WP 10 Dissemination of results and
2 Aims and Research Questions
The ReSuLead project explores the role of leadership in relation to workers' psycho-logical wellbeing with special consideration being given to the differences in leader-ship between three European countries, namely Finland, Germany and Sweden. The GLOBE-study on leadership prototypes has shown differences between these coun-tries, in particular concerning the dimensions of human orientation and group- versus self-centeredness (BRODBECK et al., 2000), which can be assumed to be important when it comes to the relationship between leadership style and wellbeing of the sub-ordinates.
The research project is a combination of a longitudinal and an intervention study, both conducted in a field setting, that is, with samples from the working population.
The longitudinal study design allows us to clarify and evaluate the causal chain be-tween leadership and employee wellbeing. The question of causality is of special in-terest when the topic of leadership is raised as research has shown the process of leadership to be a social exchange and a two-way interaction. In other words, it is not only the leader’s behaviour that is relevant, but also the followers’ perceptions and reactions to the leader’s behaviour (VAN DIERENDONCK, HAYNES, BORRILL, &
STRIDE, 2004; VAN QUAQUEBEKE, ECKLOFF, ZENKER, & GIESSNER, 2009).
Also according to a recent meta-analysis (KUOPPALA, LAMMINPÄÄ, LIIRA, & VAIN-IO, 2008), well-founded longitudinal studies are called for to clarify the evidence con-cerning the relationship between leadership and employees’ wellbeing and health.
The intervention study has an experimental field study design and targets the im-provement of the leader-follower relationship using training on-the-job as a critical feature that distinguishes it from most other leadership training to date. Another spe-cial feature is, that the training does not primarily aim at developing the self of the leader, but concentrates on ameliorating the leader-follower relationship as we as-sume this relationship to be of more relevance for the health of the subordinates than the minor changes in the self of leaders commonly targeted in leadership trainings (though self of leader and leader-follower relationship will not be unrelated to each other). Special efforts will be taken to enforce a sustainable and rewarding health promoting leadership behaviour, as we will explain in greater detail later. We distguish leaders from managers. Managers (the supervisors of leaders) are mainly in-volved in more general strategic planning of the company and overall goal setting, whereas leaders are those who have to pursue these goals together with their team.
Thus we focus on leaders on a lower level who have to interact frequently with their team.
The theoretical background of the study is based on two areas of work and organiza-tional psychology: We combine theories of occupaorganiza-tional stress and health and theo-ries of leadership. With respect to stress theotheo-ries, our main focus will be on demands and resources at work using the Job Demands-Resources model as our conceptual framework (e.g., BAKKER & DEMEROUTI, 2007). Concerning leadership theories, those theories that consider the relation between leader and follower as an interac-tion are particularly helpful, these being, for example, the theories of Leader-Member-Exchange (LMX; LIDEN & GRAEN, 1980) and Transformational Leadership (BASS, 1985).
We do not only focus on single dyads. Within a leader’s team, manifold dyadic rela-tions occur and the perceived quality of a single dyadic relation may depend on each team member’s perception on the relations others have with the leader. Another im-portant issue will be the inclusion of contextual factors on societal, organizational and individual levels. The societal level is included by comparing data from three coun-tries that have great differences in those contextual variables that are of relevance for the topic of our research: different leadership prototypes (BRODBECK et al., 2000), differences in women’s participation in the workforce and different gender ratio of male and female leaders (among other differences) (see EUROPEAN COMMIS-SION, 2007, 2008). The organizational level will be taken into account by including features that may have an impact on workers’ health, such as a recent increase or decrease in the company’s workforce. One of the main individual factors will be the inclusion of the gender of leaders and followers, because leadership research has shown, that the effects of a leader’s behaviour depend on the gender of the leader as well as on the gender of the follower (MOHR & WOLFRAM, 2008; NYBERG, WEST-ERLUND, HANSON & THEORELL, 2008). Furthermore, gender differences in health or mental illness are a widespread research result (but warranting, however, periodic re-examination, see MACINTYRE, HUNT & SWEETING, 1996).
We will take a multi-level perspective in analysing the data, which allows us to sepa-rate team- and individual influences.
The objectives of the ReSuLead project are twofold. First we wanted to find out, which features of the leader’s behaviour will influence subordinates’ health. Prior re-search has not been without contradiction and needs further investigation. We focus on the mental health of employees because national statistics – in every participating country – indicate that sickness absences and work disability due to impaired mental health are on the rise. The WHO estimates that depression will be the main cause of incapacity by 2020 (COMMISSION OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES, 2007).
Second based on the literature and supported by our own results, we will develop a leadership training program. The outstanding feature of the program will be the scien-tific background and the principle of “on-the-job training”, in contrast to the much more common off-the job courses. With this training program, we want to reach sus-tainability, that is, lasting effects even after the intervention has come to an end.
Several other features of the training aim to enforce sustainability: Supervisors of the leaders will take part at some stages of the intervention, real teams are subject to intervention, not just the leaders, and the intervention will cover a time frame of 16 months.
The longitudinal study explores the effects of leadership behaviour on employees’
mental wellbeing and health. More specifically, we seek answers to the following main questions:
1. Do changes occur in the leadership behaviour (evaluated by the employees and their leaders) across time? If there are changes, what factors (e.g., change of the leader, lengthened relationship tenure, increased communication frequency, de-crease in job demands, inde-crease in job resources) explain these changes in leadership behaviour?
2. Does leadership behaviour have longitudinal effects on employees’ psychological wellbeing and health? Or is there evidence for the reversed causality that is, do employees’ psychological wellbeing and health have longitudinal effects on
per-ceptions of leaders’ behaviour? Does the gender of the leader and the employee play a role in this regard?
3. Do job demands (e.g., work load) and job resources (e.g., job control and social support), or changes in these variables, mediate and/or moderate the potential relationship between leadership behaviour and employees’ mental wellbeing and health?
4. Are there any cultural differences in the questions (a-c) posed?