Despotic Leadership Research Articles

Despotic leadership and organizational deviance

PurposeDrawing on the social exchange theory, the purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between despotic leadership and employee’s organizational deviance. Specifically, the authors take a relational approach by introducing employee’s organizational identification as the mediator. The moderating role of value congruence in the relationship between despotic leadership and organizational deviance is also considered.Design/methodology/approachData were collected from 15 universities in Turkey. The sample included 1,219 randomly chosen faculty members along with their department chairs. Hierarchical multiple regression analysis was conducted to test the proposed model.FindingsThe results of this study supported the positive effect of despotic leadership on employee’s organizational deviance as well as the mediating effect of employee’s organizational identification. Moreover, when the level of value congruence is high, the relationship between organizational identification and organizational deviance is strong, whereas the effect is weak when the level of value congruence is low.Practical implicationsThe findings of this study suggest that educational administrators in the higher education should be sensitive in treating their subordinates, as it will lead to positive interpersonal relationship, which, in turn, will reduce organizational deviance. Moreover, they should pay more attention to the buffering role of value congruence for those subordinates with high distrust and showing organizational deviance.Originality/valueThis study contributes to the literature on workplace deviance by revealing the relational mechanism between despotic leadership and employee organizational deviance. The paper also offers a practical assistance to employees in the higher education and their leaders interested in building trust, increasing leader-employee relationship and reducing organizational deviance.

Does Despotic Leadership Harm Employee Family Life: Exploring the Effects of Emotional Exhaustion and Anxiety.

Research has not focused on the negative effects of despotic leadership on subordinates’ life satisfaction and the interface between work and family. Drawing on the Conservation of Resources theory, this research investigates the mediating effect of emotional exhaustion through which despotic leadership transcends from the workplace to subordinates’ personal lives, resulting in work-family conflict and decreased life satisfaction. The research also examines the moderating effect of subordinates’ anxiety on the relationship of their perceptions of despotic leadership with work-family conflict and life satisfaction. Three waves of time-lagged data was collected from 224 book sellers who work in publishing houses. We used Hayes’ PROCESS to test moderation and SEM to test mediation. The results of the study suggest that despotic leadership is related to work-family conflict via emotional exhaustion, but offer no support for its relationship with life satisfaction. As expected, when subordinates’ anxiety increases, the positive relationship between a supervisor’s despotism and his or her subordinates’ work-family conflict and the negative relationship between despotic leadership and life satisfaction both strengthen. The results suggest that despotic leaders harm their subordinates’ non-work lives, and these effects intensify when subordinates have high levels of anxiety. These findings have important implications for service organizations in mitigating the negative effects of despotic leadership by minimizing subordinates’ anxiety through coping mechanisms and giving reward and incentives.

When is an Islamic work ethic more likely to spur helping behavior? The roles of despotic leadership and gender

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to investigate how employees’ Islamic work ethic might enhance their propensity to help their coworkers on a voluntary basis, as well as how this relationship might be invigorated by despotic leadership. It also considers how the invigorating role of despotic leadership might depend on employees’ gender.Design/methodology/approachSurvey data were collected from employees and their supervisors in Pakistani organizations.FindingsIslamic work values relate positively to helping behaviors, and this relationship is stronger when employees experience despotic leadership, because their values motivate them to protect their colleagues against the hardships created by such leadership. This triggering role of despotic leadership is particularly strong among female employees.Practical implicationsFor organizations, the results demonstrate that Islamic work values may be important for creating a culture that promotes collegiality, to a greater extent when employees believe that their leaders act as despots who exploit their followers for personal gain.Originality/valueThis study elaborates how employees’ Islamic work ethic influences the likelihood that they help their coworkers, particularly in work contexts marked by stress-inducing leadership.

The relationship between compulsory citizenship behavior and leadership: a research by accommodation businesses

Purpose- Compulsory citizenship behaviour (CCB) is a disparate and new topic recently presented in management literature. Organizational citizenship behaviours (OCB), being expected to have positive impact on organizational success, having been transformed to CCB as a result of various administrative and social pressures may cause several negative results due to employers and organization. The basic problem of studying within this framework is to reveal the relation between compulsory citizenship behaviour (CCB) -being evolved from volunteering to obligation (Vigoda-Gadot, 2006)-and leadership styles by focusing on the negative effects of CCB within the organization. The primary objective of our research is to establish a general framework for Compulsory citizenship behaviour in accommodation businesses sector of Turkey and to present a perspective on how leadership affects compulsory citizenship behaviour. In this way, it is aimed to provide a perspective to leaders to develop solution proposals. Methodolgy- A five-item scale is benefited in the study, which is adapted by Compulsory Citizenship Behaviour Scale (CCBS) of Gadot (2007) in order to evaluate the compulsory citizenship behaviours of the participants. Within this scope, three hypotheses are tested based on the theoretical implications of the variables in our study. Findings- The findings acquired within the study indicate that compulsory citizenship behaviour (CCB) has a positive relation with despotic leadership while CCB has negative relations with transformative leadership and rewarding leadership. Additionally; there is a positive and significant relationship between transformative leadership and rewarding leadership while a negative relation is revealed with despotic relation. There is a negative relationship found between despotic leadership and rewarding leadership. By evaluating the findings of regression analysis in general; it is understood that compulsory citizenship behaviour (CCB) is quite effective to explain despotic leadership, a style of leadership that is often described as negative by employees. The environment in which CCB is developed can be achieved more easily via this leadership style. Besides; though it has negative effect on rewarding leadership style, the mentioned effect is limited. In this context; CCB is suggested to have significant effect on leading styles. Conclusion- By analysing the findings; despotic leadership has a significant impact on CCB. In the context of the study; while the negative impact of transformative leadership on CCB is detected, it is surprising that the same negative impact of rewarding leading style is limited on CCB.

Despotic Leadership and job Outcome: Moderating Role of Islamic work Ethics

By using two wave study design, we examined the main effects of despotic leadership and Islamic work ethics (IWE) on job stress, supervisor rated job performance and turnover intention. We also exa...

Perils of being close to a bad leader in a bad environment: Exploring the combined effects of despotic leadership, leader member exchange, and perceived organizational politics on behaviors

Using social exchange theory, we propose a three-way interaction of despotic leadership, leader member exchange (LMX), and perceived organizational politics (POP) to predict employee job performance, organizational citizenship behaviors (OCBs), and creativity. Using two-source field data (N=480) with independent measures for predictors (self-reports) and outcomes (peer-reports), we tested our hypotheses using moderated regression analyses. The results indicate that despotic leadership is negatively related to the three employee outcomes, and that the effects are stronger under conditions of high LMX or high POP. A three-way interaction suggests that the negative relationship between despotic leadership and the three dependent variables is strongest when both LMX and POP are high. Our study addresses an important and unexplored area of the dark side of leadership and its interplay with perceived politics and LMX to better predict important outcomes in a new cultural setting.

Perils of being close to a Bad Leader in a Bad environment

This study investigates the toxic effects of despotic leadership on job performance, citizenship behaviors, and creativity. By integrating social exchange, social identity, and social learning theo...

Enhancing employee performance through ethical leadership, transformational leadership and organizational culture in development sector of Pakistan

The scale of work of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in Pakistan has drastically increased in the last few years due to man-made and natural disasters. These disasters have brought huge funding into Pakistan for implementation of emergency, relief and rehabilitation projects implemented by Government, United Nations, Population Welfare Department, International and Local NGOs. Effective Implementation of these projects was not possible without transformational leaders that could promote ethical values within organizations and contribute for increasing employee performance through their supportive role. Researchers have focused on linkage of transformational leadership with ethical leadership. This study focused on how leadership qualities and organizational culture support employee performance. This study also analyzes how ethical leadership plays a mediating role between organizational culture and despotic leadership. In order to test the research hypotheses, this study used structural equation model (SEM) technique. Stratified random sampling was used and data were collected from 377 management staff of local and International NGOs working in Pakistan. The study has found positive and significant relationship among transformational leadership, organizational culture, ethical leadership and employee performance. The study further found negative relationship between ethical leadership and despotic leadership. The study findings are important for NGOs in promoting ethical values in organizations contributing to employee performance. Key words: Transformational leadership, organizational culture, ethical leadership, employee performance and despotic leadership.

Ethical Leadership

Ethical Leadership

Ethical and despotic leadership, relationships with leader's social responsibility, top management team effectiveness and subordinates' optimism: A multi-method study

In this multi-method study, we examined the relationships of leader's social responsibility with different aspects of ethical leadership (morality and fairness, role clarification, and power sharing) as well as with despotic leadership. We also investigated how these leadership behaviors relate to effectiveness and optimism, using multiple-source ratings. Interviews with CEOs ( N = 73) were coded for the presence of leader's social responsibility and its facets. Also, using questionnaires, direct reports rated each CEOs' leader behavior ( n = 130) and a second group of direct reports ( n = 119) rated effectiveness and optimism. As expected, leaders high on social responsibility were rated higher on ethical leadership and lower on despotic leadership. Ethical leadership was also positively related to perceived top management team effectiveness and subordinates' optimism about the future of the organization and their own place within it.

Preserving Order Amid Chaos: The Survival of Schools in Uganda 1971-86

To say that education in Africa is under stress is all to obvious. News reports from that continent seem to describe only war and violence, poverty and malnutrition, corruption and mismanagement, or natural disasters that destroy or threaten already frail infrastructures - most news from Africa is bad news. When an education system survives in a country like Uganda, long subjected to the whims of despotic leadership, it warrants an investigation. This book tells the story of four senior secondary schools during a time of war and intractable social conflict, examining a complex topic through multiple perspectives such as documentary history, oral history, ethnography, and organization theory. The author develops a broad picture of the Amin/Obote years and the accompanying political and social chaos in Uganda, while at the same time filling in the crucial details essential for developing an understanding of school survival in the Kaborole District. The author's intensive field work gives this study a unique dimension: by preserving a record of African voices - students, teachers, parents, alumni, board members, community leaders - a rich tableau of theh local conditions for school survival emerges. At the same time the discussion is situated within the larger Ugandan historical and political context, thus offering an excellent example of the application of multiple research perspectives to a complex social, cultural and political setting.