Original Article Actions Speak Louder Than Words The Benefits of Ethical Behaviors of Leaders Carmen Tanner, 1 Adrian Brügger, 2 Susan van Schie, 1 and Carmen Lebherz 1 1 Department of Psychology, University of Zurich, Switzerland, 2 School of Psychology, University of Exeter, UK Abstract. Ethical scandals in business have led to calls for more ethical or moral leadership. Yet, we still know very little about what characterizes ethical leadership and what its positive consequences actually are. We argue that the major question is not about what leaders value, but rather whether their ethical values are regularly reflected in behavioral patterns across situations and situational challenges. To address this, we have begun to build the Ethical Leadership Behavior Scale, which is based on behaviors reflecting concrete manifestations of ethical values (e.g., fairness, respect) across occasions and situational barriers. A study with 592 employees of 110 work units in two departments provided a first test of this scale and demonstrated that the level of ethical leadership behavior predicts important work-related attitudes (job satisfaction, work engagement, affective organizational commitment) and outcomes (health complaints, emotional exhaustion, absenteeism). Keywords: ethical leadership, ethical behavior, ethical values, job attitudes, work outcomes Ethical scandals in business, the current financial crisis, and examples of misuse of power by prominent leaders have contributed to widespread attention on ethics and led to calls for more ethical or moral leadership. This has raised impor- tant questions: What constitutes ethical leadership? How can it be measured? How does ethical leadership affect follow- ers’ attitudes and performances? Yet, we still know very lit- tle about what characterizes ethical leadership and what its effects actually are. To date, very little research has empiri- cally examined ethical leadership (Brown, Trevin ˜o, & Harrison, 2005; Trevin ˜o, Brown, & Hartman, 2003). Given that leadership is inevitably value-laden, leader- ship scholars have emphasized the role of moral develop- ment and values for the emergence of ethical leadership and have called for research to examine such issues (Russell, 2001; Schmidt & Posner, 1982; Sosik, 2005). Consequently, discourses in many arenas have centered on values and on the questions of which personal values are important and how they affect behavior (see Meglino & Ravlin, 1998). Ethical values essentially imply adherence to standards of morally right or good behaviors, as opposed to morally wrong or bad behaviors. However, leaders’ values only mat- ter to organizations and followers if they convey those beliefs and values through their actions. As Ciulla (1999) pointed out, ‘‘leaders sometimes lack the ability or the moral courage to act on their values’’ (p. 169). In this work, we call for more focused attention on the question of whether and how ethical values are reflected in behavioral patterns, and whether people act upon these values cross-situationally and despite situational challenges, because: actions speak louder than words. Specifically, we suggest that an ethical leadership instrument that assesses leaders’ ethical behavior across settings and difficulties has more potential to serve as a diagnostic and educational tool. The main goal of the following research is to build and test a first version of an Ethical Leadership Behavior Scale (ELBS). The intention is to expand upon previous assess- ments of ethical or authentic leadership by assessing con- crete ethical manifestations of varying difficulties. Furthermore, as there is little empirical evidence on the potential positive effects of ethical behaviors, a second goal is to examine the extent to which ethical leadership behavior contributes positively to followers’ job attitudes and work outcomes. Issues in Ethical Leadership Conceptualization Although most scholars agree that all major forms of lead- ership should be based on some ethical foundation (Bass & Steidlmeier, 1999; Kanungo, 2001), moral dimensions of leadership behavior have at best played an implicit or indirect role. Ethical standards of leadership have only recently been discussed and investigated more explicitly and directly. However, discussions differ as to what should be expected from an ethical leader. In their initial frame- work, Brown and colleagues (Brown et al., 2005; Brown & Trevin ˜o, 2006) asserted that ethical leadership involves promoting normatively appropriate conduct through role modeling and interpersonal relationships. They stated that ethical leaders are perceived as trustworthy, fair, and con- cerned about others, that they set clear ethical standards Ó 2010 Hogrefe Publishing Zeitschrift fu ¨ r Psychologie / Journal of Psychology 2010; Vol. 218(4):225–233 DOI: 10.1027/0044-3409/a000032