Authentic Leadership: Effects on Work Performance and Analysis of Mediating Processes

Informações

Código: GPR2316
Divisão: GPR - Gestão de Pessoas e Relações de Trabalho
Tema de Interesse: Tema 05 - Liderança

Autores

Otacílio Torres Vilas Boas, Flávia de Souza Costa Neves Cavazotte

Resumo

The concept of authenticity, long present in Western philosophical thought (Harter,2002), has been incorporated into contemporary theories about leadership in the businessliterature over the last decade (Avolio et al., 2004; Gardner et al., 2005; Luthans, 2002;Luthans & Avolio, 2003, May et al., 2003). This was done following the demand forleadership action based on principles such as transparency, consistency, balance and integrity(Dealy & Thomas, 2006; Avolio & Luthans, 2006), which are considered the solidfoundations of constructive, responsible and long-lasting organizational projects (George &Sims, 2007; George, Sims, McLean, & Mayer, 2007; George, 2003). Building on previousworks (Luthans & Avolio, 2003; Gardner et al., 2005; Ilies et al., 2005), Walumbwa, Avolio,Gardner et al. defined authentic leadership as a pattern of leader behavior inspired by positivepsychological capacities, which stimulates these same capacities and a positive ethical climatein groups. It is capable of generating greater self-awareness, internalized moral perspective,balanced information processing, and relational transparency between leaders and followers,thus making positive self-development possible (2008: 94). This study investigated theinfluence of authentic leadership on job performance in a sample of employees andsupervisors in a large company in Brazil. The study also developed and tested a model linkingauthentic leadership with in-role performance via interactional justice and creative behaviors.Using survey data, we found that authentic leadership positively affected employee in-roleperformance at work. Data analysis also verified a significant positive relationship betweenauthentic leadership and the other variables included in the study. With respect to themediation tests, it was possible to observe that creative behaviors mediated the relationshipbetween authentic leadership and performance, and that the perception of interactional justicemediated the relationship between authentic leadership and creative behavior. From thepractical stand point, our results suggest that efforts should be made to develop authenticleader behaviors among those in charge of managing teams, a point that should guide theagenda for the training and development programs. Attention to the issue of authenticitymight improve organizational performance in the short run by stimulate higher levels ofengagement (Avolio et al., 2004), and thus foster business performance (Avolio & Gardner,2005), as well as the development of innovative solutions to internal problems and marketchallenges. Besides, development and monitoring of authentic behavior in organizationsmight also prevent decisions and actions that are not aligned to ethical principles (Walumbwaet al., 2008).

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