Write a brief summary of the important concepts you learned from chapter 4 & 5. (Chapter 4 & 5 summary attached and textbook attached)

5-1Copyright © 2015 McGraw-Hill Education. All rights reserved. No reproduction or distribution without the prior written consent of McGraw-Hill Education.

5-2

Values, Ethics, and Character

“Leadership cannot just go along to get

along… Leadership must meet the moral

challenge of the day.”

~Jesse Jackson

C h

a p

te r

5

5-3

Introduction

• Leaders can use power for good or ill.

• A leader’s personal values and ethical code

may be the most important determinants of how

that leader exercises available power sources.

• Recent scandals involving political, business,

and religious figures highlight the need to

consider values and ethics in terms of

leadership.

• Scholarly and popular literature have turned

greater attention to the question of ethical

leadership.

5-4

Leadership and “Doing the Right Things”

• Leaders face dilemmas that require choices

between competing sets of values and

priorities.

• Leaders set a moral example that becomes the

model for an entire group or organization.

• Leaders should internalize a strong set of

ethics—principles of right conduct or a system

of moral values.

• Gardner and Burns stress the centrality and

importance of the moral dimension of

leadership.

5-5

Leadership and “Doing the Right Things” (continued)

• Four qualities of leadership engender trust:

– Vision

– Empathy

– Consistency

– Integrity

• Two contrasting sets of assumptions people

make about human nature:

– Theory X asserts that most people need extrinsic

motivation because they are not naturally motivated to

work.

– Theory Y asserts that most people are intrinsically

motivated by their work.

5-6

Values

• Values are “constructs representing generalized

behaviors or states of affairs that are

considered by the individual to be important.”

• Values are learned through socialization,

become internalized, and affect behavior.

• People in an organization vary in the relative

importance they place on values.

– Instrumental values refer to modes of behavior (being

helpful, being responsible).

– Terminal values refer to desired end states (family

security, social recognition).

5-7

Values (continued)

• Pervasive influences of broad forces at a

particular time tend to create common value

systems.

– This may contribute to misunderstandings and tension

during interactions between older leaders and

younger followers.

• Each generation is molded by distinctive

experiences at their critical developmental

periods.

– The Veterans (1922–1943)

– The Baby Boomers (1942–1960)

– The Gen Xers (1961–1981)

– Millennials (1982–2005)

5-8

Values (continued)

• Gen Xers have a clearly different view of

authority than previous generations.

– Leadership is viewed as removing obstacles and

giving followers what they need to work.

– Leaders must “earn their stripes” rather than advance

by seniority.

• Research has found little evidence of a

generation gap in basic values.

• Studies show that Boomers, Xers, and

Milliennials in the managerial workforce are

more similar than different in their views of

organizational leadership.

5-9

Moral Reasoning and Character- Based Leadership

• An important consideration is how people think

and act concerning matters of right and wrong.

• Moral reasoning is the process leaders use to

make decisions about ethical and unethical

behaviors i.e. the manner by which they solve

moral dilemmas.

• Value differences often result in different

judgments regarding ethical and unethical

behavior.

• Not everyone fully develops their moral

judgment.

5-10

Moral Reasoning and Character- Based Leadership (continued)

• Unconscious biases may affect moral

judgments, which is why many organizations

are developing programs to develop moral

decision-making competence among leaders.

• Effectiveness of such programs depends on

understanding the moral decision-making

process, which is complex.

• Greene suggests a dual-process theory of

moral judgment.

– Moral judgments dealing with rights or duties are

made by automatic emotional responses while those

made on a utilitarian basis are made more cognitively.

5-11

Moral Reasoning and Character- Based Leadership (continued)

• A common but challenging ethical dilemma

involves choosing between two “rights.”

• Kidder identified four common ethical dilemmas.

– Truth vs. loyalty – honestly answering a question that

may compromise confidentiality

– Individual vs. community –compromising the rights of

an individual for the good of the community

– Short-term vs. long-term – balancing spending time

with family against making career investments for future

benefits

– Justice vs. mercy –excusing a person’s behavior due

to extenuating circumstances or convicting to teach a

lesson

5-12

Moral Reasoning and Character- Based Leadership (continued)

• Kidder offers three principles for resolving ethical

dilemmas.

– Ends-based thinking – “Do what’s best for the greatest

number of people.” It is also known as utilitarianism.

– Rule-based thinking – It is consistent with Kantian

philosophy and is characterized as “following the

highest principle or duty.”

– Care-based thinking – “Do what you want others to do

to you.” It is similar to the Golden Rule of conduct

common in some form to many world religions.

5-13

Moral Reasoning and Character- Based Leadership (continued)

• Research has identified 4 biases that affect our

moral decision making.

– Implicit prejudice refers to subconscious prejudices

that affect our decisions without us being aware of

them.

– In-group favoritism involves doing acts of kindness

and favors for those who are like us.

– Overclaiming credit involves overrating the quality of

our own work and contributions.

– Conflicts of interest adversely impact ethical

judgments and bias our perceptions of situations.

5-14

Moral Reasoning and Character- Based Leadership (continued)

• When people behave badly, they use the

following methods to interpret their behavior in a

self-protective way.

– Moral justification

– Euphemistic labeling

– Advantageous comparison

– Displacement or diffusion of responsibility

– Disregard or distortion of consequences

– Dehumanization

– Attribution of blame

5-15

Moral Reasoning and Character- Based Leadership (continued)

• Moral potency has three key components.

– Moral ownership is a felt sense of responsibility not

only for the ethical nature of one’s own behavior but

also for one’s commitment not to allow unethical

things to happen within one’s broader sphere of

influence.

– Moral courage refers to the fortitude to face risk and

overcome fears associated with taking ethical action.

– Moral efficacy is the confidence in one’s capability to

mobilize personal, interpersonal, and other external

resources to persist despite moral adversity.

5-16

Character-Based Approaches to Leadership (continued)

• Avolio asserts that there are two components of

ethical leadership.

– The moral person is a principled decision maker who

cares about people and the broader society.

– The moral manager makes ethics an explicit part of

the leadership agenda by communicating messages

of ethics and values and by modeling ethical behavior.

• There is new interest in leadership approaches

that are based on the interdependence between

effective leadership and certain value systems.

– Authentic leadership

– Servant leadership

5-17

Character-Based Approaches to Leadership (continued)

• Authentic leadership is based on the notion of

“to thine own self be true.”

• Authentic leaders are self-aware and self-

consciously align their actions with their inner

values.

• The study of authentic leadership has gained

momentum because of the following beliefs:

– Enhancing self-awareness can help people in

organizations find more meaning at work

– Promoting transparency and openness in relationships

builds trust and commitment

– Fostering more inclusive structures and practices can

help build more positive ethical climates

5-18

Character-Based Approaches to Leadership (continued)

• Servant leadership views serving others to be

the leader’s role.

• Ten characteristics describe servant leaders:

– Listening

– Empathy

– Healing

– Awareness

– Persuasion

– Conceptualization

– Foresight

– Stewardship

– Commitment to others’ growth

– Building community

5-19

The Roles of Ethics and Values in Organizational Leadership

• The top leadership’s collective values play a

significant role in determining the dominant

values throughout the organization.

• Many of the most difficult decisions made by

leaders are choices between opposing values.

• A leader must set a personal example of

values-based leadership and ensure that clear

values guide everyone’s behavior in an

organization.

5-20

Leading by Example: the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

• One of the most quoted principles of good

leadership is “leadership by example.”

• Research shows that ethical role models are

characterized by four general categories of

attitudes and behaviors:

– Interpersonal behaviors: show care, concern, and

compassion for others.

– Basic fairness: show fairness to others

– Ethical actions and self-expectations: hold themselves

to high ethical standards

– Articulating ethical standards: articulate a consistent

ethical vision and are uncompromising toward it

5-21

Leading by Example: the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (continued)

• Upward ethical leadership involves individuals

showing leadership by taking actions to uphold

ethical standards when higher-ups misbehave.

• The general quality of an organization’s ethical

climate affects whether or not employees raise

ethical concerns.

– In ethical climates, ethical standards/norms are

consistently and clearly communicated, embraced,

and enforced by organizational leaders.

– In unethical climates, unethical behavior exists with

little corrective action, and misbehavior may even be

condoned.

5-22

Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Climate

• Five “fronts” of leadership action are required to

create an ethical climate.

– Formal ethics policies and procedures – formal

statements of ethical standards/policies, reporting

mechanisms, disciplinary procedures, and penalties

– Core ideology – organization’s purpose, guiding

principles, basic identity, and most important values

– Integrity – core ideology is congruent with all public and

private actions throughout the organization

– Structural reinforcement – organization’s structure and

systems encourage higher ethical performance and

discourage unethical performance

– Process focus – how goals are achieved is as important

as achievement

5-23

Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Climate (continued)

• Principle–centered leadership asserts a

fundamental interdependence between the personal, interpersonal, managerial, and organizational levels of

leadership.

– Personal: Be a trustworthy person in terms of both

character and competence.

– Interpersonal: A lack of trust leads to self-protective

efforts to control and verify each other’s behavior.

– Managerial: Empowering others requires a trusting

relationship, team building, delegation, communication,

negotiation, and self-management.

– Organizational: Creativity requires that the

organization’s structure, systems (training, reward,

communication), strategy, and vision be aligned and

mutually supportive.

5-24

Summary

• There is a relationship between ethics, values

and leadership.

• It is not just the content of what one believes is

right and wrong, but how one makes moral or

ethical judgments.

• Ethical dilemmas often involve a choice between

two “rights” rather than right and wrong.

• Recent research has explored the

interdependencies between effective leadership

and particular value systems.