Exploring emergent leadership in agile teams: network dynamics, roles, and skills at the individual level

Tabassum, Marya, Raziq, Muhammad Mustafa, Allen, Matthew ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6463-9039, Sarwar, Naukhez and Golra, Owais Anwar (2024) Exploring emergent leadership in agile teams: network dynamics, roles, and skills at the individual level. Business Process Management Journal. ISSN 1463-7154

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Abstract

Purpose: Leadership research has traditionally focused on formal leadership; however, leaders may emerge in informal settings in self-managed teams, and little is known about who emergent leaders are and what their characteristics are. Drawing on a multi-method approach, the study investigates emergent leaders’ behaviors, roles, skills, and leadership styles. Method: We first identify emergent leaders using social network analysis (SNA) and aggregation approaches. Second, we investigate emergent leaders’ characteristics using interviews with forty agile team members in five organizations. Findings: Results indicate different roles of emergent leaders (i.e., coach, liaisons), leadership styles (i.e., supportive), skills (i.e., culturally intelligent, strategist), and influencing factors (i.e., personality, technical knowledge, social circle). Originality: We contribute by identifying emergent leaders through multiple identification methods (i.e., network analysis, aggregation), and then through identifying their various characteristics, we contribute to leadership literature as well as idiosyncrasy-credit theory. We also add to agile-leadership theory, showing that multiple informal leaders may emerge within agile teams. Finally, our findings have practical implications for self-managed teams, informal group settings, organizational change professionals, and organizations with horizontal structures.