Leader Authenticity, Behavioral Integrity, and Six Sigma

This study broadens our understanding of the relationship between top leadership in organizations and Six Sigma success. Responding to recent calls from operations management (OM) scholars for incorporating human behavior into OM models, we draw on authentic leadership and behavioral integrity theory to examine Six Sigma success. We use a survey methodology to explore the relationships between top leadership characteristics and the success of Six Sigma. We find that authentic leadership and behavioral integrity are positively related to the Six Sigma process. We contribute to Six Sigma literature by presenting a coherent leadership-performance model and provide theoretical support for explaining variations in Six Sigma performance.