Chapter 8: Putting The Visual Into The Social Construction Of Leadership

We live in an era in which visual images have become paramount, taking center stage in the news, politics, advertising, corporate communication, and media coverage of management concepts and events (Frosh, 2003; Merzoeff, 1999; Schroeder, 2002; Thompson, 2000; Thrift, 2000). In this context photographic images and portraits of top business leaders have become the wallpaper of corporate capitalism, plastered on newspapers, magazines, annual reports, newsletters, airport book jackets, and corporate websites. Many of these images appear so bland and so similar that we barely even notice them. But there must be a reason that they exist in such great numbers, and they don’t always appear so innocuous. The recent burning of portraits of Temasek Holdings CEO Ho Ching provides just one example. The shifting fortunes of celebrity CEOs and other business heroes often give rise to intense bouts of what we might call “visual politics,” symbolic contests in which photographic portraits of the executives in question play a prominent role.