Courage and Courageous Communication Among Leaders and Followers in Groups, Organizations, and Communities

A speech addressed by Fred Jablin, professor at the University of Richmond, Jepson School of Leadership Studies, is presented. His interest in exploring the fuzzy concept of courage and its relationship to leadership and followership is founded on four factors: 1. Practicing leaders and many academics recognize its importance. 2. Courage appears to represent an extreme form of motivation and commitment yet is rarely considered in social science research on motivation, commitment, and leadership. 3. It is possible that one of the most common ways in which leaders and followers in groups, organizations, and communities display courage is by "speaking up." 4. Interest in exploring the concept of courage and leadership and followership, because to date, generally speaking, despite its apparent importance, courage has been neglected as a factor in most social scientific leadership theories.