Dialogic leadership

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Dialogic leadership is a leadership approach that has been developed at the Friedrich von Hardenberg Institute for Cultural Studies in Heidelberg since the mid-1990s . The reason for this was provided by inquiries from business and the school sector (self-administered schools / Waldorf schools ). Dialogic leadership is practiced today in various commercial enterprises and non-profit organizations.

"Dialogic leadership works on the question of how as many employees of a company or organization as possible get into an individual entrepreneurial disposition and how they can work together productively from such a position." The expression "Dialogic leadership" was first coined in 2002 at the Hardenberg Institute.

Concept of dialogue

In the background of the dialogical guidance there is an understanding of dialogue that is inspired by the logos concept of the Greek philosopher Heraclitus of Ephesus . Logos means more than just a meaningful conversation. " Dialogue " denotes processes through which the Logos goes through (dia = through). In the sense of dialogical leadership, these processes are understood as updating people's capacities for knowledge and freedom. Conceived in this way, dialogue is on the one hand a certain way of speaking to one another, but it is also more: a way of dealing with one another that promotes the self-determination of the individual.

Here dialogue is understood as a way of dealing with things in which the participants help each other to develop their own insights and initiatives. In this respect, the dialogue approach differs from dialogue approaches that understand dialogue exclusively or predominantly as a communication tool. Occasionally, the approach of dialogical leadership in media reports or in the literature is confused with anti-authoritarian leadership or wrongly reduced to a certain leadership style (e.g. cooperative leadership ). Decisive suggestions for the “Dialogic Leadership” arose time and again in the examination of the idea of ​​ethical individualism ( Rudolf Steiner , “The Philosophy of Freedom ”). Ultimately, it is about how the free, self-orienting personality works can be. leadership is increasingly becoming a self-guided tour .

Key questions and processes of dialogical leadership

Against the background of individualization and the associated new challenges for leadership, the key questions of "dialogical leadership" and the associated processes are:

The people

How can the individual person really be taken seriously? How is the individual promoted in his development by others?

The given situation

How does each individual get his or her view of the whole? How does the common whole arise from the independence of the individual?

future

How do as many employees as possible get creative? How does the originality of the individual flow into the future of cooperation?

Act

How do as many employees as possible take the initiative? How does the responsibility of individuals lead to joint action?

For leadership and self-leadership this means:

  • Enable the individual to develop in the overall process;
  • To be able to cope with the given circumstances in their complexity;
  • Stimulate and realize productive skills;
  • Combine the independent activities of the individuals into a whole.

In a dialogical leadership it is therefore important to stimulate and develop the corresponding processes in the individual as well as in the social:

  • Individual encounter with people in mind.
  • Interest in individual people instead of role behavior or instrumentalization of the other.
  • Transparency with regard to the given situation. Independence of the individual instead of knowledge of power or dictatorship of opinion.
  • Advice and idea generation with a view to the future. Creativity instead of tradition or structural guidelines.
  • Determination with regard to actual action. Acting out of initiative instead of self-fulfillment mentality or commissioning.

Web links

literature

  • Peter Dellbrügger: Design elements for an entrepreneurial leadership culture. The example of "Dialogic Leadership" at the company dm-drogerie markt GmbH & Co KG Karlsruhe. In: Margit Raich, Harald Pechlaner, Hans H. Hinterhuber (eds.): Entrepreneurial Leadership. Profiling in theory and practice. Deutscher Universitäts-Verlag, Wiesbaden 2007, ISBN 978-3-8350-0819-9 , pp. 65–79.
  • Karl-Martin Dietz : Dialogic school tour at Waldorf schools. Spiritual individualism as a social principle. Menon, Heidelberg 2006, ISBN 3-921132-40-1 .
  • Karl-Martin Dietz: Everyone is an entrepreneur. Basics of a dialogic culture (= writings of the Interfacultative Institute for Entrepreneurship (IEP) of the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology. Vol. 18). Universitäts-Verlag Karlsruhe, Karlsruhe 2008, ISBN 978-3-86644-264-1 .
  • Karl-Martin Dietz: Independent in the sense of the whole. Intentions of Dialogical Leadership. In: Markus Hänsel, Anna Matzenauer (Ed.): I work, therefore I am? Search for meaning and meaning crisis in everyday professional life. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2009, ISBN 978-3-525-40416-4 , pp. 61-76.
  • Karl-Martin Dietz: Dialogue. The art of collaboration. 3rd, expanded edition. Menon, Heidelberg 2010, ISBN 978-3-921132-13-5 .
  • Karl-Martin Dietz, Thomas Kracht: Dialogical leadership. Basics - practice - case study: dm drugstore market. 3rd, updated edition. Campus-Verlag, Frankfurt an Nain et al. 2011, ISBN 978-3-593-39450-3 .
  • Rudy Vandercruysse: Me and more than me. Basic exercises in a culture of self-management. Menon, Heidelberg 2011, ISBN 978-3-921132-46-3 .

supporting documents

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Dietz: Everyone is an entrepreneur. 2008, p. 6.
  2. ^ Dietz, Kracht: Dialogical leadership. 2011.
  3. ↑ See Reinhard K. Sprenger: Leadership for Adults. In: brand eins. Vol. 4, Issue 10, 2002, p. 154 f.