Positive Approach To Leadership (PAL) Implications for Today's Organizations

Executive Summary The article proposes a positive approach to leadership (PAL) to help today's organizational leaders rise to the occasion of the turbulent post-9/11 environment. Drawing from positive psychology and Luthans' recently proposed positive organizational behavior (POB), the PAL criteria meeting RICH components of Realistic Optimism, Emotional Intelligence, Confidence, and Hope are defined and analyzed. Particular attention is given to the implications that each of the RICH components of PAL have for organizational leadership development and effective application. ********** The millennium celebration was to be a symbolic turning point for the new economy and a reinvigorated time of peace and goodwill to everyone. The actual event on January 1, 2000 went unexpectedly smooth, but then the dark clouds of economic uncertainty began to quickly form. The bursting of the dot-com bubble about a year later not only shocked the unrealistic e-business sector, but also showed just how fragile the booming new global economy really was. Then, all of a sudden the dark clouds of uncertainty brought on by the declining economy became thunder and lightening on September 11, 2001. The horrific terrorist attack on America and its continuing aftermath and devastation have sounded the alarm for leadership at all levels and institutions not only in America, but within the entire global community. Post-9/11, most of the news has been dominated by geopolitical, military, religious, and even humanitarian events and concerns. Few would question that these are indeed the topics most important in a world that most of us agree will never be the same. However, we would also argue that the uncertainty and threat is not just to life itself and our way of life, but also to our economy and the psychology of organizational participants. A real moment of truth has arrived for organizational leaders at all levels. The time has come for organizational leaders to rise to the occasion, meet today's and the foreseeable future economic and psychological challenges with undaunted courage and compassion, and, we propose, a new positive approach to leadership, or what we simply call PAL. The purpose of this article is to first provide a brief summary background of the turbulent environment facing today's organizational leaders. Then, drawing from both the recent positive psychology movement and Luthans' (2001, 2002a, 2002b; Luthans and Jensen, 2001) newly proposed positive organizational behavior (POB), we present the components of our proposed positive approach to leadership (PAL). Specifically, we have identified what we call the RICH components of PAL: Leadership Realistic Optimism, Leadership Emotional Intelligence, Leadership Confidence, and Leadership Hope. The theoretical background and processes, research applicable to leadership, and, especially, implications for PAL development and effectiveness for each of the RICH components are given attention. The Turbulent Environment Facing Organizational Leaders After only a short time into the new millennium, the U.S. and other economies around the world began to unravel. For example, Japan, already in a recession for almost a decade, seems to be going down still further because so many of its banks are insolvent. Russia's economy, and more so the other former Soviet countries and even post-communist Central European nations that had supposedly turned the corner, remain in turmoil. Germany, the biggest economy in Europe, and the other EU countries are doing poorly. So are all the Latin American countries. China, which estimates it needs almost an 8 percent annual economic growth just to maintain its reform agenda and civil order, reports that its economy is cooling off and unlikely to meet its target. And Singapore, which has been the major economic success story in Asia, recently announced that it too was having problems. This negative economic news across the world is reflected in foreign direct investment (FDI) which for the first time in ten years is slumping badly. …