Unethical Pro-Organizational Behavior. The Role of Loyalty in Ethical Leadership

Bachelor Thesis from the year 2016 in the subject Business economics - Business Management, Corporate Governance, grade: 1,7, University of Cologne, language: English, abstract: Leaders act as mediators between an organization and its employees. They are agents of the organization and have a role model function for their followers. Since leaders play a significant role in motivating ethical behaviour of their subordinates, most scholars have focused on the consequences of leader behaviour on their followers. However, it is more complex and therefore ethical behaviour should be determined in a first step.Imagine a situation in which someone detects a colleague hiding information about the environmental pollution of a new production process. Is it ethically right to collaborate and be loyal to the colleagues and protect the entire organization? Or is it ethically right to tell the truth to supervisors or the public to protect the environment and a larger society? What about a situation in which someone observes a co-worker manipulating sales numbers that are necessary to achieve group targets? Is it ethically right to collaborate and maintain silence? Or is it ethically right to tell the truth even though group objectives cannot be achieved by being honest? What, if jobs are related to achievement of objects and are possibly cut in case of not obtaining these targets? Imagine a situation in which someone withholds relevant information about a customer to other members of the organization who do not work on the same team. Is it ethically right to deprive these information in order to give an edge to the in-group? Or is it ethically right to share those details across all colleagues who hold a stake in order to improve the overall performance?What is perceived as ethically right, wrong or desirable differs across cultures, organizations, individuals and situations. In contrast to the leader perspective of previous scholars and considering those differences Fehr, Yam and Dang took a follower-centric perspective on ethical leadership. Within their novel conceptualization of ethical leader perception moralized leader behaviour can entail value consistent behaviour, depending on what is morally relevant to an individual and the organizational culture. If ethical leader behaviour is subject to moral values of an individual or of the organization, it depends on either the organization and the leader's behaviour or the moral identity of a follower and the leader's behaviour, if this behaviour is perceived as ethically right or desirable.