The role of HEXACO in the development of authentic leadership and its consequences on task performance

Purpose

The objectives of the current study were to identify the antecedents and outcomes of authentic leadership. For antecedents, the research considered the HEXACO (Honesty-Humility, Emotionality, eXtraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Openness to Experience) personality model and thereby identified the impact of authentic leadership on employee performance with the mediating role of psychological safety and employee engagement by using the trait theory.

Design/methodology/approach

The current study adopted a positivism research philosophy followed by a deductive approach. Overall, 347 samples were collected from the public sector organizations using quantitative research techniques, and data were gathered through a self-administrated questionnaire. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were used through structural equation modeling (SEM)-Mplus to generate the results and test the formulated hypotheses.

Findings

The results revealed that honesty-humility significantly impacts authentic leadership (β = 0.094 and p < 0.05). Similarly, other dimensions of HEXACO also play a significant role in forming authentic leadership. After analyzing the HEXACO as the antecedent of authentic leadership, sequential mediation of psychological safety and employee engagement was checked and identified that authentic leadership in the presence of mediators was insignificant. Hence the full mediation has been recorded.

Originality/value

Since its inception, a plethora of research has been available on the authentic leadership theory. However, the empirical evidence revealed that most research is related to outcomes of authentic leadership. As far as antecedents of authentic leadership are concerned, the literature is still silent, specifically on the development of authentic leaders. The current study is significantly contributing to the theory of authentic leadership, and in this context, the study is unique since it is taking the HEXACO personality model as an antecedent of authentic leadership to investigate its role in the development of authentic leaders. Moreover, the study is also identified as the impact of authentic leadership on task performance, not in isolation, but by taking psychological safety and employee engagement as a mediating mechanism.

“One of these things is not like the others”: the role of authentic leadership in cross-cultural leadership development

Purpose

The purpose of this research is to explore a possible relationship between the presence of authentic organisational leadership and the leadership development experience.

Design/methodology/approach

This study uses a qualitative exploratory hybrid research design which draws on data from multiple sources. Data were collected by means of semi-structured interviews, document analysis and non-participant observations across two case study organisations in Saudi Arabia.

Findings

The authors' findings suggest that the presence of authentic leadership (AL) within an organisation is a significant factor in the leadership development experience. This study also highlights the key importance of advancing leadership development theory that is holistic and comprehensive.

Research limitations/implications

The study was conducted as case studies within a specific social context. Findings cannot be generalised but offer valuable direction for future research.

Originality/value

The research advances leadership development theory by highlighting the inadequacy of the person-focussed perspective and offering exploratory evidence for the role of social context, organisational leadership and organisational artefacts in the leadership development process.

The gaslighting of authentic leadership 2.0

This article is a response to Bill Gardner and Kelly McCauley’s ‘gaslighting’ critique of our text on the perils of authentic leadership. Against gaslighting 1.0 (evilly trying to convince people to doubt their perceptions), we propose gaslighting 2.0 (enlightenment). We argue that organizations face severe problems and challenges that cannot be solved by motivating managers to engage in introspection and being overly preoccupied by their own authenticity. A search for one’s true self is a personal journey of inner growth and heightened self-awareness that individuals, leaders and non-leaders may engage in and find highly beneficial, but outside any notion of exercising influence or power on others to reach career objectives or corporate goals. The broad use of simple recipes with claims of overwhelming positive effects is problematic. Leadership research is often based on highly problematic measures, making most efforts to capture the core phenomenon unreliable. That many people are attracted by simplistic, positive-sounding and ego-enhancing formulas is not the same as evidence for theoretical value and relevance of a truth claim. Taking aspiration as a critical element would call for the development and study of Aspirational Authentic Leadership Theory, which would be something quite different from the static study of how managers score in terms of being true to their values, a core self, and so on. In-depth process studies of managers trying to be authentic navigating dilemmas at work could be an alternative to focus further research on.

Reconstructing authenticity through a multi-paradigmatic umbrella: A process perspective

While there is a substantive body of research that recognizes the importance of authentic leadership theory, critiques have challenged its dominant and positive-focused conceptualization. We synthesize these extant critiques, providing researchers with an integrative understanding of the theoretical, conceptual, and empirical deficiencies facing authenticity in a leadership context.

These deficiencies have thwarted authentic leadership’s development limiting our understanding of what authentic leadership is and who authentic leaders are. Synthesizing what has been said about authentic leadership demonstrates why authenticity needs to be conceived of and studied differently. We offer being-in-becoming as a multi-paradigmatic umbrella which accommodates different ontological foundations of what it means to be authentic. A being-in -becoming approach recognizes that authenticity emanates from a developmental process, suggesting the study of authenticity must also be thought of processually. Studying authenticity as a developmental process holds important theoretical and practical implications as it embraces the processual nature of our dynamic, evolutionary beings.

The Effect of Positive Management Practices on Firm Profitability – Evidence from Text Mining

The concepts of positive psychology and positive organizational scholarship emphasize the value of employees’ positive emotions and satisfaction for organizations to thrive. However, conceptions of positive practices or virtuousness emanating from managers are not yet fully established and suffer from incompleteness and inconsistency. This study establishes a framework that holistically and coherently captures management practices that lead to satisfaction among employees, applying text mining and unsupervised machine learning methods to a large sample of employee reviews (n = 5,650). The framework of positive management practices (PMP) encompasses the six dimensions of respectful interaction, open communication, interpersonal support, reasonable instructions, intellectual support, and managerial competence. In a subsequent analysis, this study finds a positive association between PMP at the organizational level and firm profitability, indicating that companies should ensure that employees in leadership positions understand and adopt PMP.

The gaslighting of authentic leadership revisited

Authentic leadership theory (ALT) has become the target for considerable criticism of its conceptual grounding and the methods used for its empirical investigation. Mats Alvesson and Katja Einola (2019) have led the charge in advancing skepticism about ALT by warning of the pitfalls of excessive positivity in leadership research, using ALT as an illustrative example. In a subsequent exchange of letters, the cases against and for authentic leadership were advanced by Alvesson and Einola and Gardner and Karam, respectively (Gardner et al., 2021). As an extension to this debate, Einola and Alvesson (2021) advanced a provocative argument that ALT is not only misguided, but “perilous” to those who believe in it. We felt compelled to reply to this claim by documenting erroneous elements of their arguments that we contend constitute “academic gaslighting” in that they may cause leadership scholars and practitioners to inappropriately discount empirical evidence and their own lived experiences of authentic leadership (Gardner & McCauley, 2022). Alvesson and Einola (2022), in turn, replied with a lengthy defense of their position in which they assert that rather than engaging in gaslighting, their critique constitutes an effort to “enlighten” ALT. In this final entry in this academic exchange, we identify areas of agreement as well as continued disagreements in our exchange and take issue, yet again, with their argument that ALT is inherently dangerous for scholars and practitioners alike. We conclude by asking readers to be wary of these efforts to gaslight ALT and instead rely on the extant empirical evidence and their own lived experiences to draw their own conclusions about the merits of authentic leadership as a topic for academic inquiry and an approach for practicing leadership in the workplace.

The gaslighting of authentic leadership

In a recent critique of authentic leadership theory, Einola and Alvesson (2021) assert that the theory “is not only wrong in a harmless way, but it may be outright perilous to leadership scholars, scholarship, and those who believe in it” (p. 483). They describe four “perils” of authentic leadership theory to support their arguments; in this response paper, we address each “peril”. Unfortunately, their criticism is based, in part, on misleading and inaccurate information about authentic leadership theory, which we identify and correct in this article. We contend that their arguments are at odds with the experiences of authentic leadership that both practitioners and scholars have personally encountered. In essence, through their critique, Einola and Alvesson are engaging in the practice of gaslighting, as they try to convince others to doubt their perceptions of and experiences with authentic leadership, along with the extensive empirical support that has accumulated. Further, Einola and Alvesson suggest that encouraging leaders to strive to be authentic by enhancing their self-awareness, processing positive and negative self-relevant information in a balanced fashion, establishing open and transparent relationships with followers, and living by their core values, is dangerous. We ask readers to consider the merits of their criticism, as well as our alternative, more positive perspective of authentic leadership theory. We suspect that, for many, such introspection will yield a realization that Einola and Alvesson are gaslighting them into questioning their own reality about what it means to lead with authenticity.

Fostering Workplace Innovation through CSR and Authentic Leadership: Evidence from SME Sector

The cut-throat situation of competitiveness in almost every business sector, followed by globalization, shortened product life cycles, and rapid technological changes have raised the importance of innovation to overrun the rivals. Scholars have established that appropriate leadership style is a key enabler for organizational success. However, it is not clear in existing literature how the concept of authentic leadership is related to innovative work behavior (IWB). Likewise, the role of corporate social responsibility (CSR) to induce IWB is also vague in current literature. Thus, the basic purpose of the current study was to test the relationship of CSR and IWB with the mediating effect of authentic leadership. The proposed model was tested in the small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) sector of China. The data were collected through a questionnaire that was distributed among different respondents of the current survey. The data were obtained from a dyad of supervisor and subordinate serving in different SMEs in Wuhan city of China. The study used the structural equation modeling (SEM) technique to validate different hypotheses. The empirical results confirm that CSR positively relates to IWB while authentic leadership partially mediates this relationship. The findings of the current survey will be helpful for policymakers to recognize employees as a source of innovation through CSR and authentic leadership.