Congruence of Leader-follower Evaluations and the Effect of Leadership Styles on Work Engagement

Abstract

The shift into relationship-oriented, positive leadership theories in recent decades brought with it a deeper investigation of leader-follower interactions. Transformational and engaging leadership styles are widely assumed to be proven determinants of work engagement, although these conclusions are based mostly on followers' evaluations. Therefore, we analysed followers' and leaders' evaluations simultaneously and used congruent results to test which leadership dimensions positively impact followers' work engagement. Our results show that follower-rated passive and charismatic leadership negatively affect work engagement. In contrast, follower-rated inspirational communication and passive leadership rated by leaders positively affect above-average work engagement. From them, inspirational communication seemed to be the most influential factor. These results draw attention to the importance of leaders' communication and emphasise its role in leader-follower interactions.