Introduction
In the world of work, there are four types of managers. You might have probably heard of, or known managers who take up front seats in church, mosque or any other place of worship. They are always the first to give offertory, and offer words of wisdom to the worshippers, but the same managers steal from their employers. In this paper, we refer to such managers as Dualists. You might also have heard of another set of managers who actively participate in worship but never steal from their employers. We refer to this set of managers as Stoics. Of course, you should have heard of managers who neither go to church or mosque and never steal from their employers. We refer to these managers as empiricists. Yet, you find in real world managers who never attend prayers at church or mosques are typical thieves. We refer to them here as Nihilists. Logically speaking, it would not surprise anyone if nihilist managers stole from their employers. Such managers are expected to lack christian morals because they do not recognise God’s or Allah’s commandments which are a pillar to doing good and avoid evil. Stealing is evil, isn’t? Trouble surfaces when dualist managers, some of whom are even leaders in churches, mosques or other places of worship steal from their employers. These people are the first to hear the word of God because they sit in front. They know all key biblical or qur’anic themes in every preaching. They have knowledge of what justice, fairness, trust, obedience, faithfulness, greed and selfishness mean. Why, for heavens sake, should they steal from their employers, not once, not twice but routinely? What factors drive their high propensity to steal? These are fundamental questions this paper endeavours to answer.
Bringing Religious Values to Work
Previous research assumes that religious ethical principles such as honesty, integrity, and fairness, enjoy variations in their practical application in the workplace (Alshaabani et al., 2021). Most dualist managers may worship routinely to focus on financial success or professional connections from among fellow dualist worshippers. They may also pretend to be pious so that when they are caught, nobody will believe their ears. Rarely do dualist managers pray for the success of their employers because what brings them to worship places could be boredom at home. Byrd (2022) notes that motivations of dualist managers such as material possessions, striking business deals after prayer sessions, showing off a new car, or an expensive gomesi overshadow calls from religious leaders to observe God’s commandments and doctrine. Thus, dualist managers while in church or mosque may pay more attention to how they ignite sensory captivations of fellow worshippers and never pay attention to the preaching
Religiosity and Moral Obligations
Religion often reinforces moral obligations, but its influence is shaped by personal and societal factors. Hayes et al. (2020) highlight that religious commitment fosters community-oriented values such as fairness and equity, yet, these commitments can clash with personal ambitions. Researchers led by Chaudhry et al. (2021) observe that dualist managers might frame fairness narrowly to favour family or friends over broader organizational responsibilities. Even Stoic managers who abstain from stealing may avoid confronting thieving colleagues or subordinates prioritizing harmony over integrity. Societal factors include community expectations, legislation and policy frameworks. In the Scandinavian countries, for example, there are predominantly empiricist managers who probably have never heard of the phrase ‘God,’ or ‘Allah.’ A few stoic managers in these countries may travel thirty kilometres or more every Sunday or Friday afternoon for an hour’s worship due to the scarcity of places of worship. Legislation in these countries takes into account promotion of better child upbringing as a precursor for moral values. For example, you cannot buy alcohol from anywhere in Finland after 9.00 pm unless you go to a gazetted drinking place or bar. If you send a child below the age of eighteen to buy you liquor, you will end up in jail. If you forget your phone in a bus, you will find it the next day in ‘lost and found shops.’ Africa with predominantly dualist managers has churches and mosques every 500 metres. In Africa, children drink alcohol with adults. If you leave your phone on the pew and head to the pulpit to take your offertory, you will probably find when a fellow worshipper has stolen it and escaped. Here in Africa, managers are under pressure to help their family members with little focus on their employers’ success. In the Scandinavian countries, empiricist managers focus on promoting success of their employers first and help to their families come next.
Public vs. Private Values
The interplay between religious values and managerial roles highlights the complexity of integrating personal beliefs with professional responsibilities (Becker et al., 2016). While the rare stoic managers in Africa not only wear christian values on their faces, but also practice them, dualist managers tend to apply their religious ethics based on personal interests. They use public lenses while determining what to do and what not to do, (Alshaabani et al., 2021), forgetting that the most serious and impactful actions are those that never surface in the public domain.
Equity in Resource Distribution
In the public sector organisations, everyone everywhere is watching how resources are being allocated. Whenever there are budget cuts, victim organisations tend to avoid the bigger picture but focus on petty issues of unfairness in ‘cake sharing.’ Dualist managers whose budgets have been cut tend to shelf religious teachings and choose to pay themselves by stealing, even when such budget cuts never affected their salaries. We cannot ignore the fact that at times budgets are allocated unfairly in the public sector, such as cutting the budget in entity A to fund a parallel entity B performing duplicate roles.
Conclusion
If you have read this paper from introduction to this conclusion, you might be wondering what we are advocating for. The world is flooding with dualist managers, especially in Africa, yet, the same continent has innumerable places of worship, over 99% of Africans are religious. Are we saying religion in Africa has had an insignificant impact? No. Perhaps even the little good we see in organisations, its because of religious values. You recall the examples from the Scandinavian region discussed in this paper? The biggest problem in Africa has been poor legislation on morals. Most of our laws target adults while ignoring families and child upbringing. A few of our laws about children focus on prohibition of child labour, defilement and child trafficking. No African country has active laws regulating the relationship between parents and children, guiding on what children must do or not do, what adults should order children to do and not do, where children should not go at what time, and where they should go. Laws about what children should watch on TV, internet or listen to on radio. Governments in Africa have tended to commit a fallacy of generalisation, the thinking that every parent knows how to bring up their children, in religious focus. Religion has done its part, and African states must play theirs. It is our desire to produce as many as stoic managers as possible. No employer would wish to have dualist or nihilist managers.
References
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Hayes, T. L., Oltman, K. A., Kaylor, L. E., & Belgudri, A. (2020). How leaders can become more committed to diversity management. Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research, 72(4), 247.