ProfRubbs!

Question 1

The long-standing debate about the possibility of teaching leadership is yet to find

conclusive answers. However, the continued use of educational interventions such as

seminars, courses, and retreats demonstrates that leadership can actually be taught (Kronz,

2013). The aim of the proposed thesis will be to show that participation in international

student organizations not only develops leadership skills but also helps to create international

leaders who can practice on a multinational level. Furthermore, the rising trend of

globalization has resulted in unique leadership challenges were the leaders have to work in

unfamiliar environments and to make critical decisions using limited information. In addition,

multinational leaders are expected to work with diverse teams using a very crucial skill of

cultural sensitivity that can be learned.

Multinational leaders have to learn about the geography and the general environment

of the foreign countries where they practice leadership. Conley (2013) refers to this as a shift

of leadership role from being the administrator to an anthropologist. It has evolved in due

course to become the art of establishing connections and condemning boundaries to connect

with the global communities. Therefore, participating in student organizations helps to build

connections with people/leaders from other countries on a face to face basis. This concurs

with Conley’s (2013) perception that the face to face interactions have a lasting impact than

technology-based or online interactions.

On the other hand, multinational leaders must emphasize the importance of worker

interactions. This implies that on a personal level, the leaders should first recognize the

benefits of interpersonal relations in the workplace. This is closely related to team

performance and the need for the leader to create a collaborative environment in the

workplace (Darling and Fischer, 1998). In this case, the leader gains more insight into the

issues when he/she participates in international student organizations.

The Erasmus Student Network (ESN) will be used to advance the objectives of the

proposed thesis. Founded on16th October 1989, the organization grew significantly to

become the largest student association in Europe which develops and promotes student

exchange programs. The choice of the organization was influenced by several factors. First of

all, it offers its services to a relatively large number of youngsters (approximately 200,000

international students per year) which means that it’s possible to locate a diverse team of

research subjects for the thesis. In addition, the organization offers a different program

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known as “internationalization at home” which focuses on a group of students who cannot get

a period abroad. This will be used to increase the significance of the results of this study.

Question 2

The proposed thesis will comprise of the following research questions;

A. Can leadership be learned through participation in student organizations?

The idea of acquiring leadership skills via participation in international student

organizations suggests that leadership skills can be learned in the youthful years of an

individual. This contradicts the thoughts of a respected scholar-Warren Bennis who said:

“more leaders have been made by accident, circumstance, sheer grit, or will than have been

made by all the leadership courses put together "(Bennis, 2009). This meant that the

possibility of acquiring leadership skills through a planned learning process was very low. It,

therefore, implies that international student organizations could do nothing more or less to

impact the skills of multinational programs through leadership exchange programs.

However, the study is supported by the findings of Richard Avey who proposed that

30% of leaders acquire their skills genetically through birth, 30% in the formative years while

the remaining 30% is modeled throughout an individual’s life (Avolio, Rotundo and

Walumbwa, 2009). This means that the international student organizations can provide a

platform for the 30% of leaders to acquire leadership skills in due course.

B. What is the role of international student organization exchange programs in giving

students insight into global cultures and promoting cultural sensitivity?

This research question will focus on the impact of the exchange programs to the

student leadership development model. It will analyze the learning opportunities provided by

the programs and their ability to stimulate multicultural engagement among the students. In

particular, it will examine how the programs help students to attain multicultural leadership

skills by advancing from simple to complex leadership dimensions throughout their stay at

the organization. Therefore, students will identify how working in diverse teams helped them

acquire cultural sensitivity over time by identifying the difficulties they encountered and the

interventions that they learned/ used to counteract them.

C. What actions should international student organizations such as ESN take to enhance the

growth of multinational leaders?

The third research question will seek to uncover how the students progress towards

complexity, integration, and change to become multinational leaders. In a real sense, it will

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monitor the development of students through the specific stages of the development model to

identify bottlenecks and suggest possible actions. For example, the problem of the language

barrier which is prevalent in international student organizations will be addressed by hiring

interpreters to help students understand each other. Similarly, stereotypes should be

addressed at the initial stages of the exchange programs to ensure that the diverse cultures

that participate in the program fit comfortably in the platform. On the other hand, the role of

the international student organizations in monitoring the practice of leadership skills by its

graduates will be important.

D. In what ways are the exchange programs conducted abroad different from the approach of

internationalization at home? Which gives better leadership outcomes?

Conley (2013) suggests that face to face interactions are more promising when it

comes to the development of relational leadership skills rather than online or

technology-based methods. The participants of the study will be quizzed on their mode of

participation in ESN. The characteristics of exchange programs for students who travel

abroad will be compared with those of the alternative approach- internationalization at home.

In the end, the study will determine the approach that provided better opportunities for

relational leadership. This will give a conclusion about the best approach for developing

multinational leaders.

Question 3

The study will be based upon three theoretical concepts (Stage based model of

leadership identity development, the Cognitive development theory, and the Chickering’s

psychosocial theory). It will also build upon the four main individual behavioral styles

namely; the analyzer, the socializer, the director and the relater (Kronz, 2014). These

behavioral styles will be used to account for the different styles that individuals use to

interact or communicate with others. They will also be used to determine how receiving

feedback from others would enable individuals to locate themselves along the four behavioral

styles. In this sense, the study will evaluate the different competencies that are required by

the participants of student leadership organizations who desire to become multinational

leaders.

The Stage based model of leadership identity development uses a grounded theory

approach to evaluate the steps taken to attain multinational leadership skills (Komives et al.,

2006). In this case, the use of a helix rather than a circular model allows the stages of

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development to be repeated in a circular fashion (Komives et al., 2006). The first stage in this

model is awareness which involves the recognition that leadership actually exists and that

successful leaders have been on the scene for a while. The second stage entails is engagement

where students experience their interpersonal interaction with peers and seek new friendships.

In stage three, the leader was identified while in stage 4, leadership was differentiated

(Komives et al., 2006).

On the other hand, the Cognitive development theory focuses on the thought

processes involved in leadership identity development. It emphasizes on reflexive thinking in

social multinational contexts which promotes the development of multinational leaders

(Komives et al., 2006). Chickering’s Psychosocial theory suggests that establishing

leadership identity involves a progression through certain vectors that move from autonomy

towards interdependence than the development of sustainable interpersonal relationships.

Based on this model, relationships, purpose, and integrity have to be developed for student

leaders to make commitments in the global interactional context within which leadership is

practiced (Komives et al., 2006).

Question 4

One of the main aspects of successful research is the issue of selecting the right research

methodology. The research method is basically the procedure to follow in order to implement

our study. In order to systematically conduct our research, we would like to suggest a suitable

research design and methodological approach based on the “research onion”, the work of

Saunders, Lewis, and Thornhill in 2008.

To begin with, according to the first layer of the research onion, we choose the

research philosophy for our study, which is meant to provide a particular view on the matter

we are interested in. By choosing the right research philosophy, we would be able to reflect

certain assumptions about how we perceive and understand the world. The choice of research

philosophy has also a crucial effect on the strategy and design of our study. Thus, we believe

that the most suitable philosophy of our study among four research philosophies (positivism,

realism, interpretivism, and pragmatism) described by Saunders et al. (2007), is

interpretivism.

According to the authors, interpretivism is about understanding the way humans

interpret their social roles according to the meaning they give to those roles. In this way, we,

as researchers, would interpret the social roles of our research participants based on our own

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set of meanings (Saunders et al., 2007). The purpose of our research is to understand how

taking a leadership role in a student organization may affect the leadership development of

students. We believe there is no one true answer to this matter to be identified if we adopted

the positivist philosophy. Instead, we assume that the development of leadership skills of a

particular individual as a result of participation in a student organization is highly dependent

on the frame of reference and perspective of that individual.

From the ontological point of view, we adopt subjectivism, which follows from the

interpretivism philosophy. According to subjectivism, we argue it is necessary to study the

subjective meanings that motivate students for their actions associated with taking a

leadership role in order for us to understand those actions. This leads us to the choice of a

particular research approach, the second layer of the research onion. We plan to perform an

inductive study, which in contrast to deductive, it is aimed to build a theory based on the data

collected. Since the results of our study are to be developed within a certain context of

Erasmus Student Network organization, we believe that inductive reasoning is more likely to

be relevant.

We plan to begin our study by collecting relevant data associated with the leadership

skills, student organizations and the process of leadership development. As soon as a

reasonable amount of data is collected, we intend to search for particular patterns of data that

can be observed and then develop a theory that may explain those patterns.

When it comes to research strategies, we choose the classic grounded theory strategy,

which was developed by sociologists Glaser and Strauss in 1967. Goulding’s study in 2002

(cited in Saunders et al. 2007) suggests that grounded theory is a particularly useful strategy

for the research aimed to explain the behavior of the subjects studied.

After having identified an inductive approach and grounded theory strategy for our

study, we believe the most suitable method for data collection is qualitative, non-statistical

analysis method. According to Creswell (2003), the qualitative method usually associates

with conducting the interviews to obtain respondents’ opinions, views, and attitudes. Since

we are interested in students’ perceptions about their leadership experience within a student

organization, we, therefore, plan to use qualitative techniques through interviewing as a

primary data collection and analysis method.

Thus, based on the research onion model, we identify our research to be carried out

using a mono-method, a single qualitative data collection technique as conducting

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semi-structured interviews. To conclude, our research will be a cross-sectional study due to

time constraints of the academic course.

Question 5

Data collection is meant to be the process of gathering information from relevant

sources in order to answer the research question of our study. Nowadays, there are multiple

tools for collecting the data with the potential to contact individuals in any part of the world

electronically. Our study is based on various Erasmus Student Network sections around

Sweden and we aim to have a conversation with the board members of those ESN sections,

who took a leadership role in their local organization. The empirical data we plan to collect

will be conducted through one-on-one semi-structured interviews with a relatively small

sample size of 8-15 respondents.

We believe that the use of interviewing techniques would add value to the relevance,

reliability, and validity of the answers collected. As it was described by King in 2004 (cited

in Saunders et al. 2008), semi-structured interviews are often referred to as “qualitative

research interviews”. We choose this particular category of interviews in order to provide

ourselves flexibility of omitting some or asking additional questions if needed to clarify

statements by respondents depending on the flow of the interview. We will be collecting the

data through the use of an audio recording device (provided that the permission of

respondents is acquired) in order to ensure the accuracy of the data collected.

One-on-one interviews will be conducted face-to-face whenever possible, however,

due to the physical distance constraints between us and the potential respondents, telephone

interviews and internet-mediated video-calls will be used as well. Initially, we plan to send

the introductory letter to the potential respondents with the invitation to participate in our

research study and the consent form for taking part in the research. Afterward, given we

receive positive responses from potential respondents, we plan to schedule the interviews by

confirming the method of communicating (face-to-face, phone, video call) and suitable

dates/times for the participants. assume one interview to last from 30 to 40 minutes.

The questions we are going to prepare for the interviews will involve certain topics

associated with the leadership experiences of the board members. As such, we plan to ask

questions regarding the participants’ understanding of their roles within the organization in

order to explore their own identity view. Also, we are interested in particular events or

activities they experienced that respondents feel have contributed to their leadership skills.

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Additionally, we aim to identify if any of those opportunities provided by student

organization have challenged them or had no significant impact on their leadership

capabilities, what are the benefits and drawbacks of taking a leadership role within a

particular student organization.

We are also interested in collecting the answers from former ESN leaders who were

involved in student organization activities years ago and may provide insight into whether

student organization positively contributed to their leadership development in practice.

Question 6

In many cases, the success of the study is highly dependent on the access to the

potential participant of the research. Since our study is mainly focused on collecting the

primary data, gaining access to board members of ESN student organization is a crucial

matter. The basic type of access is physical access, that needs to be approved by the

management of the organization. We plan to contact the President of ESN Sweden and notify

him on our interest in conducting the research which would involve the board members of the

local sections around Sweden. We believe that his support, as well as the support of ESN

Sweden National Board, would add value to the local sections’ interest in participation. We

could also request access to the ESN organization’s internal documents to be used as a

valuable secondary source for our study.

We believe in the importance of acquiring cognitive access to the participants, in a

way that they will be open to provide their opinions and describe their experiences of taking

part in ESN. We assume that our own experience of being a part of Erasmus Student Network

at the local section in Kalmar may establish our credibility and facilitate building an open

communication channel between us and the respondents. Additionally, our knowledge of the

organization from within and the existence of established contact with some of the potential

respondents may add value to the successful outcomes of our interviews.

Since the Erasmus Student Network is a non-governmental and non-profitable

organization local sections provide the information on their activities openly on their websites

and social network accounts. Therefore, we do not expect issues on confidentiality of our

research findings. On the other hand, the anonymity of our respondents’ identity will be

provided if requested by the research participants.

Furthermore, there are ethical concerns that need to be addressed. According to

Saunders et al. (2008), research ethics involves «…questions about how we formulate and

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clarify our research topic, design our research and gain access, collect data, process and store

our data, analyse data and write up our research findings in a moral and responsible way» (p.

184).

In order to avoid any ethical misconduct, we plan to read the university’s Code of

ethics or some other ethical guidelines to get familiarised with the terms and procedures

associated with ethical study research. One of the examples could be The European Code of

Conduct for Research Integrity developed by the European Commission in 2017.

First of all, we are going to explain the purpose and objectives of our study to the

participants prior to starting the interviewing process. As it was mentioned above, the consent

form will be sent to the participants in order to familiarise them with the interviewing

procedure. Also, the privacy and anonymity of the participants will be provided if requested

by them. The participation in our research will be totally voluntarily with the right of the

participants to withdraw from the process at any time. As such, avoidance of any stress and

harm to the research participants, their safety and comfort while taking part in our research

process will be guaranteed.

We also strive for honesty and transparency regarding the whole process of our

research from data collection to the results derived from that data. We will not falsify,

fabricate or misrepresent any data collected. We will not discriminate or be biased to the

participants of our study on the basis of their race, nationality, gender and other

characteristics. We will strive for social responsibility by preventing any social harm of the

research to the participants, colleagues, and the public in general.

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References

Avolio, B., Rotundo, M. and Walumbwa, F. (2009). RETRACTED: Early life experiences as

determinants of leadership role occupancy: The importance of parental influence and rule

breaking behavior. ​The Leadership Quarterly​, 20(3), pp.329-342.

Bennis, W. (2009). ​On becoming a leader​ (revised edition). New York: Basic Books.

Conley, K. (2013). Looking for leadership.(ISSUE ORIENTED)(developing leadership

skills) ,. ​Learning & Leading with Technology​, 41(2), p.4.

Darling, J. and Fischer, A. (1998). Developing the management leadership team in a

multinational enterprise. ​European Business Review​, 98(2), pp.100-108.

Komives, S., Longerbeam, S., Owen, J., Mainella, F. and Osteen, L. (2006). A Leadership

Identity Development Model: Applications from a Grounded Theory​. Journal of College

Student Development​, 47(4), pp.401-418.

Kronz, E. (2014). Acquiring and developing leaders on a global or multinational scale.

Strategic HR Review​, 13(6), pp.249-254.

Creswell, J.W., 2002. ​Educational research: Planning, conducting, and evaluating

quantitative​ (pp. 146-166). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Glaser, B.G. and Strauss, A.L., 1967. The discovery of grounded theory: Strategies for

qualitative research. ​Chicago: Aldire​.

Saunders, M., Lewis, P.H.I.L.I.P. and Thornhill, A.D.R.I.A.N., 2007. Research methods.

Business Students 4th edition Pearson Education Limited, England​.

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