Dr. Steve Kempster - Leadership for What?

Send us a text

Dr. Steve Kempster is a Professor of Leadership Learning and Development at Lancaster University. He is a prolific scholar and a systems thinker. His latest book, Good Dividends: Responsible Leadership of Business Purpose "explores how five dividends (based on five capitals) can be developed through attention to a sixth dividend (and sixth capital) – the dividend from our planet and communities."

Dr. Kemspter's Books

• Good Dividends: Responsible Leadership of Business Purpose by Steve Kempster, Thomas Maak, Ken Parry
• Responsible Leadership: Realism and Romanticism by Steve Kempster & Brigid Carroll 

Quotes from This Episode

• "We keep talking about leader/follower, but frankly in the organizational world, followers just do not exist. No one aspires to become a follower....think about leader/stakeholders. What would that relationship then offer? You start moving attention towards purpose, towards meaningful work, towards aspects that are deeply significant to people."
• “You can use capitalism to change capitalism. The biggest way forward for capitalism to change is leadership. It’s the most powerful mechanism on the planet, for social change. For good or for ill, there isn’t anything more powerful than leadership with the power it wields.”
• “It is corporates that have the scope to rescue humanity.”
• “Here is the important thing...the data shows us that when you link purpose, meaningful work, adding value to communities, positive social impact, you see profitability go up. And there’s loads of data that shows you that.”
• “In my experience, out of all of this, the most difficult part of business leadership is getting their heads around purpose.”

Resources Mentioned in this Episode

• Firms of Endearment by Rajendra Sisodia, Jagdish N. Sheth, & David Wolfe 
• Responsible Leadership by Thomas Maak & Nicola M. Pless  
• Gallup - Employee Engagement
• A Very Short Fairly Interesting and Reasonably Cheap Book About Studying Leadership by Brad Jackson & Ken Parry 
• Brown, M. E., Trevino, L. K., & Harrsion, D. A. (2005).  Ethical leadership: A social learning perspective for construct development and testing.  Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 97, 117-134.  
• Archie Carroll

What Steve Listens to While He's Writing All These Books and Articles!

• Genesis: Suppers Ready
• YouTube Channel: Prog Rock Dock