Explore "values-based leadership" from perspectives of scholars and practitioners : a systematic literature review in google scholar and amazon

With many severe collapses in business world due to lack of moral values, such as cases of Enron, Tyco International, Adelphia, Peregrine Systems, WorldCom… the “values-based leadership” (VBL) has become one of the most important concepts to deal with such moral problems. However, due to the separation between scholars and practitioners in management/leadership subject, practitioners fail to receive enough solutions for their moral issues in business life, and scholars may lose contact with what is actually going on in the real business reality. This thesis aims to explore the VBL subject from perspectives of both scholars and practitioners in terms of ontology, epistemology, methodology and key findings. This is illuminated by a systematic literature review with 40 qualified relevant scientific articles of scholars and 20 qualified relevant book summaries of practitioners. Results on their ontology, epistemology, and methodology indicated that there is indeed the separation between them and the size of gap between them depends on which philosophical position scholars are in. The size of gap is huge when scholars are in internal realism (positivism), but the gap is reduced when they take the position of relativism (constructionism). Results also showed the significant positive impact of VBL on employee outcomes and several other aspects. Many lessons which scholars and practitioners can learn from each other are also pointed out by assuming that they are open and try to appreciate the values of the other side. In addition, what may happen are also discussed if scholars and practitioners switch their philosophical positions with each other. Last but not least, many challenges for scholars and practitioners on the road towards a better collaboration are also presented: very different philosophical approaches, automatic mindset, institutional barriers… Despite all that challenges, scholars and practitioners can and should collaborate with each other for better common benefits for both of them