THE IMPORTANCE OF CONTEXT - QUALITATIVE RESEARCH AND THE STUDY OF LEADERSHIP

The use of qualitative research in the study of leadership is growing and its impact on the field is beginning to be felt. This article outl ines some of the advantages of qualitative investigations of leadershi p and reports the results of an investigation of police leadership in England in which a qualitative approach was employed. Drawing on ideas from the New Leadership approach, data deriving from semi-structured interviews with a sample of police officers were analyzed in terms of concepts deriving from typical New Leadership findings. While many fin dings were consistent with New Leadership approaches, some important d ivergences emerged too. For example, charisma emerged as much less pro minent in notions of what makes an effective leader than might have be en expected from New Leadership research; by contrast, instrumental le adership was far more pervasive in police officers' thinking as centra l to effective leadership. The reasons for such findings are speculate d upon, particularly with respect to the sensitivity to context that i s a feature of qualitative research.