Comparing models of follower outcomes: destructive and constructive leader behavior

Purpose

To provide evidence-based recommendations on the types of leader behaviors organizations should target for a better return on leader training investment the authors draw on the destructive and constructive leadership behavior model and the bad is stronger than good proposition to examine the following question: Compared to constructive leader behavior, does destructive leader behavior have a greater effect on follower outcomes or is something more nuanced occurring?

Design/methodology/approach

The authors used Qualtrics online panels to collect data (N = 211 and N = 342) from full-time office-based participants. They used multivariate latent regression and dominance weights analyses to examine the relative strength of destructive versus constructive leader behaviors on followers' satisfaction with leader, and task performance.

Findings

Across both samples, leader hypocrisy and leader social undermining had relatively stronger effects on follower satisfaction with leader. Leader knowledge hiding had a relatively strong effect on follower task performance. Leader ethical conduct had the strongest association with follower satisfaction with leader in both samples. Hence, the authors' results were aligned with the bad is stronger than good proposition.

Originality/value

The authors' show that white-collar organizations can benefit from improved follower attitudes and performance by reducing leader hypocrisy and social undermining (destructive behavior) while simultaneously promoting leader ethical conduct (constructive behavior).

The Influence of Leader Bottom-Line Mentality on Miners' Safety Behavior: A Moderated Parallel Mediation Model Based on the Dual-System Theory

As a high-risk industry that is always struggling with unsafe factors, coal mine enterprises must prioritize safety in their operation and management, but there are still some short-sighted coal mine managers who choose to leave safety behind in the desperate pursuit of financial benefits, resulting in coal mine accidents from time to time. Unfortunately, this leadership style, known as leader bottom-line mentality, has not yet received sufficient attention in the safety field. Based on dual-system theory, this study aimed to explore the mediating role of emotional exhaustion and safety consciousness between leader bottom-line mentality and miners' safety behavior, as well as the moderating role of Chinese traditionality. Using a sample of 422 frontline miners in China, the results of the data analysis showed that emotional exhaustion and safety consciousness played parallel mediating roles between leader bottom-line mentality and miners' safety behavior, and Chinese traditionality moderated the effect of leader bottom-line mentality: the higher the Chinese traditionality, the weaker the mediating effect of emotional exhaustion and the stronger the mediating effect of safety consciousness. Present research explains the mechanisms and boundaries of the influence of leader bottom-line mentality on miners' safety behavior, contributing to the emerging literature on safety management and bottom-line mentality.

What if the bully is the manager?

Bullying can occur at all levels of nursing, and anyone could be targeted. This article offers strategies to identify bullying behaviors and discusses the prevalence of incivility in the nursing profession with a focus on vertical violence.

Threatened but Involved: Key Conditions for Stimulating Employee Helping Behavior

This article examines the relationship between employees’ job involvement and helping behavior directed toward coworkers, as well as how this relationship might be augmented when employees encounter adversity, whether due to malicious leadership (abusive supervision) or threats to their physical integrity (workplace hazards, fear of terrorism). Drawing on a two-wave survey research design that collected data from employees and their supervisors in Pakistan, the results reveal that job involvement increases the likelihood that employees go out of their way to help their coworkers, and this relationship is strongest when they have to deal with the hardships of malicious leadership or threats to their physical safety. For organizations, these findings indicate that employees perceive their own allocation of positive work energy, derived from their job involvement, to helping behaviors that assist other members as particularly useful when they also experience significant adversity, inside or outside the workplace.

Causes, Contingencies, and Consequences of Disengagement at Work: An Integrative Literature Review

Disengagement at work is proving to be a source of continued trouble for business organizations. Various estimates suggest that in excess of 70% of the workforce is either passively or actively disengaged, which in turn subjects the organizations to enormous financial burden. Regretfully, this problem has not found sufficient intellectual resonance in the academia. Therefore, employing conservation of resources (COR; Hobfoll, 1989) as the guiding theory, in this research, we conduct an integrative literature review to consolidate the extant approaches to disengagement at work. Apart from explaining the construct, we also identified its antecedents, moderating influences, and outcomes. Implications for human resource development (HRD) research and practice have been discussed. We believe that such an attempt is likely to encourage an informed debate on the subject in the academic domain, while helping practitioners identify actionable interventions.

Examining Organizational Citizenship Behavior in the Context of Human Resource Development

Over the past three decades, scholarship on organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) has grown tremendously and now enjoys a place of relative importance in the managerial, behavioral, and psychological literature. Researchers have traditionally focused their attention on understanding the nomological network of OCB, including its antecedents, predictors, correlates, and outcomes. Such work has also expanded to include cross-disciplinary investigations in areas such as health care, education, public organizations, and service industries, to name a few. Despite the relative prominence of OCB in other literature bases, OCB receives only minimal attention in the field of human resource development (HRD). The purpose of this integrative literature review was to examine and synthesize the available literature on OCB with specific consideration to the aims of the HRD field, namely, performance and learning and development. I present a synthesis of the relevant literature and conclude with a proposed research agenda and implications for HRD theory and practice.

Deconstructing the Privilege and Power of Employee Engagement

The purpose of our work was to explore the job demands–resources model of engagement through the critical lens(es) of privilege and power. This deconstruction of the privilege and power of employee engagement was focused toward exploring four principal questions: Who (a) controls the context of work? (b) determines the experience of engagement? (c) defines the value of engagement? and (d) benefits from high levels of engagement? We conclude that organizations and employees both benefit from the outcomes associated with the heightened experience of employee engagement. We maintain, however, that the organization is uniquely positioned to influence systems of power and privilege that ultimately enable the conditions for engagement to flourish. Organizations desiring high levels of engagement have an obligation to confront manifestations of privilege such as unequal states of power, access, status, credibility, and normality.