The new leader: a synthesis of leadership research in Australia and New Zealand

This article presents the findings of a recently completed synthesis of leadership research conducted through the mid-1990s in Australia and New Zealand. Differences and similarities in implications between Australasia and North America are identified. The implications of those findings for the profile of effective middle management business leadership generally are also discussed. Four integrating themes are identifed. They are (1) the issue of leader self-development, (2) the importance to leadership of learning, (3) the importance of leaders being both transformational and transactional, and (4) the identification of a number of paradigm shifts in thinking about leadership. A proposed over-arching theme is that of 'leader self-assessment'. In addition, a profile of the new successful leader of the future is proposed, as are a number of implications for practitioners that came as a result of this research. Finally, future research directions are identified.