Emergent leaders as managers of group emotion

This article proposes a new role for emergent group leaders, that of the manager of group emotions. This description of leadership suggests that individual group members take leadership by providing certainty and direction during times of ambiguity. They are able to assume a leadership role by making an interpretation of the emotional response that best serves the group's needs, and then modeling that response. By modeling a particular emotional response, the leader resolves ambiguity and catalyzes the group to act. Simultaneously, they are able to increase group solidarity by creating shared emotion within the group and communal action. The idea of leadership as group emotional management is not tied to one specific individual, but rather, allows leadership to be enacted by different group members at different times. Leader emergence and leader success would be subject to several conditions, such as the emergent leader's degree of empathy, group norms of emotional expression, and ambiguous feedback regarding the group's performance. Qualitative analysis of group observation reveals several examples of group emotional management that are used to develop the concept. Implications for theory and practice are discussed. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science Inc. All rights reserved.