TY - JOUR
T1 - Strengths-based leadership and employee work engagement
T2 - A multi-source study
AU - Wang, J.
AU - van Woerkom, M.
AU - Breevaart, K.
AU - Bakker, A.B.
AU - Xu, S.
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2023 The Authors
PY - 2023
Y1 - 2023
N2 - Strengths-based leadership helps employees identify, utilize, and develop their strengths. Does such leadership facilitate employee work engagement and performance? In this study, we integrate Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) and Leader-Member Exchange (LMX) theories to hypothesize that strengths-based leadership is positively related to employee task performance through employee work engagement, and that this effect is moderated by LMX quality. We collected survey data at two time points – with one month interval – from 556 Chinese workers and their managers (N = 104 teams). The results of path modelling showed that strengths-based leadership was positively related to supervisor-ratings of employee task performance via employee work engagement. As predicted, the positive relation between strengths-based leadership and employee work engagement was stronger when LMX was of high-quality. However, the predicted moderated-mediation effect was not supported. We discuss the implications of these findings for research on strengths-based leadership, as well as the practical implications.
AB - Strengths-based leadership helps employees identify, utilize, and develop their strengths. Does such leadership facilitate employee work engagement and performance? In this study, we integrate Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) and Leader-Member Exchange (LMX) theories to hypothesize that strengths-based leadership is positively related to employee task performance through employee work engagement, and that this effect is moderated by LMX quality. We collected survey data at two time points – with one month interval – from 556 Chinese workers and their managers (N = 104 teams). The results of path modelling showed that strengths-based leadership was positively related to supervisor-ratings of employee task performance via employee work engagement. As predicted, the positive relation between strengths-based leadership and employee work engagement was stronger when LMX was of high-quality. However, the predicted moderated-mediation effect was not supported. We discuss the implications of these findings for research on strengths-based leadership, as well as the practical implications.
KW - Job Demands-Resources theory
KW - Leader-Member Exchange
KW - Strengths-based leadership
KW - Task performance
KW - Work engagement
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85149258045&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.jvb.2023.103859
DO - 10.1016/j.jvb.2023.103859
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85149258045
SN - 0001-8791
VL - 142
JO - Journal of Vocational Behavior
JF - Journal of Vocational Behavior
M1 - 103859
ER -