An investigation into the role of emotion in leadership development for entrepreneurs

Purpose – The Holy Grail of leadership learning is to stimulate behavioural changes that continue beyond the learning environment into the workplace, ultimately leading to improved productivity and value. The purpose of this paper is to explore the interface between emotion and leadership learning and provides evidence from research undertaken in Wales (UK) to support further research on the use of emotion in this endeavour. Design/methodology/approach – Unique access to a successful programme of guided leadership development for owner-managers of small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) in Wales, UK, provided an opportunity to observe emotion being used and experienced by both learners and trainers. Literature reviews were used to inform initial inferences made during participant observations of a sample of the learners (n=91). Focus groups were undertaken with a sample (n=27) of participants in order to determine the emotional impact and perceived effectiveness of the method by the learners. Findings –...