Chapter 7: Leader Virtues Promote Resilience and Sustainability

Each human is unique, and the climate of productive working teams is arguably the most valuable, rare, non-substitutable, and inimitable of all an organization's resources. Further, these capabilities are not depleted as quickly as other resources, and they may even grow stronger over time. It behooves virtuous leaders to foster followers with skill, diligence, and virtues, leading to personal resilience. Improved team cohesion and performance is in turn a determinant component of organizational resilience and aspects of Triple Bottom Line (TBL) sustainability. At a higher level, virtuous leaders may favorably impact the sustainability of entire societies. Such ideas are ancient, fundamental, and multicultural. Synthesizing findings from philosophy, psychology, cultural studies, economics, organization theory, leadership, and sustainability, the discussion extends the thinking into modern considerations of resilience and sustainability.