other words,
innovation makes creativity implementable. Some creative ideas may not come into
fruition due to limitations in available technology and breakthroughs such as our
dream of flying or Da Vinci’s concept of a Helicopter (the picture shown above).
Innovation is not the consequence of creative thinking (Levit, 2002). In order for us to
make become succesful innovators, we have to be focused, diligent, persistent, and
committed. We need to have a good grasp of our reality and reconcile our idealism
with it. Drucker (1998) stated that if innovations do not aim at leadership from the
beginning, it’s unlikely to be innovative enough.

Leadership

There a lot of definitions of leadership that we can find in books in various resources
in the internet but if there is one unifying aspect of these definitions is that, it is the
process of influencing people or society towards a goal (Rahman and Sultana, 2012).
There are various styles and theories which we will discuss in another section of this
module.

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Innovative Leadership

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Different experts and scholars who have studied about innovative leadership have
varied views. Agin and Gibson (2010) emphasized the importance on developing
innovation culture and strategic direction through the leader’s role while Morris (2007)
focused on developing innovating culture. With all these into consideration what is
innovative leadership? When can we say that the leadership we are manifesting is in
fact, innovative leadership? Rahman and Sultana (2012) define innovative leadership
as the process of fostering innovation through developing innovation, friendly culture
and setting strategic direction that guide and build truct among people to innovate.

The Four Interactive Elements of Innovative Leadership

By combining the various ideas about innovative leadership, we then can surmise four
interactive elements of the Innovative Leadership Process:

Emotional Intelligence
Emotional Intelligence is the abilty or skill to identify, assess, and control
emotion of onself, of others and of groups. Daniel Goleman applied the term
emotional intelligence in business in 1998 a sin qua non in leadership while
Vitello-Cicciu (2003) considered as the main quality of an innovative leader.
This is especially important as people in organizations and institutions are
potentuially exposed to internal and external chaos. There is a need for trust,
communication, and support coming from the leader to excel and even among
the members. Self-Awareness, Self-Regulation, Motivation, Empathy, and
Social Skills are paramount elements in this respect. Innovative Leaders need
to be technical with a good IQ to boot but emotional intelligence should be the

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top quality for organizations to be more innovative, build a culture of
innovation and management.
Management Innovation

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Hamel (2006) defined management innovation as a marked departure from

traditional management principles, processes, and practices or a departure
from customary organizational forms that significantly alters the way the work
of management is peformed. This means that innovative leaders change things
or depart from what was once done to make things better. Accordingly, there
are elements that can be considered to install management innovation in an
organization such as commitment to a big management problem, using novel
principles that illumiate new approaches, deconstruction of old management
orthodoxies or norms, and analyzing the organization to redefine possibilities.
Developing Innovation Culture
The difference between the innovative and non-innovative organizations is that
former focuses on collective successand latter is focused on merely surviving
regardless of who is able to push on or not. Developing Innovation Culture
entails steps which were suggested by Agin and Gibson (2010) and Morris
(2007). The steps include championing innovator’s guidance, inspiring young
colleagues to unleash innovations, open communication to inspire creativity,
empowerment of colleagues with new ideas, training, development and cross
functional teams and an environment that is tolerant to faults. Thus, the
developemnt of an innovation culture is not an easy task especially when done
in already established organizations and institutions. What do you think are

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some ot the hindrances that make the steps mentioned above to be difficult to
apply?
Interaction with Stakeholders

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Innovation cannot take place without leaders and the members of an

organization to interact with different stakeholders. After all, whether it be in
a business perspective or academic, the end benficiaries of our service are our
stakeholders. Moreover, leaders have to listen more and more to the
stakeholders because they are whom we need to soatify more than our
competitors. This is also one of the reasons why some organizations,
institutions, and business are able to survive despite the growing competition
as they are able to keep their stakeholders satisfied.
What are the Components of Innovation Leadership?

Excerpt of Innovative Leadership

David Gliddon

Innovative leadership is a philosophy and system that synthesizes different leadership

styles in organizations to influence members to produce creative ideas, products,
services and solutions. The key role in the practice of innovative leadership is the
innovation leader, but successful innovation leaders rely on their members to be
innovative too.

Innovative leadership encompasses a two-tiered approach. The first tier of innovative

leadership involves an innovative approach to leadership itself. Leaders should
consistently be looking for new ways they can approach their roles. They should also
constantly be looking for new ways they can address challenges in their organization,

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how they can solve persistent issues, and how they can continue to evolve and be agile
and efficient at addressing such challenges.

The second tier of innovative leadership entails leadership for innovation. Leaders
should consider ways they can encourage members to think differently and work in
new ways to face challenges. They should look for ways to inspire members to come
up with new ideas, products, and services to stay ahead of the competition, especially
when resources are limited.

Leadership Theories and Styles

Though innovative leadership is the type of leadership that is needed today, it is also
equally important to understand the different leadership theories and styles that
formed as basis for the conception of innovative leadership. In this section of the
module you will be introduced to some of these theories and styles.

Leadership Theories

Great Man Theory

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In 1847, Thomas Carlyle stated in the best interest of the heroes that “universal history,
the history of what man has accomplished in this world, is at the bottom of the history
of the great men who have worked here”. Carlyle claimed in his “great man theory”
that leaders are born and that only those men who are endowed with heroic potentials
could ever become the leaders. He opined that great men were born, not made. An
American philosopher, Sidney Hook, further expanded Carlyleperspective
highlighting the impact which could be made by the eventful man vs. the event-
making man (Dobbins & Platz, (1986).

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Trait Theory

The early theorists opined that born leaders were endowed with certain physical traits
and personality characteristics which distinguished them from non-leaders. Trait
theories ignored the assumptions about whether leadership traits were genetic or
acquired. Jenkins identified two traits; emergent traits (those which are heavily
dependent upon heredity) as height, intelligence, attractiveness, and self-confidence
and effectiveness traits (based on experience or learning), including charisma, as
fundamental component of leadership (Ekvall & Arvonen, 1991).

Contingency Theories

The theories of contingency recommends that no leadership style is precise as a stand-

alone as the leadership style used is reliant upon the factors such as the quality,
situation of the followers or a number of other variables. “According to this theory,
there is no single right way to lead because the internal and external dimensions of the
environment require the leader to adapt to that particular situation”. In most cases,
leaders do not change only the dynamics and environment, employees within the
organization change. In a common sense, the theories of contingency are a category of
behavioral theory that challenges that there is no one finest way of leading/organizing
and that the style of leadership that is operative in some circumstances may not be
effective in others (Greenleaf, 1977).

Style and Behavior Theory

The style theory acknowledges the significance of certain necessary leadership skills
that serve as enabler for a leader who performs an act while drawing its parallel with
previous capacity of the leader, prior to that particular act while suggesting that each
individual has a distinct style of leadership with which he/she feels most contented.
Like one that does not fit all heads, similarly one style cannot be effective in all
situations. Yukl (1989) introduced three different leadership styles. The employees
serving with democratic leaders displayed high degree of satisfaction, creativity, and
motivation; working with great enthusiasm and energy irrespective of the presence or
absence of the leader; maintaining better connections with the leader, in terms of
productivity whereas, autocratic leaders mainly focused on greater quantity of output.
Laissez faire leadership was only considered relevant while leading a team of highly
skilled and motivated people who excellent track-record, in the past (Kahn and
Nawaz, 2016).

Process Leadership Theory

Additional leadership theories with a process focus include servant leadership,

leading organizations, principal centered leadership and charismatic leadership, with
others emerging every year. Greenleaf introduced servant leadership in the early
1970s. A resurgence of the discussion of servant leadership was noted in the early
1990s. Servant leaders were encouraged to be focused to the anxieties of the followers
and the leader should sympathize with them take-care of and nurture them. The
leadership was imparted on a person who was by nature a servant. “The servant leader
focuses on the needs of the follower and helps them to become more autonomous freer

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and knowledgeable”. The servant leader is also more concerned with the “have-nots”
and recognizes them as equal (Greenleaf, 1996).

Transactional Leadership

The leadership theories, by the late 1970s and early 1980s, activated to diverge from
the specific perspectives of the leader, leadership context and the follower and toward
practices that concentrated further on the exchanges between the followers and
leaders. The transactional leadership was described as that in which leader-follower
associations were grounded upon a series of agreements between followers and
leaders (House & Shamir, 1993).

The transactional theory was “based on reciprocity where leaders not only influence
followers but are under their influence as well”. Some studies revealed that
transactional leadership show a discrepancy with regard to the level of leaders‟ action
and the nature of the relations with the followers. Bass and Avolio (1994) observed
transactional leadership “as a type of contingent-reward leadership that had active
and positive exchange between leaders and followers whereby followers were
rewarded or recognized for accomplishing agreed upon objectives”. From the leader,
these rewards might implicate gratitude for merit increases, bonuses and work
achievement. For good work, positive support could be exchanged, merit pay for
promotions, increased performance and cooperation for collegiality. The leaders could
instead focus on errors, avoid responses and delay decisions. This attitude is stated as
the “management-by-exception” and could be categorized as passive or active
transactions. The difference between these two types of transactions is predicated on
the timing of the leaders‟ involvement. In the active form, the leader continuously
monitors performance and attempts to intervene proactively (Avolio & Bass, 1997).

Transformational Theory

Transformational leadership distinguishes itself from the rest of the previous and
contemporary theories, on the basis of its alignment to a greater good as it entails
involvement of the followers in processes or activities related to personal factor
towards the organization and a course that will yield certain superior social dividend.
The transformational leaders raise the motivation and morality of both the follower
and the leader (House & Shamir,1993).

It is considered that the transformational leaders “engage in interactions with

followers based on common values, beliefs and goals”. This impacts the performance
leading to the attainment of goal. As per Bass, transformational leader, “attempts to
induce followers to reorder their needs by transcending self-interests and strive for
higher order needs". This theory conform the Maslow (1954) higher order needs
theory. Transformational leadership is a course that changes and approach targets on
beliefs, values and attitudes that enlighten leaders‟ practices and the capacity to lead
change.

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 Leadership Styles

Transactional Leadership Style

Transactional leadership style comprises three components; contingent reward,

management-by-exception (active) and management-by-exception (passive). A
transactional leader follows the scheme of contingent rewards to explain performance
expectation to the followers and appreciates good performance. Transactional leaders
believe in contractual agreements as principal motivators (Bass, 1985) and use extrinsic
rewards toward enhancing followers' motivation.

Transformational Leadership Style

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Transformational leadership links with positive outcomes on individual as well as

organizational levels. Transformational leaders emboldens followers to attain higher-
order needs like self-actualization, self-esteem (Bass, 1985), and are influential in
surging followers' motivation in the direction of “self-sacrifice and achievement of
organizational goals over personal interests (Bass, 1995). Leaders with Idealized
Influence demonstrate heightened concerns and cognizance of followers' needs and
generate a sense of shared risk-taking” (Jung et al., 2008).

Inspirational Motivation affords a cradle of encouragement and challenges followers

to achieve the set goals, whereas, Intellectual Stimulation inspires followers to be more
creative and innovative in their problem-solving skills. Transformational leaders
grade their relationships with followers very high in priority and demonstrate
individualized consideration in meeting their needs for empowerment, achievement,
enhanced self-efficacy and personal growth

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 C LOSING STATEMENT

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Now that you learned about the meaning, theories and components of innovative
leadership, I hope that you will live up to the vision of our University by making
yourself innovative amid this challenging time in our history. In the next module, you
will analyze the characteristics of innovative leaders. Subsequently, you will assess
your own leadership strengths and weaknesses.

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 References
Agin, E., & Gibson, T. (2010) Developing Innovative Culture. www.benet.com,
http://finadarticles.com/articles/mi_m4467/is_2007/ai_n54716203/

Bass, B.M. &Avolio, B.J. (1994) Full Range leadership development: manual for the
Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire, Mindgarden, Palo Alto, Calif.

Dictionary.com (2011). Innovation.

www.dictionary.reference.com:http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/innovation

Dobbins, G.H. & Platz, S.J. (1986). Sex Differences in leadership: How real are they?
Academy of Management Review.

Drucker,R.F. (1998). The Discipline of Innovation. Harcard Business Review. Pp.3-8

Ekvall, G. & Arvonen, K. (1991). Change-centered Leadership: An extension of the

two dimensional model. Scandinavian Journal Management.

Gehani, R.R. (1998). Management of Technology and Operation. USA: John Wiley
and Sons, Inc.

Goleman, D. (1998). What Makes A Leader. Harvard Business Revew.

Greenleaf, R. (1996). On Vecoming a servant Leader. San Francisco; Joseey bass

Publishers.

Greenleaf, R. (1977). Servant leadership: A Journey into the Nature of Zlegitimate

Power and Greatness. Mahwah, NJ; Paulist Press.

Hamel, G. (2006). The Why, What, and How of Management Innovations. Harvard
Business Revew

House, R.J & Shamir, B. (1993). Toward the integration of trasformational,

charismatic and Visionary Theories.

Horth, D. (2009). Innovation Leadership. https://innovationstarterbox.bg/wp-

content/uploads/2014/10/InnovationLeadership.pdf

Jung, D.I (2001). Transformational and Transactional Leadership and their effects on
creativity in groups. Creativity Research Journal.

Khan, I. & Nawaz, A. (2016). Leadership Theories and Styles: A Literature Review.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/293885908.

Levitt, T. (2002) Creativity is not Enough. Best of HBR: The Inovative Enterprise

Morris, L. (2007). Creating the Innovation Culture: Geniuses, Champions, Leaders.

www. Innovationytools.com:
http://www.innovationtools.com/PDF/creatinginnovationculture.pdf

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Rahman, M. And Sultana, N. (2012). Innovative Leadership (People).
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Vitello-Ciccu, J.M. (2003) Innovative Leadership Through Emotional Intelligence.

Nursing Management.

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