Change Leadership: A Social Identity Perspective

This chapter takes a social identity perspective on change leadership. Although leading change is considered to be an essential part of leadership in general, the empirical literature on this topic is relatively sparse. Yet, the social identity perspective provides valuable insights into this topic, in particular, shedding light on why individuals resist or support change and how leaders can play a role in facilitating positive change pathways. Drawing on this literature, we develop a multi-identity pathway model, which outlines how leaders can enable employee change adjustment by enhancing perceptions of identity continuity and identity gain during change processes. This model further explores the identity management behaviors that leaders can employ to inspire support for change, and the different (organizational, team, and occupational) identity foci that may facilitate positive change reactions. Finally, we discuss whether shared or distributed models of leadership are feasible leadership mechanisms in fostering strong post-change support among employees.