Authentic leadership: women leaders in Serbia

• Main Authors: Sandra Dramićanin, Snežana Mihajlov, Nebojša Pavlović
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Academy of Professional Studies South Serbia, Department of Business Studies Blace 2020-12-01
• Series: BizInfo
• Subjects: women's leadership; authentic leadership; self-awareness; internalized moral perspective; balanced processing; relational transparency
• Online Access: http://bizinfo.edu.rs/index.php/bizinfo/article/view/191

Authentic leaders are people who are aware of themselves and own capabilities, who respect other people's opinions, perspectives and attitudes (about business and them as leaders), who are guided by high moral principles and practice transparency in business and communication with other employees. The aim of this research is to show are the women leaders in Serbia belong to the authentic type of leader and which of the characteristics of the authentic leader is the most common among them. In the research 113 women leaders from various activities from the territory of the Republic of Serbia participated. Of the total number of respondents, 31 results show an authentic leadership style, while only 3 results show a strong authentic style. Self-awareness is a dimension that stands out in relation to the other three and characterizes the largest number of women leaders. Further analysis showed that the greatest leadership potential in terms of authentic leadership has women who deal with services, have between 36-45 years and 10-15 years of work experience in the business in which they are engaged and have Bachelor’s degree. The society in Serbia is such that it prefers male leaders, the goal of this research is to show that women are excellent leaders based on their characteristics and to have the predisposition to become great authentic leaders.