Cultural intelligence as a global leadership competency in disruptive contexts

Called upon to navigate their respective organizations through extreme and more frequent disruptive contexts, global leaders must leverage cross-cultural capabilities or cultural intelligence (CQ) to drive effective performance outcomes. This chapter offers a review of the extant research on CQ for global leaders and the impact of CQ competencies for how leaders effectively navigate disruptive contexts. We discuss the empirical research on CQ and leadership practices, and how CQ has been examined as an antecedent, moderator, mediator, and outcome in leadership studies. We then propose a model of CQ and leadership practices that illustrates CQ competencies, leadership practices, and performance outcomes across four disruptive contexts: (a) crises; (b) diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives; (c) strategic change and joint ventures/alliances; and (d) organizational innovation. For each disruptive context, we develop propositions for advancing theory and research on the role and impact of CQ for global leadership practices.