Empowering Leadership Behavior Research Articles

Does empowering leadership behavior affect employee performance? The mediating role of workforce agility

PurposeWorkforce agility (WFA) is an emergent research topic in volatile times. However, there is a lack of research in understanding the leadership dimension that triggers such an attribute in organizations. Our study aims to understand the impact of workforce agility on empowering leadership behavior and employee performance dimensions (task performance, contextual performance and counterproductive work behavior).Design/methodology/approachWe collected data from 236 employees using reliable, validated scales and conducted various statistical analyses.FindingsOur results demonstrated that WFA (1) partially mediated the relationship between empowering leadership and contextual performance (CP), (2) has not mediated the relationship between empowering leadership and counterproductive behavior (CWB) and (3) mediated the relationship between empowering leadership and task performance (TP).Practical implicationsOur research has practical implications for management practitioners. It suggests hiring and developing an agile workforce through appropriate training and development programs can significantly impact organizational performance. Furthermore, it provides insights into building leadership capabilities that sustain workforce agility practices, empowering leaders to make informed decisions.Originality/valueOur research fills a significant gap in the existing literature by exploring the effects of WFA on leadership and performance. This novel approach provides a fresh perspective on the dynamics of organizational behavior, making it a valuable addition to the field.

Do schools have hindrance of quality to promote innovativeness? Examining the role of empowering leadership and stakeholder involvement

PurposeSchools provide high priorities to offer innovative curricular and cocurricular programs, and leaders make necessary efforts to promote enablers and overcome disablers for sustaining their innovativeness. With the background of quality management and stakeholder theories, the present study examines the interplay of hindrances to quality between empowering leadership, stakeholder involvement and organizational innovativeness.Design/methodology/approachResponses of 157 American school principals collected through the Teaching and Learning International Survey 2018 by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development were used and analyzed to test the proposed hypotheses.FindingsResults show that empowering leadership behaviors of school principals support promoting organizational innovativeness, and involvement of stakeholders with the school activities also promotes organizational innovativeness. Interestingly, when American schools faced a high level of hindrance to providing quality education to their students, principals’ high level of empowering leadership behaviors promoted organizational innovativeness.Originality/valueThis is the first time in the literature that the interplay between empowering leadership, stakeholder involvement and hindrance of quality education has been examined to promote organizational innovativeness.

Differentiated Empowering Leadership and Interpersonal Counterproductive Work Behaviors: A Chained Mediation Model.

Through an empirical analysis of paired sample data from 308 employees in China, this study examines the chain-mediated effects of trust in leaders and defensive silence on the relationship between differentiated empowering leadership and interpersonal counterproductive work behaviors. The study finds that differentiated empowering leadership does not directly influence employees' interpersonal counterproductive work behaviors. Additionally, it finds that trust in leaders and defensive silence each serve as mediators in the relationship between differentiated empowering leadership and interpersonal counterproductive work behaviors, forming a chained mediation effect. This study is the first empirical research to explore the impact mechanism of differentiated empowering leadership using a chained mediation model. The findings contribute to a deeper understanding of how and why differentiated empowering leadership affects employees' attitudes, such as trust in leaders, and behaviors, such as interpersonal counterproductive work behaviors.

The Effect of School Principals’ Empowering Leadership Behaviors on Well-Being at Work: The Mediating Role of Organizational Ostracism

AbstractThis study investigates the impact of empowering leadership exhibited by school principals on teachers’ perspectives on organizational ostracism and well-being at work in educational settings in Türkiye. Applying a cross-sectional research design, we collected responses from 603 teachers in different provinces. The results reveal that empowering leadership has a positive impact on teachers’ well-being. Furthermore, empowering leadership practices significantly diminish teachers’ perceptions of ostracism, thus cultivating a positive and inclusive work environment. Our findings emphasize the pivotal role of organizational ostracism in mediating the relationship between empowering leadership and well-being at work, highlighting the importance of empowering leadership in creating a healthy and supportive school setting. These insights offer valuable guidance to school leaders, teachers, and policymakers in crafting conducive work environments, enhancing teacher–principal relationships, and promoting overall teacher well-being.

Leadership empowerment behavior and employee referrals: chain mediation of perceived challenge stress and employee experience

Purpose Internal employees of firms are a reliable source of information for potential job seekers. However, few studies have focused on why internal employees actively recommend their firms. Based on the social exchange theory, this study aims to construct a chain mediation model using perceived challenge stress and employee experience as mediators to explore how leadership empowerment behavior affects employee referrals. Design/methodology/approach Bootstrap repeated sampling analysis was conducted on a sample of 307 employees collected through two-time points. Findings Leadership empowerment behavior is positively related to employee referrals; perceived challenge stress and employee experience mediate the effect of leadership empowerment behavior on employee referrals, respectively; in addition, perceived challenge stress and employee experience play a chain mediating role between leadership empowerment behavior and employee referrals. Originality/value The findings can help provide insight into the drivers of employee referrals and can effectively guide organization reputation management.

Modeling innovative work behavior through leadership behaviors in the hospitality industry; the role of work–family enrichment

PurposeThis study aims to examine authentic leadership behavior (ALB) and empowering leadership behavior (ELB) as predictors of innovative work behavior (IWB) while assessing the mediating role of work-family enrichment (WFE).Design/methodology/approachThrough the explanatory research design, data was retrieved from 303 respondents from 16 small-sized hotels in Ghana and analyzed quantitatively using descriptive and inferential statistics (hierarchical component analysis within PLS-SEM).FindingsThe study’s findings revealed that both ALB and ELB positively and significantly relate to IWB. Additionally, our study found that WFE partially mediated the nexus between ALB and IWB as well as ELB and IWB.Practical implicationsThe findings of our study imply that in the pursuit of excellence, ALB and ELB in the hospitality industry are crucial, as they not only nurture employee potential but also help employees to thrive both at home and at the workplace.Originality/valueThe hospitality literature lacks a comprehensive understanding of the underlying mechanism by which ALB and ELB influence IWB. To the best of the authors' knowledge, our study is the first empirical study conducted on ALB, ELB, WFE, and IWB in the hospitality industry.

In search of digital solution sellers: the role of non-monetary motivation and empowering leadership behaviors

Many B2B companies are trying to gain a competitive advantage by leveraging digitally-enabled, value-creating solutions. For this, they need to modify their sales force and re-consider what “talent” is. While the skills of digital solution sellers have been explored in the literature, much less is known about the motivational profile the new type of salesperson needs. Therefore, we explore the role of non-monetary drivers of motivation and sales supervisor empowerment. Drawing on Self-Determination Theory (SDT) and using data from 178 salespeople of a B2B company, this study investigates the impact of learning orientation, task enjoyment, challenge seeking, and service-to-others motivation on task-specific Digital Solution Selling (DSS) Implementation motivation. The results show the importance of these general non-monetary motivations for selling digital solutions and the stimulating force of sales leader empowerment. The general non-monetary motivations partially mediate the positive impact of sales leader empowerment on a salesperson’s task-specific DSS implementation motivation.

Turning the tide: an impact of leader empowering behavior on employees' work–family conflict, spillover and turnover intention in tourism

PurposeThe aim of this study is to look into the associations, both direct and indirect, between a leader empowering behavior and employee turnover intention. Additionally, this study examines the mediating effects of work–family conflict (WFC) and work–family spillover (WFS) in the association between a leader empowering behavior and employee turnover intention. This study also explored how perceived peer support (PPS) may have a moderating effect on these associations.Design/methodology/approachA time-lag approach was used in this study to collect data from the 228 participants that made up the sample. Both front-desk employees and their immediate supervisors were included in this sample, which came from diverse tourism enterprises in central China. The research design included two independent time waves that were separated by two months, making it easier to examine the way the variables of interest changed throughout that time.FindingsThe results showed that there is a significant impact of leadership behaviors on WFS, WFC and employee turnover intention. This study showed a significant mediating effect of WFS, however, the influence of WFC as a mediator was not statistically significant. Furthermore, the results suggested that PPS significantly moderated the association between leader empowering behavior and WFS. The findings revealed that the mediating effect of WFS in the association between leader empowering behavior and employee turnover intention.Originality/valueThis study advances knowledge of the impacts of leadership empowering behavior on employee turnover intention through the use of a moderated mediation analysis. Based on the leader member exchange, it offers a distinctive perspective on leadership empowering behaviors to maintain a work–family balance in tourism.

Gender Bias toward Supervisors’ Empowering Leadership Behavior

Gender Bias toward Supervisors’ Empowering Leadership Behavior

Leader–Subordinate Gender Composition and Leader Empowering Behavior

Focusing on gender role theory and the queen bee phenomenon, this study explored the differentiated exchange relationships between leaders and subordinates with different gender composition, and their influence on leader empowering behavior. We collected data from 1,211 subordinates of 286 teams at a Fortune 500 company in China through the questionnaire method. The empirical analysis results showed that the leader-member exchange relationship of the woman leader-woman subordinate composition was lower than that of the man leader-man subordinate composition, which further reduced leader empowering behavior. This study further used man leader-woman subordinate and woman leader-man subordinate compositions as control groups to verify the effectiveness of the queen bee phenomenon. We concluded that the queen bee phenomenon alone does not significantly affect leader empowering behavior, but that the combination of gender stereotypes and queen bee phenomenon has a significant effect.

Influence of Leader–leader Exchange on Team Prosocial Voice: Empowering Leader Behavior as a Mediator

Influence of Leader–leader Exchange on Team Prosocial Voice: Empowering Leader Behavior as a Mediator

The Effect of Position Promotion, Training, Leadership Style on Employee Career Development in One of the Start Up Companies

This research study explores the effect of promotion practices, training initiatives, and leadership style on employee career development in a start-up company. The study employs a mixed-methods research design, including quantitative surveys and qualitative interviews, to gather comprehensive data. The findings from the quantitative analysis indicate a positive correlation between promotion opportunities and employee career advancement, as well as a positive relationship between the effectiveness of training programs and perceived skill development. The qualitative analysis reveals the importance of supportive and empowering leadership behaviors and the impact of specific training initiatives on employee career growth. The integration of quantitative and qualitative findings provides a holistic understanding of the factors influencing employee career development in start-up companies. The implications of the study contribute to theoretical knowledge and offer practical recommendations for start-up companies to optimize promotion practices, training initiatives, and leadership styles to support employee career development.

The Relationship between Teachers' Perceptions of Compliance with the Psychological Contract and School Administrators' Empowering Leadership Behaviors

The aim of this study is to examine the effect of school administrators’ empowering leadership behaviors on the psychological contract perceptions of secondary education institution (high school) teachers. The population of the study consists of 2,878 teachers who were working at 47 high schools located in central Elazığ during the 2019-2020 school year. The sample of the study consisted of 470 teachers selected from 12 schools using the stratified sampling method. Data were collected by using the "Scale for School Administrator Compliance with Psychological Contract" developed by Koçak (2016) and the “Scale for Teacher Compliance with Psychological Contract". Teacher perceptions of the level to which school administrators displayed empowering leadership behaviors were measured by using the Empowering Leadership Behaviors Scale developed by Konczak and Stelly and Trusty (2000) and adapted to Turkish by Aras (2013). It was found that teachers had high perceptions of school administrator compliance with psychological contract (SACPC) and that they also had a high level of compliance with psychological contract (STCPC). Additionally, it was found that teacher perceptions of school administrators displaying empowering leadership behaviors (OYGLD) were also high. Perceptions of teachers who had been working for 7-11 years in the same school regarding school administrator compliance with psychological contract were higher than those of teachers who had been working in the same institution for 2-6 years. Moderately positive and significant relationships were found between the Scale for School Administrator Compliance with Psychological Contract (SACPC), the Scale for Teacher Compliance with Psychological Contract (STCPC) and its subdimensions, and the Empowering Leadership Behaviors Scale (ELBS). The variables of deciding on one’s own, knowledge sharing and innovative performance did not have a significant impact.

LEADERSHIP EMPOWERING BEHAVIORS: GENDER-BASED COMPARATIVE STUDY AT SECONDARY SCHOOL LEVEL

The study compared the leadership empowering behaviors of male and female secondary school heads in Pakistan. Main purpose of the research is to collate captaincy empowering conduct of male & female educational leaders at the secondary level. The sample was comprised of 564 teachers including 379 males & 185 females employing a stratified random sample technique. In this study, quantitative and descriptive methodologies were used. A standardized tool “Leader Empowering Behavior Questionnaire” was used for data collection. Data was collected and analyzed using the mean, standard deviation, & independent samples t-test. Results explored that there is significant difference (t = 3.160, p = .002) between leadership empowering behavior among male (mean = 5.73, SD = .30) and female leaders (mean = 5.64, SD = .31) on whole. Male leaders were found to have better leadership empowering behavior than female leaders. Thus, it was recommended from results that female educational leaders should further improve and adopt leadership empowering behavior for better organizational productivity and female educational leaders should further improve their empowering behavior so as to stimulate potential of their subordinates for better performance and commitment in diverse situtions for desired outcomes.

Entrepreneurs' role overload and empowering leadership: A reciprocal relationship based on conservation of resources.

Role overload is not new, but its increasing prevalence in recent years calls for further research. This study considers empowering leadership as a means of resource investment and proposes that it is exerted by entrepreneurs to reduce their role overload. This study adds clarity by revealing how entrepreneurs' role overload is mitigated via the intermediate mechanism of empowering leadership. Hypotheses are derived from conservation of resources theory. Data were collected from 315 entrepreneurs in China using a three-round questionnaire survey. This study finds that entrepreneurs' previous experience of role overload positively relates to their current empowering leadership behavior and their previous empowering leadership behavior negatively relates to their current role overload, which implies a mediating role of empowering leadership. Specifically, the second stage of the indirect effect of previous role overload on current role overload through empowering leadership is moderated by top management team (TMT) heterogeneity. When TMT heterogeneity is higher, the negative indirect effect is stronger. This study contributes to the idea of positive psychology and extends the scope of conservation of resources theory into the fields of entrepreneurship and leadership.

How self-leadership promotes job crafting: Based on the perspective of self-determination theory.

According to self-determination theory, the present study develops a moderated mediation model to investigate how and when self-leadership promotes employees' job crafting, emphasizing the mediating effect of autonomous motivation and the moderating effect of leader empowering behavior. We analyze and test the hypotheses based on 269 valid three-wave data from employees. The findings show that self-leadership has a significantly positive impact on job crafting, and a positive indirect effect on job crafting via autonomous motivation. Furthermore, leader empowering behavior not only enhances the positive impact of self-leadership on autonomous motivation, but also positively moderates the mediating effect of autonomous motivation in the relationship between self-leadership and job crafting. Practically, our study provides insights into how to promote job crafting. We also propose limitations and directions for future research.

Can salespeople use social media to enhance brand awareness and sales performance? The role of manager empowerment and creativity

PurposeAlthough research analyzing the consequences of salesperson social media use in driving sales behaviors and performance outcomes has proliferated in the recent past, there are significant research gaps in the domain. Grounded in task-technology fit theory, this paper aims to propose a conceptual framework that integrates between previously disjointed areas of research and analyzes the relationships between salesperson social media use, brand awareness, creativity, manager empowerment and company performance.Design/methodology/approachSurvey responses were collected from a multi-industry sample of 158 business-to-business salespeople. Structural relationships were tested using partial least squares structural equation modeling.FindingsThe analysis shows that salesperson social media use positively affects brand awareness. The relationship between social media and brand awareness is magnified with the increase in salesperson creativity. Findings also show that manager empowerment increases salesperson creativity. Finally, brand awareness positively affects company performance.Practical implicationsSales organizations should focus on developing digital strategies, especially focusing on salesperson social media use to enhance company’s brand awareness, which in turn increases company performance. Moreover, sales managers should also follow empowering leader behaviors to enhance creativity.Originality/valueThe authors amalgamate salesperson social media use literature and branding literature by proposing salesperson social media use’s positive effects on brand awareness. This study also expands the knowledge by exploring the moderating effect of individual-level variables such as salesperson creativity on driving the effects of salesperson social media use.

Research on the impact of leadership empowerment behavior on task performance - Based on the moderation of employee maturity

This paper explores the impact of leadership empowerment behavior on employee task performance and the moderation of employee maturity in it, based on conservation of resources theory. By analyzing 308 valid questionnaires through polynomial regression analysis, the research shows that (1) leadership empowerment behavior has a positive impact on task performance; (2) employee maturity moderates the relationship between leadership empowerment behavior and task performance. This research constructs the influence path of leadership empowerment behavior on employee task performance, reveals the moderation of employee maturity, and provides insights into the leadership behavior practices of Chinese enterprise managements.

The hidden dark side of empowering leadership: The moderating role of hindrance stressors in explaining when empowering employees can promote moral disengagement and unethical pro-organizational behavior.

The majority of theory and research on empowering leadership to date has focused on how empowering leader behaviors influence employees, portraying those behaviors as almost exclusively beneficial. We depart from this predominant consensus to focus on the potential detriments of empowering leadership for employees. Drawing from the social cognitive theory of morality, we propose that empowering leadership can unintentionally increase employees' unethical pro-organizational behavior (UPB), and that it does so by increasing their levels of moral disengagement. Specifically, we propose that hindrance stressors create a reversing effect, such that empowering leadership increases (vs. decreases) moral disengagement when hindrance stressors are higher (vs. lower). Ultimately, we argue for a positive or negative indirect effect of empowering leadership on UPB through moral disengagement. We find support for our predictions in both a time-lagged field study (Study 1) and a scenario-based experiment using an anagram cheating task (Study 2). We thus highlight the impact that empowering leadership can have on unethical behavior, providing answers to both why and when the dark side of empowering leadership behavior occurs. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Okul Müdürlerinin Güçlendirici Liderlik Davranışları İle Öğretmenlerin Psikolojik Dayanıklılık Düzeyleri Arasındaki İlişki

Bu çalışmada, lise yöneticilerinin güçlendirici liderlik davranış düzeyleri ileöğretmenlerin psikolojik dayanıklılıkları arasındaki ilişkinin belirlenmesiamaçlanmaktadır. İlişkisel tarama modeli kullanılarak araştırmagerçekleştirilmiştir. Araştırmanın evrenini 2020-2021 öğretim yılında Batmanilinin merkezindeki 43 Anadolu ve 2 Fen Lisesi olmak üzere toplam 45 okuldagörev yapan 1265 branş öğretmeni oluşturmaktadır. Araştırmada, 318öğretmenden elde edilen veriler analiz edilmiştir. Bu araştırmada, “GüçlendiriciLiderlik Ölçeği”, “Psikolojik Dayanıklılık Ölçeği” kullanılmıştır. Yapılanaraştırma sonucunda, lise yöneticilerinin güçlendirici liderlik davranışlarınailişkin öğretmen algılarının "iyi düzeyde" olduğu tespit edilmiştir. Öğretmenlerinpsikolojik dayanıklılıklarına ilişkin kendi algılarının "orta düzeyde" olduğubelirlenmiştir. Araştırmada yapılan korelasyon analizi sonucunda, okulyöneticilerin güçlendirici liderlik davranışları ile öğretmenlerin psikolojikdayanıklılık düzeyleri arasında pozitif yönde ve orta düzeyde anlamlı bir ilişkiolduğu saptanmıştır. Ayrıca yapılan regresyon analizi sonucunda ise, genel olarakokul yöneticilerinin güçlendirici liderlik davranışları öğretmenlerin psikolojikdayanıklılık düzeylerini anlamlı bir şekilde yordamaktadır.