ABSTRACT
It seems that educationalists have been unable to resist trying to shape leadership practice since Plato set up his Academy in fourth-century BC Athens (Grint 1997). This chapter describes and analyses a recent intervention – ‘corporate universities’ (CUs), an educational initiative often oriented towards the development of leaders. We examine interventions in four multinational companies and two UK public sector initiatives. The companies operate across continents, each employing tens of thousands of people, and each with its own corporate university; the public sector initiatives are intended to transform two of the largest areas of state provision. We explore how leadership development is prioritized within these initiatives and the methods used for developing leadership. We suggest that CU-based approaches have distinctive features, and consider the tensions and uncertainties associated with them. We suggest that CUs are an attempt to rationalize the mysterious aspects of leadership. Drawing on the work of German sociologist Max Weber (1978), we explore the desire to include the charismatic and the efforts made to manage, routinize, and transform charisma into something that can be educated for and developed.
