Introduction
Leaders are facing unprecedented challenges in today’s global organizations to prove themselves in employees’ perception of being ethical leaders. Some conducts, which might be considered right in one organizational culture might be considered wrong in another. Normative appropriate conduct varies with societal and organizational culture (Yidong & Xinxin, 2013). Perception of leaders being ethical affects employees’ performance and innovative work behavior (Yidong & Xinxin, 2013). Global leaders should possess traits such as honesty, altruism, high moral values, transparency, integrity, and fairness to be respected by the followers as a role model (Cowart, Gilley, Avery, Barber, & Gilley, 2014; Yidong & Xinxin, 2013).
Leaders perceived to have internal value compass to guide them through the complex and ambiguous ethical dilemma times (Murty, 2014; Yidong & Xinxin, 2013).There are many religious and spiritual scriptures such as the Bible, the Bhagavad Gita, Dharma Sastra, or the Sutras of Patanjali, which form the ethical values of a human being (Yidong & Xinxin, 2013). Ethical leaders look for the greater good and are selflessly working to serve others. Ethical leaders are aware of their responsibilities and concern about society and environment (Weng, 2014). Ethical leaders possess charisma to influence their followers.
Transformational leadership model postulated that charismatic leaders have morality and ethical conduct as their core values (Weng, 2014).
Leaders are expected to act consistently with their vision and the values they advocate to their team. If a leader’s words or actions are contrary to the values they expect in others, they will be faced with cynicism and contempt. Followers expect their leader to act in their best interests, putting their welfare before their own. An ethical leader is honest, open and truthful to their followers. When leaders lose this trust, their followers will quickly disregard them.
Leaders can achieve an understanding of ethics, this paper will analyze how personal ethics are built from virtues, morals, values, and principles. Then, how ethics begin and continue for people and understanding the importance of ethics will be examined. How to serve as a role model in making ethical decisions is shown with a step-by-step process of how a leader develops a template for ethical decision-making.
This paper will first discuss briefly what ethics are and provide the definition for an ethical issue. An ethical leadership issue is identified and explained for this author’s practice area. We will then identify and discuss key strategies for leadership that are pertinent to the ethical issue. Next, empirical evidence which supports the strategies discussed will be analyzed. Then, the impact and importance of the strategies will be stated. The final step will be to provide a conclusion to the reader that summarizes the content and strategies.
Leaders that demonstrate a commitment to behaving in an ethical manner are viewed as trustworthy and subordinates gravitate toward them. Ethical leaders have a foundational belief in honesty and trustworthiness and disseminating these principles throughout the organization. This paper will present ethical leadership models as tools for merging diverse cultures into the existing organizational culture. An overview of which leadership models, styles, and traits are most commonly accepted as ethical across the greatest array of social cultures will be discussed. The paper will culminate with a selection of a particular leadership model as a tool for shaping organizational culture and the rationale for selecting that model.
Transformational leaders provide a sense of vision and mission, they have the capability to inspire through communication of high expectations, stimulate the use of intelligence for problem solving, and provide personal attention and coaching for followers. This type of leadership is concerned with emotions, values ethics, standards and long term goals (p.185). “Charismatic leaders act in unique ways that have specific charismatic effects on their followers”(p.188). Charismatic leaders are strong role models for the beliefs and values they want their followers to adopt.
Ethical leaders espouse moral values, altruism, civic virtue, good citizenship behavior and conscientiousness both in their personal and professional lives. They imbibe the same core values in their followers. They demonstrate moral judgement in their decision making process, influenced by the long term interest of the stake holders. Also ethical leaders hold their followers accountable for their conduct and establish a reward and vicarious learning process for ethical conducts
In this article, the reader will be enlightened on (a) two definitions (explanations) for ethical leadership described by researchers, (b) how leadership is measured, (c) assess how ethical leadership relates to several leadership styles, and (d) concluding thoughts on how moral strength through ethical leadership is hoped to be seen in the future.
Transformational leadership is used by a leader to “appeal to the moral values of followers in an attempt to raise their consciousness about ethical issues and to mobilize their energy and resources to reform institutions” (Yukl “Charismatic” 261). Pseudotransformational leadership refers to transformational leadership, but when the leader is “self-consumed, exploitive, power-oriented, [and] possess[es] warped values” (Hinz). When a leader appeals to followers’ self-interest and offers an exchange of benefits, the leader is utilizing transactional leadership (Yukl “Charismatic” 261).
The objective of this essay is to critically discuss that the 'best ' organisational cultures lead to the 'best ' organisational performance using concepts and examples trough analysis of empiric studies.
In order to be a successful ethical leader there are many activities that can be promoted to encourage ethical behavior in one’s organization. An ethical leader will create programs that endorse integrity in business. Programs can include setting guidelines for dealing with ethical issues, open discussion on ethical issues, and establish a protocol for people to get advice (Yukl, 2010). By establishing programs an ethical leader is really changing and encouraging moral behavior which can affect an organizations work environment and improve moral. By empowering your employees to know how to handle ethical dilemmas you create a new found trust.
..........................10 Sources of Data Limitation ..........................................................................................10 Chapter- 2 Literature Review...............................................................................................11 Definition of Organizational Culture................................................................................12 Organizational Culture.................................................................................................13 Analyzing Organizational Culture....................................................................................15 Organizational Culture Profile .........................................................................................16 Type of Organizational Culture .......................................................................................17 Elements of Organization Culture....................................................................................18 Healthy Organizational Culture .......................................................................................20 Organizational Culture Questionnaire ..............................................................................22 What Is A Healthy Organizational Culture?.....................................................................23 Organizational Culture Perspective..................................................................................24 Definition of Socialization
Leaders who are ethical are people-oriented, and also aware of how their decisions impact others, and use their social power to serve the greater good instead of self-serving interests.
The objectives of this research are to examine the influence of organizational culture on employee work behavior. Moreover, there are to explain the influence that organizational culture has on employee work behavior, to formulate recommendations regarding organizational culture and employee work behavior. There are a few questions that were asked, in order to measure the result. In addition, the method was used in this research is a survey research method. Plus, respondents were selected by using stratified and simple random sampling techniques. Primary data were collected through questionnaire. Data were presented and analyzed by means of simple percentage and the hypotheses were tested by
I will examine the importance of personal ethics in leadership and how ethics produce effective leaders in organizations today. The importance of understanding ethics, motivation to act as a role model and developing a plan of action for an organization are discussed because of their importance regarding development of good leadership. These key points suggest personal ethics positively affect leadership and when made a priority for leaders will produce ethical and effective leadership. With so many definitions of leadership, the question evolved from “what is the definition of leadership?” to “what is good leadership” (Ciulla, 2004, p. 13). To develop a system of values one must compile a list of the most important instrumental values and terminal values. These lists are unique to every individual because they are determined by personal importance. Instrumental values, such as honest, helpful, ambitious, responsible, etc. should reinforce terminal values. Once a leader’s means are consistent with desired goals, their value system is unified and they have climbed the staircase from the lobby to the first level of values. The climb from the first floor to the second floor results in a person incorporating principles into their newly developed values. Although values act as the bedrock of ethics, principles are required because alone, “values are far too vague to have much meaning in ethical analysis” (Cooper, 1998, p. 12). Morals are ideals that help us decipher between right
The maintenance of ethical behavior when in a leadership situation becomes difficult when leaders are operating in a weak or non-existent value system. Brown (2005) exposes various reasons which make leaders behave unethically. According to him, leaders are expected to lead by example since all subordinates have to follow what the leaders prospect. However, there are instances where these leaders behave in an unethical manner because of various reasons. As the author argues, it is clear for leaders with strong, virtuous values to act ethically because their values define their character. Conversely, if the leaders are operating in a weak or non-existent value system, they tend to act unethically. Therefore, the author asserts the organization to be leading in destabilizing factors that make leaders to behave dishonorably. If the organization does not actively promote the universally accepted values such as wisdom, self-control, justice, and kindness, most leaders who are also weak in values follow suit and embrace unethical behavior. These are the kind of leaders likely not to enhance honesty, fairness, equality, and dignity for personal gains.