Trust and Self-trust in Leadership Identity Constructions A Qualitative Exploration of Narrative Ecology in the Discursive Aftermath of Heroic Discourse Lundberg, Maria Document Version Final published version Publication date: 2019 License CC BY-NC-ND Citation for published version (APA): Lundberg, M. (2019). Trust and Self-trust in Leadership Identity Constructions: A Qualitative Exploration of Narrative Ecology in the Discursive Aftermath of Heroic Discourse. Copenhagen Business School [Phd]. PhD series No. 20.2019 Link to publication in CBS Research Portal General rights Copyright and moral rights for the publications made accessible in the public portal are retained by the authors and/or other copyright owners and it is a condition of accessing publications that users recognise and abide by the legal requirements associated with these rights. 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Sep. 2021 COPENHAGEN BUSINESS SCHOOL OF HEROIC DISCOURSE ECOLOGY IN THE DISCURSIVE AFTERMATH OF NARRATIVE EXPLORATION IN LEADERSHIP IDENTITY CONSTRUCTIONS - A QUALITATIVE TRUST AND SELF-TRUST SOLBJERG PLADS 3 DK-2000 FREDERIKSBERG DANMARK WWW.CBS.DK ISSN 0906-6934 Print ISBN: 978-87-93744-82-0 Online ISBN: 978-87-93744-83-7 Maria Lundberg TRUST AND SELF-TRUST IN LEADERSHIP IDENTITY CONSTRUCTIONS A QUALITATIVE EXPLORATION OF NARRATIVE ECOLOGY IN THE DISCURSIVE AFTERMATH OF HEROIC DISCOURSE Doctoral School of Organisation and Management Studies PhD Series 20.2019 PhD Series 20-2019 Trust and self-trust in leadership identity constructions A qualitative exploration of narrative ecology in the discursive aftermath of heroic discourse Maria Lundberg Doctoral School of Organization and Management Studies Copenhagen Business School Department for Management, Politics and Philosophy Supervisor: Dan Kärreman, Department for Management, Society and Communication Copenhagen Business School Maria Lundberg Trust and self-trust in leadership identity constructions A qualitative exploration of narrative ecology in the discursive aftermath of heroic discourse 1st edition 2019 PhD Series 20.2019 © Maria Lundberg ISSN 0906-6934 Print ISBN: 978-87-93744-82-0 Online ISBN: 978-87-93744-83-7 The Doctoral School of Organisation and Management Studies is an active national and international research environment at CBS for research degree students who deal with economics and management at business, industry and country level in a theoretical and empirical manner. All rights reserved. No parts of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Acknowledgements This project would not have seen the light of day without the contributions from the 20 leaders who shared their leadership stories with me. I thank each of them for generously granting me their time and trust. I am grateful for the compassion, support and help from exceptional people along the way. To Henrik Hermansen and Katja Høeg Tingleff with CBS—thank you for your ever professional and friendly assistance along the way. To my PhD fellow colleagues and ‘partners in crime’ at the Department of Management, Politics and Philosophy, Anne Sofie Fisher and Dorthe Thorning Mejlhede, I am thankful for your friendship and all of your professional support, sharing and care along the way. To my main supervisor Dan Kärreman at the Department for Management, Society and Communication, Copenhagen Business School, thank you for always offering support and encouraging me to walk the extra miles, as well as for persistently offering challenging viewpoints and critical reflexivity, perceptive support and genuine interest. In addition, thank you for encouraging me to believe in, stick with and continue exploring my own ideas. Your reassuring and proficient guidance has made all the difference to this project. I would also like to thank my previous main supervisor Stefan Meisiek at Copenhagen Business School’s Department of Management, Politics and Philosophy for encouraging me to conduct a qualitative study in the first place, as well as for supporting my idea to pursue leadership identity constructions as a topic for further exploration. I also want to thank my second supervisor Per Darmer at Copenhagen Business School’s Department for Organization for the valuable support and feedback, particularly concerning my methodological approach. Special thanks goes to Minna Paunova at Copenhagen Business School’s Department for Management, Society and Communication, and to Charlotta Levay at Lund University’s School of Economics and Management, Department of Business Administration, for engaging comprehensively with my work and offering so much insightful feedback and invigorating perspectives when I presented my work-in-progress. Furthermore, I wish to thank Chris Grey of Organisation Studies at Royal Holloway, University of London, for the inspirational exchanges and engaging conversations about the numerous 2 invisible workings of leadership as an ideology during the first stage of this research project. I also wish to thank the colleagues in my professional network community who have contributed to this project through stimulating conversations along the way. I wish to extend my gratitude to Tuomas Kuronen at National Defence University, Helsinki, Finland, for sharing invigorating ideas about the value of engaging with leadership narratives as a research field. Thanks also goes to my former colleagues at Sintef Knowledge Creation, Oslo, Norway, for encouraging me to embark on my PhD journey. I also wish to thank my former colleagues at the Centre for Management and Organisations, UTS Business School, University of Technology, Sydney, Australia, with particular thanks to Tyron S. Pitsis for introducing me to the works of Donna Ladkin; these opened up a new vocabulary for me regarding leadership as a qualitative research field. Moreover, I am thankful to Carolyn Stonham and Daphne Freeder for their inspirational friendship, co-creation of academic work and encouragement during my first year as a PhD research fellow at UTS. To all of my family and friends who have continued cheering come rain or shine—you are simply the best. To Anne, Anne and Klausine in particular – thanks for always igniting my stamina! A special thanks also goes to my parents-in-law Randi and Terje for so generously letting me occupy their kitchen table for weeks and months with my laptop and books while writing up my thesis. To my life companion Jon Terje—thank you for being my solid rock superman all the way. Oslo, June 1st, 2019 Maria Lundberg 3 Abstract The phenomenology of trust and self-trust in narrative leadership identity constructions is a field less explored within leadership studies. With a critical lens, this study approaches the construction of leadership identity, offering a broadened perspective on post-heroic leadership identity constructions. The investigation builds on an empirical inquiry based on qualitative interviews with 20 leaders. The thesis examines aspects of the narrative ecology of trust and self-trust related to leadership identity constructions in a post-heroic leadership context. The investigation concentrates on how a dyadic coexistence of trust and self-trust in leadership language can be understood to operate as an underlying potency in leadership identity constructions. The discussion focuses on four main findings related to trust and self-trust in the leaders’ stories. Based on an interpretative framework and building on a phenomenological and ethnomethodological perspective, I show how Ladkin’s idea of the leadership moment, together with Lührmann and Eberl’s identity theory as a model for leadership identity construction, correspond to the theory of narrative ecology, wherein the leaders operate as creative bricoleurs constructing their narrative identities by drawing upon resources in a narrative ecosystem. The discussion attempts to elucidate how trust and self-trust provide agency for post-heroic leadership mastery, replacing leadership agency associated with formal power and authority that links to traditional leadership ideas. As part of this, the text examines how the heroic and post- heroic leadership paradigms operate as competing big “D” Discourses, occurring side by side in the little “d” discursive leadership-as-talk identity context. My main argument is that the tension- filled contradiction between heroic and post-heroic leadership Discourse is resolved by metaphors fuelled by notions of trust and self-trust in discursive leadership practices, which function as narrative rescue remedies, providing the leader with identity resources that validate and stabilise the identity construct. In addition, a potential eclipse in the literature on trust in leadership research is examined, wherein I point to the absence of risk in the empirical material of this project, and ask how this nonappearance can be understood in a post-heroic leadership-identity context. Lastly, I look to how the leadership identity construction project materialised in this study can be understood in the light of a self-realisation, anti-establishment fashion in popular management. 4 Sammendrag Det fenomenologiske aspektet knyttet til tillit og selvtillit i narrative konstruksjoner