Learning-Oriented Leadership: Managers as Facilitators of Human Resource Development in Daily Work

Abstract

The aim of this article is to provide theoretical and empirical insights concerning the role of managers in facilitating their employees' learning and development at work. The empirical basis of the article is two case studies of industrial companies in which managers were interviewed and observed. The results indicate that managers use combinations of different activities (planned, partially planned and spontaneous) and roles (the supporter, the educator and the confronter) to facilitate learning in different situations. Depending on the combination of activities, roles and the learning to be facilitated, two types of learning-oriented leadership emerge. The main type, performance-oriented leadership, is intended to facilitate adaptive learning. The less prominent type, development-oriented leadership, is intended to facilitate developmental learning. By illustrating learning-oriented leadership in daily work, the findings contradict the romantic notion that leadership for learning is charismatic and transformational.