ESRC - Understanding Complex Leadership and Social Marketing in Nutritional Security

• In Event: 9th Annual Emerging Scholars Research Consortium

Short Description

Social marketing can change behaviors for the benefit of the greater good. Additionally, complex leadership can address complex adaptive systems and how different theoretical leadership frameworks enable societal changes (Lichtenstein, Uhl-Bien, Marion, Seers, Orton, & Schreiber, 2006). This poster will address the relationships among many different forces in nutritional security.

Detailed Abstract

Complex leadership creates a foundation for social marketers to develop plans to adequately influence changes among forces in food security. Nutritional security is essential in feeing a predicted population of 9 billion people by the year 2050. It is not just people’s access to food but nutritional food and it involves yield, educational awareness, access to transportation and cost of food.

Using a five systems approach with environment, food, social, economics, and health, complex leadership is need to evaluate each aspect of complex systems. The framework for complexity leadership theory addresses the intertwining forces that catalyze social change (Uhl-Bien, Marion & McKelvey, 2007). Adaptive leadership can be used within complex leadership in nutritional security because each of the five systems require different trains of thought to address each one effectively. The more someone tries to come up with a solution to this problem they realize how intertwined they are and one cannot be changed without affecting the other systems.

For example, hydroponics is a way to grow plants without soil and use an aerated nutrient rich solution to help the plants grow. It is a closed loop system that uses less water, fertilizers, and pesticides. From a nutritional security perspective, the adoption of hydroponics would allow for a decrease in the price of food because these systems could be installed in the center of cities for immediate access to healthy fruits and vegetables to help the food system. This in turn would increase the health of the population to become stronger than plagued but obesity, heart failure and other non-communicable diseases. By being in the city center transportation costs and their environmental effects would also decrease.

Using hydroponics as the context, social marketing is key to influencing movements and the adoptions of specific practices. Based off of Social marketing: influencing behaviors for good by Lee and Kotler (2008), how do we utilize their 10-step approach for developing and effective plan for the adoption and diffusion of innovative agricultural technologies? Additionally, leadership is essential in the social marketing process because it promotes change management, allows for leaders to empower their organizations and enables the increased capacity for community development. In this process, leaders must first look at themselves, their values, goals, and intentions to effective transform a behavior or mindset. Knowing where they are allows them to help the community/organization to grow.

When creating teams for effective change, complex leaders need members who are insightful, committed and capable (Lagarde, 2012). Insightful teams, are forever curious about how they can do things better and take the initiative to make those changes. Committed teams are invested in the cause no matter what and the leader can encourage the culture of the group in order to keep their members committed. Finally, capable teams allow their culture to thrive on communication. If there is no known direction for the group then it will fall apart. We have seen many examples of this such as Occupy Wall Street and Kony 2012.

Facilitators will come prepared with examples of successful social marketing campaigns as well as leadership theories that support the adoption of new ideas. Following these conversations, the participants come away with a better understand of the definition of social marketing, how leadership can provide the framework for a campaign and a structure to start a social marketing campaign on their own.

Participant

• Kayla Waldorff, University of Florida