The Role of Shared Leadership and Communication in Promoting Strategic Consensus and Performance

ABSTRACT

The current study aims to investigate the effect of strategic consensus among managers on organizational performance, with an emphasis on shared leadership and communications in Iranian knowledge-intensive firms. Since Iran has its unique cultural characteristics with favoring a more authoritarian attribute, and leadership in knowledge-intensive firms has a more shared style, the context of the study is more appealing to such relationships. Data were collected from 115 randomly selected knowledge-intensive firms and analyzed using structural equation modeling by LISREL. Findings show that shared leadership positively influences strategic consensus of the management team, but it does not have a direct effect on performance. Also, communication among managers increases their strategic consensus which in turn positively affects firm performance. The findings act as a guideline for managers and suggest them to broaden the scope and the content of consensus and also for more effective decision-making and improved performance.

KEYWORDS:

• Strategic consensus
• shared leadership
• communication
• performance
• knowledge-intensive firm

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Younis Jabarzadeh

Younis Jabarzadeh is an assistant professor of management at the University of Tabriz. He received his PhD in operations and production management from the University of Tehran. In addition to academic teaching and research, he serves as strategy and operations consultant in different industrial sectors. Strategic decision making, supply chain and operations strategy and project management are among his research interests. He may be reached at [email protected]

Naser Sanoubar

Naser Sanoubar is an associate professor of management at the University of Tabriz. He is a PhD graduate in strategic management from the Allameh-Tabataba'i University. Along with teaching and research in leadership and organization theory, behavior and ethics, he serves as a consultant in strategy and total responsibility management. Governance, professional ethics and leadership are among his research interests. He may be reached at [email protected]

Arash Vahdat

Arash Vahdat is a graduate in master of art in business administration. He is serving as research and development manager and also researcher in management and Organization. He may be reached at [email protected]

Faezeh Khosravi Saghezchi

Faezeh Khosravi Saghezchi is a graduate in master of business administration. He is a researcher at department of management of University of Tabriz. She may be reached at [email protected]