The Leadership in Values Chair was created to generate, disseminate and transfer knowledge about values-based leadership and to foster professional contexts of ethical practice related to people, their surroundings and the economy. From this idea, a theoretical framework has been developed which is closely connected, on the one hand, to the professional career of its directors, Pep Guardiola and Manel Estiarte, and on the other hand, to the values of the Bages University Foundation, the institution behind the project.

In this model, values such as exemplarity, honesty, discipline, commitment, generosity, audacity, innovation, excellence or gratitude are organised in the form of a football line-up on an imaginary playing field. Each one contains a seed of ethical leadership which can be interpreted as denoting different behaviours, attitudes and experiences which can be approached from an abstract to a specific perspective.

The 4-3-3 alignment is completed with two additional players: firstly, the player-goalkeeper, and finally the twelfth player which is represented by the audience. When read horizontally, this alignment leads us to a model with four dimensions that invites us to reflect both from an organisational and a personal point of view. Thus, from the standpoint of the organisation, leadership is structured from oneself to one’s surroundings, passing through the team and the organisation. On the other hand, from a personal perspective, it invites us to think about the reasons which lay behind what one feels, what one says, thinks or does, and the relationships one establishes with others to finally question why one does what one actually does. The way in which the values are arranged on the field also favours an identification of those different intelligences closely linked to leadership: intrapersonal, emotional, interpersonal and spiritual/existential.