Leadership Styles and Their Relationship with the Private University Employees’ Job Satisfaction in United Arab Emirates

Abstract

Rapid progression of United Arab Emirates’ higher education sectors and the competition among private universities, increase the need to explore the influencing factors which leading to improve the organization performance. The purpose of the study current research was to examine the relationships between leadership styles and job satisfaction among the private university employees in the UAE. A random sampling technique was employed to collect data of 241 faculty members and staff from seven private universities in UAE. The method used to collect data was quantitative in nature and two different types of instruments were used: Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (MLQ) and the Minnesota Satisfaction Questionnaire (MSQ). The result of the Pearson correlation analysis showed that there was positive and significant relationship between transformational style and employee Job Satisfaction. However, the relationship between transactional leadership style and job satisfaction was observed to be negative and significant. This study provided validity evidence for the adapted instruments based on context of UAE universities, empirical evidence on the importance of leadership styles in enhancing job satisfaction among employees in higher education organizations. It is expected to be very helpful to faculty, academic leaders and supervisors as it might offer them new insights to facilitate better understanding and smooth functioning at the academic workplace. Keywords: Transformational leadership, Transactional leadership, Job satisfaction.