Day-level transformational leadership and followers’ daily level of stress: a moderated mediation model of team cooperation, role conflict, and type of communication

Reducing Work-Related Stress Through Soft-Skills Training Intervention in the Mining Industry

OBJECTIVE

The aim of the study was to verify if soft-skills training is an effective intervention in reducing work-related stress among miners, that is, people who run the risk of losing health and/or life due to unpredictable natural forces or human error at work.

BACKGROUND

The motivation for the intervention was based on Job Demands-Resources model where soft skills are job resources that help individuals to cope with or prevent high demands of the environment. The needed skills as well as work demands were first investigated and then a custom training was developed. The rationale for introducing soft-skills training into the work environment can be seen as compatible with the Human Capital Model (HCM) which is designed to stimulate positive organizational behaviour by providing an effective approach to ensure employees' adequate coping with work-related stress.

METHOD

96 volunteer employees were assigned to intervention (n = 48) and comparison (n = 48) groups. 16-hour tailored training covered tasks and simulation games related to communication, teambuilding, self-management and conflict resolution skills. Job Content Questionnaire, Occupational Stress Indicator (modified to fit the mining environment) and General Health Questionnaire were used in the study. A MANOVA with effect-size measures was conducted.

RESULTS

Results revealed a significant increase in decision latitude and social support for the trainees. A substantial decrease in stress was also observed, along with a significant decrease in general health problems. There were no such changes in the comparison group.

CONCLUSIONS

A soft-skills training, including communication, teamwork, self-motivation and conflict-resolution skills, helped participants to cope better with the stressful environment and improved their mental health. These effects lasted three months later.

APPLICATION

The intervention improved miners' psychosocial health and the strategies of coping with stress, which increased safety and health in the company. Investigating the effectiveness of such interventions included in the general Human Capital Model, as it was done in the study, might be a step forward towards building an interdisciplinary approach for health and safety and human resources.

How Does Transformational Leadership Relieve Teacher Burnout: The Role of Self-Efficacy and Emotional Intelligence

This study explored the underlying mechanisms and boundary conditions of the relationship between transformational leadership and teacher burnout. Specifically, it investigated the mediating role of teacher self-efficacy and the moderating role of teacher emotional intelligence (EI) in this relationship. Data from 539 primary and secondary school teachers were analyzed using Structural Equation Model and hierarchical regression. The results indicate that transformational leadership predicted teacher burnout negatively, self-efficacy mediated the association of transformational leadership with burnout partially, and EI strengthened the association between transformational leadership and burnout. This study has important theoretical and managerial implications as it deepens the understanding of the association between transformational leadership and burnout in the educational field and provides practical suggestions on how to relieve teacher burnout in the school context.

The Impact of Transformational Leadership on Service Employees in the Hotel Industry

Transformational leadership is important to the hotel industry where employees play a critical role in delivering the service. Transformational leadership is a leadership style that causes changes in employees by sharing the organization's vision and goals, providing necessary resources, promoting intellectual stimulation, and expecting high performance. This study uses four dimensions of transformational leadership to investigate how the dimensions influence employees' organizational identification, creativity, and task performance. In order to test the proposed model, data were gathered from employees of six hotels in South Korea. The data were analyzed with SmartPLS 4.0 program. The finding shows that four dimensions of transformational leadership have different effects on organizational identification and creativity. While core transformational leadership and supportive leader behavior enhance employees' organizational identification, which affects creativity and task performance, intellectual stimulation has an impact on creativity, which influences task performance. The post hoc analysis shows that organizational identification fully mediates the relationship between two dimensions of transformational leadership and creativity. This study contributes to the existing literatures of leadership theory and social identification theory by expanding the knowledge on the role of transformational leadership on employees. Some theoretical and practical implications are offered.

The association of perceived leadership style and subjective well-being of employees in a tertiary hospital in Germany

BACKGROUND

Professionals in the healthcare sector are a particularly vulnerable group for occupational strain due to high work-related psychological stress. For the implementation of targeted stress-prevention interventions as an important part of a workplace health management programme for all occupational groups and hierarchy levels, information about the current state of their mental health is mandatory. Hence, this study investigated the association of general well-being and different leadership styles among employees in a German tertiary hospital.

METHODS

Via an online survey, 10,101 employees were contacted. The final sample consisted of 1137 employees. Of these, 27.7% described themselves as leaders and 72.3% as followers. Most participants were female (74.8%), more than half were under 41 years old. Besides control variables, general well-being (WHO-5) and leadership style (transactional and transformational, laissez-faire and destructive leadership) were assessed.

RESULTS

Leaders reported higher well-being scores than followers. Physicians without leadership responsibilities had the lowest scores for well-being. Practitioners of both transformational and transactional leadership were associated with higher well-being scores, while those practicing laissez-faire and destructive leadership had lower scores for almost every professional group.

CONCLUSION

Results highlight the necessity for future multimodal health-preventive leadership interventions feature behavioural and organizational intervention modules specifically tailored to hospital professionals at different hierarchical and functional levels to foster the mental health of employees.

Sustainable Leadership, Environmental Turbulence, Resilience, and Employees' Wellbeing in SMEs

Drawing on the conservation of resources theory and contingency theories of leadership, this study aims to investigate how sustainable leadership (SL) influences employees' wellbeing (WB) through employee resilience (ER) and to examine the moderating effect of environmental turbulence (ET) on the “sustainable leadership-employees' wellbeing” relationship. Data were collected from 593 employees and 373 supervisors adopting two-wave design among small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in China. The authors used structural equation modeling to empirically test the hypothesized model in this study. The research shows that SL is significantly related to the employees' WB in SMEs. Regarding mediating effect, SL also indirectly influences employees' WB through ER. Moreover, the impact of SL on employees' WB becomes more prominent in the presence of lower ET. To the best of the authors' knowledge, no prior study is available about the integrated relationship of SL, ER, ET, and employee WB.

Transformational Leadership, HRM practices and burnout during the COVID-19 pandemic: The role of personal stress, anxiety, and workplace loneliness

The present research investigates the crucial role of "Transformational Leadership (TFL)" on employees' "anxiety", "personal stress", and "workplace loneliness", and finally on employees' "burnout". Moreover, this survey investigates the moderating role of "HRM practices" in the relationship between TFL and burnout. For the needs of the research, "Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM)" was conducted on a sample of 459 Greek "customer-contact employees" based on thirteen hotels during the "COVID-19 pandemic". First, the findings uncover the dynamic of TFL in reducing all three stressors, namely "personal financial stress"; "anxiety"; and "workplace loneliness", thus prohibiting employees' "burnout". Moreover, the study underscores the moderating role of "HRM practices" in strengthening the negative relationship between TFL and "burnout". Overall, the findings provide additional evidence on the process through which "HRM practices" interact with "TFL", "job stressors", and employees' "burnout", a vital knowledge for HRM professionals and hotels' managers.

The Mediating Effects of Work Characteristics on the Relationship between Transformational Leadership and Employee Well-Being: A Meta-Analytic Investigation

Evidence points to an indirect relationship between transformational leadership (TFL) and employee well-being, and numerous work characteristics have been identified as mediators. However, the relative mediating effect of different types of job resources and job demands on the TFL-well-being relationship remains unclear, rendering it impossible to determine which ones are the most influential. This study aims to provide a comprehensive analysis of the relative mediation potential of different work characteristics in the TFL-well-being relationship in multiple three-level meta-analytical structural equation models of 243 samples. Based on the JD-R Model, this study extends this theoretical framework by suggesting TFL as a predisposing variable that influences both job resources and job demands, leading to changes in indicators of both positive and negative employee well-being. The results show that, while all the examined job resources and demands mediated the TFL-well-being relationship, organizational resources were identified as the strongest mediators. Furthermore, job demands had a strong mediating effect on the relationship between TFL and negative well-being, while job resources more strongly mediated TFL and positive well-being. We present a differentiated picture of how transformational leaders can influence their employees' well-being at the workplace, providing valuable knowledge for future research and practice.

Work environment risk factors causing day-to-day stress in occupational settings: a systematic review

Background

While chronic workplace stress is known to be associated with health-related outcomes like mental and cardiovascular diseases, research about day-to-day occupational stress is limited. This systematic review includes studies assessing stress exposures as work environment risk factors and stress outcomes, measured via self-perceived questionnaires and physiological stress detection. These measures needed to be assessed repeatedly or continuously via Ecological Momentary Assessment (EMA) or similar methods carried out in real-world work environments, to be included in this review. The objective was to identify work environment risk factors causing day-to-day stress.

Methods

The search strategies were applied in seven databases resulting in 11833 records after deduplication, of which 41 studies were included in a qualitative synthesis. Associations were evaluated by correlational analyses.

Results

The most commonly measured work environment risk factor was work intensity, while stress was most often framed as an affective response. Measures from these two dimensions were also most frequently correlated with each other and most of their correlation coefficients were statistically significant, making work intensity a major risk factor for day-to-day workplace stress.

Conclusions

This review reveals a diversity in methodological approaches in data collection and data analysis. More studies combining self-perceived stress exposures and outcomes with physiological measures are warranted.

Leadership and Job Demands-Resources Theory: A Systematic Review

The purpose of this article is to provide a systematic review of leadership and Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) theory. We have analyzed 139 studies that study the relationship between leadership and Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) theory. Based on our analysis, we highlight ways forward. First, research designs can be improved by eliminating endogeneity problems. Regarding leadership concepts, proper measurements should be used. Furthermore, we point toward new theory building by highlighting three main ways in which leadership may affect employees, namely by: (1) directly influencing job demands and resources, (2) influencing the impact of job demands and resources on well-being; and (3) influencing job crafting and self-undermining. We hope this review helps researchers and practitioners analyze how leadership and JD-R theory can be connected, ultimately leading to improved employee well-being and organizational performance.

Are Job Demands Necessary in the Influence of a Transformational Leader? The Moderating Effect of Role Conflict

(1) Background: The objective of this manuscript is to propose the necessity of job demands to ensure the positive influence of policies in stimulating employees’ engagement and performance. If the policies related to the intellectual stimulation of employees implemented by team leaders are to have positive effects on employee performance, they must induce emotional engagement in the employees. Furthermore, to achieve this positive influence on emotions, the organization must offer an environment that challenges the employees in the organization. Here, we analyze a moderate mediation model to examine the moderating, positive effect of role conflict on the intellectual engagement and performance of employees. (2) Methods: This study involved 705 employees of a multinational private company based in Spain. (3) Results: We confirm the positive moderating effect of role conflict between the intellectual stimulation of employees and intellectual engagement, and the mediating effect of intellectual engagement between leadership behavior and employee performance. (4) Conclusions: Organizational leader stimulation practices necessitate an environment of moderate job demands in order to improve the intellectual engagement of employees, thereby increasing their performance. The implications of the findings in terms of theory, research and practice are discussed.

The Impact of Transformational Leadership on Employee Retention: Mediation and Moderation Through Organizational Citizenship Behavior and Communication

This study investigates the impact of transformational leadership on employee retention in small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and probes the mediating role of organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) and the moderating role of communication. Data were collected using convenience sampling from 505 employees of SMEs. A Smart PLS structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was used to estimate the various relationships. The findings of the study reveal a positive and significant relationship between transformational leadership and OCB. Similarly, this study finds a positive and significant relationship in OCB and employee retention. In addition, OCB had a positive mediating effect on the relationship between transformational leadership and employee retention. Furthermore, communication positively moderates the transformational leadership- OCB and OCB-employee retention relationships. Leaders at SMEs should implement the traits of transformational leadership such as developing a compelling vision for employees, focusing on goal achievement, having problem-solving techniques, having a sense of purpose, and spending time on the training and development of the team to enhance OCB and employee retention.

How and When Do Leaders Influence Employees' Well-Being? Moderated Mediation Models for Job Demands and Resources

Following the call of recent reviews on leadership and well-being, the purpose of this study is to examine how and when two contrasting leadership styles, transformational leadership (TFL) and passive-avoidant leadership (PAL), are related to employees’ anxiety and thereby either promote or inhibit employees’ well-being. Using the prominent job demands-resources (JD-R) model as a theoretical framework, we propose that the relationship between leadership behavior and anxiety is mediated by organizational job demands, namely, role ambiguity (RA), and job resources, namely, team climate for learning (TCL), as well as moderated by autonomy as important job characteristic. A sample of 501 knowledge workers, working in teams in a German research and development (R&D) organization, answered an online survey. We tested moderated multiple mediation models using structural equation modeling (SEM). Results demonstrated that the relationships between TFL as well as PAL on the one hand and anxiety on the other hand were fully mediated by RA and TCL. Job autonomy moderated the quality of the leadership–job demand relationship for TFL and PAL. This paper contributes to understanding the complex relationship between leadership and followers’ well-being taking into account a combination of mediating and moderating job demands and resources. This is the first study that examines the effects of TFL and PAL on well-being taking into account the job demand RA and team processes and autonomy as resources.

Entwicklung eines Fragebogens zur Erfassung zentraler Merkmale der Arbeit 4.0

Zusammenfassung. Ziel dieses Beitrages ist es, ein Fragebogeninstrument zur Erfassung zentraler Merkmale der Arbeit 4.0 vorzustellen. Kerndimensionen des Fragebogens sind die Digitalisierung von Arbeitsprozessen, die Flexibilisierung der Arbeit in räumlicher und zeitlicher Hinsicht, die Entgrenzung der Arbeitstätigkeit, sowie die Möglichkeit zur Mitbestimmung bei der Arbeit und deren subjektive Relevanz. Die Faktorstruktur der erfassten fünf Dimensionen erweist sich als replizierbar stabil. Die Dimensionen lassen sich mittels konfirmatorischer Faktorenanalysen von verwandten Dimensionen des Job Diagnostic Survey ( JDS) und des Copenhagen Psychosocial Questionnaire ( COPSOQ) trennen. In Bezug auf die Vorhersage von Außenkriterien besitzen die fünf Dimensionen inkrementelle Validität über den JDS hinaus. Insgesamt sprechen die Ergebnisse aus fünf unabhängig durchgeführten Erhebungen dafür, dass der Fragebogen ein kurzes, reliables und valides Instrument zur Erfassung zentraler Merkmale der modernen Arbeitswelt darstellt.