Relational Leadership

The foundation for Relational Leadership is essentially the relationships that formulate within a team, group, or organization, mostly with the goal to accomplish positive change (Komives, Lucas, & McMahon, 2013). In its current form, the Relational Leadership model serves as a philosophy or a practice to aspire to, rather than a model that has been widely used. Five elements comprise the model, providing a framework for “developing and supporting a healthy, ethical, effective group” (Komives et al., 2013, p. 96); the group must be purposeful, inclusive, empowering, ethical, and process-oriented. Purpose is the core of the model because it drives the actions for the group’s members. The actions that deliver on the purpose or mission make up the process, guided by inclusive, empowering, and ethical practices. In order to carry out the relational leadership model, each individual must possess the necessary knowledge, attitudes and skills for each particular element, also known as a model of knowing-being-doing.

Purposeful

Knowing: understanding change, shared values, and the role of a mission or purpose
Being: being hopeful, committed, and positive
Doing: developing goals with the ability to think creatively and make meaning

Inclusive

Knowing: awareness of self, others, and multiple realities
Being: having an open mind and valuing diversity
Doing: listening, developing talent, and collaborating with others

Empowering

Knowing: understanding power and practices that inhibit or promote empowerment
Being: valuing others’ contributions and growth
Doing: encouraging others and sharing information as well as promoting individual and team learning

Ethical

Knowing: understanding values, justice, care, and ethical decision making
Being: commitment to social responsibility, integrity, authenticity, and trust
Doing: exhibiting moral and selfless behavior as well as congruence between words and actions

Process-oriented

Knowing: understanding community, relationships, and group processes
Being: commitment to quality, process, and outcomes
Doing: collaborating, learning, giving and receiving feedback, and reflecting

Pros

The model allows all members of a group or an organization to be involved in a shared vision, pulling from various sources of creativity, imagination, and passion.
Ideally members will be engaged and empowered, with feelings of significance to others and the overall process.

Cons

The process can be very time-consuming, especially for complex organizations. A complete culture shift may have to occur in order for successful implementation.
Depending on the size of an organization, a relational leadership model can be costly when it comes to the development of a learning environment (innovation, increased probability for failure and its repercussions, professional development opportunities).
There may be a greater risk of responsibility avoidance, indecisiveness, or role ambiguity.
The model is fairly new and is not supported by significant research.

Practical Implications for Teaching College Students

The Relational Leadership model serves as a great approach for developing and empowering students; however, it is very complex and involves a great deal of learning and preparation. The five elements seem fairly simple on the surface, but it is important to consider cognitive and identity development of college students. For example, it would be much more difficult to implement this model with freshmen students considering that they might have a more dualistic mindset and are still developing some of the competencies needed to understand and carry out relational leadership. Organizations with diverse ages and developmental spectrums may be more successful at carrying out a relational model. Students who possess the knowledge, attitudes, and skills can lead by example and empower others to be engaged in the process. Moreover, it is also a responsibility to the institution to provide learning experiences for students in order to enhance their ability to be inclusive, empower others, and display socially responsible behavior.

References

Komives, S. R., Lucas, N., & McMahon, T. R. (2013). Exploring leadership for college students who want to make a difference. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

4 responses to “Relational Leadership”

The model seems to be a good model, even with it’s cons, and the fact that it is not supported with a lot of research. It just makes sense. The 5 elements for developing and supporting a healthy group are good, and are supported by the knowing, being, and doing skills which are good for the group members and the group. Although the cons are very valid, i.e. costs and time consuming, etc., the group success, with a valid purpose, can offset the cons. In other words, if the purpose was significant, with a significant pay off or big win, then the costs and related could be worth it. I think that people and organizations will see the benefit of this model, and make it work for them. SLU, apparently, thinks that it is worth while and others will too. As you stated, one student who is familiar with the model, could lead by example. Just as Freshman may have learned to be dualistic, they can learn this model and perspective, too. James.

Do you think it is possible to put the issue of time into the pro column by teaching time management skills to students and allowing them the opportunity to be empowered while exercising their level of involvement with time constraints? Does the literature discuss any of these issues or how to circumvent this particular issue?

lsnowden1 March 20, 2014 at 10:38 pm · · Reply →

Definitely, there’s no harm in teaching time management in the process. However, with regard to time I was thinking more along the lines of the difficulty involved in implementing this model for a very large and complex organization. It’s a type of model where everyone must be on-board and the culture will have to shift to a learning environment because not everyone will possess the knowledge, attitudes, and skills right away to be an effective contributor. Like for example, the culture at my old employer was very competitive; an employee would get jealous of someone else just because he or she was given a new project. We were even compared to other people in our employee evaluations. If the organization wanted to implement a relational model, the culture shift would have to be the first focus which could be a long process. Leaders would have to change their focus from pinning employees against each other to becoming more collaborative and selfless. This could even negatively impact productivity at first which which may reflect less buy-in from managers.

I see that the relational leadership model is very much a model to aspire to in terms of cultivating an effective group. I think that purposeful, ethical, empowering, and process oriented are all the ideal characteristics someone would look for in a high functioning group. It would seem to me that a team functioning highly in all of these areas would respect each others individual strengths and empower those around them to work together to achieve the common goal.

One of the cons I believe after reading your post that could also exist is the leader role could be not clearly defined. I see that this model requires all members of the team to know- be- do but without having a clear leader I see this model as being very hard for many organizations to implement. I think that this leadership model could be very beneficial in a group project or small organization but with a larger group of people this could be a difficult leadership model to use successfully.

jbuck122014 March 8, 2014 at 2:58 pm · · Reply →

The model seems to be a good model, even with it’s cons, and the fact that it is not supported with a lot of research. It just makes sense. The 5 elements for developing and supporting a healthy group are good, and are supported by the knowing, being, and doing skills which are good for the group members and the group. Although the cons are very valid, i.e. costs and time consuming, etc., the group success, with a valid purpose, can offset the cons. In other words, if the purpose was significant, with a significant pay off or big win, then the costs and related could be worth it. I think that people and organizations will see the benefit of this model, and make it work for them. SLU, apparently, thinks that it is worth while and others will too. As you stated, one student who is familiar with the model, could lead by example. Just as Freshman may have learned to be dualistic, they can learn this model and perspective, too. James.
tlucas7 March 9, 2014 at 4:20 pm · · Reply →

Do you think it is possible to put the issue of time into the pro column by teaching time management skills to students and allowing them the opportunity to be empowered while exercising their level of involvement with time constraints? Does the literature discuss any of these issues or how to circumvent this particular issue?
- lsnowden1 March 20, 2014 at 10:38 pm · · Reply →
  
  Definitely, there’s no harm in teaching time management in the process. However, with regard to time I was thinking more along the lines of the difficulty involved in implementing this model for a very large and complex organization. It’s a type of model where everyone must be on-board and the culture will have to shift to a learning environment because not everyone will possess the knowledge, attitudes, and skills right away to be an effective contributor. Like for example, the culture at my old employer was very competitive; an employee would get jealous of someone else just because he or she was given a new project. We were even compared to other people in our employee evaluations. If the organization wanted to implement a relational model, the culture shift would have to be the first focus which could be a long process. Leaders would have to change their focus from pinning employees against each other to becoming more collaborative and selfless. This could even negatively impact productivity at first which which may reflect less buy-in from managers.
elowe5 March 16, 2014 at 9:39 pm · · Reply →

I see that the relational leadership model is very much a model to aspire to in terms of cultivating an effective group. I think that purposeful, ethical, empowering, and process oriented are all the ideal characteristics someone would look for in a high functioning group. It would seem to me that a team functioning highly in all of these areas would respect each others individual strengths and empower those around them to work together to achieve the common goal.

One of the cons I believe after reading your post that could also exist is the leader role could be not clearly defined. I see that this model requires all members of the team to know- be- do but without having a clear leader I see this model as being very hard for many organizations to implement. I think that this leadership model could be very beneficial in a group project or small organization but with a larger group of people this could be a difficult leadership model to use successfully.