Demographic challenges for the future business leader: evidence from a Greek survey
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/EBHRM-03-2017-0019 |
| Pages | 297-310 |
| Date | 04 December 2017 |
| Published date | 04 December 2017 |
| Author | Eleanna Galanaki,Nancy Papalexandris |
| Subject Matter | HR & organizational behaviour,Global HRM |
Demographic challenges for the
future business leader: evidence
from a Greek survey
Eleanna Galanaki and Nancy Papalexandris
Department of Marketing and Communication,
Athens University of Economics and Business, Athens, Greece
Abstract
Purpose –The purpose of this paper is to identify the challenges posed to business leaders from major
global demographic changes expected in the workforce composition, such as higher participation of women
and more active involvement of elder and more experienced people in the future workforce.
Design/methodology/approach –The authors ran a survey among 733 middle managers, focusing on
their ideal leadership behavior. The Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior project methodology was
applied for data collection and analyses.
Findings –Several significant differences were established in leadership ideals according to gender, age and
managerial experience. The differences based on gender had higher practical significancethan the ones based
on age and experience of the respondents.
Research limitations/implications –The paper adds up to the pertinent in the implicit leadership
approach dialogue over the existence of stable, global and unchanging aspects of leadership.
Practical implications –Leader behaviors traditionally deemed as positive, such as the participative and
charismatic/value-based leadership, are shown to be critical for the future business leader. Leadership
development in organizations should focus on these two aspects.
Social implications –Leaders who can meet the expectations of diverse groups of people will be able to
achieve inclusion of least privileged groups at the business level, leading to higher inclusion at the social,
aggregate level.
Originality/value –The paper is the first to explore how documented demographic trends could affect the
way that leadership will evolve in the near future.
Keywords Aging, Gender, Organizational leadership and leadership development
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
Leadership has been a topic of intense study for social scientists for many years, yet there is
no consensual agreed-on definition of leadership (House et al., 2014a). Leaders have existed
in all cultures throughout history and the practice and philosophy of leaders and leadership
can be found in very diverse writings, ranging from the Greek classics such as Homer’sIliad,
to the Old and New Testaments, to essays about Confucius in China, to Machiavelli’s rules
and principles (Dorfman and House, 2003). An almost endless variety of definitions of
leadership have been developed, perhaps as many as the persons who attempted to define
the construct (Stogdill, 1974). This goes hand-in-hand with the existence of somewhat
different, across countries and time “modal leader behavior patterns, in their emphasis on
individualistic versus team orientation, performance versus maintenance orientation,
authoritarian versus democratic orientation, paternalism, reliance on personal abilities,
subordinates or rules, leader influence processes, consensual decision making and service
orientation”(Dorfman and House, 2003, p. 60). A recurring question in leadership and
management studies is whether a modal leader exists across time and geographic
boundaries. Evidence holds that this is not the case and that the external environment
affects definitions of the ideal leader (Den Hartog et al., 1999). Therefore, it makes sense to
expect that the ideal leader of the future may be different to our current experience. In this
paper, we attempt to explore indices of how the ideal leader of the close future will be, based
Evidence-based HRM: a Global
Forum for Empirical Scholarship
Vol. 5 No. 3, 2017
pp. 297-310
© Emerald PublishingLimited
2049-3983
DOI 10.1108/EBHRM-03-2017-0019
Received 30 March 2017
Revised 14 June 2017
28 June 2017
Accepted 28 June 2017
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/2049-3983.htm
297
Demographic
challenges for
the future
business leader
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