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Leadership In The Accountability Era: Resisting Values Drift Through Deliberate System Design, Christine Haskell

The Journal of Values-Based Leadership

This study introduces values drift— the gradual, often unconscious misalignment between actions and stated commitments, driven less by misconduct than by lack of awareness, inertia, or performance pressure. As an emerging leadership risk, values drift is increasingly amplified by algorithmic influence and efficiency metrics. This research extends the Values Lifecycle Framework to examine how leaders sustain values alignment in high-velocity, data-driven environments. Through qualitative interviews with 19 CEOs, three leadership typologies emerged: Defaulters, who maintain stability through routine; Correctors, who stand at pivotal choice points where recognition and response are possible but not guaranteed; and Balancers, who embed …

Evolving Leadership And Increased Wisdom – Understanding Ethical Leadership, Tangela Rutledge, Cam Caldwell

The Journal of Values-Based Leadership

Laying the foundation for understanding ethical leadership, we begin this paper by identifying a framework for understanding the leader’s roles based upon five dimensions for understanding leadership’s duties and responsibilities. We present a model for ethical decision making that addresses the complex factors of ethical decision-making based upon a virtuous continuum. We then review five levels of leadership identified by Jim Collins (2001) in his research about leaders – identifying the special significance of Level 5 leaders who enabled their companies to evolve from “Good” to “Great.” We describe the characteristics of leaders in each of Collins’ five leadership levels …

Summer/Fall 2025

The Journal of Values-Based Leadership

No abstract provided.

Book Review: Leadership At The Spiritual Edge: Emerging And Non-Western Concepts Of Leadership And Spirituality, Susan E. Brownlee

The Journal of Values-Based Leadership

Abstract

Leadership at the Spiritual Edge: Emerging and Non-Western Concepts of Leadership and Spirituality is a recent collection of thoughtful contributions by scholars and practitioners that study and work at the intersection of leadership and spirituality. The book was edited by Mohammed Raei (leadership and organization development consultant based in Jordan), Stacey Guenther (leadership coach and affiliated faculty at George Mason University), and Lisa Berkley (founding president of the Institute for Inner Economy and faculty at University of California, Santa Cruz). The book’s dominate themes encompass compassion for self and others, wholeness of mind, body and spirit, and promoting the …

A Comparative Analysis Of Values-Based Leadership Theories: A Review And Future Research Agenda, Simon Tareke Abay, Jorge F. S. Gomes, Abeba Beyene Mengistu

The Journal of Values-Based Leadership

This paper systematically reviews the literature on values-based leadership (VBL) theories by analyzing 161 studies published in different peer-review journals from 2000 to 2022. The study first identified the literature on VBL and found that terms “values-oriented, values-centered, or value-based” leadership are used interchangeably as a roof term for various theories focusing on the moral, authentic, principled, and ethical dimension of leadership. The literature on leadership offers different types of leadership theories that constitute VBL, but we focused on six leadership theories that are widely cited as forms of VBL and have a strong theoretical background. This was followed by …

Academic Leadership: Gatekeeping Or Groundskeeping?, Beronda L. Montgomery

The Journal of Values-Based Leadership

Common approaches to academic leadership include serving as assessors of the progress of individuals towards organizationally determined milestones and markers of success. Likewise, leadership development often focuses on leadership skills and tactics, rather than on cultivation and enactment of leadership philosophies and progressive vision. Here, I discuss the importance of cultivating leadership for progressive faculty and academic staff development through strategically tending the cultures and systems that one leads, in addition to tactical supervision of people. I describe this as systems-engaged leadership manifested as groundskeeping, or as attending to the individuals in an organization while simultaneously actively tending the ecosystems …

Meaning Management: A Framework For Leadership Ontology, Muhittin Oral

The Journal of Values-Based Leadership

Leadership is a multifaceted and complex subject of research and demands a sound ontological stance that guides studies for the development of more integrative leadership theories. In this paper, I propose the leadership ontology PVA (perception formation – value creation – achievement realization) and associate it with the two existing leadership ontologies: TRIPOD (leader – member – shared goals) and DAC (direction – alignment – commitment). The leadership ontology PVA, based on a new theory called “meaning management,” consists of three circularly supporting functions: cognitive function to form perception, creative function to generate value, and communicative function to …

When Leadership Leads To Loathing: The Effect Of Culturally (In)Congruent Leadership On Employee Contempt And Voluntary Work Behaviors, Berit Sund, Rune Lines

The Journal of Values-Based Leadership

This article suggests that contempt ― a proclivity towards loathing others ― as an emotional response, can arise as a consequence of culturally incongruent leadership, i.e. leader behaviors and actions that do not comply with follower-held, culturally derived expectations and values. Outcomes of contempt were also studied by hypothesizing that contempt, when experienced in response to a situation of culturally incongruent leadership, can cause followers to reduce their display of organizational citizenship behaviors (OCB) while engaging in deviant behaviors. The model was tested in a sample of 348 follower-level employees using structural equation modeling. Empirical results largely support theoretical hypotheses. …

Spot Your Leadership Style – Build Your Leadership Brand, M. S. Rao

The Journal of Values-Based Leadership

The purpose of the research paper is to present various leadership styles with illustrations of international leader types. It helps the reader spot a particular leadership style for building a leadership brand. It attempts to motivate senior level leaders to appreciate what style of leadership is essential in the current scenario.

Appalachian Farmers: Building Value From Values, Natalie Shubert, Amy Taylor-Blanco, Ana L. Rosado Feger

The Journal of Values-Based Leadership

This trio of authors has presented a microcosm of values-based shared business practices, involving local food production and distribution in a small, rural Appalachian region in the United States. They focus upon the collective activities of a group committed to advancing local business practices while eliminating unnecessary transportation costs, boosting the region’s economic infrastructure, and most importantly, bringing people together to share experiences and pass along knowledge designed to benefit their communities and generate a sustainable agricultural-based economy.