How Does Ethical Leadership Work?

We are hoping that this chapter will enable you to better

understand yourself as you develop your leadership skills, knowledge, and abilities. Use the thinking on
ethical leadership in this chapter as a guide in making your decisions. Remember that the relationship
between you and your followers is at the heart of ethical leadership and requires that you show
sensitivity to others’ needs, treat others in a just manner, and have a caring attitude toward others.
Being an ethical leader will be easier if you entrench the following questions into your thinking
(Northouse, 2013): • Is this the right and fair thing to do? • Is this what a good person would do? • Am I
respectful to others? • Do I treat others generously? • Am I honest toward others? • Am I serving the
community? Ethical leaders must be concerned with more than running their businesses. They must be
concerned with their employees, their customers, their suppliers, their communities, their shareholders,
and themselves. Leadership is influencing people to achieve communal goals; ethical leadership is
achieving those goals in a way that is fair and just to your employees, your customers, your suppli