In Search of Zorba – Part II Myths, Realities, and Assorted Bedtime Stories about Leading Open, Online and Distance Education
Abstract
Indeed, is it possible to envision a future digital university landscape where we could ‘future proof’ against poor leadership? Perhaps this is a rhetorical (and comical) question, but sometimes we need a satirical slant on important issues. A sense of humour and having fun have shown to be essential attributes of good leaders. We are all interested in expanding our effective leadership approaches for creating thriving organizations that are agile, innovative, and responsive to the range of shifting trends, market demands, and stakeholder needs of the 21st century. A brave new world right – not so fast.
The cold hard truth, however, is that we live in a complex, uncertain, ever-changing world where leadership is simply hard. Just when we think we got it – it’s gone; just when we think we understand it, we are perplexed; and just when we think we know how to implement it, we don’t have a clue! We seem to know good leadership when we see it; and we are certain we know what poor leadership looks and feels like and yet trying to define, describe, and adapt leadership it is quite another matter (Burns, 1978; Olcott, Arnold & Blaschke, 2023).
We have a century of scholarly literature and theory about management and leadership and a vast experiential repository across a continuum of different types of organisations; and despite having more information and knowledge at our fingertips than at any time in human history, effective leadership often seems as elusive and enigmatic as ever (Olcott, Arnold, & Blaschke, 2023). The brave new world of leadership was supposed to be easy according to legend. The legend was a myth and the reality is leadership was never supposed to be easy.
The purpose of this paper is to present a helicopter view of selected leadership issues in online, open and distance learning with the goal of identifying some key, and perhaps new, research questions for the future. This article is aimed at offering a synthesis of innovative practice and experience for discerning the myths from the realities. This is not a definitive commentary or silver bullet analysis of the leadership field. On the contrary, it is an attempt to identify some tangible and intangible leadership issues that may give us new vantage points and reflective lightbulbs to consider in our teaching, research and practice of leadership. The format for the article is 1) identify the myth; 2) present the reality; and 3) formulate a reasonable research question (RQ) for further empirical research.
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