Defining leadership: the three sins
A few weeks ago I sat in on a lecture given to members of the Australian public service. The topic was leadership, and the title went something like this: ‘Are […]
Will the real social identity please stand up?
Where does the social identity approach come from? Awkwardly, before we can answer that question we need to have a conversation about what we mean by ‘the social identity approach’. […]
Self-categorization: I and us
We have had a couple of recent posts looking at the social identity approach in action, and our last post introduced a pathway for using social identity ideas. I therefore […]
Doing leadership: Introducing the three ‘R’s
We have started making claims that the social identity approach provides answers to common leadership questions and that these insights can be leveraged to strengthen leadership credentials. We will continue […]
Understanding power: authority and coercion
In a couple of our previous posts we have contrasted leadership with ‘authority’ and ‘coercion’. But what are these exactly? What do we mean when we say that a police […]
What foreign coaches can teach us about leadership and team performance
December in Australia is a time when everyone wastes far too much time watching cricket. Mostly this is an experience of national pride, where we rely on our cricketers to humble the English, […]
Event notice: The New Psychology of Leadership: From Theory to Practice
Are you going to be in Brisbane, Australia, next week? Or can you get there? If so, there is an excellent opportunity for you to get up close with one […]
Social identity in policing: from football hooligans to football fans
Early this year Australia was visited by Cliffard Stott, a UK based social identity theorist. I had the privilege of listening to him present on some of his latest work […]
Categorization: Knives, forks, spoons, and us
This post is our first that is wholly dedicated to a tenet of the social identity approach. That tenet is ‘cognitive categorization’. Why cognitive categorization? We need to have some […]
Beware the presumptions of mergers and acquisitions: cultural fit isn’t similarity
Company mergers and, more commonly, acquisitions, are renowned for failure. Estimates of failure rates usually start at 50% and can be as high as 90%. That’s a lot of failure. […]
Social Identity Resources 