Logic of Leadership Research: A Reflective Review of <i>Geeks & Geezers</i> by Bennis and Thomas

Abstract

Leadership has turned out to be one of those topics, which persistently slip out of scientific hands. The field of leadership research should be of interest to researchers in various other disciplines, because it serves as a source of examples of many common difficulties faced by researchers in general. These relate to difficulties in defining a research task, specifying quality criteria, choosing methods, ensuring that the research programme remains progressive (the criterion is from Lakatos, see Science and Pseudoscience, 2004; Worrall & Currie, 1978), etc.

The book by well-known leadership researchers, Bennis and Thomas, gives us an occasion to critically appreciate the practice of leadership research so far and assess the book’s potential contribution. This will be done by first outlining the developments in leadership research since the 1930s. It will be shown that although the book’s focus is interestingly different, it does not go so far as to reframe the logic of research in the field.