Based on research by Simone Meskelis, DBA, and J.Lee Whittington, PhD.
Employees bring engagement to work through their individual traits, but organizations can help create an environment that fosters engagement through positive leadership behavior such as authentic leadership.
This study found that individuals with high levels of honesty–humility have a natural tendency of being engaged with their work. However, because of authentic leadership functions as a substitute for honesty–humility. This means that in the presence of authentic leadership behaviors, an individual’s traits become unnecessary to drive higher levels of engagement. In other words, even if an individual does not have a particular personality trait, the presence of authentic leadership behaviors will lead to high levels of engagement.
Key Points
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A field study involving a total of 100 participants was conducted to investigate the relationship between honesty–humility, authentic leadership and employee engagement.
- The results show that honesty–humility impacts employee engagement and that authentic leadership functions as a substitute for honesty–humility.
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Employees bring engagement to work through their individual traits but organizations can help create an environment that fosters engagement through positive leadership behavior such as authentic leadership.
Why This Matters
Previous research has examined the impact of personality traits and leadership behaviors on employee engagement. However, this study was able to identify the substitute effect that authentic leadership has on honesty–humility to drive engagement. Findings from this study demonstrate that a leader’s behavior not only impacts employee engagement but also it replaces the need for a particular trait to positively impact engagement.
Based upon the following peer-reviewed manuscript: Meskelis, S., & Whittington, J. L. (2020). Driving employee engagement: how personality trait and leadership style impact the process. Journal of Business & Industrial Marketing.
