The influence of leadership style on safety climate, level of trust, and employee engagement.

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2021-08-23
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en
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Current study aimed to investigate the influence of leadership style on employee engagement via safety climate and employee trust. This potential effect was measured by means of a survey including Spanish and Dutch respondents in order to include probable moderating effects of culture in terms of varying levels of uncertainty avoidance. A survey was conducted aiming at discovering relationships between previously mentioned variables based on the following hypotheses: H1: Transformational leadership will stimulate higher levels of safety climate compared to transactional leadership H2: Employees with a higher uncertainty avoidance will show a higher level of safety climate compared to employees with a low uncertainty avoidance for transactional as well as transformational leadership H3: Safety climate will positively influence level of trust. H4: Employee trust will have a positive effect on employee engagement. Results showed that leadership did not have a significant influence on safety climate nor was this effect moderated by uncertainty avoidance. However, uncertainty avoidance did demonstrate a significant direct effect on safety climate. Furthermore, safety climate turned out to be a significant predictor for employee trust. Subsequently employee trust was a significant predictor for employee engagement and therefore mediated the relation between safety climate and employee engagement. In conclusion, supervisors should be aware of the high influence perceived level of safety has on employee trust and subsequently on employee engagement. Focussing on making employees feel safe seems to be highly beneficial when creating a committed workforce, even more so for employees with high uncertainty avoidance.
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