Religion and Contemporary Management: Moses as a Model for Effective Leadership

By Arthur J. Wolak

‘Leadership’ is crucial to contemporary business, politics, and organizations of every type, including the corporate, non-profit, educational, and government sectors. While modern leadership theorists suggest various models, traits, and approaches to leadership behavior that purport novelty, Ecclesiastes just may have been right that ‘There is nothing new under the sun’. The biblical figure of Moses – a familiar name both to adherents of the Western religious traditions and to people who are not – provides an exemplary model of effective leadership that is broadly applicable. Moses is depicted in the Bible as exhibiting ‘heroic’ and ‘charismatic’ tendencies. He was certainly empathic. Yet Moses also shows ‘transactional’, ‘transformational’ and ‘visionary’ leadership qualities. A leader of good character, Moses exhibits features similar to the Yiddish term, ‘mensch’ – someone showing responsibility and integrity, knowing right from wrong.

Though few might think of Moses as a ‘leader’ or a ‘manager’ in the contemporary sense, Moses not only holds a firm place among the most significant leaders in Western civilization but is arguably the quintessential example of leadership from whom much can be learned by people entering and occupying leadership positions. While current leadership and management vocabulary might differ from the Hebrew Bible, many of the traits, behaviors and actions advocated by modern leadership theorists appear to emulate those of Moses. Wolak contrasts contemporary leadership ideas with biblical and rabbinic sources that show Moses’ leadership qualities, Moses serves as an ancient model with current relevance for what modern leadership theorists argue make for an effective leader.

‘Religion and Contemporary Management’ discusses and compares original and critical biblical and rabbinic sources with current business leadership and management literature, revealing what leadership theorists’ advocate today largely emulates what the Bible depicts as effective leadership through Moses’ example. Hence, Moses’ influence on current leadership trends in Western culture appears pervasive, even if contemporary leadership theorists do not typically cite Moses as an important source for leadership precedent.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Anthem Press
• Release date: Nov 21, 2016
• ISBN: 9781783086016

Book preview

Religion and Contemporary Management

Religion and Contemporary

Management

Moses as a Model for Effective

Leadership

Arthur J. Wolak

Anthem Press

An imprint of Wimbledon Publishing Company

www.anthempress.com

This edition first published in UK and USA 2016

by ANTHEM PRESS

75–76 Blackfriars Road, London SE1 8HA, UK

or PO Box 9779, London SW19 7ZG, UK

and

244 Madison Ave #116, New York, NY 10016, USA

Copyright © Arthur J. Wolak 2016

The author asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Wolak, Arthur J., author.

Title: Religion and contemporary management : Moses as a model for

effective leadership / Arthur J. Wolak.

Description: New York : Anthem Press, 2016. |

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2016036847 | ISBN 9781783085996 (hardback : alk. paper)

Subjects: LCSH: Moses (Biblical leader) | Leadership in the Bible. |

Leadership. | Management.

Classification: LCC BS580.M6 W65 2016 | DDC 222/.1092–dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016036847

ISBN-13: 978-1-78308-599-6 (Hbk)

ISBN-10: 1-78308-599-1 (Hbk)

This title is also available as an e-book.

To my mother, Elizabeth Wolak, and in memory of my father, Dr. Edward Wolak, who always encouraged a traditional focus on study as a result of Jewish culture, tradition and education in their native Poland; to my wife, Anna, and my brother, Richard; and to my children, Jacob, Joshua and Julia, who may one day read this book among the broader corpus of biblical and rabbinic sources and become effective leaders in any endeavor they choose to pursue.

Never again did there arise in Israel a prophet like Moses—whom the Lord singled out, face to face.

—Deuteronomy 34:10

When the righteous become great the people rejoice, but when the wicked dominate the people groan.

—Proverbs 29:2

Contents

Foreword

Ruth Sandberg

Foreword

Larry Pate

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Introduction

1.Ancient Leadership for Present Times

2.Defining Leadership

3.Leaders and Managers

4.Heroism, Charisma and Their Limitations

5.Empathic Leadership

6.Humility—the Antithesis of Arrogance

7 .Moses’ Essential Leadership Skills

8.Assessing Moses’ Leadership Style

Glossary

Bibliography

Index

FOREWORD

At first blush, the ancient biblical figure of Moses does not appear to have anything in common with today’s political or financial leaders. What Dr. Arthur Wolak has accomplished in his work is to show us that, in fact, Moses has a great deal to teach contemporary leaders. Dr. Wolak also succeeds in connecting the most current work on effective leadership with the figure of Moses, as well as in demonstrating that all the leadership skills most desired today have their roots in the text of the Hebrew Bible as personified by Moses.

Dr. Wolak carefully and thoroughly outlines an amazing array of leadership characteristics described in the Hebrew Bible that are associated with Moses. After reading this work, one is confronted with the following list of leadership traits: humility, empathy, power sharing, vision, tenacity, heroism, self-reflection, patience, charisma, wisdom, compassion and perseverance. In addition, Moses is also shown to exhibit the ability to engender trust, to inspire others, to resolve conflicts, to push people beyond their boundaries, to delegate and to speak truth to power.

This list of qualifications at first glance seems an impossible one for any single human being to possess and more appropriate perhaps for a messianic figure. What Moses shows us, however, is that one human being can reach many, if not most, of these leadership traits, if he or she is willing to take on the lifelong discipline of continual character development and moral growth necessary to foster these traits. What Dr. Wolak has done is to show us that the best leaders are those who strive constantly for self-development first before expecting this from others.

Dr. Wolak also demonstrates the ways in which Moses intuitively moves between the roles of leader and manager, and how he succeeds in many different forms of leadership—transactional, transformational and visionary. At the same time, this work focuses on the important theme of the many human imperfections associated with Moses. As great a leader as he is, Moses is just a human being with humanity’s inherent flaws. His anger can get out of control; he is not an eloquent orator due to a speech impediment; he has moments of self-doubt and fear. Yet these very weaknesses are what contribute to his great leadership. By having a humble ego, Moses is not interested in power for its own sake or in self-aggrandizement, but is instead a leader who has compassion for those he is leading and an eagerness to share power with those who serve him. Dr. Wolak points out that the dangers of the charismatic cult leader, to whom so many people have been susceptible in the modern world, are not found in Moses, who is its very antithesis.

Dr. Wolak’s most important contribution is his insistence that the biblical and rabbinic traditions of Judaism have an important place in Western society, and that the leadership concepts that are assumed to be contemporary discoveries are in fact part of an ancient culture that has much to teach the modern world.

Ruth Sandberg, PhD

Leonard and Ethel Landau Professor of Rabbinics

Gratz College

FOREWORD

As a tree is known by its fruit, so man by his works.

—The Talmud

When Arthur asked me to write a foreword to his book Religion and Contemporary Management: Moses as a Model for Effective Leadership, I was honored and a little surprised. Although I have spent the past 30 years studying and teaching the various facets of leadership and spent several years teaching at a Jesuit university, Loyola Marymount University, I’m not exactly a religious scholar. My focus has been on the modern history of leadership rather than ancient practices.

As I contemplated further, though, I began to ask myself, Are things really that different? For thousands of years, there have been effective leaders and corrupt ones. Whether a leader is in politics, business or religion, the dynamics are the same. People are the same. The blazing scandals at Enron, WorldCom, Tyco, Volkswagen and too many other companies illustrate that the age-old battle between right and wrong still rages on.¹

In the wake of these scandals, we don’t need more standards-based guidelines or accounting-based rules to cover every possible situation. Instead, we need leaders of character and integrity. We need leaders who don’t put their own egos and greed ahead of the welfare of the company and its employees. We need principled leaders who make ethically based decisions while considering how both other people and the environment will be affected by their actions.² Frankly, we need more leaders like Moses.

Although people and their characters haven’t changed much, the demands of leadership have increased. Perhaps today more than ever, people have extraordinarily high expectations of leaders. Leaders are expected to be decisive, strong, commanding, ethical, honest, fair, balanced, thoughtful and just about any other redeeming quality you can think of.

In addition to these personal qualities, leaders are also expected to have a skill set that is above and beyond that of the people they lead. If the people are negotiators, the leader is expected to be the best negotiator. If the people are athletes, the leader is expected to have knowledge and understanding in every aspect of the sport. If the people are in academics, the leader is expected to be an expert in the field in addition to leading. Is it really fair to expect all those qualities to be present in one person? Is there some underlying trait that can be considered the foundation of effective leadership?

In Religion and Contemporary Management: Moses as a Model for Effective Leadership, Arthur makes the case that humility and empathy are at the core of effective leadership. And for those of us who have worked with humble, empathetic leaders and with those who are not, we know firsthand that the differences between them are great.

For those who work with a person who is a poor leader, every day is a struggle. At any given time, feelings of frustration, anger, helplessness and disillusionment are present. For those who work with a humble, empathetic leader, though, the experience is much different. At any given time, feelings of inspiration, passion, commitment, excitement, connection and accomplishment are present. One leader brings his or her people down. The other lifts them up.³

The latter kinds of leaders are often called servant leaders. In an article on servant leader attributes, Robert Russell and A. Gregory Stone identified several characteristics of servant leaders.⁴ These include listening, empathy, healing, awareness, persuasion, conceptualization, foresight, stewardship, commitment to the growth of people, building community, encouragement and teaching.

As you will read in the following pages, Moses embodied each of these qualities. Yet, you will also learn that Moses doesn’t fit the most essential criterion for servant leadership, which is that he or she is a servant first and a leader second. Moses was a leader who served his people, not a servant who led. It’s a subtle distinction, and is one that Arthur clarifies well.

A leader influences followers in two ways—directly and indirectly. Leadership researcher Steve Kerr states that a direct effect occurs when a subordinate is influenced by the leader’s behavior in and of itself.⁵ An indirect effect occurs when the subordinate is influenced by the implications of the leader’s behavior for some future consequence, such as rewards. Put another way, the leader can influence others both by how he or she behaves directly and by inspiring others and making them feel connected to some greater implication.

Leadership uses influence, and with influence comes power. It’s what a leader decides to do with this power that determines whether or not he or she will be an effective leader. With power, a leader has two options. They can use it to overpower subordinates or to empower them. It depends on their intent. And, this is where the concept of empathy comes into leadership.

Lamm, Meltzoff and Decety conducted research using functional magnetic resonance imaging to look at the neural underpinnings of empathy. They noted that when strong emotional response tendencies exist, these tendencies have to be overcome by executive functions. They further noted that regulation of one’s egocentric perspective is crucial for understanding others.⁶

In other words, an effective leader must recognize when his or her followers are in a situation that can bring out strong emotions, and must use his or her thinking to lead the followers to what is best for everyone—not just for the leader. Clearly, leading slaves to freedom is an example of that kind of leadership.

For any reader who aspires to change the landscape of modern society, whether in business, politics, religion or any other area where leaders have power, Religion and Contemporary Management: Moses as a Model for Effective Leadership is a valuable resource. It’s time to free ourselves from the corruption that seems so rampant these days and to follow in the footsteps of Moses.

Larry Pate, PhD

Chief Learning Officer, Decision Systems International

Adjunct Professor, California State University, Long Beach

1 M. R. Bandsuch, L. E. Pate and J. Thies, Rebuilding Stakeholder Trust in Business: An Examination of Principle-Centered Leadership and Organizational Transparency in Corporate Governance, Business and Society Review 113, no. 1 (2008): 99–127.

2 L. E. Pate, W. E. Lindsey, T. R. Nielson and M. Hawks, Innovations in Graduate Business Education: The Challenge of Developing Principle-Centered Leaders, in Advances in Business Education and Training: The Power of Technology for Learning, Vol. 1 , ed. N. Barsky, M. Clements, J. Ravn and K. Smith (Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Kluwer Academic Press, 2008), 129–42. See the following: W. Lindsey and L. Pate, Integrating Principle-Centered Leadership into the Business Curriculum: Lessons from the LMU Experience, Journal of Executive Education 5, no. 1 (2006): 17–29.

3 L. E. Pate and T. L. Shoblom, The ACES Decision-Making Technique as a Reframing Tool for Increasing Empathy, in Organizing through Empathy , ed. K. Pavlovich and K. Krahnke (New York, NY: Routledge, 2014), 130–44.

4 R. Russell and A. Stone, A Review of Servant Leadership Attributes: Developing a Practical Model, Leadership & Organization Development Journal 23, no. 3 (2002): 145–57.

5 S. Kerr and J. M. Jermier, Substitutes for Leadership: Their Meaning and Measurement, Organizational Behavior and Human Performance 22, no. 3 (1978): 375–403.

6 C. Lamm, A. N. Meltzoff and J. Decety, How Do We Empathize with Someone Who Is Not Like Us? A Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging Study, Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience 22, no. 2 (2010): 362–76.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

While the process of researching and writing a book is often a solitary endeavor that entails countless hours to reach flawless perfection—a virtually unattainable goal for anyone but always the objective to which an author should aspire—this work could not reach publication without the assistance of special individuals who provided moral support or advice along the way.

I would like to thank my wife, Anna, our two sons, Jacob and Joshua, and our daughter, Julia, for their patience and understanding, giving me time to work on this manuscript when they would have preferred me to be engaged in less solitary activities. I would like to express my gratitude to my mother, Elizabeth, and brother, Richard, for their encouragement in the early years when undergraduate and graduate studies preoccupied much of my time, but would later culminate in the writing of numerous publications, including this book that came out of a deeply profound intellectual interest from my graduate work in business, management, history and religious studies. If there ever was an interdisciplinary topic more deserving of book-length treatment, I cannot think of a better one than Moses and leadership because the two—though otherwise seemingly reflective of completely separate fields of inquiry—are inseparable when analyzing the context of Moses, as the pages of this book show.

I would like to express my gratitude to Rabbi Dr. Ruth Sandberg, Leonard and Ethel Landau Professor of Rabbinics at Gratz College, who provided insightful suggestions on the earliest drafts of this work, and from whom I had the pleasure of acquiring a profound interest and respect for the study of the primary religious texts, including those that reveal the character of Moses and the cultures and general atmosphere in which he grew up and ultimately thrived. I would also like to thank Ruth for her thoughtful foreword to this volume.

Likewise, I wish to thank business professor Dr. Larry Pate, currently of California State University, Long Beach, for his kind and thought-provoking foreword. I became familiar with Larry’s vast knowledge of leadership and management topics as a doctoral student, when I was appointed copy editor of the academic business journal for which he was then editor-in-chief. I assisted him in the review of countless academic papers submitted for publication consideration and learned a great deal from this experience.

Thanks must go to my editor, Kiran Bolla, and the publication committee and production team at Anthem Press for believing in the value of this book and helping to bring this unique interdisciplinary business title to a broad audience of interested readers.

The front cover image, The Children of Israel Crossing the Red Sea (oil on canvas, circa 1855), by the French painter Frédéric Schopin (1804–1880), is courtesy of ©Bristol Culture (Bristol Museums, Galleries and Archives, UK).

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Dr. Arthur J. Wolak is president of CMI Chat Media Inc. Having earned a BA in Psychology from the University of British Columbia, followed by an MA in History and an MBA, he went on to receive a PhD from Macquarie University’s Graduate School of Management, in Sydney, Australia. He also earned an MA in Jewish Studies and a Graduate Certificate in Jewish-Christian Studies from Gratz College. He has published articles in the International Journal of Organizational Analysis, Australasian Canadian Studies Journal, Reviews in Australian Studies and Jewish Bible Quarterly, among other academic journals, newspapers and magazines. He is the author of The Development of Managerial Culture: A Comparative Study of Australia and Canada (2015). Arthur lives in Vancouver, Canada, with his wife, Anna, and their three children, Jacob, Joshua and Julia.

INTRODUCTION

Just as leadership is essential for effective management, successful management depends on effective leadership. While each role is important to the proper functioning of any organization, a leader of an enterprise or organization—or any leader in a position of authority to whom others look for guidance—has a broader focus that benefits from particular attributes that managers, and those who report to them, should be able to respond to favorably in order to achieve the common goal of organizational success.The particular qualities a leader should possess are a matter for debate because it can be rationally argued that cultural differences play an important role in how leaders function. This is a reasonable assertion and has been shown in studies to be an important consideration because cultures often differ, even if only subtly, among those that would otherwise be deemed closely aligned.¹

In my years of academic study of management and leadership along with my experience working under leaders, and holding leadership roles myself, I have recognized the impact of cultural differences.² But I have also come to view effective leaders as possessing a particular skill set that separates them from less effective leaders. This skill set includes, but ultimately transcends, such management techniques as the delegation of responsibilities to others and the empowerment of people, and also includes the influence of personal attributes. Charisma can be a powerful quality, but it is not a defining feature of an effective leader. Wisdom matters. Personal values matter. A sense of humility is important to assert the message that the organization is not about extolling the virtues of the leader but rather emphasizing the leader’s purpose in garnering support for the organization and inspiring the rank and file to feel a similar sense of meaning in the pursuit of achieving the organization’s purpose.

Hence, I firmly believe it is possible to identify features of successful leaders that transcend the reality of cultural differences, serving as an almost timeless model for those who aspire to various leadership positions. Naturally, context matters where particular attributes stand out as more significant and effective than others. Management scholars Rob Goffee and Gareth Jones assert,

The exercise of leadership is contextual. Always. This undermines the notion