Ethical Leadership
What is ethical leadership?
Ethical leaders will strive for the highest common good. Ethical leaders diligently
reflect on their own experiences and welcome the lived experiences and contexts of
others. Ethical leaders inspire and act with care, authenticity, attention to equity
and courage, transparently embracing responsibility for moral decisions, behaviors
and actions. Ethical leadership has an imperative that all must use their influence
for the betterment of others without any demand of formal titles or official roles.
Developing Ethical Leadership
Examples could include:
- Makes decisions with integrity
- Deciding to do something the right way, not the easy way: Reflecting on past experiences, students can identify a moment in which they decided to do the right thing, even when that wasn’t the easy thing. For example, a student decided to uphold their integrity through academic honesty, completing the assignment in an ethical fashion, even if pressured to do otherwise. Or, a student leading a student organization who decides to listen to the feedback of the group and follow their input instead of making a decision that would better themselves and not the group.
- Leading with honesty: For example, a student leader in a lab group makes a mistake in the lab that leads the group to several wrong answers. After receiving feedback that the lab was done incorrectly, the student leader has the choice of owning the mistake or blaming the problem on another lab partner. Acting with integrity means owning the mistake and then doing whatever is possible to make it right.
- Exercises empathy
- Listening to a person with a different perspective and experience: One example of leading with empathy is listening to differing opinions. For example, in a class discussion, a student hears a viewpoint that is contrary to their own. Instead of responding with passivity by not saying anything, or instead of shooting down the other person’s perspective with all of your reasons why they are misguided, leading with empathy means that the student will ask questions, listen, and learn why the person has a differing perspective. As Covey (1989) writes, “Seek first to understand, then to be understood.”
- Serving others: Another way that students can lead with empathy is by serving the community. One student may decide to volunteer at Our Daily Bread (a local food and resource center), Pete’s Pantry (the OSU food pantry), Habitat for Humanity (a local organization that helps families build and own a home), or Wishes for Water (a student-created, student-run non-profit that ensures access to clean water for schools in rural Zimbabwe). By serving others, the student learns from those they are serving, hears new stories, sees through others' eyes and develops the skill of leading with empathy.
- Embraces accountability
- Leading a student organization: A student may choose to take on a formal leadership role in a student organization. In this role, the student must learn to be accountable to the goals of the group and the expectations of the university. Meetings must be scheduled, emails must be sent, programs need to be planned and the leadership is accountable for accomplishing the goals and fulfilling these responsibilities in an ethical and empathetic manner.
- Unfinished tasks: Another example could be a student on a research team. As a part of the research team, the student is accountable for getting work accomplished. However, this student gets overwhelmed with the workload and other competing priorities. They fall behind, fail to communicate an absence and continue to miss deadlines. Embracing accountability, the student schedules a meeting with the research supervisor and takes responsibility for not getting their work done. They accept the consequences of their mistakes, learn from their experience and offer solutions to rectify the problems. The student apologizes to the supervisor, their research group and then acts differently the next time they begin to get overwhelmed.
- Demonstrates moral courage
- Mental Health Awareness: For example, a student experiences mental health challenges. Instead of pretending that everything is ok, they have the courage to seek help and find the resources on campus that they need to succeed. This takes courage to act according to the shared value that mental health is a priority and must be openly talked about and engaged to provide a healthy environment for all to thrive.
- Inviting others in: One student might display moral courage by creating space for a colleague. For example, in a student project in which each student is required to present a portion of the project to the class, one group member is confident that they are the best presenter and claims the majority of the presentation, leaving the rest of the group members to have insignificant roles in the presentation. One student, acting with moral courage, addresses the group member, calling out the poor decision with respect and creates a new plan in which each group member has a valuable role. The decision to speak out takes great courage, and the value of creating space for other group members ensures equity.
Explore the competencies
In addition to ethical leadership, learn more about each of the additional competencies
that make up the Ideal Graduate.