Experiences of authentic leadership from life stories in West Africa

Studies have called for exploring authentic leadership in diverse contexts, as organizations expressed a need for credible leadership amid challenging business times and societal volatilities. However, there has been limited consideration of the cultural and contextual boundaries of authentic leadership. This paper addresses this gap in literature and expands the empirical evidence by investigating the conceptualization of authentic leadership through a qualitative study in the context of West Africa. To this end, this research adopts a life-story approach with a variety of 16 business executives who shared their leadership experiences from Ghana. The findings of this research not only support and enrich the multifactorial characteristics of authentic leadership but also reveal an emerging dimension described as collective orientation. Additionally, the findings indicate that authentic leadership holds cultural relevance in emerging economies. Therefore, managers aiming to promote authentic leadership in their organizations need to recognize contextual values and cultivate appropriate environments to achieve positive outcomes.