Authentic Leadership Defined
First and foremost, the concept of authenticity
has been around for a long time, as reflected in
many philosophical discussions of what constitutes
authenticity (Harter et al. 2002). George
(2003) popularized authentic leadership in the
general practice community when he published
his book on the topic, as did Luthans & Avolio
(2003) for the academic community. Luthans
& Avolio (2003, p. 243) defined authentic
leadership as “a process that draws from both
positive psychological capacities and a highly
developed organizational context, which results
in both greater self-awareness and selfregulated
positive behaviors on the part of
leaders and associates, fostering positive selfdevelopment.”
This definition and subsequent
work on authentic leadership was defined at
the outset as multilevel in that it included the
leader, follower, and context very specifically in
the way it was conceptualized and measured.
This addressed a typical criticism in the leadership
literature summarized by Yammarino
et al. (2005, p. 10) who concluded, “relatively
few studies in any of the areas of leadership
research have addressed levels-of-analysis issues
appropriately in theory, measurement, data
analysis, and inference drawing.”
At the same time, several scholars (e.g.,
Cooper et al. 2005, Sparrowe 2005) expressed
concerns with Luthans & Avolio’s initial defi-
nition of authentic leadership. The initial conceptual
differences notwithstanding, there appears
to be general agreement in the literature
on four factors that cover the components of
authentic leadership: balanced processing, internalized
moral perspective, relational transparency,
and self-awareness. Balanced processing
refers to objectively analyzing relevant data
before making a decision. Internalized moral
perspective refers to being guided by internal
moral standards, which are used to self-regulate
one’s behavior. Relational transparency refers to
presenting one’s authentic self through openly
sharing information and feelings as appropriate
for situations (i.e., avoiding inappropriate displays
of emotions). Self-awareness refers to the
demonstrated understanding of one’s strengths,
weaknesses, and the way one makes sense of
the world. These four constructs were further
operationally defined by Walumbwa and colleagues
(2008). Walumbwa et al. (2008) provided
initial evidence using a multisample strategy
involving U.S. and non-U.S. participants
to determine the construct validity of a new set
of authentic leadership scales. Specifically, they
showed the four components described above
represented unique scales that were reliable.