| Title |
Business leadership in public social service organizations: implementing and sustaining social innovations |
| Authors |
Čižikienė, Janina |
| DOI |
10.61093/10(1).1-20.2026 |
| Full Text |
|
| Is Part of |
Business ethics and leadership.. Hamburg : Academic Research and Publishing. 2026, vol. 10, iss. 1, p. 1-20.. ISSN 2520-6761. eISSN 2520-6311 |
| Keywords [eng] |
business leadership ; change management ; cross-sectoral collaboration ; innovation sustainability ; leadership ; organizational learning ; social innovations |
| Abstract [eng] |
Business leadership is increasingly central to debates on organizational sustainability and innovation governance within public social service systems facing complex accountability and resource pressures. Despite the growing body of research on social innovation and leadership, business leadership remains insufficiently conceptualized in terms of how leadership practices become institutionalized in everyday organizational routines during the sustainment of social innovations, particularly in emotionally intensive public service environments. The purpose of this study is to examine how managers initiate, implement, and embed social innovations and to identify the leadership mechanisms that enable their long-term institutionalization. Empirical data were collected in September 2025 in Lithuania through semi-structured interviews with 7 managers (n=7) of public social service organizations; all participants had more than 5 years of managerial experience and direct responsibility for innovation processes. The study employed semi-structured interviews and qualitative thematic analysis, with manual coding and systematic cross-case comparison across seven cases (n=7). All seven managers (7/7) emphasized articulating vision and sustaining meaning-making as the primary mechanisms through which business leadership connects innovation initiatives to professional identity and organizational direction. Six managers (6/7) identified employee empowerment and the deliberate cultivation of a learning culture as key mechanisms transforming innovation from episodic change into routinized practice. Five managers (5/7) highlighted interorganizational collaboration and adaptive process restructuring as decisive conditions preventing innovation fragmentation and supporting long-term integration. These findings reconceptualize business leadership in public governance contexts as a relational and integrative practice that operates across cognitive, structural, and collaborative domains, thereby extending current leadership and innovation sustainability theory. |
| Published |
Hamburg : Academic Research and Publishing |
| Type |
Journal article |
| Language |
English |
| Publication date |
2026 |
| CC license |
|
