Opposites Attract: Leadership Endorsement as a Function of Interaction Between a Leader and a Foil

Abstract

This study focused on situations in which a leader gains a group's endorsement as leader in response to a “foil,” a central person in the group who is perceived to work against group goals. A field study of 3 Quality Improvement Teams revealed how endorsement of leadership occurred via a dialectical process in which the leader's interaction with the foil highlighted certain positive characteristics of the leader and certain counterproductive characteristics of the foil. Positive actions without the foil might have added to the leader's credit, but the same actions taken in the context of foiling the foil had added valence.

Keywords:

• Bona Fide Groups
• Dialectics
• Endorsement
• Leadership

An earlier version of this paper was presented to the Group Communication Division at the 2004 National Communication Association conference in Chicago, IL. Funding for the research was provided by the National Science Foundation (grant SES-8715565 to Marshall Scott Poole and Gerardine DeSanctis), the Carlson School of Management, the NCR Corporation, and Texaco, Inc. The views expressed here are solely those of the authors and not of the research sponsors. We would like to acknowledge the help of the following individuals: Gerardine DeSanctis, Julie Billingsley, George DeSharnis, Michele Jackson, Janet Kelly, Howard Lewis, Rebecca Lind, and Dale Shannon for providing valuable assistance during the initial conduct of this research.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Johny T. Garner

Johny T. Garner (Ph.D., Texas A&M) is an Assistant Professor at Pepperdine University

Marshall Scott Poole

Marshall Scott Poole is a David and Margaret Romano Professorial Scholar and Professor of Communication at Illinois University.