"Financial Crises can be Beneficial to Building Trust in Leadership" - The 2014 Leadership Behaviour & Education Forum

LONDON, October 2, 2014 /PRNewswire/ --

Leaders from Bath University School of Management, Henley, Ashridge and The Open University Business Schools have been meeting in London with Deloitte, EY and Willis Group to discuss the latest research in leadership behaviour.

Professor Veronica Hope-Hailey, Dean of the University of Bath's School of Management, said:

"Post-financial crash, many of the companies that we researched* had built a higher level of trust among their employees than before. The leadership teams achieved this by being honest about decisions, for example when cutting the workforce, and by being straight forward about why, rather than putting spin on decisions. We found that the businesses which did well treated trust as a precious commodity."

She added: "You can't twitter your way to trust…trust is not a soft concept".

Baroness Jay of Paddington opened the Forum by stating that collaborative leadership can be more helpful today than only believing in the cult of the heroic leader.

Panellists at the Forum debated ethics and leadership behaviour, decision-making, modern leadership and the humanities, leadership in schools and the leadership value of MBAs.

Professor Bernd Vogel of Henley Business School, who has been creating new research on leadership behaviour with neuroscientists at the University of Reading, added:

"We looked at CEOs' sense of identity and most had awareness of the communal good when making decisions. However there was a tension between the "I" ego element of their identities and the higher good of the organisation part. When these two parts are confused problems can arise."

However, Dr Patricia Hind of Ashridge Business School explained that she was interested in how companies are now using social networks and crowd sourcing in the new era of leadership.

*The "Cultivating trustworthy leaders" 2014 study for the CIPD and University of Bath School of Management covered thirteen organisations, including The John Lewis Partnership, Norton Rose, ABN Amro and GKN.

To view the videos from the Forum please click here:  http://www.behaviouralfinanceforum.com/  and  http://www.broadcastacademics.com/ 

For more information please contact: Heather Fearfield or Matthew Locke at the Broadcast PR Business and The Behavioural Finance Forum on +44(0)207-469-4036 matthew@broadcastprbusiness.com