Re/searching leadership: A critique in Two Agonies and Nine Fits

Ford, J.; Harding, N.; Gilmore, S.

doi:10.1177/00187267221079167

Re/searching leadership: A critique in Two Agonies and Nine Fits

Ford, J.; Harding, N.; Gilmore, S.

Authors

Professor Jackie Ford jacqueline.ford@durham.ac.uk
Professor

N. Harding

S. Gilmore

Abstract

Since the nineteenth century much academic effort has been expended researching leadership. Bodies of theory have risen to dominance, proved unsatisfactory, and been replaced by another generation of ultimately-disappointing leadership thought. This repetitive pattern continues, so we ask what motivates this continuing, seemingly fruitless search? Focusing on researchers and not leadership per se, our analysis is inspired by two surprisingly complementary sources: psychoanalytical theory and Lewis Carroll’s epic nonsense poem The Hunting of the Snark: An Agony in Eight Fits. Together they lead to a theory that re/search is motivated by unconscious desires to experience the transformational object – an ultimately unachievable search but one that unconsciously sustains the ever-growing field of leadership research. In contributing a new psychoanalytical theory of unconscious motivations that inspire our research, we also demonstrate the inspiration poetry may offer organizational researchers. We conclude by offering a ninth fit which leaps into the void of future thought and finds that the leadership Snark was, in fact, a Boojum.

Citation

Ford, J., Harding, N., & Gilmore, S. (2023). Re/searching leadership: A critique in Two Agonies and Nine Fits. Human Relations, 76(6), 809-832. https://doi.org/10.1177/00187267221079167

Journal Article Type	Article
Acceptance Date	Jan 4, 2022
Online Publication Date	Feb 24, 2022
Publication Date	2023-06
Deposit Date	Jan 20, 2022
Publicly Available Date	May 18, 2023
Journal	Human Relations
Print ISSN	0018-7267
Electronic ISSN	1741-282X
Publisher	SAGE Publications
Peer Reviewed	Peer Reviewed
Volume	76
Issue	6
Pages	809-832
DOI	https://doi.org/10.1177/00187267221079167
Public URL	https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/1216414

Files

Published Journal Article (238 Kb)
PDF

Publisher Licence URL
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Accepted Journal Article (368 Kb)
PDF

Copyright Statement
This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Lficense (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) which permits any use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access pages (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).