Leadership is cognitively framed as a group-level rather than relational process

Evidence

Second, Chen and Brewer’s (2010) recent findings support our assertion that leadership is more of a group, rather than a relational, notion in people’s cognition. As Chemers (1997) has suggested, leadership is “a process of social influence in which one person is able to enlist the aid and support of others in the accomplishment of a common task” (p. 20). Thus, it might be useful for future leadership research to consider followers’ assessment of the leader’s ability to establish and maintain common goals and a shared identity among group members, and how such assessment affects their loyalty to the leader and the commitment to the group, in addition to the effects of the leader’s group prototypical characteristics (Van Knippenberg & Hogg, 2003). — Roderick M. Kramer, Geoffrey J. Leonardelli, Robert W. Livingston, Social Cognition, Social Identity, and…, 2356

Categorization

• DEFINE: Gives a clean working definition of leadership as social influence enlisting others toward a common task.
• XREF: connects to: Leadership structure tracks the strength of shared social identity over time. — Stephen Reicher, S. Alexander Haslam, and Nick Hopkins, Social identity and the dynamics of…, 56; Leaders build cohesion by recategorizing conflicts in shared terms. — Stephen Reicher, S. Alexander Haslam, and Nick Hopkins, Social identity and the dynamics of…, 90; Leadership acts on followers through collective group norms, not just individual exchange — Stephen Reicher, S. Alexander Haslam, and Nick Hopkins, Social identity and the dynamics of…, 34 (+1 more)