Jepson Faculty in the Spotlight at Leadership Conference, Forum

Jepson faculty members earned plenty of frequent flyer miles in the fall.

Faculty members traveled to Vancouver, Canada, Oct. 31-Nov. 3, 2007 to present papers and host sessions at the International Leadership Association’s ninth annual global conference. The theme of the conference was “Leadership: Impact, Culture and Sustainability.”

Dean Sandra Peart and faculty members Karen Zivi, Thad Williamson, Crystal Hoyt, Terry Price, Joanne Ciulla, Gill Hickman and Al Goethals took active roles in the conference.

Peart led a roundtable discussion on economics and leadership and presented a paper titled, “Effective Leaders: Insights from Adam Smith.” Political scientists Zivi and Williamson shared insights on democratic theory. Zivi’s paper focused on the tensions between leadership and democracy while Williamson’s paper was a critique of the uncritical embrace of social hierarchy in discussions of leadership.

Ciulla, Hickman and Goethals chaired roundtable discussions. Hoyt and Price presented their recent research in a paper titled, “The Psychology of Leadership Ethics.” Additionally, Price was elected to the ILA Board of Directors and will serve on the board for the next three years.

But perhaps no other professor spent as much time traveling during the fall as Hickman.

She also traveled to Shanghai, China, Oct. 19-20 to participate in the Leadership Forum 2007 hosted by the China Executive Leadership Academy Pudong, and to present her research in a paper titled, “The Power of Invisible Leadership.” Hickman co-authored the paper with University of Maryland professor Georgia Sorenson, a pioneer in the field of leadership studies.

The paper and presentation described components of an emerging theory of invisible leadership and offered examples from government, nonprofit and private-sector organizations.

“What I found most exciting was the work by Chinese scholars on the intersection between Eastern and Western theories of leadership,” she said. “This topic has been an interest of mine since the founding of the Jepson School."

                             Professor Hickman in Shanghai, China.