Facing the music: Strategic leadership in Australian opera

Abstract

The Australian opera industry faces entrenched business challenges in an increasingly volatile, uncertain and complex world; challenges that both impede its ability to deliver an in-demand contemporary art form and that make such a transformation imperative. To further both evidence-based research knowledge and practitioner competency in this field, this study focuses on strategic leadership in the executive management echelon of Australian opera companies; on those leaders who are responsible for building a connection between strategic thinking and action to sustain and transform an organisation. To this end, Adaptive Leadership Theory (ALT; Heifetz, 1994) is employed as the conceptual framework to analyse the extent to which opera leaders are aware of adaptive challenges and demonstrate ALT-prescribed adaptive behaviours and, hence, to offer appropriate evidence-based prescriptions for greater adaptive leadership practice in the industry. The study applies an interview-based qualitative methodology and a positivist episteme to gather and interpret rich, experiential data from 24 executive-level opera leaders. Results show that while most of these leaders typically have a high level of adaptive awareness, it was less common for this awareness to translate to adaptive action. Further, results indicate that leaders’ occupational background does affect the degree of adaptive awareness and associated adaptive behaviours. The study makes two main contributions to research knowledge and theory in the field. First, it applies the lens of ALT to build on existing arts literature, contributing to an evolving conceptualisation of arts leadership with a strong consideration of both leader background and organisational context. Second, this study adds to ALT by focusing on the intra-individual factors that may be relevant to explaining why leaders with adaptive awareness do, or do not, engage in adaptive action. We draw on Reasoned Action Theory to address this gap in the theory of adaptive leadership. The study also makes three specific recommendations for more effective strategic leadership practice in the opera industry and, by implication, in the arts sector generally.