Humility In Leadership Research Articles

Pride comes before the fall

Purpose This paper aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoint practical implications from cutting-edge research and case studies. Design/methodology/approach This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context. Findings This paper identified that leadership humility can influence team reflexivity. Originality/value The briefing saves busy executives, strategists and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy-to-digest format.

Does leadership humility foster salesperson creativity? The serial mediating role of job satisfaction and knowledge sharing

PurposeThis study clarifies the mediating effects of job satisfaction and knowledge sharing on the relationship between leadership humility and salesperson creativity. It also shows how job satisfaction mediates between leadership humility and knowledge sharing.Design/methodology/approachThis study sampled 380 salespeople in Japan’s financial sector to participate in a two-wave online survey. The partial least squares structural equation modeling was applied to test the research hypotheses.FindingsThe results of the partial least squares structural equation modeling showed that the serial mediating effect of leadership humility on salesperson creativity through job satisfaction and knowledge sharing was statistically significant. The supplementary analysis showed that leadership humility had a curvilinear effect on salesperson creativity.Research limitations/implicationsThe findings were restricted to salespeople employed in Japan’s financial sector.Practical implicationsContrary to previous meta-analytic studies, the mere presence of humble leaders is insufficient to induce salesperson creativity.Originality/valueThis study is the first to deeply elucidate the underlying mechanism between leadership humility and salesperson creativity and examine the curvilinear relationship between leadership humility and salesperson creativity.

The Role of Class Privilege and Humility in Leadership

The Role of Class Privilege and Humility in Leadership

Factors influencing innovative work behavior among local government employees in Labuan Batu

Government employees are vital for delivering services to people, particularly within the Labuhan Batu Local Government. There's a strong need for workers who display innovative behavior to foster public trust. Stakeholders must be deeply committed to improving the quality of employees' work. This study aims to understand how innovative work behavior is affected by factors like professional identity, leadership humility, work ethic, strategies for managing human resources, and job satisfaction. Research on how job satisfaction influences innovative work behavior, considering professional identity, leadership humility, work ethic, and human resource strategies, is scarce. The main purpose of this research is to see how job satisfaction can boost innovative work behavior among employees in the Labuhan Batu Local Government. It uses a Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) approach with Partial Least Squares (PLS) to analyze the data. Data was collected through surveys from 372 permanent staff members in Labuhan Batu. Findings show that job satisfaction is crucial, both directly and indirectly, in linking leadership humility, work ethic, and human resources strategies with innovative work behavior. However, professional identity doesn't significantly affect job satisfaction or innovative work behavior. The study's limitation is its narrow focus on government employees. Future studies should broaden the participant pool and include private sector workers to better understand the impact of professional identity on job satisfaction and innovation at work.

Is humility in leadership a promoter of employee voice? A moderated mediation model

PurposeIn this study, we provide a better understanding of the role of leader humility in employee voice by examining simultaneously the mediating role of intention to share knowledge and the moderating role of organizational tenure. Design/methodologyWe developed and tested a mediated moderation model. The study hypotheses were tested with partial least squares structural equation modeling techniques. FindingsResults from 309 medical representatives supported the study hypotheses, indicating that leader humility is related to employee voice via intention to share knowledge, and this relationship is stronger for shorter-tenured employees than for longer-tenured ones. The study also provides implications for both theory and practice. Practical implicationsThe study provides empirical evidence in support of the positive effect of leader humility on employee voice. Therefore, we suggest that executive administration should pay particular attention to promoting humility in leadership to appropriately manage extra-role behavior such as employee voice. OriginalityRecently, leader humility has attracted scholarly attention in organization studies. It is considered a key antecedent of employees’ extra-role behavior and a contextual factor that is associated with many positive employee and organizational outcomes.

Do sales control systems affect service–sales ambidexterity and salesperson performance? A job demands–resources perspective

This study investigated the moderating effect of leadership humility on the relationship between sales control systems and service-sales ambidexterity (SSA), and the mediating effect of SSA on the relationship between sales control systems and salesperson performance. A two-wave online survey was conducted among Japanese salespeople working in the finance and insurance industry. SSA was found to mediate the positive relationship between process control and salesperson performance, while leadership humility reinforced the positive relationship between process control and SSA. These results indicate that process control positively affects salesperson performance through SSA and works well when leadership humility is high.

Impact of Humble Leadership Behaviours of Hospital Leaders on The Innovation Performance and Work Engagement of Employees

Currently, the medical environment of hospitals is in a constant state of change, with the advancement of medical and healthcare system reforms. The organizational environment of hospitals is also becoming more and more dynamic, uncertain, and unpredictable. Relying only on the experience and knowledge of hospital administrators is no longer sufficient, necessitating employee participation. Vital to this is the provision of opportunities enabling employees to boost their motivation levels and encourage innovative practices. Four scales - leadership humility, innovation performance, psychological capital and job involvement - organize and design a questionnaire in this paper. Statistical methods are utilized to scrutinize and validate questionnaire data for quantitative research. This paper examines the factors that influence employees' innovative performance and work engagement. The aim is to identify ways in which the humble behaviour of hospital leaders can contribute concretely to enhance employees' work initiative and performance, thereby providing a substantive basis for better functioning of hospital departments.

Physician Leader, Humble Thyself: Balancing Narcissism and Humility in Healthcare Leadership.

Data on expert leadership have shown numerous benefits, including enhanced job satisfaction, productivity, and job retention. Similarly, many of the top hospitals in the United States are physician led; however, the training of a successful physician and that of a successful healthcare administrator often are significantly different. Here, we specifically discuss the balance of narcissism and humility in leadership as it pertains to physicians transitioning from clinical careers to healthcare administrative roles.

When Does Leadership Humility Nurture Career Success: A Moderated Mediation Model of Career Adaptability and Proactive Personality

Purpose - Post-pandemic circumstances and rapid globalization demand organizations to restructure jobs and working environments that increase the unpredictability of career development and increase the responsibility of individuals for career success. Therefore, this study is designed to understand how distinct aspects, i.e., leadership and personal, encourage career success. For that purpose, this study investigates the impact of leadership humility on career success with the intervening mechanism of career adaptability. Moreover, this study also examines the moderating role of a proactive personality. Design/methodology/approach - We evaluated the proposed hypotheses of this study, using a sample of 293 participants from manufacturing and service sector organizations through simple random sampling and with a time-lag approach. Findings - Results of this study show that leadership humility is highly related to career success, and career adaptability mediates the relationship between leadership humility and career success. We also found that highly proactive individuals are more confident in coping with the unpredictability of career success with higher leadership humility. Our moderated mediation results indicate that a proactive personality moderates the indirect effect of leadership humility on career success via career adaptability. Practical Implications- The findings of this study contribute to the career management and social cognitive career theory by explaining leadership humility and proactive personality within a comprehensive resource framework for career success. These results emphasize the meaning of leadership humility to support career adaptability, which leads to higher career success. Originality/value - This study explains the mechanism of leadership humility and career success by examining the mediating role of career adaptability; moreover, this study also explains the role of personal characteristics/traits (proactivity personality) for career adaptability and career success.

Innovation Onset: A Moderated Mediation Model of High-Involvement Work Practices and Employees' Innovative Work Behavior.

PurposeBased on the componential theory of creativity, this study examined the link between high-involvement work practices and employees’ innovative behavior by further investigating the moderating and mediating role of leadership humility and employees’ personal initiative.MethodologyTo test the hypothesized model, the data were gathered from 255-line staff and 119 supervisors working in the textile industry in Pakistan via the time lag technique. The proposed hypotheses were analyzed through partial least squares structural equation modeling using Smart-PLS software.FindingsThe results indicated that high-involvement work practices were significantly related to employees’ innovative work behaviors. Additionally, the moderation findings revealed that a higher level of leadership humility strengthens the relationship between high-involvement work practices and employees’ personal initiative. Furthermore, employees’ personal initiative mediates the relationship between high-involvement work practices and their innovative work behavior. The findings of the moderated mediation model indicated that a higher level of leadership humility leads to higher innovative behavior of employees in the presence of high-involvement work practices via employees’ personal initiative.Practical ImplicationsThis study’s findings are helpful for the management of organizations to understand the factors that enhance innovative work behaviors in high-involvement work practices. Moreover, managers should establish humble behaviors in their leadership style to influence employees’ personal initiative, which indirectly influences their innovative work behavior.Originality/ValueThe present study highlights the importance of leadership humility and employees’ personal initiative in the relationship between high-involvement work practices and innovative work behaviors of employees in the textile industry of Pakistan.

How and when frontline employees’ resilience drives service-sales ambidexterity: the role of cognitive flexibility and leadership humility

Purpose Service industries increasingly have a need for frontline employees (FLEs) who are both adept and versatile at providing excellent customer services whilst exploring cross-/up-selling opportunities, known as service-sales ambidexterity (SSA). However, engaging in SSA poses various challenges. The purpose of this paper is twofold: First, the authors argue that the resilience of FLEs is a critical factor of their SSA and its effect is mediated by cognitive flexibility. Second, the authors propose a boundary condition – leadership humility – that affects this indirect relationship. Design/methodology/approach Survey data was drawn from two independent studies (N = 547). Study 1 was conducted via an online survey of FLEs involved in both service and sales roles in the insurance industry in North America. Data for Study 2 was collected from FLEs working in several branches of a commercial bank operating in Southeast Asia. The data was analysed using Hayes’ PROCESS Macro and SPSS. Findings Results from these studies reveal that resilience fosters cognitive flexibility, which, in turn, drives SSA. Additionally, leadership humility was found to moderate the indirect effect of resilience on SSA through cognitive flexibility. Research limitations/implications The sample for this study is cross-sectional. Further research could replicate this study using longitudinal data to extract more in-depth information on developmental changes in FLEs. Additionally, the scope of this research is limited to an analysis of employees. However, the phenomenon of SSA is essentially a multi-level subject. Future research could extend the findings of this research by testing other organisational factors that would present a more inclusive framework to explain the SSA phenomenon. Practical implications The findings offer managers a new perspective of achieving the alignment between the service and sales goals of their operations. Originality/value This study contributes to the growing stream of literature on FLE’s resilience and SSA in particular and shows the role resilience plays in FLEs’ dealing with and navigating a constantly changing workplace where SSA has become a norm rather than an exception.

Global leadership in paediatric and congenital cardiac care: "Humility in Leadership - an interview with Katarina Hanséus, MD, PhD, President of the Association for European Paediatric and Congenital Cardiology (AEPC)".

Dr. Katarina Hanséus is the focus of our fourth in a series of interviews in Cardiology in the Young entitled, "Global Leadership in Paediatric and Congenital Cardiac Care". Dr. Hanséus was born in Malmö, Sweden. She attended undergraduate school in her home town in Malmö, Sweden, graduating in 1974. Dr. Hanséus then went on to complete medical school at University of Lund in Lund, Sweden, graduating in 1980, where additionally she completed a Doctoral Dissertation in the evaluation of cardiac function and chamber size in children using Doppler and cross-sectional echocardiography. Under the Swedish Board of National Welfare, Dr. Hanséus completed her authorisation as a paediatrician in 1986, followed by her authorisation as a paediatric cardiologist in 1988, at University of Lund. She was appointed head of Paediatric Cardiology in 2000 at the Children's Heart Center, Skane University Hospital, Lund, Sweden. The programme at Lund serves as one of the two national referral centres for comprehensive paediatric and congenital cardiac care, including paediatric cardiac surgery, in Sweden. From 2006 to 2013, she served as the clinical and administrative head of the Department of Neonatology, Paediatric Surgery, Paediatric Intensive Care, Paediatric Cardiology, and Paediatric Cardiac Surgery, returning as the head of Paediatric Cardiology in 2013, for which she currently holds the position.Dr. Hanséus is a recognised leader in the field of Paediatric Cardiology and has been involved in leadership within the Swedish Pediatric Society, the Swedish Association for Pediatric Cardiology, and the Association for European Paediatric and Congenital Cardiology throughout her career. Within the Association for European Paediatric and Congenital Cardiology, she served as the Secretary General from 2011 to 2016, the President Elect in 2018, and is the current President serving from 2019 until 2022. This article presents our interview with Dr. Hanséus, an interview that covers her experience as a leader in the field of Paediatric Cardiology, including the history and goals of the Association for European Paediatric and Congenital Cardiology, and her role and vision as their current President.

Nurturing service-oriented organizational citizenship behavior among tourism employees through leader humility

Though the effectiveness of leader humility has been established, does leader humility activate followers to serve customers in the tourism sector beyond their assigned roles? Our study aims to address this question by drawing upon the conservation of resources theory to propose that leader humility promotes service-oriented organizational citizenship behavior (service-oriented OCB) among tourism employees through the mediating role of their job crafting. Our study further assumes the moderating role of socially responsible human resource practices (SRHR practices) for the relationship between leader humility and employee job crafting. Utilizing a two-wave research design, the study garnered the data from 894 employees and 136 managers working in tour companies based in Vietnam. The analysis of the data via the multilevel structural equation modelling lent credence to the proposed research model. Our study not only advances the leadership humility literature in the tourism discipline but also provides a guideline for practitioners on how to optimally adopt leader humility in promoting service-oriented OCB among tourism employees.

The tipping point: mitigating the curvilinear effect of frontline service employee's perception of leadership humility on frontline service performance

PurposePrior studies have mainly advanced the understanding of a linear relationship between leadership humility and employee work outcomes, mediated and/or moderated by various individual, team and organizational variables. This study attempts to advance prior knowledge by investigating a potential curvilinear relationship between leadership humility and frontline service employee (FSE) performance and the role of FSE's psychological capital (PsyCap) in attenuating this curvilinear relationship.Design/methodology/approachSurvey data were drawn from a survey sample of 273 FSEs working in the hospitality industry of the United States of America. Hierarchical linear regression analysis was used to test the proposed hypotheses.FindingsThe results uncover the existence of a tipping point in the relationship between leader humility and FSE performance; that is, humble behaviors expressed by leaders positively influence FSE performance up to the tipping point beyond which FSE performance starts to diminish. However, this curvilinear effect is attenuated when FSE's PsyCap is high but not when it is low.Practical implicationsThe findings provide service managers with insights into the importance of balancing their humble behaviors to yield optimal FSE performance. Furthermore, the paper points to the need for FSE's PsyCap cultivation within service firms so that FSEs are less dependent on their supervisors and can deliver highly satisfactory results.Originality/valueThis research is one of the very first to investigate the curvilinear relationship between leader humility and FSE performance and the moderating role of PsyCap in attenuating the curvilinear effect.

Impacts of Leader Humility Between Authority and Trustworthiness on Compliance: Tests of Three-Way Interaction.

This study aims to examine how leader humility affects the relationship between authority and trustworthiness, and its effect on subordinate compliance. This study further addresses the reliability and validity issue to advance the measurement of humility; 300 participants consisting of leader-subordinate dyads of 50 leaders and 250 subordinates contributed to the data collections. This study found that both trustworthiness and authority have impact on subordinate compliance. Through three-way moderating analysis, this study further revealed that a leader's high humility, along with high trustworthiness under high authority results in the highest compliance, whereas a leader's high humility combined with low trustworthiness under low authority leads to the lowest compliance. Moreover, although a leader's personal background showed no relationship with the degree of leader humility, divergent combinations of leader-subordinate backgrounds were found to affect the degree of humility. Based on our findings, we propose that to effectively increase compliance, leader humility must be viewed as a strength when combined with high trustworthiness in high authority situations. This study may prompt future research in exploring humility in the context of virtue versus power, and the effects of humility in leadership. The implications of these findings for both theory and practice are also discussed.

Humility in Leadership: Kenotic Ecclesiology for a Post-pandemic Age

With the current challenge of the global pandemic, this article explores kenotic ecclesiology, paying particular attention to the value of humility as a necessary charism in church leadership. It advocates an Open Church to emerge in the post-pandemic era: kenotic ecclesiology, rooted in authentic Christology. A humble church does not try and ‘cling’ to its former status. Rather, it empties itself, taking the form of a servant. When found in this form, it can become obedient to its call to live an authentically humble-incarnate existence, and as an agent for the ushering in of the Kingdom of God.

호텔 총지배인의 겸손리더십이 구성원의 직무관련 자기효능감과 고객지향성에 미치는 영향

겸손은 시대가 발전함에 따라 발생하는 사회의 부작용을 타인에 대한 배려로 최소화 할 수 있는 윤리의식에 기반한다. 이와 관련하여 겸손리더십 선행연구를 살펴보면 겸손리더십의 개념을 체계화한 연구와 겸손리더십이 조직에 미치는 성과를 분석한 연구를 찾아 볼 수 있다. 겸손리더십은 우리나라에서 중요한 미덕으로 강조되고 있으며, 다양한 조직에서 겸손리더십과 관련하여 연구가 진행되고 있다. 그러나 호텔을 대상으로 한 겸손리더십 연구는 거의 찾아 볼 수 없다. 본 연구는 호텔구성원이 인식하는 겸손리더십이 직무관련 자기효능감과 고객지향성에 미치는 영향을 검증하였다. 호텔구성원을 대상으로 총 300개의 설문지를 배포하여 응답이 성실하지 못한 설문지를 제외하고 224개의 설문지를 최종분석에 활용하였다. 가설검증을 위해서는 구조방정식 모형 분석을 사용하였다. 분석결과 겸손리더십은 직무관련 자기효능감에 유의한 영향을 나타냈고, 고객지향성에도 유의한 영향을 나타냈다. 직무관련 자기효능감과 고객지향성의 관계를 검증한 결과 직무관련 자기효능감도 고객지향성에 유의한 결과를 나타냈다. 호텔에서의 겸손리더십은 인적자원관리 전략에 영향을 줄 수 있으며, 본 연구의 결과를 통해 겸손리더십이 호텔에서 중요한 역할을 하며 조직의 성과에 도움을 줄 수 있을 것으로 판단된다. 또한 호텔을 대상으로 한 겸손리더십 연구에 기본적인 자료를 제공할 수 있을 것으로 기대된다.

Leading with humility in tumultuous times: evidence from the United States

PurposeWicked problems, cross-sectoral and transregional collaborations, emerging technologies and calls for innovation generate exciting but unpredictable transformations in governance. Emerging research suggests humility, rather than certitude, represents a promising ethos for public leaders working to solve problems in tumultuous times. This study examines the nature, value and practice of humility in public administration (PA) leadership.Design/methodology/approachThis study reviews cross-disciplinary research on the nature and value of humility and emerging findings and debates on humility assessment measures. It analyzes discourse among graduate students in US PA classes and uses ethnographic analysis from workshops with local government leaders to identify institutional dynamics that may influence leaders' willingness to act with humility.FindingsFindings suggest that although PA students and leaders may value humility, they encounter institutional constraints related to public sector legitimacy and narratives about expertise and risk. The author proposes a framework to guide future research and practice in humility and public leadership.Research limitations/implicationsPotential constraints emerged from a modest study of courses and workshops; further research is required to test the prevalence of themes across public leadership environments.Practical implicationsPublic leaders, teachers and coaches may apply these practices and assessment measures to cultivate humility in PA classes and organizations.Originality/valueThis study is among the first to explore leadership humility with attention to how PA context may influence practice.

Can sales leaders with humility create adaptive retail salespersons?

AbstractAlthough humility in leadership has been recognized as vital in leading salespeople to cope with unpredictability and unknowability in customers, the role of sales leader humility in promoting sales behaviors has remained underexplored. Our research aims to unfold how and when sales managers’ leadership humility nurtures retail salespersons’ adaptive selling behavior. Grounded on the dataset from managers and employees working in retail shops of a large telecommunication and computer company in Vietnam, the results reveal the role of retail salespersons’ customer knowledge, adaptive self‐efficacy, and customer‐oriented harmonious passion as the mediation paths for the linkage between sales leader humility and retail salespeople's adaptive selling behavior. The findings further provide evidence for the role of sales managers’ adaptive selling as an enhancer for the impacts of sales leader humility on these mediators.

Leadership humility and managing a multicultural workforce

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to understand how CEO Joseph Abraham of Commercial Bank, Qatar, has shaped the culture of the bank and driven increased success during his tenure there. This is one of a series of interview-based studies that are focused on South Asian CEOs, with the goal of better understanding their management style in a multinational context. This short paper explores how leadership style can impact the development of workplace culture among a multinational workforce to build a collaborative, innovative and high-performing organization.Design/methodology/approachThis paper uses primary interviews and supplements the analyses with secondary data sources and published research on leadership, organizational identity, culture and organizational ambidexterity.FindingsThe study found that cultural values and learned behaviors impact one's leadership and vision. In this instance, the CEO's leadership style demonstrated humility, an appreciation of diverse national cultures, and an ability to create organizational identity and cultivate a culture of ambidexterity, providing comfort to the organization in dynamically opposite contexts. All of these leadership features have enabled the organization to become more adaptive and perform better.Originality/valueThe narrative provides a glimpse of leadership humility and the implementation of those ideals in the workplace. The global experience of this South Asia-raised CEO provides an insider's view to decision-making and helps us understand how family, cultural background, and diverse work experience shape leadership behavior and culture in a multinational context.