Leading editors

Two Richmond professors wrote the book on leadership. Or rather, edited the definitive encyclopedia.

Jepson School of Leadership Studies professors Scott Allison and George Goethals are two of three editors of The Sage Encyclopedia of Leadership Studies, which was published in February. Goethals and Allison both earned their doctorates in psychology and are longtime scholars of various forms of leadership, particularly heroism and leadership.

The two-volume encyclopedia provides a comprehensive overview of the study of leadership — a discipline in which UR became, well, a leader in 1992 when it opened the Jepson School, the nation’s first devoted to leadership studies.

The encyclopedia contains an array of case studies, including in social movements, in political crises, and in contexts such as sports, the workplace, and mutiny. It also explores concepts of leadership, cross-cultural influences, its historical development, ethical concerns, and much more. The text clocks in at more than 2,100 pages and features nearly 300 contributors. Among them are more than 40 UR faculty representing all five of the university’s schools.

The editors write in the introduction that their goals for publishing the text are aspirational. “Leadership demands an understanding of not only how leadership is done well but also how it is done ethically,” they write. “It is about understanding how in the best of circumstances people can find ways of getting along and getting things done, together, in highly moral ways.”