Ethical Leadership, Virtue Theory, And Generic Strategies When The Timeless Becomes Timely

Rather than see virtue theory as an approach that is constrained and co-opted by the often-unstated materialistic-individualistic assumptions that characterize mainstream consequential utilitarianism, we offer virtue theory as an alternative moral-point-of-view that allows researchers, instructors and leaders to develop theory and practices that challenge the mainstream. We develop a new model of ethical leadership and its relationship to business strategy that is based on virtue ethics rather than consequentialist-utilitarian assumptions. We use Porter's generic strategy theory as an example, and develop minimizer, transformer, and compounder strategies that reflect virtue theory's concerns with process and well-being in the context of community.