Innovation & Change
Introduction
The focus of this assignment looks at the nature of leadership and what effect it has on the ability of an organisation to be innovative. Appropriate Leadership and innovation theories and models will be used to answer the question of whether leadership is all an organisation needs to be innovative. First of all the meaning of leadership is looked at and discussed followed by a critical discussion of the role leadership plays in innovation within an organisation.
Leadership
To understand the relationship between leadership and innovation a crucial question needs to be answered before assessing whether leadership is the only requirement an organisation needs to be innovative. What is leadership? The reality is that there isn't really a definitive answer to this question. According to the Department for Further Education and Skills (DFES). "On 9 August 2003 there were 12,963 books on leadership. If we were able to read at the rate of one per day this would equate to 35 years of reading, including weekends. By 28th February 2005 this had already increased to 47 years and 17,138 books."
Although many books, articles and reports have been complied with regards to the meaning and the nature of leadership, the truth is no one can say exactly what it means.
Francis Galton, the English eugenicist who wrote e...
English: Portrait of Francis Galton (1822-1911), V...
Figure 1There is often confusion between the terms leadership and management, it states in the text "Organizational Change" by B Senior and S Swallies that "management is more about what goes on within the formal structure of the organization while leadership focuses more on interpersonal behavior in a broader context." For the purpose of this assignment it is important to note the difference.
The theories surrounding Leadership over the last 200 years have evolved; one of the earliest theories' put forward by Sir Francis Galton in 1869...