Preface

As editor of this book, I was privileged to invite colleagues from all over the world to contribute to *Social Work - Perspectives on Leadership and Organisation*. I could not have imagined the huge response received. Researchers engaged in different aspects of social work wanted to participate and share their perspectives. Authors from different parts of the world have contributed their own experiences and knowledge gained from research and practical experiences in social work leadership and organization. This has resulted in a book that combines multi-science perspectives, theories and experiences from a variety of social work practices in a fantastic mix of reflections on social work.

As a professor in social work, a former head of a department responsible for developing social work courses, including curriculum development and research at different universities, and as a former social work manager and director of home-help care for older adults and people with disabilities, I have read and followed the writing process of the chapters with great interest.

As a reader, you can look forward to a book that provides you with a comprehensive overview of social work leadership and organization as theoretical subjects, as well as of social work as a field of practice. Hopefully, it will give you an opportunity to reflect on different perspectives and deepen your understanding of the complexity of social work. The purpose of this book is to highlight social work from an alternative perspective, one that is not usually seen. By focusing on leadership and organization, the ambition is to broaden knowledge of the ethical dilemmas which managers in social work have to handle in their daily practice and the challenges of organizing a positive environment for staff members and service users, often against the background of an economy under pressure. There are similarities and differences, both within social work itself and in comparison with leadership and with other organizations in general. From my perspective, a great deal of knowledge can be gained from leadership and organizational theories in general, but there is also the knowledge that is specific to social work. This book aims to contribute to furthering this knowledge with different perspectives on social work leadership and organization. Although different contexts of social work leadership and organization are described in this book, there are common challenges related to social work as a profession.

This book aims to give you plenty of opportunities to reflect on different situations and I hope it will bring inspiration to students, social workers, politicians, lecturers, researchers and others on how to manage, lead and organize social work in the future. Of course, I also hope it will be of great interest to those for whom social work leadership and organizations are there.

Finally, I want to thank the IntechOpen team for the opportunity to edit this book and for your support during the process. I also want to thank all the chapter authors who have contributed their time and shared their passion, knowledge and experience in this field of social work leadership and organization from different perspectives. I am happy to be part of this global collaboration.
