Top

Journal of Business Ethics

Published in:

01-09-2014

Does Ethical Leadership Lead to Happy Workers? A Study on the Impact of Ethical Leadership, Subjective Well-Being, and Life Happiness in the Chinese Culture

Author: Conna Yang

Published in: Journal of Business Ethics | Issue 3/2014

Activate our intelligent search to find suitable subject content or patents.

search-config

AI-assisted search

Off

Abstract

Business ethics has been emphasized throughout the past decade and organizations are aware of the influence it has on the organization’s performance. As a result, ethical leadership is important as it influences the employees profoundly. This study aims to address this issue and explore the influence ethical leadership has on employees by examining job satisfaction, subjective well-being at work, and life satisfaction. Two groups of independent data were collected and a multi-group analysis was conducted before pooling together for a two-step structural equation modeling test. The results revealed that ethical leadership has a negative direct effect on employee well-being which offers significant findings for the meaning of ethical leadership in the Chinese culture. Useful managerial implications are provided for managers and supervisors at the end of this study.

previous article Meaning Making by Managers: Corporate Discourse on Environment and Sustainability in India

next article The Formation of Cross-Sector Development Partnerships: How Bridging Agents Shape Project Agendas and Longer-Term Alliances

Dont have a licence yet? Then find out more about our products and how to get one now:

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik"

Online-Abonnement

Mit Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik" erhalten Sie Zugriff auf:

über 102.000 Bücher
über 537 Zeitschriften

aus folgenden Fachgebieten:

Automobil + Motoren
Bauwesen + Immobilien
Business IT + Informatik
Elektrotechnik + Elektronik
Energie + Nachhaltigkeit
Finance + Banking
Management + Führung
Marketing + Vertrieb
Maschinenbau + Werkstoffe
Versicherung + Risiko

Jetzt Wissensvorsprung sichern!

inform now

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

Online-Abonnement

Mit Springer Professional "Wirtschaft" erhalten Sie Zugriff auf:

über 67.000 Bücher
über 340 Zeitschriften

aus folgenden Fachgebieten:

Bauwesen + Immobilien
Business IT + Informatik
Finance + Banking
Management + Führung
Marketing + Vertrieb
Versicherung + Risiko

Jetzt Wissensvorsprung sichern!

inform now

Adelmann, P. K. (1987). Occupational complexity, control, and personal income: Their relation to psychological well-being in men and women. Journal of Applied Psychology, 72(4), 529–537.CrossRef

Anderson, J. C., & Gerbing, D. W. (1988). Structural equation modeling in practice: A review and recommended two-step approach. Psychological Bulletin, 103(3), 411–423.CrossRef

Arbuckle, J. (2006). AMOS user’s guide 7.0. Spring House, PA: AMOS Development Corporation.

Argyle, M. (1997). Is happiness a cause of health? Psychology and Health, 12(6), 769–781.CrossRef

Ashforth, B. E., & Mael, F. (1989). Social identity theory and the organization. Academy of Management Review, 14(1), 20–39.

Avolio, B. J., & Gardner, W. L. (2005). Authentic leadership development: Getting to the root of positive forms of leadership. The Leadership Quarterly, 16(3), 315–338.CrossRef

Avolio, B. J., Gardner, W. L., Walumbwa, F. O., Luthans, F., & May, D. R. (2004). Unlocking the mask: A look at the process by which authentic leaders impact follower attitudes and behaviors. The Leadership Quarterly, 15(6), 801–823.CrossRef

Bagozzi, R. P., & Phillips, L. W. (1982). Representing and testing organizational theories: A holistic construal. Administrative Science Quarterly, 27(3), 459–489.CrossRef

Bass, B. M., & Steidlmeier, P. (1999). Ethics, character, and authentic transformational leadership behavior. The Leadership Quarterly, 10(2), 181–217.CrossRef

Becker, T. E. (1992). Foci and bases of commitment: Are the distinctions worth making? Academy of Management Journal, 35(1), 232–244.CrossRef

Becker, T. E., Billings, R. S., Eveleth, D. M., & Gilbert, N. L. (1996). Foci and bases of employee commitment: Implications for job performance. Academy of Management Journal, 39(2), 464–482.CrossRef

Biner, P. M., & Kidd, H. J. (1994). The interactive effects of monetary incentive justification and questionnaire length on mail survey response rates. Psychology & Marketing, 11(5), 483–492.CrossRef

Brandes, P., Dharwadkar, R., & Wheatley, K. (2004). Social exchanges within organizations and work outcomes. Group & Organization Management, 29(3), 276–301.CrossRef

Brown, R. (2000). Social identity theory: Past achievements, current problems and future challenges. European Journal of Social Psychology, 30(6), 745–778.CrossRef

Brown, M. E., & Mitchell, M. S. (2010). Ethical and unethical leadership: Exploring new avenues for future research. Business Ethics Quarterly, 20(4), 583.CrossRef

Brown, M. E., Treviño, L. K., & Harrison, D. A. (2005). Ethical leadership: A social learning perspective for construct development and testing. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 97(2), 117–134.CrossRef

Burke, R. J. (2010). Workplace stress and well-being across cultures: Research and practice. Cross Cultural Management: An International Journal, 17(1), 5–9.CrossRef

Byrne, B. M. (2004). Testing for multigroup invariance using AMOS graphics: A road less traveled. Structural Equation Modeling, 11(2), 272–300.CrossRef

Chen, N., & Tjosvold, D. (2007). Guanxi and leader member relationships between American managers and Chinese employees: Open-minded dialogue as mediator. Asia Pacific Journal of Management, 24(2), 171–189.CrossRef

Chen, Z. X., Tsui, A. S., & Farh, J. L. (2002). Loyalty to supervisor vs. organizational commitment: Relationships to employee performance in China. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, 75(3), 339–356.CrossRef

Cropanzano, R., & Wright, T. A. (2001). When a “happy” worker is really a “productive” worker: A review and further refinement of the happy-productive worker thesis. Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research, 53(3), 182–199.CrossRef

Cullen, J. B., Parboteeah, K. P., & Victor, B. (2003). The effects of ethical climates on organizational commitment: A two-study analysis. Journal of Business Ethics, 46(2), 127–141.CrossRef

De Jonge, J., Bosma, H., Peter, R., & Siegrist, J. (2000). Job strain, effort-reward imbalance and employee well-being: A large-scale cross-sectional study. Social Science and Medicine, 50(9), 1317–1328.CrossRef

Diener, E., & Biswas-Diener, R. (2002). Will money increase subjective well-being? Social Indicators Research, 57(2), 119–169.CrossRef

Diener, E., Emmons, R. A., Larsen, R. J., & Griffin, S. (1985). The satisfaction with life scale. Journal of Personality Assessment, 49(1), 71–75.CrossRef

Diener, E., Sandvik, E., & Pavot, W. (2009). Happiness is the frequency, not the intensity, of positive versus negative affect. Assessing Well-Being, 39, 213–231.CrossRef

Dorfman, P. W., Howell, J. P., Hibino, S., Lee, J. K., Tate, U., & Bautista, A. (1997). Leadership in Western and Asian countries: Commonalities and differences in effective leadership processes across cultures. The Leadership Quarterly, 8(3), 233–274.CrossRef

DuBrin, A. J. (2010). Principles of leadership (pp. 159–166). Canada: South-Western.

Easterlin, R. A. (1995). Will raising the incomes of all increase the happiness of all? Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 27(1), 35–47.CrossRef

Fairhurst, G. T., & Chandler, T. A. (1989). Social structure in leader-member interaction. Communications Monographs, 56(3), 215–239.CrossRef

Gardner, W. L., Avolio, B. J., Luthans, F., May, D. R., & Walumbwa, F. (2005). “Can you see the real me?” A self-based model of authentic leader and follower development. The Leadership Quarterly, 16(3), 343–372.CrossRef

George, J. M., & Brief, A. P. (1992). Feeling good-doing good: A conceptual analysis of the mood at work-organizational spontaneity relationship. Psychological Bulletin, 112(2), 310–329.CrossRef

Gerstner, C. R., & Day, D. V. (1997). Meta-Analytic review of leader–member exchange theory: Correlates and construct issues. Journal of Applied Psychology, 82(6), 827–844.CrossRef

Giberson, T. R., Resick, C. J., & Dickson, M. W. (2005). Embedding leader characteristics: An examination of homogeneity of personality and values in organizations. Journal of Applied Psychology, 90(5), 1002.CrossRef

Goldman, A., & Tabak, N. (2010). Perception of ethical climate and its relationship to nurses’ demographic characteristics and job satisfaction. Nursing Ethics, 17(2), 233–246.CrossRef

Graen, G., & Uhl-Bien, M. (1995). Relationship-based approach to leadership: Development of leader-member exchange (LMX) theory of leadership over 25 years: Applying a multi-level multi-domain perspective. The Leadership Quarterly, 6(2), 219–247.CrossRef

Hair, J. F., Anderson, R. E., Tatham, R. L., William, C., & Black, W. C. (1998). Multivariate data Analysis (pp. 284–285). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Hofstede, G. (1993). Cultural constraints in management theories. The Executive, 7(1), 81–94.

Hong, J., & Engeström, Y. (2004). Changing principles of communication between Chinese managers and workers Confucian authority chains and guanxi as social networking. Management Communication Quarterly, 17(4), 552–585.CrossRef

Hooper, D., Coughlan, J., & Mullen, M. (2008). Structural equation modelling: Guidelines for determining model fit. Electronic Journal of Business Research Methods, 6(1), 53–60.

Howell, J. M., & Avolio, B. J. (1992). The ethics of charismatic leadership: Submission or liberation? The Executive, 6(2), 43–54.CrossRef

Ilies, R., Morgeson, F. P., & Nahrgang, J. D. (2005). Authentic leadership and eudaemonic well-being: Understanding leader–follower outcomes. The Leadership Quarterly, 16(3), 373–394.CrossRef

Koh, H. C., & Boo, E. H. Y. (2001). The link between organizational ethics and job satisfaction: A study of managers in Singapore. Journal of Business Ethics, 29(4), 309–324.CrossRef

Koh, H. C., & El’fred, H. (2004). Organisational ethics and employee satisfaction and commitment. Management Decision, 42(5), 677–693.CrossRef

Lam, S. K., Kraus, F., & Ahearne, M. (2010). The diffusion of market orientation throughout the organization: a social learning theory perspective. Journal of Marketing, 74(5), 61–79.CrossRef

Law, K. S., Wong, C.-S., Wang, D., & Wang, L. (2000). Effect of supervisor–subordinate guanxi on supervisory decisions in China: An empirical investigation. International Journal of Human Resource Management, 11(4), 751–765.CrossRef

Lok, P., & Crawford, J. (2004). The effect of organisational culture and leadership style on job satisfaction and organisational commitment: A cross-national comparison. Journal of Management Development, 23(4), 321–338.CrossRef

Lyubomirsky, S., King, L., & Diener, E. (2005). The benefits of frequent positive affect: Does happiness lead to success? Psychological Bulletin, 131(6), 803–855.CrossRef

Lyubomirsky, S., & Lepper, H. S. (1999). A measure of subjective happiness: Preliminary reliability and construct validation. Social Indicators Research, 46(2), 137–155.CrossRef

Mayer, D. M., Aquino, K., Greenbaum, R. L., & Kuenzi, M. (2012). Who displays ethical leadership, and why does it matter? An examination of antecedents and consequences of ethical leadership. Academy of Management Journal, 55(1), 151–171.CrossRef

Mayer, D. M., Kuenzi, M., Greenbaum, R., Bardes, M., & Salvador, R. B. (2009). How low does ethical leadership flow? Test of a trickle-down model. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 108(1), 1–13.CrossRef

Olson, E. M., Slater, S. F., & Hult, G. T. M. (2005). The importance of structure and process to strategy implementation. Business Horizons, 48(1), 47–54.CrossRef

Page, K. M., & Vella-Brodrick, D. A. (2009). The ‘what’, ‘why’and ‘how’of employee well-being: A new model. Social Indicators Research, 90(3), 441–458.CrossRef

Pavot, W., & Diener, E. (1993). Review of the satisfaction with life scale. Psychological Assessment, 5(2), 164.CrossRef

Pettijohn, C., Pettijohn, L., & Taylor, A. J. (2008). Salesperson perceptions of ethical behaviors: Their influence on job satisfaction and turnover intentions. Journal of Business Ethics, 78(4), 547–557.CrossRef

Podsakoff, P. M., & Organ, D. W. (1986). Self-reports in organizational research: Problems and Prospects. Journal of Management, 12(4), 531–544.CrossRef

Price, T. L. (2003). The ethics of authentic transformational leadership. The Leadership Quarterly, 14(1), 67–81.CrossRef

Pugliesi, K. (1999). The consequences of emotional labor: Effects on work stress, job satisfaction, and well-being. Motivation and Emotion, 23(2), 125–154.CrossRef

Rad, A. M. M., & Yarmohammadian, M. H. (2006). A study of relationship between managers’ leadership style and employees’ job satisfaction. Leadership in Health Services, 19(2), 11–28.CrossRef

Resick, C. J., Martin, G. S., Keating, M. A., Dickson, M. W., Kwan, H. K., & Peng, C. (2011). What ethical leadership means to me: Asian, American, and European perspectives. Journal of Business Ethics, 101(3), 435–457.CrossRef

Ryff, C. D. (1989). Happiness is everything, or is it? Explorations on the meaning of psychological well-being. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 57(6), 1069–1081.CrossRef

Schminke, M., Ambrose, M. L., & Neubaum, D. O. (2005). The effect of leader moral development on ethical climate and employee attitudes. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 97(2), 135–151.CrossRef

Schwepker, C. H, Jr. (1999). The relationship between ethical conflict, organizational commitment and turnover intentions in the salesforce. The Journal of Personal Selling and Sales Management, 19(1), 43–49.

Seashore, S. E., Lawler, E. E., Mirvis, P., & Cammann, C. (1982). Observing and measuring organizational change: A guide to field practice. New York: Wiley.

Segars, A. H., & Grover, V. (1993). Re-examining perceived ease of use and usefulness. MIS Quarterly, 17(4), 517–525.CrossRef

Sparrowe, R. T., & Liden, R. C. (1997). Process and structure in leader-member exchange. Academy of Management Review, 22(2), 522–552.

Spector, P. E. (1997). Job satisfaction: Application, assessment, causes, and consequences (pp. 25–28). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Steiner, D. D., & Truxillo, D. M. (1987). Another look at the job satisfaction-life satisfaction relationship: A test of the disaggregation hypothesis. Journal of Occupational Behavior, 8(1), 71–77.CrossRef

Tait, M., Padgett, M. Y., & Baldwin, T. T. (1989). Job and life satisfaction: A reevaluation of the strength of the relationship and gender effects as a function of the date of the study. Journal of Applied Psychology, 74(3), 502.CrossRef

Tajfel, H. (1982). Social psychology of intergroup relations. Annual Review of Psychology, 33(1), 1–39.CrossRef

Toor, S. R., & Ofori, G. (2009). Ethical leadership: Examining the relationships with full range leadership model, employee outcomes, and organizational culture. Journal of Business Ethics, 90(4), 533–547.CrossRef

Treviño, L. K., Brown, M., & Hartman, L. P. (2003). A qualitative investigation of perceived executive ethical leadership: Perceptions from inside and outside the executive suite. Human Relations, 56(1), 5–37.CrossRef

Valentine, S., Greller, M. M., & Richtermeyer, S. B. (2006). Employee job response as a function of ethical context and perceived organization support. Journal of Business Research, 59(5), 582–588.CrossRef

VanSandt, C. V., & Neck, C. P. (2003). Bridging ethics and self leadership: Overcoming ethical discrepancies between employee and organizational standards. Journal of Business Ethics, 43(4), 363–387.CrossRef

Viswesvaran, C., & Deshpande, S. P. (1996). Ethics, success, and job satisfaction: A test of dissonance theory in India. Journal of Business Ethics, 15(10), 1065–1069.CrossRef

Vitell, S. J., & Davis, D. L. (1990). Ethical beliefs of MIS professionals: the frequency and opportunity for unethical behavior. Journal of Business Ethics, 9(1), 63–70.CrossRef

Von Weltzien Hoivik, H. (2007). East meets west: Tacit messages about business ethics in stories told by Chinese managers. Journal of Business Ethics, 74(4), 457–469.CrossRef

Walumbwa, F. O., Mayer, D. M., Wang, P., Wang, H., Workman, K., & Christensen, A. L. (2011). Linking ethical leadership to employee performance: The roles of leader–member exchange, self-efficacy, and organizational identification. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 115(2), 204–213.CrossRef

Wright, T. A., Cropanzano, R., & Bonett, D. G. (2007). The moderating role of employee positive well being on the relation between job satisfaction and job performance. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 12(2), 93–104.CrossRef

Wu, C.-F. (2002). Business should be its own therapist: observing the “Governance Ethics” of Taiwanese enterprises. Journal of Business Ethics, 40(4), 363–371.CrossRef

Yukl, G. A. (2013). Leadership in organizations (Eighth ed.) (pp. 222–223). Albany: Prentice Hall, State University of New York.

Title: Does Ethical Leadership Lead to Happy Workers? A Study on the Impact of Ethical Leadership, Subjective Well-Being, and Life Happiness in the Chinese Culture
Author: Conna Yang
Publication date: 01-09-2014
Publisher: Springer Netherlands
Published in: Journal of Business Ethics / Issue 3/2014
Print ISSN: 0167-4544
Electronic ISSN: 1573-0697
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-013-1852-6

Springer Professional

Abstract

Please log in to get access to your license.

Dont have a licence yet? Then find out more about our products and how to get one now:

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik"

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

Other articles of this Issue 3/2014

The Formation of Cross-Sector Development Partnerships: How Bridging Agents Shape Project Agendas and Longer-Term Alliances

Religiosity, CSR Attitudes, and CSR Behavior: An Empirical Study of Executives’ Religiosity and CSR

Western Financial Agents and Islamic Ethics

Legitimizing Negative Aspects in GRI-Oriented Sustainability Reporting: A Qualitative Analysis of Corporate Disclosure Strategies

Private Regulation and Trade Union Rights: Why Codes of Conduct Have Limited Impact on Trade Union Rights

Deconstructing Subtle Racist Imagery in Television Ads

Premium Partner