Leadership development: Crisis, opportunities and the leadership concept

In this paper, we address two different types of crises. The first one refers to a crisis in the leadership development literature. We suggest that its resolution lies in focusing on the leadership concept - the schemata that organizations have embedded in their culture about leadership. We believe that the role of leadership development is to renew these assumptions, so that they reflect the new challenges organizations face. The second type of crisis refers to the pragmatic challenges facing organizations. We suggest that the context of crisis provides ideal circumstances for promoting changes in the leadership concept, as schemata are then more malleable. In addition, we argue that sensemaking may be a possible mechanism for renewing the leadership concept due to its role in schemata changes during times of ambiguity and uncertainty, such as those of crisis