Jane Austen’s 6 Principles for Living and Leading from the Inside Out

What can organizational leaders in business, education, government, and most any enterprise learn from an unemployed, unmarried woman who lived in patriarchal, misogynistic rural England more than 200 years ago? As it turns out, a great deal. In identifying the core virtues of Austen’s heroines—confidence, pragmatism, diligence, integrity, playfulness, and humility—Andrea Kayne uncovers the six principles of internally referenced leadership that, taken together, instruct women how to tap into a deep well-spring of personal agency and an internal locus of control no matter what is going on around them. Utilizing practical exercises, real-life case studies, and literary and leadership scholarship, Kicking Ass in a Corset maps out effective leadership that teaches readers how to tune out the external noise and listen to themselves so that they can truly live and lead from the inside out.

Andrea Kayne serves as director of the doctoral program in educational leadership and is associate professor at DePaul University. She has taught, written, and consulted in the areas of empowered leadership, feminist leadership, emotionally intelligent leadership, and internally referenced leadership. She lives in Oak Park, Illinois.