Towards a critical assessment of leader and follower identity construction within the New Zealand public service

PURPOSE OF THE PAPER Informed by a critical approach to identity dynamics in organizational contexts, this research examines the regulatory and transformative practices of leadership development program (LDP) for senior... [ view full abstract ]

PURPOSE OF THE PAPER
Informed by a critical approach to identity dynamics in organizational contexts, this research examines the regulatory and transformative practices of leadership development program (LDP) for senior employees within the New Zealand public sector. The research intends to investigate how the program discursive practices influenced the participants’ identities with the construction of a particular ideal leader.
This research asks the primary research question:
How do senior public sector leaders participating in the New Zealand State Services Commissions Leadership Development Program construct their identities as leaders and followers?
This research also asks a secondary research question:
What are the senior public sector leaders lived experiences of leadership and followership within a leadership practice in New Zealand?

INTENDED CONTRIBUTION TO LITERATURE
This research intends to make a small contribution to critical leadership studies and LDPs in three main ways: First, through a critical identity lens, it examines the development practices of elite organizational leaders in a particular setting, by focussing on how ‘conformity’ produces particular implications rarely examined in previous studies of LDPs. The issue of conformity and its relationship to leadership is relatively under-examined in public sector leadership studies. Second, it explores the everyday lived experiences of participants within a leadership practice within the New Zealand public sector. Third, this research identifies how participants construct their leadership identities within the LDP narrative.

INTRODUCTION
In 2014 the New Zealand State Sector Commission (SSC) initiated a new leadership development programme aimed at significantly changing how the state sector identifies, develops and utilises leaders and talented people from the start of their careers to their most senior levels.
This prevalent discursive practice of public sector leadership within New Zealand has prompted this research. This study acknowledges and recognises the coordinated efforts of the State Services Commission as the central agency responsible for the delivery of a cross-sectoral leadership framework using the LSP, but it also picks up on the prescriptive and deep rooted essentialist nature of the model which positions this research against its rich and dense backdrop to study the construction of leadership and followership identity, notwithstanding the inherent complexities and anomalies it characterises.

METHODS
The study has evolved through a process of continuous interaction (Yin, 1989, 1993) between empirical fieldwork observations (level one) and the emerging theoretical concepts (level two). The review of the literature was conducted throughout the research process. This study conducts a preliminary exploratory research into leader and follower identity construction contextualised against the NZ public sector setting.
This empirical study makes use of information retrieved from various forms of documentary sources including policy and strategy papers, advisory group reports, academic publications, online videos and other relevant information published on NZ central agency websites. In-depth discourse analysis of data gathered through interviews will also be undertaken. This is also the main critique of this study because other forms of qualitative or quantitative research methods of analysis have not been undertaken.