Leadership: A Critical Text

by Simon Western

When Simon Western′s Leadership text first published, it received rave reviews from students, academics and practising leaders and managers all over the world. Written in an accessible style, the book challenges the notion of the individual or hero leader. Western develops the idea of leadership as a distributed process and provides a new framework for understanding and implementing this. Part one deconstructs leadership, providing a critical review and analysis of the key debates within leadership; part two reconstructs leadership, revealing the three dominant discourses of the Controller, Therapist and Messiah, and Eco-leadership discourse. Eco-leadership captures new leadership ideas and practices for twenty-first century organizations.   This widely anticipated second edition has been updated in line with recent events and the latest practice and research, with end of chapter questions encouraging reflection on key issues.

This insightful and inspiring text draws on Western′s diverse consulting experience, combining theory and practice to offer insights into the real challenges facing leaders today. It is ideal reading for MBA and postgraduate students of Leadership, OB and HRM as well as practising managers and leaders.

An  is available for instructors.

Genres: Leadership, Business

384 pages, Paperback

First published September 30, 2013

Reviews

[Bianca · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is equally inspiring and irritating. Western makes a number of valid points about different leadership discourses that dominate our current understanding of leadership, and especially his detailed and critical examination of the Messiah leadership discourse is worth exploring for readers with an interest in leadership. However, as so often in the non-fictional world, books allow authors to make their points in a more cursory or superficial manner than peer reviewed, scientific articles give access to. And Western makes quite a few very 'broad' points by blending political and organisational leadership, and these points are not convincing. Especially the one about eco-leadership as both a slowly establishing new approach to organisational leadership and as the answer to post-modern challenges is a stretch. His descriptions of what eco-leadership implies at an individual, organisational and system level leave many questions unanswered, and using the Arab Spring or the Occupy movement - both somewhat faded by now - as indicators of a new and emerging leadership culture is equally flawed. However, as a critical contribution to the far too streamlined and practice driven leadership literature, this book is a good read.