Case Study of Public Library Directors’ Entrepreneurial Leadership Behaviors on Organizational Innovation

The purpose of this qualitative single case study was to explore the influence of entrepreneurial leadership behaviors of U.S. public library directors on innovation through Thornberry’s entrepreneurial leadership model. Five research questions were designed to yield information on how entrepreneurial general, explorer, miner, accelerator, and integrator leadership behaviors of public library directors influence organizational innovativeness. Purposive sampling was used to select 18 front-line, middle-management, and senior leadership library staff from three public libraries in the Midwest and Southwest United States. Data were collected through open-ended, semi-structured face-to-face interviews, observations, and reviews of publicly available documents. Inductive thematic analysis of the data yielded five themes: (a) library directors are general entrepreneurial leaders, (b) building value-creating activities (explorers), (c) improving efficiency (miners), (d) generating and supporting innovations (accelerators), and (e) integrating people and ideas (integrators). Findings revealed innovation award-winning library directors exhibit behaviors from all five facets of Thornberry’s entrepreneurial leadership model. Findings extend the scope of Thornberry’s model beyond corporate and educational settings to public sector organizations. The results of the study have implications for organizational leadership and enhance understanding of entrepreneurial leadership’s influence on innovation in public libraries. Quantitative research is recommended to measure the extent of the five dimensions of Thornberry’s model of entrepreneurial leadership and innovation in public library leaders