Leadership Studies: the Influence and Potential
of Classical Literature
A Qualitative Literature Review
MSc Business Administration
Organizational & Management Control
Thesis Supervisor: Dr. C.P.A. Heijes
By:
Name: Freek Klein
Student number: S1917110
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Preface
A thesis theme that utilizes arts and humanities for a Business Administration MSc
programme can be seen as quite unconventional, and many people were surprised when they
heard that I was going to be focusing on classical literature for my study. However, it was the
uniqueness of the theme that lured me into making it my first theme choice. I have also been
interested in classical literature for some time, but could never find much time and energy to
read it, due to the amount of time I have to spend on my (interesting, but more conventional)
studies. Therefore, I would first like to thank my thesis supervisor, dr. Cornelis Heijes, for
allowing me to combine my passions for this research. He went above and beyond the call of
duty in guiding and helping me, as other people were also often surprised (and jealous) when
I told them how much genuine interest and support I received from my supervisor. I would
also like to thank the rest of my thesis-group; Eelze, Laura and Leonie. Their comments,
support and advice helped me break through many obstacles. I would also like to thank all
leadership studies researchers and writers who are not afraid to break away from
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Abstract
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Table of Contents
Introduction...5
Classical Literature and Leadership...6
Research Question and Sub-questions...7
Research Goals, Academic and Managerial Relevance...8
Methodology...8
Search Terms...9
Databases, Search Engines & Snowballing...9
Inclusion Criteria...10 Search Results...10 Analytical Strategy...10 Summaries...10 Codes...11 Results...12 Machiavelli – Leadership...12 Shakespeare – Leadership...14
Sun Tzu – Leadership...16
Differences and commonalities...18
Discussion...19
Ethics...20
Emotions...22
Diversity and Intercultural Leadership...24
Perception and the Social Constructability of Leadership...26
Limitations...28
Conclusion & Suggestions for Future Research...29
References...31
Appendix A...41
Key Search Terms...41
Search Strategy Results...41
Snowballing Results...43
Prisma Flow Diagram...44
Appendix B...45
Machiavelli Result Summaries...45
Machiavelli Result Codes...50
Shakespeare Result Summaries...52
Shakespeare Result Codes...59
Sun Tzu Result Summaries...61
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Introduction
Among the fields of research related to management and organisations, leadership has attracted a relatively great deal of interest, and as a result is one of the most extensively studied subjects (Low & Muniapan, 2011; Mustafa & Lines, 2016). While there is little agreement about how, exactly, leadership should be defined, scholars seem to agree on most aspects of Tannenbaum and Massarik’s (1957, p. 3) definition; “interpersonal influence, exercised in a situation and directed, through the communication process, toward the attainment of a specified goal or goals”. The most important aspect of leadership seems to be the conscious, deliberate steering of other people toward certain goals. Since this is still rather vague, this view of leadership does not limit itself to organisational research, and this might be a reason why other disciplines have also been so interested in the field. For example, the fields of sociology and psychology (Slater, 1995), political science and history (Hargrove, 2004) are also naturally inclined to be interested in how people influence, or have influenced, other people. Additionally, the arts and humanities have also played a role in the development of leadership thought and might have more to add, especially in these times and in this stage of the field (Crow & Grogan, 2011).
However, this great and long-standing interest has also led to the field of leadership being subject to much criticism and many disagreements. The field has been criticized for simply relabelling managerial work to leadership to make managers’ jobs seem more exciting and impressive (Alvesson & Spicer, 2012), and for putting almost superhuman expectations on managers, thereby creating high pressure as well as managerial hubris (Wilson, 2016).
Disagreements have existed for millennia about whether leaders are born or made (Daniel, 2018), though most scholars now agree that some leadership skills can indeed be taught. Further disagreements arise out of the different definitions of leadership, or simply stated what it means to be a leader (Avolio, Walumbwa & Weber, 2009; Alvesson & Spicer, 2012). Consequently, despite leadership being one of the most widely taught subjects in management schools for the past 50 years, there is no consensus about how this should be done, and the variety of teaching methods, theories and assumptions among different schools remains substantial (Collinson & Tourish, 2015).
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the business world, such as a shift of focus from controlling employees to employee empowerment (Hanaysha, 2016; Kim & Fernandez, 2017), and promotions of creativity and knowledge sharing for employees (Kremer, Villamor & Aguinis, 2018) in order to create competitive advantages.
The leadership field dealing with these ‘softer’ areas of business, increasing attention towards power relations and an increasing focus on employee creativity leads to disciplines such as the arts and humanities also becoming increasingly relevant for the field. Realising that future leaders in business can’t be solely focused on pursuing economic performance, a significant number of management professors has indicated that the arts and humanities could help prepare students for normative, practical judgments in addition to the objective scientific analyses they normally learn in business schools (Statler & de Monthoux, 2015).
Classical Literature and Leadership
Increasingly, scholars contend that leadership students could gain substantial knowledge from the humanities, with classical literature providing a rich source of leadership material (Banks, Ledbetter, & Greenhalgh, 2016). Contrary to organisational studies, the studies of literature and philosophy have focused more on the dimensions of leadership that are concerned with power relations, ethics and justice (Crow & Grogan, 2011). Aspects such as power relations are increasingly important in the business world due to rises in inter-organisational collaboration and decreasing reliance on hierarchies (Levina & Orlikowski, 2009; Fjeldstad et al., 2012). Consequently, there is a disillusionment with the individually-focused leadership approaches, and leadership approaches such as the more collectively-oriented ‘distributed leadership’ are gaining popularity (Bolden, 2011). Knowledge from the humanities could help aspiring leaders gain different perspectives on these issues of power in leadership.
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Despite the popularity of historical (fictional) writings in the leadership field, there is a lack of reviews of these influences. While they created a start in this regard by providing some examples, Crow and Grogan (2011) called for more insights into how classical literature has influenced and could potentially influence leadership knowledge. Their review of leadership thought from classical literature was primarily intended to urge others to expand interest into this topic, and was mostly limited to Western literature. However, many influences on leadership literature have come from the East, and it would be appropriate to include renown philosophers such as China’s Sun Tzu in an increasingly global business world. A popular theme among the recent boom in leadership literature has been whether there is something unique about Asian countries’ worldviews and values which could give them a competitive edge in global negotiations and influence (Heine, 2008).
Research Question and Sub-questions
Because of the potential knowledge that can be gained from classical literature, the significant amount of both academic- and pop-literature that has incorporated insights from classical literature, and because of the lack of comprehensive analyses of their influences, this research creates a systematic literature review.
Shakespeare’s writings are included because he is the most renowned Western writer and because his writings have been used to both expand leadership knowledge (Etzold, 2012) and recently to teach leadership skills in schools (Lezaun & Muniesa, 2017). Sun Tzu’s influence is examined to include a non-Western perspective, and because it has been one of the most popular influences in recent times, especially in popular leadership literature (Heine, 2008). Machiavelli’s writings are included because they have also been very popular in leadership literature, and because of both the similarities and contrasts his writings have with writers such as Shakespeare (Herbel Jr., 2015). By analysing how these 3 differing, and perhaps in some regards similar writers and philosophers have influenced the leadership literature, the benefits and limitations of these sources of knowledge can be determined. In doing so, both leadership scholars and educators can get better insights into which authors have which perspectives to offer. The main research question this paper will seek to answer is; What is currently known about the influences of the writings by Shakespeare, Machiavelli and Sun Tzu on the field of leadership studies, and what can they add to the field? This main question will be broken down into the following sub-questions:
- Are Machiavelli, Shakespeare and Sun Tzu used for similar or different themes and perspectives in the leadership literature and why is this?
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The answers to these questions are explored with a systemic, qualitative literature review, which will be discussed further in the methodology section.
Research Goals, Academic and Managerial Relevance
This review contributes to the field of leadership studies by discovering the benefits and limitations of the usage of classical writings in the leadership literature and establishing the differences and similarities between how the different classical writings are used in the field. In doing so, hopefully a clear image can emerge about the potential value this aspect from the field of humanities can add to leadership. After gaining a clearer view of the potential that classical literature has to offer to academic leadership writings, future avenues for research related to the link between the humanities and leadership will also be suggested.
This review also offers practical relevance for organisations and (aspiring) managers, seeing how popular leadership development is. Lacerenza et al. (2017) state that despite a large portion of organisations’ development budgets being spent on leadership training programs, a significant number of these programs are regarded as ineffective, though their analysis proved that they can indeed be useful. They also find that there is no ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach to leadership development. As previously mentioned, classical literature and a humanities-oriented approach might offer solutions by stimulating more creative thinking, and allowing managers to envision and prepare for different scenarios and dilemmas. Generally, more effective leadership could lead to benefits such as better strategy development and communication (Porter, 1996), and unconventional forms of leadership such as distributed leadership can lead to better enablement of organisational change (Bate, Khan & Pye, 2000) and innovation (Harris, 2004).
The rest of this paper is structured as follows: The next section will describe the methodology for this research. After that, the results will be showcased and explained. Then, a discussion of the results will follow. After the discussion, the limitations of this research are discussed. Finally, the conclusion is given and suggestions for future research are provided.
Methodology
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recommendations for literature reviews from the Cochrane handbook for systematic reviews (Higgins & Green, 2011) were used. Accordingly, this paper provides and explains the search terms that were used, the database and search engine selection, the inclusion criteria, and the documentation of results for each search strategy. Finally, a timeline of the performed research are given. A flow diagram from PRISMA (Moher et al., 2009) is used to illustrate the separation of included and excluded literature.
Search Terms
The search terms that were used in the data collection for this research can be found in Table A1 in Appendix A. Each column-header represents a general theme, and the items below the header reflect search terms that are associated with that theme. In order to find literature that links multiple themes, search terms from the different columns are combined when entered into search engines and databased. For example, when searching for the influence of Shakespeare on leadership, ‘Leader’ could be combined with ‘Shakespeare’.
Databases, Search Engines & Snowballing
Databases were accessed through EBSCOhost, using a proxy of Rijksuniversiteit Groningen’s library website. While searching through EBSCOhost is more time-consuming than using the search engines, more filtering options are available, duplicates are automatically excluded, and multiple databases can be selected for inclusion simultaneously. EBSCOhost also allows for searching of the key terms in specific parts of articles, such as the title or abstract. For this reason, EBSCOhost was used to do in-depth, specific searches and to access articles that were found with Google Scholar, but not accessible. The databases that were included in EBSCOhost searches for their relevance to either leadership or classical literature are; Business Source Premier, Academic Search Premier, PsycARTICLES, SocINDEX, Psychology and Behavioural Sciences Collection and the Philosopher’s Index. The bibliography of Asian Studies database was also included for a focus on humanities from non-Western perspectives.
Google’s ‘Google Scholar’ search engine was used to do initial, broad searches on the themes. Google Scholar was more appropriate for this task because of its speed and comprehensiveness. This comprehensiveness was also a limitation, since filtering options are limited and Google Scholar includes literature that is not peer-reviewed. Additionally, because of the limited filtering options, key terms could have different meanings depending on the research field. ‘Management’, for example, does not always relate to organisational research. Google Scholar was also used to count citations, and to find articles that had cited other useful literature.
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scanning the reference sections of articles for the appropriate key terms, or by using Google Scholar to see which articles cited the relevant article. These processes of ‘snowballing’ and ‘reverse snowballing’ were used to accumulate information on specific themes and to see what some general opinions on these themes were.
Inclusion Criteria
Literature was only included if it was deemed to be relevant to both leadership theory or practice and the writings of Machiavelli, Shakespeare and/or Sun Tzu. The literature had to have been published in peer-reviewed journals, had to be written in English, the complete article had to be available, and it must not have been a duplicate of literature that was already included. Literature that did not fit these criteria were excluded from the study.
Search Results
In Table A2 in Appendix A, the search results are documented. These include the dates of the searches, the search terms that were used and in which section of papers the terms were sought, the databases/search engine that was used, the number of results that were generated, and the article that was found. Table A3 in Appendix A contains the snowballing results. Figure A1 in Appendix A illustrates the total numbers of included/excluded papers, with the use of the PRISMA flow diagram.
Analytical Strategy
Webster & Watson (2002) suggested that qualitative literature reviews should focus on concepts instead of the authors of research papers. They argue that in order to properly synthesise the literature, rather than just summarising previous literature, key concepts need to be identified and preferably outlined with the use of concept-matrices. This is also suggested by Wolfswinkel, Furtmueller & Wilderom (2013), who further argued that open, axial and selective coding should be used to categorize concepts found in the literature. This paper follows these suggestions, and the found articles were summarised shortly, after which broad categories were created, which were then narrowed down and connected to each other. This was done with Adobe Acrobat Reader DC and Microsoft Excel 2016. The summaries and codes can be found in Appendix B, they will be discussed and linked in the results section. Machiavelli, Shakespeare and Sun Tzu, though technically writers, are used as concepts since they are used as subjects in articles written by others.
Summaries
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of article and the method that is used, which is deemed important because there is such a large variety in this regard. The third column shows the lessons for leaders, or about leadership, that are discussed in the article. This column can include a wide variety of lessons, such as prescriptions for leaders, problems that leaders often run into, factors that influence how the leadership concept itself is created or changed, and opinions about how the concept of leadership itself is or should be seen. Because of the wide variety of the types lessons and discussions the articles have in this regard, this likely offers some findings of interest. The fourth and final column lists the reasons the authors include in order to argue why they used either Machiavelli, Shakespeare or Sun Tzu for their article about leadership, and how (the works of) these writers could be relevant for contemporary leadership. This likely also offers some interesting findings as well, seeing how even though Machiavelli, Shakespeare and Sun Tzu are substantially different, they have all been popularized in leadership literature.
In the results section, only the found codes of the articles are shown that were used to categorize and visualize aspects that were found in multiple articles, to illustrate the prevalence of certain topics or characteristics of groups of articles.
Codes
In addition to the abovementioned summaries, codes were created about themes, subjects, or arguments found in the collected articles.
Tables B2 (Machiavelli), B4 (Shakespeare), and B6 (Sun Tzu) in Appendix B show the codes that were gathered from the articles. The codes might not necessarily be derived from the short summaries, they were collected from the full-text articles.
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Results
In this section, the results of the literature analyses will be shown and explained, after which some findings of interest are highlighted that will be the topics of discussion in the next section. These findings of interest include differences and commonalities between how the subject of leadership is approached in articles related to either Machiavelli, Shakespeare or Sun Tzu. The results and the discussion will demonstrate how these 3 writers of classical literature have influenced leadership studies, and will answer the research question; What is currently known about the influences of the writings by Shakespeare, Machiavelli and Sun Tzu on the field of leadership studies, and what can they add to the field?
The tables in Appendix B that were discussed in the previous section demonstrate the shortly summarised findings and codes, ordered chronologically. In the sections below, the codes found in the articles are aggregated and are shown to categorise and visualise aspects that were found in multiple articles, to illustrate the prevalence of certain topics or characteristics of groups of articles.
Machiavelli
The search for articles related to Machiavelli and leadership yielded 18 usable results.
The summaries in Table B1 in Appendix B demonstrate that a large number of articles about the relationship between Machiavelli and leadership are focused on the ethics/morality of Machiavelli’s leadership style and advices. Many articles note that there are significant differences between how Machiavelli is interpreted, about what his philosophy really was and whether he and his leadership styles can be seen as amoral or not. There are also conflicting interpretations about whether Machiavelli supported empowerment of subordinates, or whether he was in favour of centralized control. Furthermore, a significant number of the leadership lessons discussed are about what leaders should do to maintain or achieve power, and many articles are about what leaders should do in order to be successful at influencing others.
The table also shows that with regards to methods, most articles are essays and a popular avenue of exploration using Machiavelli as a ‘lens’ through which contemporary events are examined. This is sometimes even done through fictitious interviews or memos.
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Table 1
Machiavelli Results (18 Total)
The results of coding in Table 1 above highlight the prevalence of ethics as a leadership theme. Power is also a main aspect of leadership, and both centralized power and self-direction of subordinates are often argued to be what Machiavelli was, or would be, in favour of. Context was seen as very important, meaning that how a leader behaves should depend on the situation. Related to both ethics and context is moral relativity. Many authors argue that, in some situations, it is sometimes justified to be cruel when it is deemed necessary, or to use manipulation. These tactics are often described as pragmatic and are necessary due to human nature, which is bound by self-interest. Many authors state that the main role of the leader is to increase stability or certainty.
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sometimes lost due to discrepancies between business leaders and politicians, or because of the questionable ethics.
There is a large variety in subjects of comparison for Machiavelli’s ideas, but ‘Machiavellianism’, or the Mach IV personality scale to measure Machiavellianism, was most common. Modern theory and educational leadership were also seen multiple times.
Regarding the main nature of the articles, discussions of general leadership issues were most common, but there were also many articles that prescribed leadership traits and/or behaviour.
Shakespeare
The search for articles related to Shakespeare and leadership yielded 19 usable results.
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Table 2
Shakespeare Results (19 Total)
The coding above shows that for the articles about Shakespeare and leadership, the most prevalent theme is the importance of context. Many authors argue that the behaviour of leaders should be judged on the roles leaders were expected to take in their time and place. Power is also important, as many of Shakespeare’s characters struggle with the issue of how to use their positions. Characters in Shakespeare’s stories don’t always use their power responsibly, and are often deemed to represent (aspects of) bad leadership. Relationships and emotions were also acknowledged to be important, as they are often driving forces behind leadership behaviour. Perception was also seen as crucial, meaning that it is more important how leaders are seen by their followers than how they actually are in reality. Leaders are also often acknowledged to have interdependent relationships with their followers, meaning there can be no leader without support of their followers. To be supported and to be perceived as legitimate by their followers, leaders often adapt to the situation. Some of Shakespeare’s characters are seen as transformational leaders, but some are also willing to be cruel when necessary.
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A significant amount of authors also use Shakespeare to argue the social constructability of leadership, meaning that what is deemed legitimate leadership, or who can become leaders, is determined by the time, place and people. Shakespeare’s stories and the many interpretations, adaptions and portrayals also evolve with the times due to this constructability, keeping them relevant.
Shakespeare’s stories and characters are most often compared with or contrasted to real-life organisational leaders, or different interpretations/adaptions of the same stories or characters. The nature of most articles is general discussion about issues leaders face, often explored with either the characters in Shakespeare’s stories, real-life leaders, or both. With the many contrasts between characters, a large number of articles also explore why some leaders succeeded and why others failed, or which characters are typically seen as ‘bad’ or ‘good’ leaders. Few articles using Shakespeare prescribe traits or behaviour for effective leadership.
Sun Tzu
The search for articles related to Sun Tzu and leadership yielded 16 usable results.
The summaries in Table B5 in Appendix B show that many of the articles about Sun Tzu and leadership are essays, and many articles deal with traits and behaviour that leaders ideally should have. The main traits identified by Sun Tzu in ‘the Art of War’ are also heavily stressed in these articles, namely wisdom, benevolence, integrity, discipline and courage.
Many articles also deal with Chinese culture, and how leadership ideas and expectations have been formed in China due to influences such as Sun Tzu, Confucius and Lao Tzu (Taoism). Consequently, these articles often explore the divergence or convergence of these ideas with Western notions of leadership.
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Table 3
Sun Tzu Results (16 Total)
The results of the coding seen above in Table 3 show that most articles deal with strategy as an important leadership issue. Scanning and making use of the environment and information is also significantly important, as is also stressed in ‘the Art of War’. Moral influence and benevolence are also important, meaning the leader should not lead his followers by material rewards or punishments, but by insight and sensitivity to their followers’ wishes. The leader should be adaptable, create harmony and align goals, but is also urged to use deception when necessary.
Sun Tzu’s relevance to contemporary leadership is often argued to be because of his popularity and influence, and because many of the principles in leading the military to war can also be applied to managers leading their employees. His lessons should also be learned due to increases in intercultural business, and these lessons often can be gained from the differences/similarities between Western and Eastern leadership. Despite this, many articles also argue that some relevance is lost due to discrepancies between warfare and business, or because Western leaders might not be able to effectively use Eastern leadership principles.
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The main nature of the articles is mostly prescriptive and often deals with leadership issues in general, but many of the articles are also cultural explorations and comparisons.
Differences and commonalities
The articles using Machiavelli are the ones most often concerned with the ethics of (certain types of) leadership, and how power should be attained, kept and used. This also results in the large variety of subjects Machiavelli is compared to, as they are usually other philosophies. The articles stress the realism of Machiavelli’s insights and advocate pragmatic attitudes, even if this entails deception, manipulation or being cruel.
Somewhat similarly, some of the articles about Shakespeare’s Henry V also discuss whether Henry’s actions could be seen as ‘Machiavellian’. Some of his actions could be seen as manipulative and was sometimes cruel, even though he is typically exemplified as an ideal leader. Many authors stress that this type of behaviour is common among real-life leaders, and similarly to the articles using Machiavelli, the articles using Shakespeare also argue for increased relevance because of the realism of his work. Also similar to articles using Machiavelli is the large variety in interpretations of Shakespeare’s work, and argued misconceptions. Another similarity is the importance of perception, as authors argue in both Machiavelli and Shakespeare’s articles that it is more important to be perceived as a righteous leader than it is to actually be one. Similarities with Sun Tzu include the advocated use of deception, the prescriptive nature of the articles, and the large amounts of articles that stress that these philosophies have also lost some of their relevance. Somewhat similar is the Machiavelli’s focus on increasing stability/certainty and Sun Tzu’s focus on creating harmony and goal alignment.
The articles using Shakespeare are the only ones significantly concerned with how leadership is formed, or social constructability, and how interdisciplinarity and the humanities can help in leadership studies. They are the least prescriptive, and most often contrast stories of successful leaders with failing counterparts. The importance of emotions was also unique to these articles.
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Unique to the articles using Sun Tzu is the significant focus on the importance of culture, and how this affects leadership expectations and behaviour. This also seems related to the argued economic rise of China, the increase in intercultural business and comparing Western and Eastern leadership styles. Consequently, Sun Tzu is also often compared with general Western leadership principles, as well as other Eastern leadership principles. These articles also tend to be significantly more prescriptive than the others. Finally, although power is very important for Machiavelli and Shakespeare, it does not receive much attention in Sun Tzu articles.
A large commonality between the articles using each of the 3 writers is the fact that context is always deemed important for leadership behaviour, even though in Sun Tzu’s articles it is more often related to making use of the functional environment, rather than the more social context which is prevalent for Shakespeare and Machiavelli. Still, almost all authors seem to agree that there is no ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach to leadership. Another commonality between articles using each of the 3 is the general discussion of issues or hardships leaders have to face. Even most prescriptive articles also tend to explore difficulties that leaders will encounter. Finally, almost all of the articles are qualitative essays.
Discussion
This section will interpret the results found in the previous section, and will go into a deeper exploration of how the writings by Machiavelli, Shakespeare and Sun Tzu have influenced the field of leadership studies. Therefore, this section will further explore the different prevalent themes of these classical writers, and what the benefits and limitations of these writings are with regards to leadership studies. Accordingly, this section will explore some of the unique and interesting aspects of leadership issues in relation to the classical literature.
First, the ethics of manipulative and cruel leadership will be discussed, and how articles using Machiavelli, Shakespeare and Sun Tzu dealt with this. Then, the importance of emotions and the lack of focus on emotions in traditional leadership studies will be discussed, and how articles using Shakespeare manage to include this aspect. After this, the influence of (national) culture on leadership behaviour and expectations will be explored, how this might cause problems for the transplantability of Western leadership principles, and how articles using Sun Tzu help with exploring these issues. Subsequently, the importance of context, perception and the social constructability of leadership will be discussed, along with problems that this socially constructed nature of leadership causes for underrepresented groups of people.
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Ethics
Because of the prevalence of business scandals, business practitioners and scholars have substantially increased their attention towards issues of ethics in leadership (Chuang & Chiu, 2018). Bruhn (2009) states that globalization, technological advances, social and cultural changes have led to an increased complexity for business ethics, leaving significant amounts of ethical ‘grey zone’, where the distinction between ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ is not clear cut. In these grey zones, ethical dilemmas often do not result in solutions where all parties involved benefit, and certain compromises have to be made. According to Lockhart (2000), these moral uncertainties are unavoidable for leaders making business decisions. Yet, in newer leadership theories, morality is often considered a core aspect of successful leadership. Hannah et al. (2014) argue that not all forms of influence can be called leadership, only forms of influence that are positive and socially acceptable can be seen as leadership. In this view, morality is an inherent part of leadership itself.
Most authors found in the results for articles using Machiavelli argue that Machiavelli saw power as the most important aspect of leadership, and the main task of leaders should be maintaining power and increasing stability, even when seemingly cruel or immoral acts are needed to do so. Machiavelli is often seen as ruthless, manipulative and uncaring about which means are achieved to reach ends of self-interest. However, the moral ambiguity mentioned in the beginning of this section was also explored in many of the articles found in the results.
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Most of these authors seem to be of the opinion that misconceptions have led people to believe in Machiavelli as supportive of callous cruelty and manipulation, although this is not the case. Most authors do argue however, that leaders will sometimes need to conduct behaviours that are typically deemed unethical, since human nature compels people to seek power and to further their self-interests. According to McGuire & Hutchings (2006), Machiavelli believed that this human nature means that people are unchanging, and leaders will always have to take people’s self-interested motives into account to judge whether it would be better to be feared or loved. Many authors argue that, in order to maintain control and stability, leaders must be strict and sometimes cruel to people willing to seek self-interests at the expense of the common good. Authors such as Cunha, Clegg & Rego (2013), found in the results, are critical of the overly positive assumptions in newer leadership theory about the nature of people. They argue that, while Machiavelli’s work should not be used as instruction manuals, it offers a more realistic and pragmatic perspective that should be used to complement modern leadership studies.
Still, many authors stated that cruelty in the form of physical violence and deception are no longer tenable in today’s business world. Authors such as Galie & Bopst (2006) and Fathei (2018) note the extremely tumultuous era Machiavelli was in, and stress that his advices regarding cruelty would probably not be applicable today. However, they also note the influence his works still have, and the usefulness that can be gained in studying his philosophy.
Still, Machiavelli’s prevalence in management literature is often in a prescriptive form. According to Galie & Bopst (2006), many authors ignore or misinterpret the more ethically questionable aspects of Machiavelli’s works, leading to a plethora of dangerous prescriptive literature. They state that many authors use the popularized conceptions of Machiavelli in order to mildly approve of tactics such as deception, manipulation and cruelty, instead of exploring Machiavelli’s teachings on fighting corruption and instability.
According to Haslam, Reicher & van Bavel (2018), the use of cruelty by leaders has to been seen as legitimate by followers, which is a difficult thing to accomplish. They argue that followers need to identify with the cause of the leader/group, the goals need to be seen as noble, and the cruelty has to been as absolutely necessary. The maintaining of order was seen as a legitimate goal in the political environment of 15th century Italy facing many crises, and cruelty by rulers was often seen as a
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importance of context and the fluid nature of leadership behaviour and expectations will be discussed in another part of this discussion.
Besides Machiavelli, Shakespeare’s stories are also prone to ignite discussions about ethics. Specifically, the moral dilemmas faced by Henry in ‘Henry V’ are explored often. For example, Garaventa (1998), found in the results for Shakespeare, argues that similar ethical dilemmas are still faced by business leaders today. When Henry had the power to spare an old companion from execution after his looting, he continued the execution because of his responsibility as a visible, supposedly righteous leader. Business leaders having to fire employees can face these same problems. Garaventa (1998) also argues that contemporary business leaders often lack the same sense of responsibility as Henry. Henry absolves himself of blame after threatening to rape the women of Harfleur during his siege, and denies being responsible for the death of his soldiers. Similarly, contemporary CEO’s tend to also deny any responsibility for scandals or other unethical behaviour. Herbel Jr. (2015), also found in the results using Shakespeare, explicitly contrasts king Henry with Machiavelli’s teachings. While Machiavelli and Henry are both seen as ruthless leaders, he argues that Henry differs to Machiavelli because Henry has a clearly defined moral framework. However, as explored earlier in this section, many authors would disagree about Machiavelli’s lack of morals.
It is this multiplicity of interpretations and ambiguity of classical literature, and the resulting explorations and discussions that can possible offer leadership studies valuable insights. According to Amiridis (2018), the normative binary oppositions between ‘good’ and ‘bad’ in the field of leadership ethics is problematic. He uses an interpretation of the plays of Sophocles and the idea of tragedy to argue that the lines are often blurred when it comes to leadership ethics, and that leadership ethics is characterized by ambiguity and paradox. As is described in Machiavelli’s work, and as Henry had to do in Shakespeare’s work, leaders will likely face situations where they have to choose between conflicting but legitimate moral ends. Classical literature and other art-forms could help (prospective) leaders relate to other points of views and moral frameworks to consider their potential legitimacy. Edwards et al. (2015) argue that by helping to relate to different positions, analysis of arts can help leadership students realize the flaws of dichotomous thinking about ethics, and critical reflection can help students embrace this ambiguity and fluidity. Harris (2019) states that examinations of Machiavelli’s and other classical writers’ works can offer a broader foundation for leadership students. The purpose of these examinations would not be to judge others’ ethical positions, but to compare both idealistic and realistic views of human nature.
Emotions
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creativity, judgment, motivation and relationships. Smith (2010) argues that emotions are especially important for leaders, as leadership roles in organisations are becoming increasingly scrutinized and politicized.
Emotional intelligence, focused mainly on the recognition and management of others’ moods and emotions, has become popular in leadership development programs, although empirical results of its usefulness are mixed. Fambrough & Hart (2008) note that many of the discovered positive effects of emotional intelligence can actually be largely attributed to intelligence and managerial quotients. However, they do stress the importance of (prospective) leaders’ ability to express, manage and understand their own emotions. Emotions have often been repressed in organisational life, to the detriment of authentic relationships and goal-achievement, and opportunities to explore these emotions are argued to prepare for the burdens of leadership. To achieve this, they suggest the use of non-traditional leadership development methods such as personal reflection and conversational learning. The results section showed that many of the articles using Shakespeare acknowledge the importance of emotions. Stein (2005), found among the results, explored how feelings of jealousy had disastrous effects in both the story of Othello and on the real-life Gucci family. He used Shakespeare’s story to stress the need for leaders to realize that not all challenges are external, some of the biggest struggles have to be fought inside oneself.
Warwick (2016) used Shakespeare’s story ‘The Tempest’, along with his own experiences, to explore leaders’ feelings of doubt and uncertainty. He argues that fiction allows people to be engaged with, and reflect on, characters in ways that the more traditional case studies do not. In case studies, the context and focus are almost always fixed, making them feel too logical, distant and unemotional. But in fiction and reality, the contexts and characters evolve, which makes readers more likely to relate and reflect on their own experiences, which in turns allows them to gain meaning about their own emotions. Garaventa (1998), also found in the results, had a similar opinion. The use of plays in leadership development, instead of case studies, can create relatability while at the same time remaining distant enough for objective reflection and evaluation.
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such as jealousy, doubt, fear and contempt can destroy leader-follower relationships and destroy the minds of leaders. Aycan & Shelia (2019) find that emotions such as doubt and fear might even reduce people’s willingness to become leaders in the first place, causing prospects with high leadership potential to simply refuse leadership positions. They also stress the need for leadership development programs to teach prospects how to handle emotions.
Diversity and intercultural leadership
Among the articles that use Sun Tzu to discuss leadership, culture is an overwhelmingly prevalent theme. Specifically, Chinese culture is often investigated and compared to other cultures. Authors such as Wee (1994) attribute the increased interest into Chinese culture to the successful rise of China in the global markets. Pressentin (2015) builds on this by saying that, in order to effectively do business in an increasingly important China, it is important to realize that Western management techniques or leadership styles might not be applicable.
According to Bai & Roberts (2011), the principles or values of Chinese people are heavily influenced by Taoism and Confucianism. According to Keung Ip (2011), these humanistic and virtue-based values are also increasingly being applied in Chinese business, due to growing concerns about unethical practices in China. Gerstner (2011) states that these traditional values are experiencing a resurgence due to ‘cultural depravity’, where Chinese people are becoming interested again in traditional wisdom after Mao’s cultural revolution and the increasing focus on material wealth. These Chinese traditional value include benevolence, wisdom, courage, propriety, trustworthiness, righteousness and harmony (Thompson, 2011). Since Sun Tzu also drew heavily on these traditional values, it is no surprise that many of the articles found in the results prescribe these traits for leaders. According to Fernandez (2004), found in the results, leaders should possess traits (or virtues) such as kindness, courage, discipline and wisdom. To effectively lead, they should overcome their weaknesses such as insecurity, recklessness and oversensitivity. He further states that the ultimate goal of the leader is to align purposes in the organisation, and to create harmony. Many of the authors also make the connection between Confucius, Lao Tzu (the founder of Taoism) and Sun Tzu. Dimovski et al. (2012), found in the results, state that Sun Tzu, Confucius and Lao Tzu are applied to many different types of leadership in China, including political, business and military leadership. However, whereas Confucius and Lao Tzu are more focused on morality and spirituality, Sun Tzu wrote about how to practically lead people, and how to avoid and win conflicts.
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principles, whereas Lao Tzu’s and Confucius’ philosophies are not. However, Opdebeeck & Hadisch (2011) note that many lessons about compassion and benevolence could form a bridge between Eastern and Western leadership principles.
While the trait theory of leadership has largely fallen out of favour in the West, and behaviour and situational dynamics have become more important (Nawaz & Khan, 2016), the results show that Chinese culture still attaches significance to traits. Mansur, Sobral, & Goldszmidt (2017) argue that in leadership styles such as paternalistic leadership, the possession of traits such as sincerity can be crucial for leaders. Blunt & Jones (1997) find that in Asia, managers or leaders are not necessarily judged on the basis of their management techniques, behaviour or even performance, but on how well they reflect Confucian traits. They also found that the leader-follower interdependence often considered in the West does not hold up in Asia, where leadership is often unquestioned and leaders do not depend on their followers. In Asia, relationships between leaders and followers are often paternalistic, where leaders expect unquestioning loyalty and deference from their followers (Nie & Lämsä, 2018). According to Pressentin (2015), found in the results, the Chinese emphasis on paternalism originates from the Confucian strand of leadership thought, and these norms and values can hamper efforts from Western managers to transplant their leadership methods in Asia. Nie & Lämsä (2018) find that Chinese migrants actually appreciated and benefitted from more authoritative leadership styles, and that Western managers often misunderstood paternalistic leadership. However, similar to the aforementioned arguments by Opdebeeck & Hadisch (2011), they also find that Eastern paternalistic styles and Western participatory styles might be more compatible than often thought, since both Eastern and Western styles have an emphasis on benevolence.
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project (House et al., 2004) have explored the effectiveness of leadership styles in different national clusters, these survey-based quantitative studies often remain shallow and tend to ignore many contextual, culture-specific aspects (Harrison & McKinnon, 1999). Studying materials that form the basis for cultural dispositions, such as the writings by Lao Tzu, Sun Tzu and Confucius, could help leadership students develop a deeper understanding of why people in other cultures have different expectations, rather than merely understanding what these expectations are.
Perception and the Social Constructability of Leadership
Leadership studies have faced increasing criticisms for the views and models they utilize and reinforce, which are often static and one-directional in nature (DeRue & Ashford, 2010). Because of this, the existing leadership literature and theory often fails to explain how leadership positions are gained, and how they evolve over time. According to Fairhurst & Grant (2010), disillusionment with these simplistic traditional views is one of the main reasons why leadership scholars are shifting towards the view that focuses on leadership as a social construct. They explain that in this view, both leaders and followers cocreate realities based on socio-historical, collective sensemaking in order to determine who are leaders and who are followers. They further argue that these leadership and follower positions are not static, but are continuously negotiated through interactions by actors. DeRue & Ashford (2010) state that in this process, leadership is not necessarily dependent on formal positions or hierarchy, but is dependent on the views and relationships between involved actors. Consequently, perceptions and evaluations of leaders are based on, or at least affected by, people’s constructed leadership expectations.
This view also explains why certain groups are underrepresented in leadership positions, or more negatively evaluated as leaders. For example, Vinkenburg et al. (2011) show that people expect leaders to have presumably masculine traits such as assertiveness, which then clashes with expectations that have been formed about women, who are seen as more sensitive and caring. Then again, when women act assertively, this clashes with gender stereotypes. According to Brescoll, Okimoto & Vial (2018), women in leadership positions that do not act in line with gender expectations can incite negative emotions such as disgust and contempt, and they advise female leaders to engage in impression management.
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different portrayals of Cleopatra throughout the ages, and argues that Shakespeare’s ‘Antony and Cleopatra’ is unique in portraying her, since it challenges notions of masculinity and femininity. In the story, Cleopatra was a strong and powerful leader, who could also behave in typically masculine ways. He further argues that there is always a struggle by (especially underrepresented) groups of people for changes to leadership as a concept, in order to gain more inclusion in leadership positions.
Since leadership is dynamic and multi-directional in this social construction view, the perception of (potential) followers is crucial for leaders. Leaders will need to act in line with what is typically expected of leaders in order to gain legitimacy. Liu, Cutcher & Grant (2015) question the essentialist view that is still often employed in leadership studies about authenticity, where authenticity is something that actors ‘possess’. They argue that authenticity is in the eye of the beholder, and leaders need to engage in performativity, the act of behaving according to accepted norms, in order to have leadership status attributed to them. This implies that contextual factors, follower perception and relationships are crucial for leaders. With these aspects being dynamic, this also implies that leaders need to be adaptable. The importance of follower perception and adaptability is emphasized in articles using Shakespeare, Machiavelli and Sun Tzu.
Bezio (2013), found in the results on Shakespeare, uses the story of ‘Henry V’ to argue that successful leaders are always engaged in performative negotiation, where they fulfil a role that the audience (followers) want or expect to see, which then depends on the audience. Roberts (2017), also found in the results on Shakespeare, uses ‘Coriolanus’ as a cautionary tale, where a lack of willingness to be flexible and adaptable can be a downfall of leaders. She argues that leaders have to be visible, and this often entails the necessity of adapting to socially defined expectations.
Cunha, Clegg & Rego (2013), found in the results on Machiavelli, make similar arguments. They argue that while leaders should maintain and display commonly accepted values, they need to also flexible as to change their priorities depending on the situation. Authors using Machiavelli (e.g. Julius, Baldridge & Pfeffer, 1999) also tend to stress that it is not necessary to genuinely believe in these values in order to lead, leaders only need to display virtues in order to be perceived as legitimate. While articles using Sun Tzu also have adaptability as an important theme, it is not the type of social adaptability that is needed to be perceived as a legitimate leader. Authors such as Wee (1994), found in the results on Sun Tzu, argue that leaders mainly need to be adaptable in order to gain strategic advantages from the environment.
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engagement with multiple viewpoints, including those of ‘villains’ and ‘heroes’, students can become aware of how complex leadership situations are, and how assumptions about ‘good’ leadership can be fluid, ambiguous and dependent on the situation. Schedlitzki, Jarvis & MacInnes (2014) have used stories from Greek mythology in leadership development courses. They also argue that the use of stories allowed for more critically reflective thinking, and helped students realize the open-endedness and uncertainty that leaders face in organisations. They state that arts-based methods complement the more rational, traditional leadership models that are usually taught. By reading and experimenting with different storylines, students can embrace a multiplicity of ideas or viewpoints, they can deal with contradicting expectations that are often found in organisational leadership, and can ultimately challenge taken-for-granted assumptions about what leaders should do. And because a wide range of emotions is often stimulated by stories in these courses, students are more likely to memorize lessons and engage in sense-making.
Limitations
Like all research, this literature review is subject to limitations. First, due to time and space constraints, some potentially interesting topics had to be left underexplored. For instance, in articles using Shakespeare and Machiavelli, the balancing of traits and behaviour was a somewhat prevalent theme. Somewhat similar to the ‘Harmony’ theme found in articles using Sun Tzu, this often referred to the need for leaders to not be extreme in their personalities, but instead opt for a ‘golden mean’. This could have been related to a need for stability, or a sense of realism/pragmatism to counteract overt optimism, which in turn might have implications for prescriptions of optimism or confidence which has been acknowledged as a positive leadership trait in leadership models and theory (Bass, 1990). Relatedly, this research focuses on how classical literature and the humanities could contribute to leadership literature and development, but these contributions were not compared to modern leadership theory.
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searches were too narrow, and useful articles might have been missed.
Finally, and most importantly, only 3 writers/philosophers were used to explore the influence of classical literature on the field of leadership. While Shakespeare, Machiavelli and Sun Tzu were deemed to be the most influential and popular, there is a vast amount of writers/philosophers that were excluded from this research. The articles that were found often used or compared other influential thinkers, such as Confucius or Aristotle.
Conclusion & Suggestions for Future Research
This study set out to answer the research question: What is currently known about the influences of the writings by Shakespeare, Machiavelli and Sun Tzu on the field of leadership studies, and what can they add to the field? The results and the discussion demonstrate that these classical writers, and academic articles that are written while utilizing these writers, can offer unique perspectives that complement the more traditional leadership studies. Machiavelli and Shakespeare can mainly provide perspectives on the ethics of leadership, Shakespeare’s stories allow for explorations about the importance of emotions, Sun Tzu’s ‘the Art of War’ allows for insights into the culture-specific factors that constitute leadership, and all of these writers allow contemplation about the context-specific factors that influence leadership behaviour and expectations, albeit in different ways. Finally, the articles utilizing Shakespeare’s stories uniquely focus on the socially constructed, fluid and ambiguous nature of leadership. Although the usefulness of these classical writings is sometimes limited by their context-specificity and changing circumstances, the important aspects of leadership they explore do not get adequate attention in organisational leadership literature and leadership development programmes. For these reasons, classical literature and the humanities could complement both the traditional academic leadership field and leadership practice.
The preceding discussion and limitations that resulted from this study might also offer avenues for useful future research. First, topics such as emotions and the fluidity, moral questionability, and the fluid socially constructed nature of leadership could be compared to what (contemporary) leadership theory and models explain. For instance, emotional intelligence and relationships are increasingly argued to be important for transformational leadership styles (Mathew & Gupta, 2015), these aspects are focused on how leaders can influence the emotions and behaviour of others, not themselves. Complementary studies about how the internal emotions of leaders affect leadership styles are scarce in the field of organisational studies.
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effects of emotions on leadership behaviour between different cultures. Ethical leadership issues could also have different interpretations in Western countries. Future research can examine whether non-Western classical writings, such as those by Lao Tzu (Taoism) or Confucius, have an increasing impact on the morality of Chinese leaders. According to Gerstner (2011), the returning popularity of the nature-oriented Taoism in China could have important implications for leadership issues such as driving sustainability. Additionally, research by Resick et al. (2006) has already shown empirically that different cultural clusters do have different ideas about leadership ethics. It would be interesting to examine what influence classical writings have had on ethics in different parts of the world. For instance, it might be that classical literature has influenced whether countries adopt stakeholder or shareholder perspectives to business.
The social constructability of leadership was a theme that was also only significantly present in articles using Shakespeare. This theme might also have different implications in non-Western countries. Whereas this view is getting more attention in the West, leadership legitimacy in Asian countries is still often determined by given positions of authority, or traits (Bai & Roberts, 2011). It would also be interesting to see how this affects underrepresented or minority groups such as women in non-Western countries. Peus, Braun & Knipfer (2015) argue that while cross-cultural leadership research has flourished, there is a lack of research about the cross-cultural differences of female leaders.
Furthermore, while this literature review explored ways in which classical literature could help leadership studies and development, empirical support is needed. While articles such as those by Schedlitzki, Jarvis & MacInnes (2014) mentioned their positive experiences while teaching leadership development courses using classical literature, they lack empirical support and are often from the perspectives of teachers. Future research could examine what the students found enriching about this innovative way of leadership development. For instance, it could explore whether they learned more about leadership issues by reflecting on their own emotions, or by considering different ethical positions.
Additionally, while this research included a non-Western perspective by utilizing Sun Tzu, this perspective naturally is not representative of all non-Western countries. Classical literature, philosophy or religions in other non-Western countries could also be studied to gain a deeper understanding of their cultures. For instance, India’s rising economic importance could warrant more research to gain a better understanding of the influence the Bhagavat Gita has had on leadership (Low & Muniapan, 2011; Chow Hoi Hee & Gurd, 2010).
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