Regarding the topic of leadership, economists and psychologists have much to learn from each other. By now, both economists and psychologists seem to agree on at least one thing: leadership matters.

Economists have started paying more attention to the role of leadership, both in micro- and macro level research (Lazear, Shaw & Stanton, 2015; Jones & Olken, 2005 e.g.), and a growing number of economic scholars start to acknowledge the relevance of leadership in economic research. However, the leader and its behavior within the organization still remains a so-called ´black box´ in economic research. An important conclusion drawn by economists in a world-wide study is that heterogeneity across and within firms, sectors and countries can be explained by differences in the quality of management of organizations (Bloom, Lemos, Sadun, Scur, & Van Reenen, 2014). However, individual leadership styles are still omitted as an effect on these outcomes.

Psychologists have traditionally studied leadership and its effect for the greater part within organizations at the micro-level. Along with a call from the leadership literature to consider a broader context in leadership studies (Dinh et al, 2014; Liden & Antonakis, 2009; Staw, 2016), research in applied psychology and management research is starting to incorporate contextual and macroeconomic factors (Jacquart & Antonakis, 2015). Moreover, to tackle the problem of endogeneity and/reverse causality, leadership research has started to pay more attention to methods typically used in economic research.

On 7, 8 and 9 June 2017, the conference ´Economics and Leadership´ will be organized in Groningen with the aim of bringing leading international economic and leadership scholars together to gain a better understanding into the topic of economics and leadership.

Several top-economists and psychologists, such as Kathryn Shaw (Stanford U), John Antonakis (HEC Lausanne), Christian Zehnder (HEC Lausanne), Michael Kosfeld (Goethe U Frankfurt), Roberto Weber (U of Zurich) and Holger Herz (Fribourg U), will take part in the conference to share their knowledge and talk about their research.

We now invite researchers to submit papers that address research at the cross-roads of economics and leadership. Papers or extended abstracts (four-pager) can be submitted to inthelead rug.nl. The deadline for submission is 1st of March 2017 and acceptances will be communicated by mid-March. See for more information our call for papers.

Questions can be addressed to inthelead rug.nl. More detailed information about the conference will be provided soon on our website.

Bloom, N., Lemos, R., Sadun, R. , Scur, D. & Van Reenen, J. (2014). The new empirical economics of management. Journal of the European Economic Association, 12, 835–876.

Dinh, J. E., Lord, R. G., Gardner, W. L., Meuser, J. D., Liden, R. C., & Hu, J. (2014). Leadership theory and research in the new millennium: Current theoretical trends and changing perspectives. The Leadership Quarterly, 25: 36-62.

Edward P. Lazear, Kathryn L. Shaw, and Christopher T. Stanton (2015). The Value of Bosses. Journal of Labor Economics, 33, 823-861.

Jacquart, P. & Antonakis, J. (2015). When does charisma matter for top-level leaders? Effect of attributional ambiguity. Academy of Management Journal, 58, 1051-1074.

Jones, B. F. & Olken, B. A. (2005). Do leaders matter? National leadership and growth since World War II. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 120 (3), 835-864. 835-864.

Liden, R.C., & Antonakis, J. (2009). Considering context in psychological leadership research. Human Relations, 62: 1587-1605.

Staw, B.M., (2016). Stumbling toward a social psychology of organizations: An autobiographical look at the direction of organizational research. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, 3: 1-19.