Please join us for a research presentation on the 18th of November by a visiting research scholar from the Australian National University. This talk is sponsored by Dr Emina Subasic and the School of Psychology’s Social and Organisational Psychology Research Group.WHEN: 12.00pm -1.00pm Tuesday 18th November
WHERE: Keats Reading Room, AVLG17 Psychology Building, Callaghan
WHERE ELSE: Video conferenced to The Science Offices Meeting Room, Ourimbah (please advise Stefania is you plan to be at the Ourimbah end)
WHO/WHAT FOR: Shaistha Mohamed, visiting scholar, ANU, delivering a research presentation entitled “Leadership as a contest for influence: Support for status quo and social change leadership in a competitive context.” (see abstract and bio below)
Abstract
In the social identity leadership literature much of the work focuses on a single leader or a single group of followers, and overlooks that who will be able to mobilize ‘us’ centres not only upon aligning oneself with a given constituency, but doing so better than the available alternatives. We examine the intersection of leadership and social change, and explore leadership as a competitive (and contrastive) process, looking at 1) when more radical or change-oriented visions will be preferred over those advocating for the status quo, and 2) whether support for a leader change as a function of contest. We propose that to be successful in mobilizing the group for change, leaders need to go beyond being representative of ‘who we are’ in the present and also be normatively aligned with ‘who we want to be’ in the future. In line with this reasoning, we examined and found support for the idea that a new pro-change leader would be more successful than a pro-status quo incumbent in securing votes and mobilizing collective efforts for change, but only when aligned with the group’s change trajectory. When the pro-change alternative was ‘non-aligned’, the incumbent maintained their influence (Study 1). We also found that when a pro-change leader is aligned with the group’s normative trajectory, they should be more influential and mobilize more support in the presence of competition than its absence. While the opposite pattern should appear for when pro-change leaders are non-aligned with the group’s normative trajectory, where they should be more influential and mobilize more support in the absence than presence of competing alternatives (Study 2 & 3)
Speaker's Bio
I am a PhD student at the Australian National University, investigating leadership and influence in the context of social change. More specifically, my research investigates when more radical or change-oriented visions will be preferred over those advocating for the status quo.
Find Out More
If you are interested in meeting the visiting speakers for a one-to-one research chat, please contact Emina to make arrangements at: Emina.Subasic@newcastle.edu.au
If you would like to get to know the speaker, please join us for an informal lunch with her at Mamadukes on campus between 1-2pm on the day. For catering purposes, please let Stefania know at Stefania.Paolini@newcastle.edu.au
