Military Leadership and Organizational Innovation: a Case Study of the Pacific Theater in Ww Ii
DISSERTATION APPROVED BY June 16, 2020 James R. Martin Jr. Date James R. Martin, Jr., Ph.D., Chair Elizabeth Elliot-Meisel, Ph.D., Committee Member Jennifer Moss Breen, Ph.D., Director _______________________________________ Gail M. Jensen, Ph.D., Dean MILITARY LEADERSHIP AND ORGANIZATIONAL INNOVATION: A CASE STUDY OF THE PACIFIC THEATER IN WW II ___________________________________ By Anthony C. Zinni ___________________________________ A DISSERTATION IN PRACTICE Submitted to the faculty of the Graduate School of Creighton University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the degree of Doctor of Education in Interdisciplinary Leadership _________________________________ Omaha, NE (May 15, 2020) Copyright (2020), Anthony C. Zinni This document is copyrighted material. Under copyright law, no part of this document may be reproduced without the expressed permission of the author. iii Abstract The US military, faced with unprecedented challenges, has sought to transform its services and other commands into more innovative organizations and has struggled in trying to understand the process to accomplish this. Studies that have been conducted to determine how best to make this transformation have not offered a comprehensive methodology or model that has proven useful. The purpose of this study was to explore the relationship between the practices of military leadership teams and organizational innovation in historic and highly successful military commands, specifically in the World War II Pacific theater of operations, to gain insights into how current and future leadership may influence innovation. The research examined historical documents, leader accounts, and scholarly literature on innovation. Through this case study, insights were gained into how current and future leadership may influence the transformation into innovative organizations through their practices.
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