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In response to both the lack of formal leadership training and the challenges facing leaders across higher education, a number of programs are being planned and initiated at colleges and universities. This application brief highlights the conceptual foundations, structural components, and operational considerations of one such program, the Rutgers Leadership Academy (RLA). RLA was created to provide an integrated leadership development program for individuals in academic, administrative, and professional programs who aspire to assume or advance in leadership positions. The program is theory-based, and emphasizes leadership, communication, and organizational concepts and competencies. Somewhat uniquely, it is designed for both academic and administrative leadership positions, and it highlights the importance of informal as well as formal leadership roles, among other core topics. We have found the proposed model to be useful in developing high-quality leadership initiatives for our institution, and the core components of the model and initial outcomes may be of use to others in their leadership development efforts.

Leadership scholars, practitioners and educators find themselves at a very opportune time, when their subject matter-expertise is of increasing interest across sectors, settings and levels of analysis, as leadership is hailed as both a pressing problem and a promising solution. It is also a challenging time for leadership study—a point in time when incongruities between leadership theories and the observed dynamics and outcomes of leadership in practice have been difficult to ignore. In this article we identify and discuss several problematic incongruities, explore possible reasons for these gaps and outline an integrated view of theories of resonance, communication and systems to address these discontinuities and advance our understanding of leadership theory and practice.

Building upon the intersection of theories of resonance, communication and systems in this conceptual article, we advance a line of renewed macro-level thinking on the topic of leadership as social influence, resulting in what we describe as leadership resonance theory.

This article advances an explanation of leadership as a phenomenon that is co-constructed through the communicative connections established between leaders and followers. These connections are mutually-defining, mutually-reinforcing and mutually-causal. Resonance, activation and cultivation are central concepts in the proposed framework, introduced to help explain dynamics and outcomes that seem unpredictable or unexplainable when focusing attention solely on a leader or followers in isolation of one another at a single moment in time.

This framework offers an original, nuanced and integrated way of thinking about leadership in terms of communication, social influence and systems theory, and it helps to explain gaps between the guidance provided by leadership theory and observed leadership outcomes in practice. The proposed framework can help to explain observed leader–follower behaviors, dynamics and outcomes, irrespective of whether they are seen as desirable or comfortable, whether they are necessarily aligned with extant theories or guidance on preferred practices and whether or not they align with traditional values in a personal, organizational or societal context.

The purpose of this paper is to summarize a series of studies conducted by the Center for Organizational Development and Leadership at Rutgers University from 2003‐2005. Motivating these studies is the recognition that organizational self‐assessment programs such as the Malcolm Baldrige program have achieved prominence and popularity. The paper seeks to focus on the value of the Baldrige program, and, more specifically, the impact of the Excellence in Higher Education (EHE) approach, an adaptation of the Malcolm Baldrige framework tailored specifically for colleges and universities.

This paper reports on a two‐phase investigation of six independent university departments that participated in separate Baldrige/EHE assessment workshops. Through a web‐based survey and in‐person interviews we were interested to discover participants' perceptions of the assessment process, the extent of knowledge acquisition, and extent of organizational change.

Findings suggest that self‐assessment does result in the acquisition of a knowledge and theory base; and leads to the identification of strengths and improvement needs. Results also indicate that in a majority of the departments, the assessment program initiated a genuine commitment to organizational change, one that led to a number of tangible improvements.

Enhancing our understanding of the relationship between knowledge acquisition and change is one of the most fundamental and enduring pursuits of social science – one that is absolutely central to organizational development. This study provides an empirical investigation of how these dynamics operate during organizational self‐assessment, an increasingly popular leadership tool for advancing institutions of all kinds.

This study seeks to examine the processes through which leadership is fostered and developed within student leadership development programs. While there has been some scholarly literature written in this area, a dearth in the literature exists with respect to providing a detailed chronicle and examination of the complete processes employed within an exemplary student leadership development program. Through the analysis of such a program – validated by a recent NASPA (2011) study as an exemplar in the field of student leadership development – such a program will be examined. Through a qualitative, grounded theory approach using interviews to inductively build a framework of understanding, seven themes of student leadership development are identified. How these findings extend existing literature is then presented, as is a new theoretical model illustrating the process through which leadership is fostered and developed within students, thereby aiding the construction of future programs.

Electronic mail (EMS) is a new and increasingly common mechanism for communication. How computer‐mediated communication affects human behavior has become the focus of research and of commentary in the popular press. An etiquette or rules of conduct when using EMS appears to be needed. Suggestions are offered based on experience utilizing an electronic mail system for intra‐organizational communication in the Carnegie‐Mellon University Libraries.

This study aims to explain the impact of the Beijing Olympic Games 2008 on China's image in the international TV media. It applies agenda-setting theory to analyse foreign TV coverage of the Olympics in nine countries. Using Rivenburgh's national image richness construct, it attempts to make sense of the coverage before and after Beijing 2008, particularly its impact on the image of the host country. The study concludes that the breadth and attribution of China's image remained relatively stable, that these factors did not improve China's national image directly but that indirectly they raised awareness of China in the international media and framed the host country's image more clearly.

The use of persuasive mass communication techniques by public relations and advertising practitioners, rather than abating in influence as early theorists hoped because of more widespread education, is an increasing component of both private and government communication. In an information environment, persuasion serves a public interest when it assists social utility, but there has been no “macro‐ethical” consistency by practitioners. Indeed, today's global business environment demands an ethically conscious corporate attitude since various publics expect business organizations to take on a greater role in solving community problems—they want to see corporations be ethical in word and act. However, the lack of a single common framework for deciding what is ethical and what is not thus ultimately influences the outcome of public policymaking and the reputation of public relations. This article argues that business ethics matter for the bottom line, with ethical practice and openness in communication the keys to survival in the 21st century. Amoral leadership, exemplified by situational management theories, is outdated (and worse, increasingly ineffective). Change, however, also requires action and a willingness to be open to communication to many constituencies and cultures. Old internal divisions in firms also must be dissolved, with more flexible structures and communications interplay encouraged. Experienced international public relations practitioners must be part of this change.

Most intercultural frameworks assess intercultural competencies, but global businesses lack instruments to support the feedback loop, that is help project managers answer the question if an effective global team has been formed. The purpose of this paper is to develop and assess a new indicator for measuring the actual effectiveness of intercultural communication and collaboration at the individual and team level, the Mysore InterCultural Effectiveness (MICE) indicator.

Based on a needs analysis in global businesses, international projects, and review of existing literature, a low-touch self-report indicator was developed. A test run in several international companies with live data obtained from 154 employees helped to validate the indicator using exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis.

The MICE indicator is based on two scales: first, the effectiveness in interacting and collaborating with foreign counterparts by providing an answer to the question “how I think I am with them;” and second, the satisfaction with appropriateness of communication received from foreign interlocutors and the outcome of the collaboration by answering the question “how I think they are with me.”

Empirical results indicate that the two scale/six factor model provides a good fit to the data. Using the MICE Indicator, it is now possible for project managers to effectively address shortcomings of intercultural communication skills in their international teams with the right type of intercultural training.

Scarcity of resources, ecological imbalance, global warming, rising energy prices and the ever-changing need for variety have attracted the government and manufacturers for sustainable development of the industries. The integrated sustainable-green-lean-six sigma-agile manufacturing system (ISGLSAMS) provides a solid platform for meeting both the customers’ variety needs and business sustainability requirements. Many organizations opted for ISGLSAMS, but still due to various barriers organizations are not able to fully implement ISGLSAMS. The purpose of this paper is to identify the barriers to the ISGLSAMS, so that a more sustainable industrial manufacturing system and industrial symbiosis can be developed.

A literature review, from the Web of Science and Google Scholar database, has been carried out to identify the various barriers to the implementation of ISGLSAMS in the entire value chain. A total of 168 research papers have been reviewed for identifying the ISGLSAMS barriers.

This paper elaborates the concept of the ISGLSAMS, its attributes and various barriers and contributes to a better understanding and successful implementation of ISGLSAMS to meet business’ sustainability and market performance goals in the entire value chain. The paper also projects the future research framework and directions for the ISGLSAMS, integrated sustainable-green-lean-six sigma-agile (ISGLSA) product and ISGLSA supply and value chain.

The study contributes to a better understanding of ISGLSAMS’ barriers. The government, stakeholders and policymakers may plan the policy, road map and strategies to overcome the ISGLSAMS’ barriers. In-depth knowledge of subclauses of ISGLSAMS’ barriers will help the practitioners to overcome the ISGLSAMS’ barriers strategically. By overcoming the ISGLSAMS barriers, a more sustainable 7 Rs based market focused manufacturing system can be designed. This will also increase the opportunities to enhance the industrial ecology, industrial symbiosis and better recovery of the product, process and supply chain residual value. This will reduce the waste to the ecosystem.

This work has been carried out in search of a more sustainable manufacturing system, i.e. ISGLSAMS (which is 7 Rs based, i.e. 6 Rs of sustainability with 7th R, reconfiguration) to meet the customer variety needs along with sustainability in the ever-changing customer market. This study adds value to the practitioners to identify and prioritize the ISGLSAMS’ industry-specific barriers and design the solution for the more sustainable development of (1) industries, (2) the industrial symbiosis system and (3) the ISGLSA product, process, system and supply value chain with minimum resource consumption and environmental impact. The research also contributes to the (a) ISGLSAMS (b) ISGLSA supply chain (c) reconfigurable, sustainable and modular products and (d) redesign, recovery and refurbishing of the product to increase the product life cycle.

Historically, Panama has always been “a place of transit.” While technically the isthmus formed part of Colombia in the nineteenth century, it was linked geopolitically to the United States soon after the California gold rush, beginning in the late 1840s. The first attempt at building a canal ended in failure in 1893 when disease and poor management forced Ferdinand de Lesseps to abandon the project. The U.S. undertaking to build the canal could only begin after Panama declared itself free and broke away from Colombia in 1903, with the support of the United States.