Ethical Leadership: With Great Influence, Comes Great Impact

If there’s a physical line drawn out to differentiate between what’s good and what’s bad, or what’s pure and what’s evil, God must have been the person who drew that line. Without question, God stands as our moral guideline. He is the artist of moral absolutes. As believers, we function around God’s standards of morality.

Now, what about ethics?

Most people would say that ethics birth forth from the philosophical study of moral values and rules. In other words, the principles of what is right and what is wrong are man-made. Whether you call it ethics, morality or value-systems, in any angle you see them, it still boils down to the very fact that God is the linchpin of moral absolutes. Well, at least for us Christians, we hold on to that belief.

When it comes to one’s personal ethics, essentially it does not only affect how that particular person functions but more than that, their ethics directly affects the people around him as well. More so if that person is in a leadership position, which leads me to my main subject matter – ethical leadership.

What exactly is ethical leadership?

Ethical leadership is defined as “knowing your core values and having the courage to live them in all parts of your life in service of the common good.” (Extracted from Center of Ethical Leadership). If we dissect it into smaller components, we will see that it involves 3 key elements:

(1.) "knowing your core values" which relates to the mind
(2.) "living them out in ALL parts of your life" which relates to action and
(3.) "for the good of everyone around you" which relates to impacting others.

Point 1 involves the anatomy of the mind. The leader needs to know from what, where or who did he get his source of principles, ethics and morality. Factors such as family upbringing, groups of friends and temperaments all play its part to one’s ethics but ultimately, as believers, God must still serve as the integral part of them all. Look at Hitler for instance, his guideline to morality and ethics obviously strayed away from God’s, yet he believed it to be true to the point of killing millions. Why? Simply because he permitted his mind to form its own sets of ethics/morality. Point 2 is the consequence of point 1 – from ‘knowing’, it flows down to the ‘doing’. Hitler had his own principles, now, what did he do about it? He initiated the great holocaust. That was his action plan. If point 2 is the consequence of point 1, then point 3 is the direct consequence of point 1 and 2 altogether, which is the point I’m most concern for – affecting and impacting others. Hitler had his own principles, he caused the great holocaust. Now, how exactly did that affect others? It’s a rhetorical question.

Why am I bringing this up?

Before I go on, let me just say that I’m really no expert in leadership nor am I the arbiter of ethics. However, I trust that I have learnt a few key essentials of a leader overtime.

Leaders are seated in an influential position. Now I'm sure you've heard that saying which rings something like, "With great power comes great responsibility". Well, I think that's just a part of it. The second part should sound something like, "With great influence, comes great impact". In recent times, I’m greatly troubled by how certain leaders react to certain situations with rather unethical approaches and I believe that unethical approaches are usually stirred up by selfish agendas.

When leaders have personal agendas going on under their sleeve, their sense of ethics will inevitably reflect those self-serving agendas. As much as these leaders may try to hide their selfish schemes, their characters will eventually be revealed by their own doing. Their unethical approaches will be seen by others and people will begin to question their authority, maturity and sincerity. Look at Hitler for instance. People saw what he did and they wanted him out.

If you consider yourself a leader in your own right, would you allow me to challenge you to pause for a moment and deliberate on these questions:

• What are some of the values in life that you hold on to dearly?
• Who or where is the source of those values derived from?
• Do you apply those values in every area of your life?
• Do those values affect the people around you in a positive or negative manner?
• Are there certain approaches that you've taken that may have been unethical in some ways? If so, what are you going to do about it?

"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. In ethical leadership it is important for the leader to consider how his or her decisions impact others."
(Values: The Key to Effective Ethical Leadership By Sylvester and Jasmine Renner)

As leaders, I believe one of the main challenges that we constantly face is our very self. It's not easy keeping up with ourselves when we are doing so many things at a time. Sometimes, we even get lost in what we're doing. But what's worst is that we stop evaluating ourselves and instead, evaluate others as if we're flawless. I urge you to pause for a bit, just as I did, and do a quick reality check. This is crucial because "it is important for the leader to consider how his or her decisions impact others". This is undergirded by a statement that goes to say that "a leader must take special responsibility for what is going on inside his or her own self, inside his or her consciousness, lest the act of leadership create more harm than good (Palmer, 1996)".

Whether we are leaders or followers, we must realize that what we say, do or even write will affect the people around us. There's a causal relationship between our actions and the people we come into contact with. Whether in a good or bad way, it is dependent on our ethical values.

With great influence, comes great impact.