Assessing the effects of safety leadership, employee engagement, and psychological safety on safety performance

Abstract

Introduction: The study assessed the impact mechanisms of employee engagement and psychological safety in safety leadership and safety performance relationships. Method: We collected 539 valid responses from contract miners using a multi-wave survey research design. We analyzed the data quantitatively using the structural equation model (SEM) and hierarchical regression analysis (HRA) in AMOS and SPSS version 26 software. We used SEM to examine our proposed framework's main and structural mediation effects. HRA was used to test the moderation effect of our framework. Results: From the SEM results of our study, safety leadership significantly and positively influenced all two dimensions of safety performance-safety compliance and safety participation -- and all three dimensions of employee engagement-vigor, dedication, and absorption. Also, vigor, dedication, and absorption partially mediated the relationship between safety leadership and safety compliance, but fully mediated the safety leadership-safety participation relationship. From the HRA results, psychological safety significantly moderated two employee engagement variables (thus, vigor and dedication) and safety compliance. Also, it moderated all three variables of employee engagement (vigor, dedication, and absorption) and safety participation. Practical Applications: This current study highlights the importance of examining safety leadership on specific job performance, such as safety performance. It also highlights the necessity of having psychological safety and enhancing employee engagement in the mines.