The Ubuntu Challenge to Business: From Stakeholders to Relationholders

Woermann, Minka; Engelbrecht, Schalk Willem Petrus

doi:10.1007/s10551-017-3680-6

Cited by 51 publications

(35 citation statements)

References 17 publications

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“…The content of the dream-boards echoes Painter-Morland's (2007) argument that relational responsiveness allows us to argue that organizations should not only be concerned with accountability for past mistakes or future disasters, but to proactively be accountable towards various stakeholders. Somewhat echoing what Woermann and Engelbrecht (2017) call the Ubuntu challenge to business, i.e. to conceive stakeholders as "relation holders".…”

Section: Theorizing From the Dream-board Exercisementioning

confidence: 99%

This Time from Africa: Developing a Relational Approach to Values-Driven Leadership

2019

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The importance of relationality in ethical leadership has been the focus of recent attention in business ethics scholarship. However, this relational component has not been sufficiently theorized from different philosophical perspectives, allowing specific Western philosophical conceptions to dominate the leadership development literature. This paper offers a theoretical analysis of the relational ontology that informs various conceptualizations of selfhood from both African and Western philosophical traditions and unpacks its implications for values-driven leadership. We aim to broaden Western conceptions of leadership development by drawing on twentieth century European philosophy's insights on relationality, but more importantly, to show how African philosophical traditions precede this literature in its insistence on a relational ontology of the self. To illustrate our theoretical argument, we reflect on an executive education course called values-driven leadership into action, which ran in South Africa, Kenya, and Egypt in 2016, 2017, and 2018. We highlight an African-inspired employment of relationality through its use of the ME-WE-WORLD framework, articulating its theoretical assumptions with embodied experiential learning.

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Section: Theorizing From the Dream-board Exercisementioning

confidence: 99%

This Time from Africa: Developing a Relational Approach to Values-Driven Leadership

2019

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“…In addition to these two moral reasons to aid others, the Afro-communal ethic grounds a third reason: one has already related communally with others (Metz, 2017b;Woermann & Engelbrecht, 2017). If one has been party to a communal relationship with others intensely or for a long time, and especially both, then one can have some strong moral reason to aid these intimates as opposed to strangers, even if the latter are worse off and if one did not promise to aid the former.…”

Section: Whom Should a Firm Aid?mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Running with this dimension of partiality in African ethics, two scholars have recently suggested that, when it is applied to the context of business ethics, the word "stakeholders" should be replaced with "relationholders" (Woermann & Engelbrecht, 2017). For them, stakeholder-talk is "contaminated" by the idea that "different parties' interests are dependent on the power and influence that these parties can exert on the organisation due to the strength of the contractual underpinnings of their claims or stakes" (Woermann & Engelbrecht, 2017). In contrast, the word "relationholder" highlights the idea that sometimes a firm can have some moral reason to aid particular individuals beyond contractual terms with them or any voluntary assumption of an obligation to aid them.…”

Section: Whom Should a Firm Aid?mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…It appears, therefore, that the value of communion pulls in different directions when it comes to how to organise a workplace. As two scholars have recently noted (Woermann & Engelbrecht, 2017), by an African ethic that prizes communal relationship, employees are particularly important stakeholders (or "relationholders"). Typically the relationship between them and the firm is especially intimate and long-standing, meaning that the firm owes them quite a lot, and that their needs are not invariably to be sacrificed for the sake of the interests of shareholders and consumers.…”

Section: How Should a Workplace Be Organised?mentioning

confidence: 99%

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An African Theory of Good Leadership

Metz¹

2018

ajobe

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This article draws on the indigenous African intellectual tradition to ground a moral-philosophical theory of leadership that is intended to rival accounts prominent in the East Asian and Western traditions. After providing an interpretation of the characteristically sub-Saharan value of communion, the article advances a philosophical account of a good leader as one who creates, sustains and enriches communal relationships and enables others to do so. The article then applies this account to a variety of topics, including what the final end of an organisation should be, how decisions ought to be made within it, who counts as a stakeholder and how to deal with non-performing or misbehaving employees. For each topic, the article notes respects in which Afro-communal leadership supports approaches that differ from those prescribed by other, more internationally familiar philosophies such as Confucianism and Kantian contract theory, and it suggests that its implications are prima facie attractive relative to them.

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“…Alors, n'est-il pas temps que, dans une perspective gagnant-gagnant, on veille à cocréer et à coréaliser le projet avec les parties prenantes? Ne sont-elles pas de véritables partenaires du projet, et non des objets que le gestionnaire de projet et son équipe peuvent manipuler à souhait (Woermann et Engelbrecht, 2019)? Voilà une réflexion à laquelle tout gestionnaire devra s'atteler pour mener à bien ses projets.…”

Section: Comment Gagner Et Gérer Leur Adhésion?unclassified

Quatre questions pour rallier les parties prenantes à la gestion d’un projet

Ika

Saint‐Macary

Bandé

2020

Rev. organ. territ.

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Les parties prenantes constituent un élément clé pour la réussite ou l'échec d’un projet. Pour en assurer une gestion plus efficace, cet article propose une approche qui tient compte des aspects politiques du projet. S'appuyant sur un cadre théorique et deux cas réels, il pose quatre questions clés pour mieux identifier, évaluer, mobiliser et gérer les parties prenantes, sur une base continue. Cette approche instrumentale se concentre sur les profils des parties prenantes et sur la distinction entre leurs positions déclarées et leurs intérêts réels. Ainsi, elle permet de mieux gérer les parties prenantes existantes, d’en inclure de nouvelles au besoin, et de modifier le contexte politique du projet. En ralliant les parties prenantes et en se concentrant sur la satisfaction de leurs intérêts réels - mais souvent voilés - le projet peut être coproduit, ce qui se traduit par une situation « gagnant-gagnant » pour tous.

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The Ubuntu Challenge to Business: From Stakeholders to Relationholders

Cited by 51 publications

References 17 publications

This Time from Africa: Developing a Relational Approach to Values-Driven Leadership

This Time from Africa: Developing a Relational Approach to Values-Driven Leadership

An African Theory of Good Leadership

Quatre questions pour rallier les parties prenantes à la gestion d’un projet

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