<p> The concept of shepherding others goes back thousands of years, yet the shepherding metaphor received limited review in academic circles. A study transpired in order to better understand what shepherding entails. It was not known how self-declared leaders from the ecclesiastic, business, and education fields, perceived, described, and practiced shepherd leadership in the greater New York metropolitan area. The purpose of this qualitative case study was to explore how 30 self-declared leaders from the ecclesiastic, business, and education fields, perceived, described, and practiced shepherd leadership. The researcher conducted a qualitative case study involving 30 experienced leaders from three Abrahamic faiths (Jewish, Christian, Islamic) and three fields (ecclesiastic, business, education). All 30 participants completed the Shepherd Leader Inventory and the Brodie Ranking of Shepherd Leadership Skills. Combining 13 open-ended interviews with the two surveys enabled the researcher to triangulate the data. When participants were asked to describe practices unique to shepherding, the leaders in the study mentioned that the shepherd leader cares about others, behaves in a professional manner, builds up others, thinks through actions, builds relationships, shares authority, develops others, shows flexibility, and provides guidance. The researcher discovered that shepherding consists of similar constructs as several positive leadership models. Shepherding proceeds from Theory Z where the leader maintains authority in times of crisis and shares authority in times of ease. </p><p> <i>Keywords</i>: Leadership, Shepherd leadership, Shepherding, Servant leadership, Spiritual leadership, Positive leadership, Transformational leadership, Leader-member exchange, Agapao love, Ecclesiastic, Business, Education, Leadership theory, Spirituality</p>
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:PROQUEST/oai:pqdtoai.proquest.com:10076305 |
| Date | 29 September 2016 |
| Creators | Brodie, Ernest Frank, Jr. |
| Publisher | Grand Canyon University |
| Source Sets | ProQuest.com |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | thesis |
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