Explicating the Synergies of Self‐Determination Theory, Ethical Leadership, Servant Leadership, and Emotional Intelligence

Abstract

Using self‐determination theory as a foundation, the current study examined ethical leadership, servant leadership, and emotional intelligence to ascertain any shared characteristics contributing to effective leadership. Self‐determination theory espouses the centrality of autonomy, competence, and relatedness to human motivation. Servant leadership emphasizes serving and caring for others. Ethical leaders consistently make morally reasoned decisions. Emotionally intelligent leaders are self‐aware and self‐regulating, nurture motivation, and stress empathy and social skill. An analysis of the literature revealed 10 shared characteristics connecting the three components of self‐determination theory, including awareness, empathy, fairness, integrity, moral values, motivation, trust, relationship management, respect, and self‐management. Synergies among ethical leadership, servant leadership, and emotional intelligence to leadership in a variety of settings emerged. Effective leaders use awareness, empathy, fairness, integrity, moral values, motivation, trust, relationship management, respect, and self‐management contributing to needs satisfaction in followers’ autonomy, competence, and relatedness. In conclusion, leadership effectiveness can increase when leaders demonstrate integrity, trust, and respect, serve others with empathy and fairness, and are personally and socially competent.

On Purpose: Leader Self‐Development and the Meaning of Purposeful Engagement

“…Autonomy is a subjectively felt psychological state that varies depending on the circumstances. Conceptually, autonomy's focus on personal relevance and empowerment overlaps considerably with many leadership concepts such as ethical leadership, emotional intelligence, and servant leadership (Lumpkin & Achen, ). Autonomy supports intrinsic motivation, which fuels persistence, creativity, and even performance (Deci & Ryan, ).…”

Introducing a Model of Transformational Prosocial Leadership

“…Furthermore, there are many other organizational constructs and personal features that it is possible to investigate and incorporate into the model. For example, future research could add data exploring the relationship between leadership styles and leader traits, topic that has been well examined by different researchers (i.e., Bono & Judge, ; De Hoog, Den Hartog, & Koopman, ; De Vries, ; Judge & Bono, ; Lumpkin & Achen, ; Posner, ; Swain, ; Zaccaro, Green, Dubrow, & Kolze, ). Similarly, it is possible to investigate the relationships between leadership styles and innovation, creativity, work attitudes, or the distribution of leadership.…”

“…Of course, each person is moved by the three motives, so that motivations are not mutually exclusive (Amabile, ; Lumpkin & Achen, ; Ryan & Deci, ); on the contrary, they can be and tend to be cumulative. The cumulation indicates that a person motivated by prosocial reasons also has extrinsic and intrinsic motives in mind; that is, he/she also seeks a good return for his work and enjoy it.…”

“…Finally, the relationship between leaders' emotional intelligence (EI) and their leadership style is examined. Based on the views supported by Caruso, Mayer, and Salovey (), Gardner (), Goleman (), and Salovey and Mayer, ; many authors (Barling et al, ; Brown & Moshavi, ; Gardner & Stough, ; Green, Miller, & Aarons, ; Kim & Kim, ; Lumpkin & Achen, ; Palmer, Walls, Burgess, & Stough, ; Riggio et al, ; Riggio & Reichard, ; Sosik & Magerian, ; Zahed‐Babelan & Rajabi, ) observed that there is a close link between EI and effective leadership.…”

Servant Leadership in the Last Decade : A Systematic Review

“…An important question to consider is 'Why does one identify a servant leader?' A review of extant literature revealed that a servant leader is expected to display several attributes, five of the most prominent of which are discussed as follows: (1) Empathy: Servant leaders seek to understand the underlying needs and motivations of their followers so as to create the necessary environment for them to prosper and thrive (Allen et al, 2018;Lumpkin and Achen, 2018;Joseph and Gandolfi, 2020), (2) Self awareness: Servant leaders are to reflect deeply and analyze their own value systems in order to identify areas where they can improve as leaders (Arain et al, 2019;Frémeaux and Pavageau, 2020;Giambatista et al, 2020), (3) Persuasion: Servant leaders do not coerce their followers to perform certain actions. Rather they convince them to do certain actions by clearly showing them the benefits of those actions (Lee et al, 2020;Megheirkouni, 2020), (4) Stewardship: Servant leaders take responsibility for the actions of their followers, rather than blame them if things go wrong (Andersen, 2018;Luu, 2020;Tuan, 2020) and 5Commitment to the growth of people: Servant leaders are focused on ensuring that their followers achieve their ambitions and fulfil their potential (Harris et al, 2020;Upadyaya and Salmela-Aro, 2020).…”