The increased reliance on interorganizational collaborations (ICs) has created new challenges for leaders. They must attempt to apply leadership theories and behaviors developed primarily for leading within one organization or group to leading collaborations of multiple organizations and stakeholders. To provide insight into this issue, this study examines leadership behavior in an IC developing a strategic plan to promote changes to address public health and safety concerns related to substance abuse. Combining observations and interviews, we followed a statewide interagency taskforce in a southwestern state of the United States from its inception through completion of its strategic plan within a 10-month deadline. Findings show different leadership behaviors were integrated and evolved over time to strike a balance between decision-making effectiveness and efficiency. In particular, the findings support recent research on examining leadership behavior holistically to develop a ‘fuller full-range’ leadership perspective (Antonakis and House, 2014), especially in terms of how collectivistic and instrumental leadership should complement transformational leadership, and by demonstrating that the combinations of leadership change over time and occur at multiple levels. These findings provide guidance for future practice and research on ICs promoting change.

Given the increasing number of interorganizational collaborations across governmental and private sectors, this study furthers theoretical understanding of these relationships by focusing on dialectical tensions experienced in a collaborative strategic change effort. The research site was an 11-member statewide interorganizational committee working to create change across all involved organizations. Data collection included prolonged observation of meetings over 18 months and interviews with committee leaders. Analytical procedures began with a modified constant comparative analysis that guided the research toward a tension-centered approach for ongoing data collection and analysis. Results include seven dialectical tensions representing three tension types: commitment-based, process-based, and outcome-based tensions. Participants used four strategies for communicatively negotiating tensions: acknowledging, delaying, hedging, and invoking authoritative texts. This study contributes to an increasing awareness of the constitutive nature of communication in collaborations and continues to refine our understanding of dialectical tension management in group interactions.

Employing a critical approach typical of humanities-based research, this article investigates the changing nature of toxic leadership in our digital world. Drawing on the perspective of media ecology, which asserts that the prevailing communication technologies at a given moment create the social conditions that, in turn, condition us, the authors illustrate how the digital logics of publicity, intransigence, impertinence, and impulsivity remake the contours of leadership. Based on a critical case study of Elon Musk’s public management of Twitter, which has subsequently been rebranded as “X”, it is argued that the four digital logics transform toxic leadership into digital authoritarianism, an unabashed form of authoritarian rule. A concluding section of the essay explores the implications of this evolution for traditional categories of leadership; the importance of attending to communication technologies in leadership research; and the individual, institutional, and social harms of digital authoritarianism.

This study examines culture, values, and identification in farmers markets as organizations that function as an alternative to the mainstream food/grocery industry. Utilizing observation and interviews with a grounded theoretical approach to data analysis, we investigated the culture of five farmers markets. Findings indicate that individuals identified with four main values of farmers markets through their communication: economic interests, nostalgia, fellowship, and education. In certain markets, findings revealed a dichotomy between expected and enacted organizational values. To overcome this dichotomy, sensebreaking and sensegiving communication by market managers and vendors was vital for the management of meaning and culture in markets.

This study examines the proposed and utilized decision-making processes of an interagency taskforce formed to create a strategic plan for addressing substance abuse concerns. Analysis of data obtained through prolonged observation, interviews, and document collection indicated that, although the planned structure remained relatively intact, the taskforce deviated from planned decision-making processes in the procedures and decision-making criteria utilized. These deviations were justified through retrospective rationality and strategic ambiguity. Although prior research has described decision making using rational, satisficing, and garbage can models, the theoretical implications of this study point to a renewed understanding of collaborative decision making combining these approaches. Ultimately, this study illustrates how the characteristics of a loosely coupled, bona fide interorganizational group both enabled and constrained the decision-making process. Accordingly, practitioners and scholars alike should consider the advantages and limitations of retrospective rationality and strategic ambiguity across a variety of group and organizational contexts.