Abstract
This paper brings empirical and theoretical studies of ethical leadership into conversation with one another in an effort to determine the antecedent(s) to perceived ethical leadership. Employing a Levinasian perspective, I argue that ethical leadership entails being faced with the impossible task of realizing the needs of many individual others. For this reason, I argue, perceived ethical leadership is grounded in an employee’s perception that a leader struggles to make decisions based on the conflicting demands placed upon her. More important than the result of a leader’s decision is the degree to which the leader demonstrates concern for the well-being of others in her decision-making process. I ground my discussion through reference to results of empirical studies on behaviors associated with ethical leadership, including Brown, Treviño, and Harrison (2005), Kalshoven, Den Hartog, and De Hoogh (2011a), and Treviño, Hartman, and Brown (2000). I identify several mediating factors which may influence employee perception of ethical leadership, proposing avenues for further research which can help to clarify the relationship between concrete leadership behaviors and perceived ethical leadership.
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Notes
For further discussion of how Levinas’ conception of personal responsibility can be brought to bear on our understanding of maintaining ethical relationships in a business environment, see Tajalli and Segal (2019). For the implications of the Levinasian conception of justice with regard to the institutional issues of whistleblowing and restorative justice, see Loumansky and Lewis (2013) and Faldetta (2019), respectively. Trezise and Biesta (2009), meanwhile, offer a pedagogical perspective on the role of Levinasian relationships in contemporary management ethics.
The term “transformative” is not agreed upon by all scholars working in the field. Burns (1978), for example, employs the phrase “transforming” leadership, whereas Avolio and Bass defend a conception of “transformational” leadership. While each term registers different connotations, I use transformative to generally refer to this constellation of views without taking a stance regarding the appropriateness of one term over the others, an issue which extends beyond the scope of this discussion.
Notably, Mayer et al. (2012) set out to demonstrate, and provide research in support of, the idea that a leader’s moral identity – i.e. how she sees herself and regulates her behavior based on internalized notions of right and wrong – is a significant antecedent to perceived ethical leadership (p. 152). This is an important finding, but it also raises the question of what it means for a leader to identify herself as moral. Furthermore, it leads to the question of how and in what sense employees perceive the moral identity of their leaders. Thus, on its own, the study doesn’t provide a clear answer to the question of the cause of perceived ethical leadership.
For the purpose of efficiency, I focus here on the leadership behaviors of people orientation, empowerment, fairness (associated with trustworthiness and justice), and ethical guidance. Related arguments can be made that role clarification, integrity, and concern for sustainability are grounded in the perception of ethical deliberation, but a more thorough analysis of these conditions is reserved for a separate discussion.
For further phenomenological analysis of the first-personal experience of trust, see Steinbock (2014).
There exists significant literature establishing the connection between religious beliefs and personal values with respect to workplace behavior and maintaining professional relationships; see, for example, Kamoche and Pinnington (2012); Smallwood (2002); and Karjalainen, Islam, and Holm (2019). Relatedly, Mayer et al. (2012) suggest that employees are more likely to emulate the behavior of ethical role models than unethical ones insofar as they observe what types of behavior are expected of them. These studies provide evidence in support of the suggestion that there may be a significant relationship between role models, previous leader-follower relationships, and perceived ethical leadership.
Evidence that suggests there may be a significant relationship between perceived workplace ethical cultures and perceived ethical leadership can be found in: Brown and Mitchell (2010), who argue that employees tend to reciprocate ethical leadership with higher levels of ethical behavior and citizenship behaviors and are less likely to engage in destructive behavior such as workplace deviance; Tanner et al. (2010) and Demirtas et al. (2017), who demonstrate a positive correlation between perceived ethical leadership behavior and organizational identification and commitment; and Walumbwa et al. (2011), who demonstrate that organizational identification and leader-member exchange mediate the relationship between perceived ethical leadership and task performance, suggesting that an employee whom a leader treats well is likely to want to perform well in return, to reciprocate prosocial behavior, and to exert effort on the behalf of the perceived ethical supervisor.
Indirect evidence of a negative correlation between perceived ethical leadership and preferential treatment can be found in Kannan-Narasimhan and Lawrence (2012), who demonstrate that behavioral integrity – alignment between leaders’ words and deeds – has a positive influence on organizational citizenship behavior. This suggests that a leader’s failure to live up to professed notions of fairness can lead to the perception that the leader has failed to “walk the talk.” Thau et al. (2013), meanwhile, demonstrate that group members who receive preferential behavior are more likely to engage in prosocial behavior than those who are treated equally to their peers; however, their study does not look at the effects of perceived preferential treatment on the behavior of employees who do not receive that treatment. For a relevant discussion of the effects of leader-follower conflict on employees’ behaviors and attitudes towards one another, see Yang (2020).
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Steiner, C. The Influence of Demonstrated Concern on Perceived Ethical Leadership: A Levinasian Approach. Philosophy of Management 19, 447–467 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40926-020-00139-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40926-020-00139-9