1. Introduction
Following the recall campaign for their emission manipulation in September 2015, it is reported that Volkswagen may have to spend US$7.3 billion on rectifying its emissions issues as well as refitting the affected vehicles(CNN Money, 2015). This example indicates how a great loss can be resulted from the lack of morality among organizational leaders obsessed with achieving financial goals.
Such immorality is an obstacle to development and social stability all over the world(Kim, 2014), and unfortunately Korea is not exceptional. For examples, most leaders of Korean conglomerates have been involved in economic offenses resulting in severe public criticism. In addition to this, as shown in the case of the Sung Wan-Jong List Scandal in 2015, bribery cases still happen frequently among politicians, administrative officials and businessmen. In military organizations, corruptions related to the defense industry and sexual harassment among military officials have also disappointed the public. Such immoral behaviors have not left university professors and the clergy of most of religions unscathed. As such, the level of immorality prevalent in Korean society was reflected in Korea’s corruption index ranking of the 43rd in the world (Transparency International, 2014). In such a climate, it is expected that promoting authentic leadership in Korean society will contribute to improving organizational efficiency as well as reducing the loss of social expenses due to the distrust and conflicts resulted from the lack of morality.
The purpose of this study is to verify that authentic leadership not only improves morality but also organizational performance, that is, organizational citizenship behavior(OCB). In addition, it examines the mediating roles of followers’ self-awareness and psychological ownership in the relationship between authentic leadership and OCB, thereby exploring how to promote authentic leadership in Korea.
An authentic leadership theory has emerged for the last decade from various studies in leadership, education, positive organizational behavior, ethics, etc.(Cameron, Dutton & Quinn, 2003; Luthans & Avolio, 2003; Cooper & Nelson, 2006). It came forth out of recognition for the side effects of growth-oriented neo-liberalism and the unquenchable thirst for quarterly profit targets in a capitalism society(George, 2003), the authentic leader-ship was thus raised as a value-oriented theoretical model in the Gallup leadership conference of Nebraska-Lincoln University in 2004(Gardner et al., 2011). An upswing in highly publicized corporate scandals such as Enron accounting fraud and the management malfeasance facing public and private organizations, has contributed to the attention placed on authentic leadership in early 2000(Walumbwa et al, 2008 Wesche et al., 2011) and the public became to require more responsibilities from their leaders(Dealy & Thomas, 2006). But unfortunately as of 2016, our environment that required authentic leadership in early 2000 does not seem to be improved at all.
This study has some implications, as follows; first, there have been much conceptual and theoretical researches presenting on authentic leadership to date, but few include empirical researches(Peus et al., 2012). Hence, this study provides empirical verification for the organizational effectiveness of authentic leadership thereby promoting it. Second, the study on follower’s self-awareness is rare so far even though there is some research on leader’s self-awareness in the leadership research. By validating the mediating roles of followers’self-awareness and psychological ownership between authentic leadership and followers’OCB, we would understand the role of followers’ self-awareness in the authentic leadership process. Third, this article provides a different point of view by using followers’ self-awareness as a mediating variable between authentic leadership and OCB in contrast to the article using the identification with a leader as a mediating variable(Jun et al., 2010). It must be noted that the aforementioned theory explaining the mediating role of the identification with a leader between authentic leadership and OCB looks to ignore the importance of followers’ authenticity developed through their self-awareness(Gardner et al., 2005), which is the key of authentic leadership and followership development theory. In short, it will be able to improve the authentic leadership and followership development by understanding the mechanism of authentic leadership leading to followers’ authenticity and finally to organizational outcomes.
2. Theoretical Background and Hypothesis
2.1. Authenticity and Authentic Leadership
The concept of authenticity is known to derive from ancient Greek philosophy, ‘be true to oneself' (Harter, 2002). The English term, authenticity, is originated from the Greek term ‘authento’, which means to be a master in one’s own area or about oneself up to the point of exerting one’s characteristics completely and having optimal self-esteem(Kernis & Goldman, 2006). This is quite similar to the concept of Maslow’s(1971) self-actualized person, who are fully aware of his/her nature and are in tune with them, and thereby fully functioning in their lives leading to psychological wellbeing. Harter(2002) defines authenticity as owing one’s experience (values, emotions, desires, preferences, and beliefs) and acting in accordance with one’s true self. But authenticity is not an either/or condition, that is, one is not 100% authentic nor inauthentic(Erickson, 1995). If one develops authenticity, one gets optimal self-esteem of genuine, true, comfortable and consistent high self-esteem, compared to high self-esteem which is fragile, defensive, unpredictable, inconsistent, etc(Gardner et al., 2005; Kernis, 2003). And authentic people develop more transparent and open relationship with others in organization and thereby can achieve more positive performance(George et al., 2007).
The authenticity of organization is realized by its’ leader(Novicevic et al., 2006), and thus an authentic leader is supposed to own such an authenticity. However, authentic leadership extends beyond the leader, himself/herself to include authentic relations with colleagues, followers and other people (Gardner et al., 2005). The authentic leader is aware of his/her own value, belief, strength and weakness and at the same time supports their followers to be aware of their own value, belief, strength and weakness as well. Thus, followers can understand the context in which they operate and become confident, hopeful, optimistic, resilient and of high moral character, which leads to organizational effectiveness(Avolio & Gardner, 2005; Ryan & Deci, 2000). According to Gardner et al.,(2005) self-based authentic leader and follower development model, the authentic leadership development starts with how individuals interpret accumulated life experiences and trigger events in organization. Through such personal experiences and trigger events, leader can reflect oneself, clarify one’s value, emotion, desires, etc. and then can act in accordance with them. This is called as self-awareness, which is assumed as a key of the authentic leadership development process(Gardner et al., 2005). Once self-awareness is developed, an authentic leader behaves through internalized regulatory process. And positive modeling is a core means whereby a leader can develop authentic followers. The words, self-awareness, internalized self-regulatory behaviors, etc. of an authentic leader are modeled for its followers and thereby authentic followership can be developed. The authentic leadership development includes followers as a key focal point, because it emphasizes the growth of both leader and followers in organization(Avolio et al., 2004; Gardner et al., 2005Ryan & Deci, 2000). In other words, once the self-awareness of leader and its followers is developed, both of them can deliver authentic behaviors of internalized self-regulation. Then, such authentic behaviors become organizational climate, which leads to followers’ psychological well-being, job commitment and finally sustainable organizational effectiveness. Walumbwa et al.,(2008)based on the authenticity definition of Kernis & Goldman(2006), viewed authentic leadership as being composed of four dimensions-self-awareness, relational transparency, balanced information processing and internalized moral perspective.
Unlike previous leadership theories, the authentic leadership theory was basically developed as a conceptual theory for the leadership development process(Avolio & Gardner, 2005). For this reason, many conceptual articles have been published, but there have been few empirical researches yet(Peus et al., 2012). Even a few empirical researches have studied on leader’s outcomes such as leader’s self-esteem(Walumbwa et al., 2008), psychological well-being(Toor & Ofori, 2009), etc. on followers outcome such as followers’burnout(Wong & Cummings, 2009), job satisfaction(Jensen & Luthans, 2006), organizational commitment(Walumbwa et al., 2008), etc. and on organizational outcome such as financial performance(Clapp-Smith et al., 2009), etc. The authentic leadership and authentic followership start with the authenticity of both leader and followers, which can be resulted from their self-awareness(Gardner et al., 2005). Nevertheless, the empirical research was rare so far on followers’self-awareness in the authentic leadership process. Although some leadership researches touched on self-awareness, they mainly focus on leaders’ self-awareness, not followers’. Thus, this study aims to understand the role of followers’self-awareness in the authentic leadership process leading to organizational outcomes.
2.2. Followers’ Self-Awareness
Goleman(1996) asserted that emotional intelligence is more important than IQ in social life, presenting self-awareness as one of key factors for emotional intelligence. Such a self-awareness has been examined in various leadership researches(Leary & Buttermore, 2003) such as servant leadership(Greenleaf, 1977), authentic leadership(Avolio & Gardner, 2005), spirituality leadership(Fry, 2003), transcendent leadership(Crossan et al., 2008), including emotional leadership(Goleman, 1996).
The self-awareness mainly studied in social psychology, clinical psychology and developmental psychology, has two dimensions. One is the objective self-awareness(Duval & Wicklund, 1972; Silvia & Duval, 2001), which suggests that people can get self-awareness when they inwardly direct their attention and pay attention to themselves. This self-focused attention automatically results in self-evaluation/reflection against self-defined and subjective standards(Sturm et al., 2014). Then, one can be more aware of who one is, one’s value, emotion, strength/weakness, etc. The other is how one understands others’perception of oneself. This is a capability to recognize how one’s decision-making and behaviors affect others. Because leadership appears in social systems and has some relations with others, a leader should be aware of his/her influence on others in order to be effective in such a social system(Taylor, 2010).
Many empirical research show that self-awareness is much related to successful leadership(Ashley & Reiter-Palmon, 2012; Showry & Manasa, 2014). For instance, it was suggested that those managers with high-level self-awareness showed better organizational performance than those with low-level self-awareness(Atwater et al.,1998; Bass & Yammarino,1991), and that consistency between followers’ evaluation of their manager and the managers’ self-evaluation was related to higher followers' satisfaction(Wexley et al., 1980). These researches mainly examined the effect of leaders’ self-awareness on the organizational outcomes. But since authentic leadership theory emphasizes the positive modeling of leader’s authentic behaviors for followers in achieving the organizational performance, authentic followership is important as much as authentic leadership(George, 2003; Shamir & Eilam, 2005). Nevertheless, empiri-cal research is rare on followers’ self-awareness, with which followers’ authentic behaviors start for organizational outcomes.
According to the authentic leaders and follower development model(Gardner et al., 2005), an authentic leader first is aware of their value, belief, emotion, strength, weakness, etc. and then he/she does self-regulatory behaviors like balanced processing of information, relational transparency with others, etc. from the internalized moral perspective. Then, followers would also understand and learn such a self-awareness for their own value, belief, emotion, strength, weakness, etc. through positive modeling from their leader. And as an authentic leader is keenly interested in followers’ growth and development, he/she would support the followers in developing their self-awareness(Walumbwa et al., 2008). Based on theories and related findings, the hypothesis can be advanced, as follows.
Authentic leadership is positively related to followers’ self-awareness.
The self-awareness improvement among followers means not only to grasp their own value, emotion, strength, weakness, etc., but also to recognize the influence of their behaviors much better on their leader, who is modeled to followers. And as followers maintain honest and transparent relationship with their authentic leader, they are emotionally connected with their leader(Kernis, 2003).Thus, they can be very aware that their leader makes effort to achieve organizational goals. Accordingly, followers are expected to make extra behaviors beyond their given tasks voluntarily for their leader and organization. Besides, self-awareness among followers leads to internalized self-regulatory behaviors based on their own value and belief, not on external coercion or compensation. Thus they can make discretionary extra-role behaviors not for direct or indirect rewards(Gardner et al., 2005). Based on these findings, the following hypothesis can be advanced.
Followers’ self-awareness is positively related to OCB.
2.3. Psychological Ownership
Psychological ownership was initially considered as an alternative to overcome the limitation of financial rewards for performance improvement and to make organization members feel like owning organization(Kim & Kim, 2012). Brown(1989) asserted that such a psychological ownership was the key to securing organizational competitiveness.
Pierce et al.(1991) defined psychological ownership as a mind state where one felt as if the object of ownership (visible or invisible) is mine, emphasizing the feeling of ownership and the state of attachment to object. Belk(1988) defined psychological ownership as a feeling that an object is felt as extension of the self whether or not one get the official right for the object. With such a psychological ownership, one can perceive the right related to information about the target and the claim to have a voice in decision-making(Kubzansky & Druskat, 1993). In return, one with psychological ownership tends to have more responsibility than others with less psychological ownership. And then one becomes more committed to his/her organization and can make extra-role behaviors(Vandewalle et al., 1995).
As for the routes how organizational members can feel ownership, Pierce et al.(2001) identified three major routes; controlling the target, coming to intimately know the target and investing the self into the target. First, ownership basically means the ability to use and to control the use of objects(Rudmin & Berry, 1987). Thus, by having more power of ‘controlling the target’, members can form psychological ownership for their organization. Second, members are given a lot of opportunities for ‘coming to know intimately the target’ such as works, jobs, teams, projects, industry, etc., and then they feel that they know the organization better(Pierce et al., 2001). As a result, members can develop psychological ownership. Finally, ‘investing the selflike one’s energy, time, effort and attention into the target’ can cause the self to become one with the target and to develop feelings of ownership toward the target(Csikszentmihalyi & Rochberg-Halton, 1981).
Considering the above routes to psychological ownership development, it is suggested that authentic leadership is likely to affect psychological ownership positively. Because an authentic leader tries to make open and transparent relationship with followers, to provide balanced and objective information, and to help followers developing their internalized moral perspectives(Gardner et al., 2005), he/she would not control information sharing with followers or not control followers’ tasks to his/her taste. Thus, followers would know more about their business and organization, and get more control power over their tasks. And then they would naturally form psychological ownership of feeling that ‘organization is mine’. In addition, since an authentic leader supports followers’ self-determination based on their own internalized value and belief, followers would be empowered psychologically(George, 2003) and they could develop psychological ownership. And Yang’s(2015) research indicated that authentic leadership had a positive impact on psychological ownership through the mediating role of multidimensional trust. Thus, the following hypothesis is advanced:
Authentic leadership is positively related to followers’psychological ownership.
Since psychological ownership makes people feel that the target is ‘mine’ even if they actually do not own it in reality, this psychological ownership can induce more active behaviors to protect the target and to achieve its target goals(Wilpert, 1991; Van Dyne & Pierce, 2004). And by owing target psychologically, people can feel more attached to target(Beggan, 1992), give more positive evaluation and develop it further(Nuttin, 1987). And people feel a sense of responsibility on target as psychological owner(Rodgers & Freundlich, 1998). Based on the theories stated above, psychological ownership would lead followers to make discretionary extra-role behaviors beyond their own role regardless of its rewards. Because they are more psychologically attached to its organization, they feel responsibility and make proactive behaviors as psychological owner for its organization. Thus, the following hypothesis is advanced, as follows;
Followers’ psychological ownership is positively related to followers’ OCB.
2.4. Organizational Citizenship Behavior
Organizational citizenship behavior(OCB) is defined as "one’s discretionary behaviors that promote the efficiency and effectiveness of organization, not directly or explicitly recognized by the formal reward" by Organ(1988). Organ’s OCB can be summarized, as follows: First, it is individual’s discretionary choice without explicit agreement with the organization. In other words, it is voluntary behavior based on individual’s free will, not required by official job description. Second, no direct or indirect official rewards are provided. While such behaviors may be rewarded with various types of advantages in the long term, OCB itself will not be rewarded not directly or indirectly in the short term. Third, even if the effect of each OCB may be insignificant, such behaviors, when accumulated for many or over time, contribute to the organizational outcomes(Mun & Kim, 2006). But some researchers, such as Podsakoff et al.(1993) & Van Dyne et al.(1994), presented critical views on such definitions, Organ(1997) himself adopted the concept of ‘contextual performance’ of Borman & Motowidlo(1993) and redefined OCB as "performance that support the social and psychological environment in which task performance takes place".
Nadiri & Tanova(2010) suggested that justice of individual performance evaluation perceived by employees positively affected their OCB. Walumbwa et al.(2010) insisted that the climate of procedural legitimacy, dedication to supervisor and self-efficacy could have positive effect on OCB. In short, justice of individual performance evaluation and procedural fairness can support the OCB of members in organization. Based on this idea, it is expected that followers would discretionary make OCB beyond their job description for the entire organization, if an authentic leader provides fair and transparent working climate in organization through his/her authentic leadership(Avolio & Gardner, 2005). And followers working together with an authentic leader can learn and do authentic behaviors such as self-awareness, relational transparency, balanced information processing and internalized moral perspective through positive modeling(Avolio et al., 2004; Gardner et al., 2005; George, 2003; Ilies et al., 2005). That is, followers make decisions based on their internalized value and belief, not on external coercion or compensation. And since followers are psychologically committed to their jobs(Ilies et al., 2005), they would make extra-role behaviors beyond explicitly described job specification to achieve organizational outcomes.
A number of articles on the relations between authentic leadership and organizational outcomes, use mediating variables such as self-efficacy(Choi & Cho, 2013), organizational commitment (Giallonardo et al., 2010), leader trust(Clapp-Smith et al., 2009), etc. in explaining the effect of authentic leadership lead-ing to organizational outcomes. Jun et al.(2010) used the identification with leader as mediating variable in explaining the relation between authentic leadership and OCB. They claimed that followers resembled leader’s authentic behavior through the identification with leader. But this paper has a different point of view from the above article explaining as the identification with leader. Authentic leadership emphasizes the authenticity of both leader and followers, which starts from the self-awareness(Gardner et al., 2005). But the theory using identification with leader seems to ignore followers’self-awareness phase, through which authentic followership is developed. Assuming that followers can conduct authentic behaviors through the identification with leader, they would not continue authentic behaviors in case that their leader leaves followers. Because followers’ authentic behaviors with an authentic leader are assumed to be not based on their internalized self-determination through self-awareness, but based on the identification with leader. That is, it can be estimated that authentic followership is not developed yet. Thus, it seems more appropriate to explain followers’self-awareness rather than identification with leader as mediating role in the relations between authentic leadership and OCB. Such an explanation looks to be in line with the authentic leadership theory emphasizing the development of authenticity for both of leader and followers. Thus, the following hypotheses are advanced:
Followers’ self-awareness mediates the relationship between authentic leadership and OCB.
Followers’ psychological ownership mediates the relationship between authentic leadership and OCB.
3. Methodology
3.1. Research Model
Based on the hypotheses aforementioned, the research model is prepared to verify mediating roles of followers’ self-awareness and psychological ownership between authentic leadership and OCB.
[Figure 1] Research Model and Hypotheses
3.2. Operational Definition of Variables
3.2.1. Authentic Leadership
In this study, authentic leadership is defined as ‘a leader’s behaviors who is well aware of his/her own value, belief, emotion, strength, weakness, etc. forms honest and transparent relationships with followers, makes decisions based on balanced information, behaves in accord with internalized moral perspective and supports followers to develop their authentic behaviors, thereby achieving organizational performance.’ ALQ (Authentic Leadership Questionnaire) developed by Avolio et al. (2007) was used for this study after Mind Garden’s approval. 16 items consisting of 4 dimensions of leader’s self-awareness, relational transparency, balanced information processing and internalized moral perspective were measured with Likert 5-point scale.
3.2.2. Organizational Citizenship Behavior
OCB is defined as followers’ discretionary extra-role behaviors beyond their roles without expecting any compensation. 6 items developed by William & Anderson (1991), were used and measured with Likert 5-point scale.
3.2.3. Self-Awareness
Followers’self-awareness is defined as the ability to recognize his/her own value, belief, emotion, strength, weakness, etc. through reflecting oneself and to perceive the effect of his/her behaviors on leader, other colleagues and organization. In this study, 4 items in self-awareness dimension of ALQ developed by Avolio et al.(2007) were used. But leader as subject was replaced by followers in the questionnaire, as these questions were asked to office workers. For instance, "My boss is well aware of his/her behaviors’ effect on subordinates" was replaced by "I am well aware of my behaviors’ effect on my boss, other colleagues and organization."
3.2.4. Psychological Ownership
Psychological ownership is defined as a state of mind that one feels a sense of responsibility, identity, and belongingness by feeling organization as mine. 6 items developed by Avey et al.(2009), were measured with Likert 5-point scale.
3.3. Research Method and Data Collection
This study was conducted through online survey for the office workers at companies with 10 or more employees in Korea. The 400 respondents were sampled from the online research panel of professional research agency and 380 samples were finally used for the analysis by excluding incomplete and/or untrustworthy questionnaires. The demographic characteristics of the sample are as follows:
[Table 1] Demographic Characteristics
[Table 2] Reliability Result
[Table 3] Construct Reliability and Average Variance Extracted
4. Results
Since all the questions in this survey were asked to the same respondents, there is possibility that the common method bias happens. Thus, to check its common method bias, the model fitness of single factor model and 4 factor model was compared for 18 observed variables of 4 latent variables. The model fitness of single factor model was: NPAR= 36, x2=1594.462, DF=117, NC=13.628 RMR=.133, TLI=.700, CFI=.742, RMSEA=.183, whereas the model fitness of 4 factor model was:
NPAR=42, x2=216.852, NC=1.954, DF=111, RMR=.031, TLI=.977, CFI=.981, RMSEA=.050. Compared to the model fitness of two models, there was significant difference between two models with Δx2=1,377.61, Δdf=6, p=.001. Thus, it is esti- mated there is low possibility of common method bias(Podsakoff et al., 2003).
4.1. Reliability and Validity
Using AMOS 22, some items were removed through confirmatory factor analysis which were not fitted to its model. And 4 items of self-awareness, 4 items of OCB and 5 items of psychological ownership were used in the final analysis. In this study, authentic leadership was treated as a higher order construct consisting of 4 dimensions; leader’s self-awareness, relational transparency, balanced information processing and internalized moral perspective(Walumbwa et al., 2008). And we did not intend to analyze authentic leadership at each dimension level and thus we reduced 16 items of authentic leadership to 4 items representing 4 dimensions by using factor scores from its factor analysis. For the reliability verification for 4 latent variables, Cronbach values were examined. And all of them were α over .7, which indicates that there is no significant issue with regard to reliability(Nunnally, 1978).
For the construct reliability, all the four latent variables resulted above .7 and for the AVE(Average Variance Extracted) all the four latent variables were also above .5. Thus, it is estimated that all the variables in this study have convergent validity(Hair et al., 1995).
To check the discriminant validity, the SMC(Squared Multiple Correlation) and AVE were reviewed. All the SMC values were less than AVE values except that the SMC, .588 between OCB and self-awareness was less than its AVE, .543. As such, it cannot be said that the discriminant validity was completely achieved(Kim, 2010). But considering the fact that the construct reli-ability, the convergent validity for the variables and the model fitness are all appropriate, there seems to be no significant issue in conducting the analysis though its discriminant validity was not achieved perfectly.
4.2. Hypotheses Verification
This study is to verify the mediating effect of followers’ self-awareness and psychological ownership between authentic leadership and OCB. To check the goodness of fit of theory model, its model fitness was reviewed together with the alternative model 1 & 2. The theory model is for followers’ self-awareness and psychological ownership to mediate completely the relation of authentic leadership and OCB. Meanwhile, the alternative model 1 is the partial mediating model of followers’ self-awareness and psychological ownership on the relation of authentic behavior and OCB. And the alternative model 2 is the mediating model of followers’ self-awareness on the relation between psychological ownership and OCB. Each research model is presented below.
And the goodness of fit index of the theory model, the alternative model 1 and the alternative model 2 are presented below.
[Table 4] Average Variance Extracted and Squared Multiple Correlation
[Table 5] Goodness of Fit Index of Theory Model and Alternative Models(n=380)
Note: AL-Authentic Leadership, SA-Self Awareness, PO-Psychological Ownership
[Figure 2] Theory Model
[Figure 3] Alternative Model 1
[Figure 4] Alternative Model 2
[Table 6] Hypotheses Estimates
*** p<.001
[Table 7] Estimates for Mediated Effect
For the theory model, its NC is 2.122, less than 3, RMR less than .05, and both of TLI and CFI are more than .9. Though RMSEA is .054, a little bit bigger than .05, most of the goodness of fit index look quite good(Kim, 2010). When compared with the theory model, the alternative model 1 has no significant difference at p=.05 level with Δx2=0.038 and Δdf=1. Only NC and RMSEA of the alternative model 1 are a little bit higher than those of the theory model without statistical difference. But the alternative model 2 shows a significant difference from the theory model at p=.05 level with Δx2=75.796 and Δdf=0. Based on the above findings, the statistical hypothesis test was made on the theory model and the result is presented below.
All the Hypotheses 1, 2, 3 and 4 showed statistically significant results at p=.001level and thus all the above hypotheses were adopted.
is that followers’ self-awareness mediates the relation between authentic leadership and OCB. The statistical result shows its total effect estimate is .194, the direct effect estimate .007 and the indirect effect estimate .187. And the path estimate of authentic leadership → OCB is .007, which is insignificant(t value=.115, p=.908). Hence, the of the complete mediating role of followers’ self-awareness is adopted. is that followers’ psychological ownership mediates the relation between authentic leadership and OCB. According to the result, its total effect estimate is .105, the direct effect estimate .007 and the indirect effect estimate .098. As the path estimate of authentic leadership →OCB is .007 and insignificant, the hypothesis 6 of the complete mediating role of followers’ psychological ownership is adopted. The statistical significance of the indirect effect of followers’ self-awareness and psychological ownership in the relation of authentic leadership and OCB was tested through Bootstrapping, which showed p=.01 and thus it is estimated that the indirect effect of followers’self-awareness and psychological ownership is statistically significant(Kim, 2010). The above hypotheses test can be summarized below.
[Figure 5] Summary of Estimates in SEM Analysis
5. Conclusion and Discussion
5.1. Conclusion and Implication
The purpose of this study was to verify the organizational effectiveness of authentic leadership and its mechanism leading to organizational outcomes, assuming that it is necessary for a society where social conflicts is prevalent due to lack of morality in a period of rapidly growth-oriented social change. The survey was conducted among office workers to test the hypotheses using structural equation model. The research findings and implications are, as follows :
First, the conceptual hypothesis that authentic leadership has positive effect on followers’ self-awareness(Gardner et al., 2005) was empirically verified. To develop authentic leadership, a leader should secure authenticity, which begins with self-awareness. As authentic leaders know themselves well, they are true to themselves and express their ideas and behaviors frankly and honestly to their followers. Thus, followers become to learn such self-awareness of leader through positive modeling. Since such a capability for self-awareness can be taught and developed(Goleman, 2006), an authentic leader supports followers to cultivate self-awareness for their development, and thereby followers’ self-awareness can be further improved. There have been many researches on leaders’ self-awareness so far, but it is rare to investigate followers’ self-awareness in an authentic eadership study. Thus, this article is meaningful in studying followers’ self-awareness and investigating the mediating role of followers’ self-awareness in relation to authentic leadership and OCB. The finding also has a practical implication in being able to improve employee training program by fostering both of followers’ self-awareness and leader’s self-awareness.
Second, the hypothesis that followers’ self-awareness is positively related to OCB was verified. According to the authentic leadership theory, authentic behaviors of the leader and followers start from the self-awareness that can make individuals be aware of who they are and their values, beliefs, etc. through self-reflection. Once followers cultivate a capability for self-awareness, they can recognize the influence their behaviors have on their leader, colleagues and organization. Then they tend to align their behaviors through positive modeling with the organizational goals their leader tries to achieve. Thus, followers would make discretionary OCB beyond their job description based on their own internalized values and beliefs. The dependent variable in the study, OCB, could be necessary and desirable for a contemporary organizational environment where organizational structure and members’ tasks require constant adaptation. Thus, it implies that the activation of authentic leadership can be meaningful in order to enhance followers’ OCB within rapidly changing organizational environment.
Third, the study found out that authentic leadership is positively related to followers’psychological ownership. Authentic leadership theory emphasizes being true to oneself, which implies being the genuine owner of oneself whereby one’s thoughts and behaviors are in line with one’s reality. As authentic leaders support followers in developing self-awareness and providing necessary information, followers can make decisions based on their internalized moral perspectives in an autonomous working climate. This helps their followers gain more knowledge of their organization, while simultaneously increasing their sense of autonomy which allows them to think of themselves as the final decision-maker even though that is not true. Thus, it can increase followers’psychological ownership and responsibility for the organization. Such a psychological ownership seems to be very important in modern times where there is a high turn-over rate among employees. This is especially because it takes a lot of time and cost to replace vacant positions(Griffeth & Hom, 2001). The fact that the average of working duration among employees of the distribution industry is only 6.7 years, 65% of that among the employees of 500 companies in Korea(CEO Score, 2013) exhibits the preventable waste in resources that is currently occurring. Thus, from a practical point of view, if psychological ownership in the employees of distribution industry can be enhanced by providing fairness of people management and widening participation of decision-making through authentic leadership, the turn-over rate of distribution industry could be reduced and its organizational efficiency will finally be improved.
Fourth, it was found out that followers’psychological ownership is positively related to OCB. Since owing the target means feeling the target as a part of extended self(Belk, 1988), individuals can make active behaviors for the target beyond the limit of regulation. Thus, once followers under authentic leadership develop psychological ownership, they would act based on their own internalized values and belief, instead of financial benefits and/or external coercion. Furthermore, followers are likely to be willing to do extra-role behaviors for the sake of their organization, because psychologically they can feel as if their organization is theirs.
Fifth, the complete mediating roles of followers’self-awareness and psychological ownership were found out in the relation of authentic leadership and OCB. This result is in line with the existing studies that related authentic leadership to job commitment(Walumbwa et al., 2008) and the relationship between authentic leadership and OCB(Jun et al., 2010). However, in contrast to the findings of Jun et al.(2010) which employed the identification with leader as a mediating variable between authentic leadership and OCB, this study established followers’ self-awareness as mediating variable. In doing so, we argue that the theory of identification with leader seems to disregard the importance of followers’self-determination phase through self-awareness in the authentic leadership and followership development process. If we follow the theory of identification with leader, there is some doubt that followers could continue to demonstrate authentic behaviors in the case an authentic leader leaves its team or organization requiring followers to work together with other leader. We attribute this to the fact that the authenticity of followers in that case is assumed to be based on the identification with leader, and is not based on their own internalized self-determination. Thus, if authentic leadership theory focuses on the authenticity of followers as well as leader and their mutual growth, it seems to be more appropriate to explain the relationship between authentic leadership and OCB through followers’ self-awareness rather than the identification with leader.
Sixth, the distribution industry recently faces much conflict among several stake holders such as big companies vs. small/medium companies, advanced market vs. traditional market, online vs. offline, big company vs. sales agencies and door-to-door sales person, etc. Our findings suggest that if a big company takes authentic leadership over such stake holders, each stake holder may take win-win decision-making through positive modeling.
5.2. Limitation and Suggestion
This study has the following limitations: First, the questions posed on leader’s authentic leadership and followers’ attitude and behaviors were asked to the same respondents for convenience. Although the common method bias test demonstrated that its effect was statistically insignificant, there is a limitation that the possibility of common method biases may not been completely removed. Second, this study was surveyed among the office workers registered to the online panel agency. Although the sample was selected through quota sampling considering variables such as gender, age, occupation, company size, etc., there is the limitation that the sample in this study might not represent the characteristics of office workers in Korea.
The followings are suggestions for future research on authentic leadership: Though there have not been much empirical researches on authentic leadership, most of them focus on the organizational effectiveness of authentic leadership. To promote authentic leadership in Korea, the antecedent and moderating variables need to be explored in the authentic leadership process, whereby we can understand how to reinforce authentic leadership in an organization. Second, the authentic leadership theory emphasizes the development of authentic followership as well as authentic leadership. However, the study on authentic followership is rare yet. With increased research on authentic followership, we may have more practical ideas on how to enhance authentic followership leading to organizational outcomes.
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- Corporate Social Responsibility and Information Asymmetry in the Korean Market: Implications of Chaebol Affiliates vol.6, pp.1, 2016, https://doi.org/10.13106/jafeb.2019.vol6.no1.21