New Data Reveal Moral Leadership Serves as a Powerful Catalyst for Organizational Effectiveness, Employee Inspiration, and Mission Achievement in the Social Sector

Yet while 85% believe their leaders are “moral leaders” only 18% demonstrate specific behaviors of top-tier moral leadership according to new report from The HOW Institute for Society with support from The Rockefeller Foundation.
NEW YORK (July 10, 2025) – A new study from The HOW Institute for Society  with support from The Rockefeller Foundation confirms that social sector leaders have an opportunity to grow their moral leadership capacities to meet the current moment and build team trust across their organizations. Moral leadership is not just a ‘nice to have’ – it is catalytic – measurably linked to mission achievement, innovation. lower rates of burnout, increased talent retention, organizational resilience, and more.
The findings in the report, From Mission to Impact: Insights on Moral Leadership in the Social Sector, show that organizations that invest in developing moral leadership capabilities demonstrate, on average, 95% greater resilience across fifteen common organizational challenges, including those in resource allocation, fundraising, and strategic planning.
Further, only 1 in 3 social sector CEOs are leading most effectively—with performance in the top two tiers of the study. These leaders demonstrate the importance of how people are treated, trusted, inspired, and led with a clear sense of purpose. While this is roughly twice the rate of those in the business sector, it still shows most leaders in the US can improve in demonstrating and building moral leadership in their organizations. Leaders gain moral authority when they let purpose lead, are animated by values, inspire and elevate others, and build moral muscle.
The report also notes 85% of social sector staff rate their organization’s moral leadership as “strong” or “very strong,” despite the finding that only 18% of social sector CEOs demonstrate top-tier moral leadership behaviors. This reveals a hidden perception-behavior gap and an opportunity for growth and alignment.
For the report, researchers surveyed more than 414 U.S. workers across the social sector to assess the presence, absence, or frequency of a set of leadership behaviors and practices in their workplaces – from how their leaders put principles and values before self-interest in decision making, how they thoughtfully extend trust to colleagues rather than micromanaging them, and, how they listen and learn from perspectives that challenge their views and assumptions, to how they shape organizational culture, and how leaders in positions of formal authority wield their power with consideration for the concerns and aspirations of the people they lead. This research on the social sector complements recent findings in the business sector.
Overall, demand for moral leadership among U.S. workers is at an all-time high. In the 2025 State of Moral Leadership in Business Report, 95% of employees believe the need for moral leadership is more urgent than ever, up from 86% in 2020. Yet only 9% of corporate CEOs and 18% of social sector CEOs reach the top-tier by consistently demonstrating behaviors associated with moral leadership.
“This is our first study specific to the social sector to analyze the presence of behaviors and practices associated with moral leadership and how, when present, they strengthen an organization’s performance, inspire elevated behavior in people, and forge deeper relationships within communities and society,” said Dov Seidman, Founder and Chairman of The HOW Institute for Society. “We genuinely appreciate the support and partnership of The Rockefeller Foundation in this research, and the unique perspective they contribute based on their deep experience with social sector leaders around the world.”
“We are partnering with The HOW Institute on this important work because we see moral leadership accelerating social innovation and systems change,” said Zia Khan, senior advisor for The Rockefeller Foundation. “Social sector leaders regularly face difficult problems and ethical dilemmas – situations where playbooks and policies fall short. Moral leadership provides the compass to navigate these complexities, ensuring complex decisions are guided by fairness, justice, and empathy​—even under pressure. By leading with values and courage, moral leaders inspire extraordinary trust among stakeholders, unlocking greater commitment, creativity, and progress.”
Among the key findings from this report:
Moral leadership is a strength of the social sector, but top-tier moral leadership remains rare.
  • Only 32% of social sector CEOs are in the top two tiers with only 18% in the top tier, revealing an opportunity to significantly improve practice and performance.
  • Just 16% of social sector leaders fall in the bottom tier of moral leadership, compared to 46% in the business sector.
Organizations with strong moral leadership development report fewer mission barriers, but the implementation gap is real.
  • Organizations can identify effective moral leadership development strategies but often fail to act on them.
  • Leadership development is the sector’s top strategic priority for strengthening organizational performance—ahead of 7 other options including advocacy, enhanced tech, and new funding models—but more experiential and values-based approaches are needed.
  • Employees reporting their organization makes good or excellent effort in developing moral leadership capabilities show 95% greater resilience against barriers to organization success (on average) compared to those reporting their organization makes poor or fair effort in developing moral leadership capabilities.
“We believe the single greatest leadership challenge of the 21st century is to nurture and develop moral leaders who lead with moral authority and ensure that these leaders occupy positions of formal authority at every level of society,” said Seidman. “It is my sincere hope that our work developing moral leaders and measuring moral leadership across sectors will encourage leaders to take the deliberate and necessary steps to build their own moral authority, scale moral leadership across their organizations, and help move society from a world primarily administered by can to a world more fundamentally inspired by should.”
About The HOW Institute for Society
The  HOW Institute for Society  seeks to build and nurture a culture of moral leadership, principled decision-making and values-based behavior that enables individuals and institutions to meet the profound social, economic, and technological changes of the 21st Century. Leading the strategy for The HOW Institute is Founder Dov Seidman, a successful entrepreneur and CEO, best-selling author, and a teacher, who has devoted his life and professional career to making philosophy and philosophical frameworks practical in the business arena and across all sectors of society. For more information, visit the HOW Institute for Society website at https://thehowinstitute.org/, subscribe to the monthly newsletter HOW Matters, and follow on LinkedIn.
 
About The Rockefeller Foundation
The Rockefeller Foundation is a pioneering philanthropy built on collaborative partnerships at the frontiers of science, technology, and innovation that enable individuals, families, and communities to flourish. We make big bets to promote the well-being of humanity. Today, we are focused on advancing human opportunity and reversing the climate crisis by transforming systems in food, health, energy, and finance. For more information, sign up for our newsletter at www.rockefellerfoundation.org/subscribe and follow us on X @RockefellerFdn and LI @the-rockefeller-foundation.
 
About Moral Leadership
At its core, moral leadership is a framework for and approach to how one leads, earns moral authority, and wields influence – with or without formal authority. Moral leaders bring others on a shared journey of significance grounded in truth, meaning, and hope. Moral leaders inspire and elevate others; infuse a culture with trust, passion, and loyalty to the mission; and seek significance as the measure of success. They live their values and act on their principles, even when uncomfortable, difficult, or inconvenient. They have the courage to ask difficult questions, wrestle with nuance, and build coalitions across multiple perspectives. They see the humanity in others, and their leadership – replicated across an organization – can start a wave that leads to increased risk-taking, innovating and, ultimately, progress. While formal authority can be seized, won or bestowed, moral authority must be earned by who you are and how you lead.
 
About the Partnership for Moral Leadership in the Social Sector
The HOW Institute for Society and The Rockefeller Foundation have formed a partnership to scale moral leadership in the social sector, grounded in the idea that forward progress on systemic issues will only be achieved by building bridges that bring people together, establishing deep levels of trust, rethinking established systems of operating, and imagining new ones grounded in human connection and collaboration. The initiative brings together a community of social impact leaders committed to the idea of putting humanity, shared values, and principled decision-making at the core of how we lead, shape culture, govern, and relate to each other and to society. With an emphasis on practical frameworks and approaches that can be used in day-to-day work, we research what makes the most effective social impact leaders and institutions work, help create models to scale successes, and help leaders frame the path ahead as a journey, together.