Addressing social inequalities and injustice is a critical and ongoing pursuit that remains a significant challenge in society as of 2025, prompting a call to arms in leadership education to develop social justice-oriented leaders; however, although many leadership educators believe in this call to action, they remain uncertain about what and how to incorporate social justice elements in their respective curricula. To address this gap, the following research question guided the study: What factors determine how instructors design and facilitate social justice-oriented leadership courses? I used the nine elements of the diversity inclusivity model (Nelson Laird, 2010) to identify the key concepts and variables relevant to the study. After interviewing 14 instructors who taught socially just leadership courses, numerous themes emerged under four major categories: beliefs and values, attributes, knowledge, and skills. The findings suggested participants believed leadership is social justice work; subsequently, the instructors designed and facilitated their courses using current theories and best practices to support learning. Based on the findings, I developed a new exploratory conceptual map to represent and highlight how leadership instructors are the driving force for creating these social justice-oriented leadership courses.
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