An identification perspective of servant leadership's effects
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Purpose: – The purpose of this paper is to reveal the identification-based mechanisms through which servant leadership affects desired outcomes (organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) toward coworkers and turnover intention) in the service industry in China. Design/methodology/approach: – The data of 293 pairs of valid subordinate-supervisor dyads were collected from the hospitality industry in China with a time lag of 30 days to reduce common method bias. Hypotheses were tested by a bootstrapping method and rival model comparisons. Findings: – The authors demonstrate that both the subordinate’s identification with the supervisor and identification with the organization play crucial roles in translating servant leadership’s effects to subordinate’s coworker-oriented OCBs and turnover intention. However, the occurrence of the two identifications seems to be not parallel but in sequence (i.e. pointing from identification with the supervisor to identification with the organization). In addition, results show that servant leadership’s ability to reduce subordinate’s fear of being close to the immediate supervisor is an equally significant route through which subordinate’s identification with the organization can be established. Originality/value: – The research has extended the literature and provided a nuanced explanation of the identification processes underlying servant leadership. The differentiation between relational identification with supervisor and collective identification with organization has shed light on a socialization mechanism through which subordinates come to demonstrate other-oriented service behavior and choose not to leave the organization. Additionally, the way that servant leadership helps eliminate subordinate’s fear in a supervisory relationship has proved to be in-negligible in enhancing organizational identification.
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Servant leadership is positively related to organizational identification, perceived person-organization fit, and person-job fit.
“This includes increased levels of organizational identification (Zhao et al., 2016), increased levels of perceived person-organization fit (Irving & Berndt, 2017), and person-job fit (Babakus, Yavas, & Ashill, 2010).”
From Servant Leadership: A systematic review and call for future research (2019) · cites this paper as Zhao et al., 2016
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Servant Leadership: A systematic review and call for future research
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“Individual Supervisor identification Turnover intention Zhao et al. (2016)”
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Servant Leadership and Employee Engagement: A Qualitative Study
Canavesi, A., & Minelli, E. (2022) · Employee Responsibilities and Rights Journal · doi:10.1007/s10672-021-09389-9 · Cited by 95 · see citing works
- Authors
- Zhao, C., Liu, Y., & Gao, Z.
- Affiliations
- Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications (CN)
- University of North Carolina at Greensboro (US)
- Capital University of Economics and Business (CN)
- Venue
- Journal of Managerial Psychology
- Publisher
- Emerald
- Published
- 2016-07-04
- Volume
- 31
- Issue
- 5
- Pages
- 898-913
- ISSN
- 0268-3946 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2439153121
- Cited by
- 100
- References
- 29
- Citations by year
- 2026: 4 · 2025: 9 · 2024: 7 · 2023: 15 · 2022: 19 · 2021: 15 · 2020: 13 · 2019: 12 · 2018: 5 · 2017: 1
- FWCI
- 11.66
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- libres.uncg.edu
- Locations
- Journal of Managerial Psychology (publishedVersion)
- NC Digital Online Collection of Knowledge and Scholarship (The University of North Carolina at Greensboro) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Business, Management and Accounting › Organizational Behavior and Human Resource Management › Job Satisfaction and Organizational Behavior
- Social Sciences › Human Factors and Ergonomics › Employee Performance and Management
- Social Sciences › Demography › Workplace Spirituality and Leadership
- Keywords
- servant leadership, organizational identification, organizational citizenship behavior, turnover intention, supervisor-subordinate relationships, hospitality industry, service sector, socialization mechanisms
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