Humane-oriented Leadership on
Leadership Effectiveness — Does it
Depend on National Culture?
Author: Marjolein Kessels Student number: 10901787 Date: January 31, 2018
Executive Programme in Management Studies — Leadership & Management Track University of Amsterdam/Amsterdam Business School
STATEMENT OF ORIGINALITY
This document is written by Marjolein Kessels who declares to take full responsibility for the contents of this document. I declare that the text and the work presented in this document is original and that no sources other than those mentioned in the text and its references have been used in creating it. The Faculty of Economics and Business is responsible solely for the supervision of completion of the work, not for the contents.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 5 ABSTRACT 6 INTRODUCTION 7 LITERATURE REVIEW 10 LEADERSHIP EFFECTIVENESS 10 LEADERSHIP BEHAVIOR 11 PARTICIPATIVE LEADERSHIP 13 HUMANE-ORIENTED LEADERSHIP 15 NATIONAL CULTURE 20DATA & METHOD 24
SAMPLE & PROCEDURE 24
MEASURES 25
PARTICIPATIVE LEADERSHIP 27
HUMANE-ORIENTED LEADERSHIP 28
RESULTS 30
CORRELATION 30
HYPOTHESIS TESTING RESULTS FOR DIRECT EFFECTS 31
HYPOTHESIS TESTING RESULTS FOR INTERACTION EFFECTS 33
DISCUSSION 40
SUMMARY OF STUDY 40
THEORETICAL IMPLICATIONS 41
STUDY LIMITATIONS & FUTURE RESEARCH 43
PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS 46
CONCLUSION 47
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
First, I would like to thank my thesis supervisor dr. Merlijn Venus for his valuable and constructive recommendations during the development of this study. I would also like to express my very great appreciation to the study advisors for their advice and assistance in keeping my process on schedule. Finally, I want to thank my husband for his unfailing support and continuous encouragement. It has been gratefully appreciated.
“Things are not difficult to accomplish. What is difficult, is to prepare ourselves to do them.”
ABSTRACT
Previous studies showed that participative leadership and humane-oriented leadership have significant and positive impacts on leadership effectiveness, that there is a connection between national culture and leadership behavior (Dorfman et al., 2012), and that there is a connection between national culture and leadership effectiveness (Thomas & Ravlin, 1995). This study builds on these prior findings and investigates if the culture of the country where the followers work influences the relationship between leadership behavior and leadership effectiveness and therefore will make this relationship stronger. The most interesting results were that in contradiction to previous literature, participative leadership appeared not to be the most effective leadership behavior style in the Netherlands and humane-oriented leadership appeared not to be the most effective leadership behavior style in Qatar.
Keywords: participative leadership, humane-oriented leadership, leadership behavior, leadership effectiveness, culture, the Netherlands, Qatar.
INTRODUCTION
When you search on the internet at websites with a great interest in business (such as Forbes), you will find a lot of articles about how to be an effective leader: how you need to behave, what kind of habits you need to adopt, which skills you need, which questions you need to ask, and so on. Leadership effectiveness is a subject that never runs out of date. But, how do we achieve it? “When in Rome, do as the Roman’s do.” Is that the answer? Should we adopt the behaviors of the society we are in? Are we effective leaders if we lead in a way they expect from us in that society?
In the academic literature leadership effectiveness is explained in many ways but building on the article of Dorfman et al. (2012), I define it as “the extent to which the behavior of a leader matches the expectations of its followers”. As this definition says, the behavior of a leader influences the leader’s effectiveness. Previous studies show that leadership behavior has the biggest influence on leadership effectiveness (Dorfman et al., 2012). Culture plays an important role as well because cultural adaption in leadership behavior results in higher ratings of leadership effectiveness (Thomas & Ravlin, 1995), and leaders who violate cultural norms are not as effective as those that conform to cultural norms (Dorfman et al., 2012).
In the existing literature, the concept of leadership effectiveness could have more attention because there is not a huge amount of existing studies that focus on this concept. What leadership effectiveness is, is clear, but how to achieve it and what factors play a role in achieving this, can be made clearer. About the concept of culture, already a lot of studies has been done in the GLOBE project and by Geert Hofstede. Although the last one did not investigate Qatar. Also, there is no article ever written that is discussing both the culture of the Netherlands and the one of Qatar. This comparison would be interesting because, since 2008, Qatar has been consistently ranked among the top three fastest growing economies in the world. A lot of Dutch (and international) organizations have an office in Qatar. This is the main reason I chose these two countries for this study.
I will investigate the influence of the leadership behavior style of the Netherlands and the one of Qatar on leadership effectiveness. I chose leadership effectiveness as the dependent variable because it is an important and interesting concept. How can you make sure leaders are effective and in a sense, be the best leaders possible? I chose leadership behavior as the independent variable because, regarding leadership effectiveness, Dorfman et al. (2012) found that many leadership behaviors have direct consequences. I predict that the dominant leadership behavior style of the Netherlands and the one of Qatar will have a significant and positive effect on leadership effectiveness. I also predict that culture will make the specific leadership behavior stronger related to leadership effectiveness.
This study will contribute to the existing literature in a way that I will try to explain more about the influence of two different leadership behavior styles on leadership effectiveness. I will try to define which factors play an important role in this. I think this study will contribute to broadening the literature about leadership effectiveness in the Netherlands and Qatar because it is never done from this angle before. This study will also contribute in a managerial way because a lot of big Dutch companies have an office in Qatar and it is good to know about the different leadership behavior styles in these two countries. It would be undesirable if a Dutch leader in Qatar is showing leadership behavior that is not congruent with the desired leadership behavior in Qatar and therefore will be less effective, just because (s)he is used to showing this leadership behavior in the Netherlands.
To bring all above things together I formulated the following research question: does the culture of the country where the followers work influences the relationship between leadership behavior and leadership effectiveness and therefore will make this relationship stronger?
LITERATURE REVIEW
Here I shortly introduce the body of theory I rely on, as well as relevant previous empirical evidence related to the research question. Building on that, I tried to develop a clear argumentation about what I claim with the hypotheses and — more importantly — why I expect those concrete effects.
Leadership Effectiveness
Leadership effectiveness can be explained in many ways. Fiedler (1967) defines leadership effectiveness in terms of group performance. Many years later, according to House et al. (1999), effective leaders were perceived as charismatic, team-oriented, participative, humane, and not as self-protective or autonomous. In the early years of this millennium, leadership researchers have focused their attention more on interpersonal and relational skills as being important for leadership effectiveness (Dickson & Den Hartog, 2005). Dorfman et al. (2012) state that leaders who behave according to the expectations of followers are most effective.
This last statement is leading in explaining leadership effectiveness for this study and therefore I define leadership effectiveness as the extent to which the behavior of a leader matches the expectations of its followers. For example, when followers desire participative qualities, leaders tend to exhibit these qualities and therefore generate a strong sense of commitment and effort among their followers.
The findings of Dorfman et al. (2012) show that the extent to which each leader’s behavior is congruent with its culturally endorsed theory of leadership counterpart is an important determinant of the leaders’ perceived effectiveness. It is the fit between the expectations of the followers and the behavior of the leader that is critical for leadership effectiveness. Leaders have the tendency to behave according to society’s expectations, because they know that is the most effective (Dorfman et al., 2012).
Leadership Behavior
Regarding leadership effectiveness, Dorfman et al. (2012) found that many leadership behaviors have direct consequences in terms of top management team commitment, effort, and team solidarity. That’s why I chose leadership behavior as the independent variable. To understand leadership behaviors in a culture, we need to understand the idealized leadership in that culture (House et al., 2004). Dorfman et al. (2012) state that if we know the idealized leadership of a society, we can predict the behaviors of the leaders in that society. So, we need to find out what the ideal leadership in a specific culture is.
House et al. (2004) defined six global leadership dimensions: (1) charismatic/value-based, (2) team-oriented, (3) participative, (4) humane-oriented, (5) autonomous, and (6) self-protective. In the GLOBE project research is done about the preferred leadership behaviors in 62 countries all over the world. Gupta & Hanges (2004) divided all countries into ten cultural clusters. As mentioned before, I will investigate the dominant leadership style of the Netherlands and the one of Qatar. The Netherlands belongs to the Germanic Europe cluster and Qatar is appointed to the Middle East cluster.
The dominant dimension of the Germanic Europe cluster is participative leadership. This kind of leadership reflects the degree to which leaders involve others in making and implementing decisions (Dorfman et al., 2012). In contrast, the Middle East cluster did not endorse participative leadership as strongly (Dickson, Den Hartog & Mitchelson, 2003). Although self-protective leadership is most common in the Middle East cluster (Dorfman et al., 2012), humane-oriented leadership is seen as the most effective in Qatar (Kabasakal & Bodur, 2007). This kind of leadership reflects supportive and considerate leadership, but also includes compassion and generosity (Dorfman et al., 2012). It refers to the extent to which leaders value the importance of being fair, friendly, generous, and kind to their followers. This shows the importance of generosity and compassion as a leadership attribute (Kabasakal et al., 2012). Participative leadership and humane-oriented leadership have significant and positive impacts on leadership effectiveness (Dorfman et al., 2012), but
Participative Leadership
According to the tool of Hofstede where you can compare the culture of countries, you can see in Figure 1 that the Netherlands score low on the dimension of power distance. The GLOBE project demonstrates that power distance impacts the validation of participative leadership (Dickson, Den Hartog & Mitchelson, 2003). Power distance is negatively related to participative leadership (Dorfman, Hanges & Brodbeck, 2004), so in this way, the low score on power distance of the Netherlands matches perfectly with participative leadership. Hofstede defines the Dutch style as being independent, coaching leaders, empowering and facilitating management, equal rights, no hierarchy, and leaders that are accessible.
On the dimension of masculinity, the Netherlands score very low and is, therefore, a feminine society. The difference between men and women in the Netherlands is almost nonexistent. Gender egalitarianism was found by Dorfman, Hanges & Brodbeck (2004) to positively predict participative leadership. This makes participative leadership desirable (Javidan et al., 2006). Gender egalitarian cultures were found to endorse participative leader attributes such as egalitarian, delegator, and collectively oriented (Emrich, Denmark & Den Hartog, 2004). In feminine countries, it is important to keep the work-life balance good. According to Hofstede the Dutch are known for their long discussions until consensus has been reached.
Figure 1
Hofstede’s tool that compares the culture of countries, in this case, the Netherlands vs. Saudi Arabia.
Studies on transformational leader behavior showed that in the Netherlands, participative leadership can be seen as a component of transformational leadership (Den Hartog et al., 1999). Only to keep things clear, I will not get into the matter of transformational leadership and will only focus on participative leadership.
Junker & Van Dick (2014) say that participative leadership behavior is universally endorsed. All the literature about participative leadership that was examined for this study showed that participative leadership has a positive influence on leadership effectiveness. This leads to the following hypothesis:
Hypothesis 1a: Participative leadership is positively related to leadership effectiveness.
Humane-oriented Leadership
Hofstede did not (yet) investigate the culture of Qatar. Because Saudi Arabia is the closest neighbor of Qatar and they have a lot of similarities, I look at the scores of Saudi Arabia as visualized in Figure 1.
On the dimension of power distance, the score is very high, which means that people accept a hierarchical order. Because of high power distance practices, there is a desire for maintaining high social distances in the paternalistic relationship between leaders and followers (Dorfman et al., 2012).
The score on the dimension of individualism is very low, which means it is a collectivistic society. Dorfman et al. (2012) found that the cultural practices in countries in the Middle East region, like Qatar, are high in-group collectivism. Members of societies high on in-group collectivism and humane orientation with high levels of uncertainty avoidance are likely to have leadership prototypes that emphasize team-oriented leadership attributes (Dickson, Den Hartog & Mitchelson, 2003).
On the dimension of masculinity, the score is high, thus we can say that Qatar is a masculine society. According to what we hear and read in the news about societies in the Middle East, it looks indeed that these are very masculine. Religion plays a big part in this assumption. Hofstede says that in masculine countries people live to work.
The score on the dimension of uncertainty avoidance is very high, so it can be said that they prefer avoiding uncertainty. Dickson et al. (2012) found that uncertainty avoidance positively predicts humane-oriented leadership.
On the dimension of long-term orientation, the score is low, which is a signal of the normative nature. According to Hofstede, countries with a normative nature have great respect for traditions and norms. They are suspicious of change. Their focus is on achieving fast and easy results.
Like I said before, Dorfman et al. (2012) found that, regarding leadership effectiveness, many leadership behavior styles have direct consequences in terms of top management team commitment, effort, and team solidarity. However, humane-orientated leadership appears to be the most predictive of all leadership behavior styles for top management team commitment, and it is a stronger predictor than participation for effort and team solidarity as well (Dorfman et al., 2012). Because of these findings, I predict that humane-oriented leadership has a positive influence on leadership effectiveness, which leads to the following hypothesis:
Hypothesis 1b: Humane-oriented leadership is positively related to leadership effectiveness.
The main difference between both leadership behavior styles is rested in the fact that participative leadership shows leadership behavior in which involving others plays the most important role, while humane-oriented leadership does not have the focus on involving others. In fact, humane-oriented leadership is quite hierarchical, as also shown by the tool of Hofstede. Humane-oriented leadership is focused on being supportive and considerate towards followers, but that is not at all the same as involving followers. As already mentioned, both leadership behavior styles have a significant and positive impact on leadership effectiveness (Dorfman et al., 2012). In this study, I explore whether these styles are even more effective in some cultures than in others.
The findings by Dorfman et al. (2012) show that leaders operating in societies that desire participatory leadership, like countries in the Germanic Europe region (e.g., The Netherlands), tend to act in a participatory manner. This is in line with the arguments by Lord & Maher (1991) and Shaw (1990) regarding the fact how important it is to understand implicit leadership theories (ILTs). Lord & Maher (1991) argued that leaders can use ILTs as a foundation for generating their own behavior. But, what are ILTs?
ILTs are defined as cognitive structures or prototypes specifying the traits and abilities that characterize leaders (Lord, Foti, & De Vader, 1984; Lord & Maher, 1991). These structures are developed based on socialization processes and prior experiences (Epitropaki et al., 2013). They are not based on data and scientific observation, which makes them subjective and nothing more than perceptions.
According to Epitropaki et al. (2013) leaders need to develop awareness about the expectations for their leadership context and how ILTs shape action tendencies. This is particularly important given the fact that much of daily behaviors operate without full conscious awareness (Wood, Quinn, & Kashy, 2002). Junker & Van Dick’s (2014) analysis revealed that ILTs can have large effects on leaders and followers. Leadership effectiveness appears to be stronger when ILTs are clear. You can create this effect by making the ILTs more explicit, as well for leaders as for followers.
Hoyt, Burnette & Innella (2012) pointed out that it is plausible that there could be cultural or socioeconomic differences in adherence to ILTs. Research on cultural variation in ILTs is well-grounded (Junker & Van Dick, 2014). It seems plausible that, as has been demonstrated for ILTs, some attributes would be universally endorsed, whereas others would vary across cultural contexts. The cultural effects on ILTs have important implications for almost every modern organization, but especially for those who do business across cultural boundaries. Differences in ILTs might account for the fact that some leaders are highly effective in one country but face difficulties in another (Schyns, 2006; Thomas & Ravlin, 1995).
GLOBE built on the ILT (Lord & Maher, 1991) to develop a culturally endorsed ILT (House et al., 2004), focusing on characteristics of “effective leaders” within cultures and suggested that there are some culture-specific traits that are contributing to effective leadership (Epitropaki et al., 2013). Both participative leadership and humane-oriented leadership are culturally contingent (Javidan et al., 2006). But, how do we define culture?
National Culture
Culture has various meanings. Hofstede (1980) defines culture as “the collective programming of the human mind that distinguishes the members of one human group from those of another”. Schein’s (1992) definition of culture is: “A pattern of shared basic assumptions that the group learned as it solved its problems that have worked well enough to be considered valid and is passed on to new members as the correct way to perceive, think, and feel in relation to those problems”. In the GLOBE project culture is defined as “shared motives, values, beliefs, identities, and interpretations or meanings of significant events that result from common experiences of members of collectivities and are transmitted across age generations” (House et al., 1999). The last definition is used for this study.
Hofstede (1980) studied cultural dimensions and originally, he defined four cultural dimensions: (1) power distance, (2) individualism, (3) masculinity, and (4) uncertainty avoidance. A few years later, a fifth dimension was added: long-term orientation (Hofstede, 2001), and even later, a sixth dimension was added: indulgence (Hofstede & Minkov, 2010). I used these dimensions to explain the leadership behavior styles in the Netherlands as well as the ones in Qatar.
Several researchers have grouped cultures into clusters. The purpose of this sort of clustering is to establish if there are differences among all cultures in general and each culture is distinctly unique, or if there are some similarities between some societies and some values and behaviors are acceptable across a group of nations (Dickson et al., 2012). Ronen & Shenkar (1985) analyzed findings of prior studies and identified eight clusters of countries based on cultural values of the societies. Like said before, project GLOBE identified ten clusters (House et al., 2002), and these clusters are used in this study.
Culture matters. It matters in how leaders emerge, are selected, developed, and seen (or not seen) as role models to be emulated, and it matters in ways that are predictable, and that organizations can respond to strategically (Dickson et al., 2012). The GLOBE project found support for Shaw’s (1990) hypothesized relationship between culture and leadership (Dorfman et al., 2012). Dorfman et al. (2012) demonstrate that culture indirectly influences the leadership behavior style of its citizens through the leadership expectations of societies. Leaders tend to adopt the desired leadership behavior consistent with the leadership style found in that culture.
The extent to which each leader’s behavior is congruent with the culture’s culturally endorsed theory of leadership counterpart determines the leader’s effectiveness (Dorfman et al., 2012). Thomas & Ravlin (1995) revealed that cultural adaption in leadership behavior results in higher ratings of leadership effectiveness. Leaders who violate cultural norms are not as effective as those that conform to cultural norms (Dorfman et al., 2012).
Because of these findings and the previous mentioned statements that participative leadership is considered as the most effective in the Netherlands (Dorfman et al., 2012), and humane-oriented is seen as the most effective in Qatar (Kabasakal & Bodur, 2007), I expect that national culture has a moderating effect on the relationship between leadership behavior and leadership effectiveness, which leads to the following hypotheses:
Hypothesis 2a: The relationship between participative leadership and leadership effectiveness is positively moderated by national culture, in a way that participative leadership will demonstrate a stronger positive effect on leadership effectiveness due to the assumption that the leadership behaviors related to participative leadership are endorsed by the country where the followers work.
Hypothesis 2b: The relationship between humane-oriented leadership and leadership effectiveness is positively moderated by national culture, in a way that humane-oriented leadership will demonstrate a stronger positive effect on leadership effectiveness due to the assumption that the leadership behaviors related to humane-oriented leadership are endorsed by the country where the followers work.
Figure 2 demonstrates the conceptual model of the relations among the variables. I expect all relations to be positive. First, I expect that a high level of the two independent variables participative leadership and humane-oriented leadership are positively related to the dependent variable leadership effectiveness. Second, I expect that national culture has a positive effect on the relationship between participative leadership and leadership effectiveness, as well as on the relationship between humane-oriented leadership and leadership effectiveness. National culture consists of two categorical values: The Netherlands and Qatar.
Figure 2 Conceptual model. National Culture Participative Leadership Leadership Effectiveness Humane-oriented Leadership
DATA & METHOD
Sample & Procedure
The sampling technique I used is quota sampling. Which is a type of non-probability sampling that ensures the sample selected represents certain characteristics in the population that I had chosen (Saunders & Lewis, 2012). The first characteristic was that the follower works in the Netherlands or in Qatar. The second characteristic that I had chosen was that the follower had to have a leader. Participation was voluntary. From the 140 respondents that started filling out the questionnaire, 120 respondents fully completed it, which makes the response rate 86%.
The age-range of the respondents was 22 to 59 years (Mage = 36.40, SDage = 9.81). 57.5% of the respondents were male and 42.5% were female. To gather information about in which industry the respondents were working, they could choose among ten given industries and ‘other industry’. Most respondents (36.7%) were working in the industry of ‘engineering, manufacturing, or production’ and second best was ‘other industry’ with 30.8% of the respondents. I was very pleased with the fact that 49.2% of the respondents were working in the Netherlands and 50.8% in Qatar. Another interesting fact is that 24 different nationalities were counted among the respondents, but the Dutch nationality was in the majority with 60%. One last demographic result that is worth mentioning is the
Data were collected by means of an online questionnaire. Qualtrics was used to make and distribute this questionnaire. All the people in my network in the Netherlands and Qatar were approached. Respondents were not asked to fill in their name or contact details to ensure anonymity. The questionnaire was open for 2.5 weeks. I used the Statistical software Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) to perform the statistical analyses.
Measures
All the items that were used in the questionnaire were obtained from prior studies. These studies were in English and the questionnaire was in English as well. There is no need to translate the questionnaire to Dutch because the respondents that work in the Netherlands are all used to the English language.
The questionnaire entailed four sections: (1) leader behaviors, (2) the way things are in your work organization, (3) leadership effectiveness, (4) and demographic questions. The first section consisted of seventeen items of several behaviors and characteristics that can be used to describe leaders. They measured the variables participative leadership and humane-oriented leadership. The second section consisted of seventeen items with statements about how the organization is.
They measured dimensions that are used in the GLOBE project to describe organizational culture (Dickson, Den Hartog & Mitchelson, 2003; Dickson et al., 2012; Dorfman, Hanges & Brodbeck, 2004; Dorfman et al., 2012; Emrich, Denmark & Den Hartog, 2004; Javidan et al., 2006). Although the items of this section did not measure one of the variables necessary for this study, I thought they could be interesting for further research. Especially because the amount of research about the culture of Qatar is limited.
The third section consisted of nine items with statements about the leader. They measured the variable Leadership Effectiveness. The first three sections were measured with a 5-point Likert scale. The fourth and last section consisted of nine items about age, gender, nationality, which country the follower was working in, etc.
Some items were counter indicative items, so they needed to be recoded. This was done in SPSS. When checking for the reliability, the Cronbach’s Alpha of all variables was positive, so no mistake was made, and all items were coded correctly.
Participative Leadership
To measure participative leadership, items from the GLOBE project in 2006 were used. Of course, only the items and scales for participative leadership were used. Participative leadership consisted of two sub-scales: (1) autocratic, and (2) non-participative. These items (except for one) were counter indicative items, so they were recoded. Examples of participative leadership behaviors are “Elitist” (believes that a small number of people with similar backgrounds are superior and should enjoy privileges) and “Non-egalitarian” (believes that all individuals are not equal and only some should have equal rights and privileges). Cronbach’s Alpha for autocratic with six items was 0.90, so this scale was good and had high reliability. Cronbach’s Alpha for non-participative with five items was unfortunately below 0.70, so one item was removed. After removing this item, the Cronbach’s Alpha went up to 0.63 and the remaining four items now all had a good correlation with the total score of the scale, because they were all above 0.30. Combining the two scales, participative leadership had a Cronbach’s Alpha of 0.86, which made the reliability high.
Humane-oriented Leadership
To measure humane-oriented leadership, also items from the GLOBE project in 2006 were used. This time, only the items and scales for humane-oriented leadership were used. Humane-oriented leadership also consisted of two sub-scales: (1) modesty, and (2) humane-orientation. Examples of humane-oriented leadership behaviors are “Modest” (does not boast; presents self in a humble manner) and “Compassionate” (has empathy for others; inclined to be helpful or show mercy). Cronbach’s Alpha for modesty with four items was 0.79, so this scale was good and had high reliability. Cronbach’s Alpha for humane-orientation with two items was 0.76, so this scale also was good and had high reliability. The two scales combined, humane-oriented leadership had a Cronbach’s Alpha of 0.72, so the reliability was high.
National Culture
The moderator national culture was measured by the country where the respondents work. They were asked the question “What country do you work in?”. Respondents were able to choose between The Netherlands and Qatar. The Netherlands was coded as 0, and Qatar was coded as 1.
Leadership Effectiveness
To measure leadership effectiveness nine items were adapted from different studies (Platow et al., 1997; Haslam et al., 2001; Van Knippenberg, 2005; Ames & Flynn, 2007; Giessner & Van Knippenberg, 2008). Example items are “My leader leads the team in a way which motivates the team members” and “Looking ahead, I expect my leader will experience great success as a leader”. Cronbach’s Alpha for leadership effectiveness was 0.96, so the reliability was high.
RESULTS
Correlation
Table 1 shows a full correlation matrix with the means, standard deviations, and correlations among all variables. It also shows the Cronbach’s Alpha of each scale (the number on the most right of each row). These numbers represent the reliability values.
Table 1
Means, Standard Deviations, and Correlations.
N = 120
*. Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (2-tailed). **. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).
The Pearson correlation coefficient between the variables participative leadership and humane-oriented leadership was 0.54 (p = 0.00), which shows there is a high positive relation between both styles. This means the more a leader shows participative leadership
Variables M SD 1 2 3 4 1. National Culture (0 = NL; 1 = Qatar) 0.51 0.50 -2. Participative Leadership 3.88 0.84 -0.02 (0.86) 3. Humane-oriented Leadership 3.40 0.84 0.11 0.54** (0.72) 4. Leadership Effectiveness 3.57 1.06 0.21* 0.56** 0.60** (0.96)
The Pearson correlation coefficient between the variables participative leadership and leadership effectiveness was 0.56 (p = 0.00), which shows there is a high positive relation between these variables. This means the more a leader shows participative leadership behavior, the higher the leadership effectiveness is. And the higher the leadership effectiveness is, the more chance a leader will show participative leadership behavior. The Pearson correlation coefficient between the variables humane-oriented leadership and leadership effectiveness was 0.60 (p = 0.00), which shows there is a high positive relation between them. This means the more a leader shows humane-oriented leadership behavior, the higher the leadership effectiveness is. And the higher the leadership effectiveness is, the more chance a leader will show humane-oriented leadership behavior. The Pearson correlation coefficient between the variables national culture and leadership effectiveness was 0.21 (p = 0.02), which shows there is a tendency to a positive relation between these variables. This means that leadership effectiveness is reported to be higher in Qatar than in the Netherlands.
Hypothesis Testing Results for Direct Effects
To test hypothesis 1a and 1b, I ran a simple linear regression analysis in SPSS. Participative leadership and humane-oriented leadership were entered as predictors of leadership effectiveness. The results of this analysis are displayed in Table 2.
Table 2
Results of the regression analysis for hypothesis 1a and 1b.
The model emerged to be statistically significant with F (2,117) = 44.71; p < 0.01 and explained 43.3% of the total variance in leadership effectiveness. Humane-oriented leadership had a higher Beta value than participative leadership, but both were positive. If humane-oriented leadership increases for one, leadership effectiveness will increase with 0.42, and if participative leadership increases for one, leadership effectiveness will increase with 0.33.
Based on this analysis I conclude that both hypothesis 1a and 1b are confirmed. So, hypothesis 1a that predicted that participative leadership is positively related to leadership effectiveness, is corroborated. And hypothesis 1b that predicted that humane-oriented leadership is positively related to leadership effectiveness, is also corroborated.
Leadership Effectiveness R R² B SE Beta t p 0.66 0.43 0.00 Participative Leadership 0.41 0.10 0.33 3.93 0.00 Humane-oriented Leadership 0.53 0.10 0.42 5.09 0.00
Hypothesis Testing Results for Interaction Effects
To test hypothesis 2a and 2b, I ran a multiple linear regression analysis. Two interaction variables based on the product of the mean-centered variables of the two leadership behavior styles and national culture were computed (Aiken & West, 1991). Participative leadership, humane-oriented leadership, and national culture were entered in step 1, and the two interaction variables in step 2. The results of this analysis are displayed in Table 3.
Table 3
Results of the regression analysis for hypothesis 2a and 2b with the Netherlands as the reference category.
Leadership Effectiveness R R² ∆ R² B SE Beta t p Step 1 0.68 0.46 0.00 Participative Leadership 0.43 0.10 0.34 4.23 0.00 Humane-oriented Leadership 0.49 0.10 0.39 4.80 0.00 National Culture 0.36 0.15 0.17 2.48 0.02 Step 2 0.71 0.50 0.04 0.02 Participative Leadership 0.23 0.14 0.18 1.64 0.10 Humane-oriented Leadership 0.78 0.15 0.62 5.23 0.00 National Culture 0.36 0.14 0.17 2.54 0.01 Participative × National Culture 0.44 0.20 0.26 2.23 0.03 Humane-oriented × National Culture -0.55 0.20 -0.34 -2.72 0.01
The first model emerged to be statistically significant with F (3,116) = 33.17; p = 0.00 and explained 46.2% of the total variance in leadership effectiveness. After entry of the interaction variables in step 2 the total variance explained by the model went up to 49.8% with F (5,114) = 22.62; p = 0.01. The introduction of these variables explained an additional 3.6% variance in leadership effectiveness.
In the final model, the interaction effect between participative leadership and national culture emerged to be statistically significant (B = 0.44; p = 0.03). Also, the interaction effect between humane-oriented leadership and national culture emerged to be statistically significant (B = -0.55; p = 0.01). To interpret these interactions, I looked at the coefficients for the independent variables in the final model (Aiken & West, 1991). These coefficients appear to be different from those in the first model because the interaction variables were also included. They represent the direct effect of the respective leadership behavior when the moderator has value 0. The Netherlands was labeled as 0 and is, therefore, the reference category. This means that the direct effect of participative leadership on leadership effectiveness in the Netherlands is not statistically significant (B = 0.23; p = 0.10). However, the direct effect of humane-oriented leadership on leadership effectiveness in the Netherlands is statistically significant (B = 0.78; p = 0.00).
The findings of these direct effects are interesting because they contradict the findings of previous literature. The Netherlands belongs to the Germanic Europe cluster (Gupta & Hanges, 2004) and the most effective leadership behavior style of this cluster is participative leadership (Dorfman et al., 2012). However, the findings of this study show that this is not true and suggests that participative leadership is not the most effective in the Netherlands. Instead, you can infer that based on these results in the Netherlands, not participative leadership, but humane-oriented leadership has a positive impact on perceived leadership effectiveness.
To know what the effects are for Qatar, I ran another multiple linear regression in SPSS. Only now, the moderator variable national culture was recoded in a way that Qatar is now the reference category and labeled as 0 (and the Netherlands as 1). Also, two new interaction variables based on the product of the mean-centered variables of the two leadership behavior styles and the recoded moderator variable national culture were computed (Aiken & West, 1991). The results of this analysis are displayed in Table 4.
Table 4
Results of the regression analysis for hypothesis 2a en 2b with Qatar as the reference category.
Again, the interaction effect of participative leadership and national culture emerged to be statistically significant (B = -0.44; p = 0.03). The interaction effect of humane-oriented leadership and national culture emerged to be statistically significant as well (B = 0.55; p = 0.01). As mentioned before, the moderator national culture was recoded. So, Qatar was now labeled as 0 and is the reference category in this case. This means that the direct effect of participative leadership on leadership effectiveness in Qatar is statistically significant (B =
Leadership Effectiveness R R² ∆ R² B SE Beta t p Step 1 0.68 0.46 0.00 Participative Leadership 0.43 0.10 0.34 4.23 0.00 Humane-oriented Leadership 0.49 0.10 0.39 4.80 0.00 National Culture -0.36 0.15 -0.17 -2.48 0.02 Step 2 0.71 0.50 0.04 0.02 Participative Leadership 0.67 0.14 0.54 4.71 0.00 Humane-oriented Leadership 0.22 0.14 0.18 1.63 0.11 National Culture -0.36 0.14 -0.17 -2.54 0.01 Participative × National Culture -0.44 0.20 -0.24 -2.23 0.03 Humane-oriented × National Culture 0.55 0.20 0.28 2.72 0.01
The findings of these direct effects also contradict the findings of previous literature. Dickson, Den Hartog & Mitchelson (2003) stated that countries of the Middle East cluster did not endorse participative leadership. And, according to Kabasakal & Bodur (2007), humane-oriented leadership is seen as the most effective leadership behavior style in Qatar. However, the findings of this study show that humane-oriented leadership is not the most effective in Qatar. Based on these results you can even infer that in Qatar, not humane-oriented leadership, but participative leadership has a positive impact on perceived leadership effectiveness. This makes these findings interesting.
So, both multiple linear regression analyses for hypothesis 2a and 2b showed that the interaction effects were statistically significant. To interpret these interaction effects further a simple slope analysis (Aiken & West, 1991) was plotted, using Jeremy Dawson’s worksheet (Dawson, 2018). Figure 3 shows the slope analysis for participative leadership, and Figure 4 shows the slope analysis for humane-oriented leadership.
Figure 3
Slope analysis for participative leadership.
Figure 4
The lines in both Figure 3 and Figure 4 are not parallel, which confirms that the interaction effects take place. All lines are climbing, which suggests that leadership effectiveness becomes stronger when a leader shows a lot of leadership behaviors (participative in Figure 3 and humane-oriented in Figure 4) that are endorsed by the country where the followers work. So, hypothesis 2a that predicted that the relationship between participative leadership and leadership effectiveness is positively moderated by national culture, in a way that participative leadership will demonstrate a stronger positive effect on leadership effectiveness due to the assumption that the leadership behaviors related to participative leadership are endorsed by the country where the followers work, is corroborated. And, hypothesis 2b that predicted that the relationship between humane-oriented leadership and leadership effectiveness is positively moderated by national culture, in a way that humane-oriented leadership will demonstrate a stronger positive effect on leadership effectiveness due to the assumption that the leadership behaviors related to humane-oriented leadership are endorsed by the country where the followers work, is also corroborated.
However, Figure 3 shows that the effect of participative leadership on leadership effectiveness is stronger in Qatar than in the Netherlands. And, Figure 4 shows that the impact of humane-oriented leadership on leadership effectiveness is (a little bit) stronger in the Netherlands than in Qatar. This strengthens the findings of the multiple linear regressions for hypothesis 2a and 2b, but it contradicts the findings of the simple linear regression analysis for hypothesis 1a and 1b. Instead, these previous findings claim exactly the opposite.
DISCUSSION
Summary of Study
The aim of this study was to enrich the literature about leadership behavior as the predictor of leadership effectiveness. More specifically, I investigated the effect of participative leadership and humane-oriented leadership on leadership effectiveness. In addition, and more importantly, the influence of national culture on these relations was examined. Drawing from previous literature, I predicted that both participative leadership and humane-oriented leadership would be positively related to leadership effectiveness. I also predicted that the national culture of the country where the followers work (the Netherlands or Qatar) would have a positive moderating effect on the relationship between leadership behavior and leadership effectiveness, in a way that the leadership behaviors related to participative leadership and humane-oriented leadership respectively are endorsed by the country where the followers work.
First, it was found that participative leadership and humane-oriented leadership are in fact positively related to leadership effectiveness. Second, it was also found that there is a positive moderating effect of national culture on the relationship between both leadership behavior styles and leadership effectiveness. However, it was interesting to discover that in contradiction to previous literature participative leadership is not the most effective
Theoretical Implications
Prior studies showed that participative leadership and humane-oriented leadership have significant and positive impacts on leadership effectiveness (Dorfman et al., 2012). The results from hypothesis 1a and 1b of this study corroborate the findings from the previous literature. This means that there is additional confirmation that participative leadership and humane-oriented leadership have a positive effect on leadership effectiveness, at least in the Netherlands and Qatar. Because of this confirmation and because this is the first study that zooms in on the Netherlands and Qatar in the same study, this study contributes to broadening the literature about leadership effectiveness.
However, some findings of this study contradict previous literature. As mentioned before, participative leadership is not the most effective leadership behavior style in the Netherlands and humane-oriented leadership is not the most effective in Qatar. This could mean that the dominant leadership behavior style in these countries is changed. If that would be the case, then this discovery is an interesting contribution to the existing literature and reason for further research. These findings could also be the result of incorrect measurement of national culture. How this measurement could be incorrect and what a better way of measuring national culture is, is discussed in the section about study limitations and future research.
To my knowledge, this is the first study that investigates the moderating effect of national culture on the relationship between leadership behavior and leadership effectiveness. Previous literature stated that there is a connection between national culture and leadership behavior (Dorfman et al., 2012) and between national culture and leadership effectiveness (Thomas & Ravlin, 1995). This study enriches these prior studies because it showed a positive moderating effect of national culture on the relationship between both leadership behavior styles and leadership effectiveness. The results showed a statistically significant interaction effect of participative leadership and national culture. And, the interaction effect of humane-oriented leadership and national culture emerged to be statistically significant as well. These results appeared in the Netherlands and in Qatar.
As mentioned before, the results of this study showed some effects in complete contradiction to previous literature. Striking results were that participative leadership is not the most effective leadership behavior style in the Netherlands and humane-oriented leadership is not the most effective one in Qatar. This raises the question whether the findings of the GLOBE project are that accurate and shows the importance of further research.
Study Limitations & Future Research
A limitation of this study is the fact that this is a cross-sectional study and not a longitudinal study. The main advantage of this last one is the capacity that it must study change and development over time (Saunders & Lewis, 2012). Another limitation is that only one way of data collection is used. To confirm (or contradict) the findings from the questionnaire, it would be enriching if multiple ways of data collection would be used in future research.
Another methodological limitation of this study is the generalizability. Even though the respondents where from many different organizations (both in the Netherlands and in Qatar), most of them (36.7%) were working in the industry of engineering, manufacturing, or production. Other industries like marketing, planning, and research and development were much less represented. Therefore, it is hard to say if the results of this study represent all industries of the working field. I encourage researchers to do the same study, but then with a more balanced representation from all industries of the working field. It would be interesting to see if the same results would come from this.
The measurement of culture is yet another limitation of this study. This study focuses on national culture, which is measured by the country where the respondents work. But, maybe this is not the right way to measure national culture. A better way might be to use the same model as Hofstede. Or to use the societal culture scales of the GLOBE survey.
The only problem that will not disappear is the fact that it is hard to capture the national culture of Qatar because most, if not all, work in Qatari organizations is done by followers from other countries. A lot of people from all over the world are hired by these organizations. The fact that there were 24 different nationalities among the respondents in this study shows this. From all the 120 respondents, not one had the nationality of Qatar. As mentioned before, humane-oriented leadership is seen as the most effective in Qatari organizations (Kabasakal & Bodur, 2007), but maybe that counts for organizations were actual Qatari work instead of immigrants. That is why I strongly suggest researchers to try to get in contact with Qatari people when measuring national culture, even though it is very difficult.
But, if you look at organizational culture instead of national culture you do not have this problem because organizations develop their own culture. So, you are not dependent on the people with the actual nationality of the country. It could also be that organizational culture is a better part of culture to investigate in relation to leadership behavior and leadership effectiveness anyway. Organizational culture could be measured with use of the organizational culture scales of the GLOBE survey. I would like to see a study with the same dependent and independent variables, but with organizational culture as the moderator.
I think it would be also interesting to look at other leadership behavior styles because this study focuses only on two leadership behavior styles and there are a few more. Self-protective leadership, for example, is the most effective leadership behavior style in the rest of the Middle East (Dorfman et al., 2012). Future research should investigate if self-protective leadership is more effective than humane-oriented leadership in Qatar. And, when a better way to capture the actual national culture of Qatar is found if this national culture would have a positive effect on the relationship between self-protective leadership and leadership effectiveness. Or, researchers could investigate if the organizational culture in Qatar would have a positive effect on the relationship between self-protective leadership and leadership effectiveness. Maybe even in comparison with humane-oriented leadership.
You could also do the same study, but then with all leadership behavior styles. This way you could test which one is most effective in the Netherlands and which one with Qatar. This way previous research by the GLOBE project could be updated. Because, as mentioned before, it could be that the most effective leadership behavior style of these countries has changed. You could use national culture again as the moderator (but then of course in a more thorough way), or with organizational culture as the moderator.
Practical Implications
The results from this study are especially useful for leaders and/or other people concerning human relations development of organizations in the Netherland and/or Qatar if they want to know which leadership behavior styles are effective. This study showed that participative leadership is the most effective leadership behavior style Qatar and humane-oriented leadership is the most effective one in the Netherlands. They can benefit from these results if their current leadership behavior style is lacking effectiveness among the followers of their organization. Adjusting to the leadership behavior style that is most effective in their country, could help them to become more effective.
The moderating effect of national culture is also interesting for leaders and/or other people concerning human relations development. National culture shows a positive effect both on the relationship between participative leadership and leadership effectiveness and on the relationship between humane-oriented leadership and leadership effectiveness. This means that if you choose to adopt participative leadership or humane-oriented leadership in your organization it is important to make sure the national culture is intertwined with the leaders and its organization.
CONCLUSION
This study investigates if the culture of the country where the followers work influences the relationship between leadership behavior and leadership effectiveness and therefore will make this relationship stronger. 120 followers that work in the Netherlands or Qatar have filled in the questionnaire. The results showed that there is a direct effect of participative leadership and humane-oriented leadership on leadership effectiveness. However, in contradiction to previous literature, participative leadership appeared not to be the most effective leadership behavior style in the Netherlands and humane-oriented leadership appeared not to be the most effective leadership behavior style in Qatar. The results also showed an interaction effect of national culture on the relationship between both leadership behavior styles and leadership effectiveness. Because of these results, this study contributes to broadening the literature about participative leadership, humane-oriented leadership, and leadership effectiveness. It also contributes to the existing literature about national culture, but because of the previous mentioned contradictory results, further research is encouraged. Among other things, but most importantly, future research should measure national culture in another way. Or instead of national culture, it should use organizational culture as the moderator. Because research is never finished.
REFERENCES
Aiken, L. S., & West, S. G. 1991. Multiple regression: Testing and interpreting Interactions. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Ames, D. R., & Flynn, F. J. 2007. What breaks a leader: The curvilinear relation between assertiveness and leadership. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 92: 307–324.
Dawson, J. 2018, January 25. Interpreting interaction effects. Retrieved from http:// www.jeremydawson.co.uk/slopes.htm
Den Hartog, D. N., House, R. J., Hanges, P. J., & Ruiz-Quintanilla, S. A. 1999. Culture specific and cross-culturally generalizable implicit leadership theories: Are attributes of charismatic/transformational leadership universally endorsed? Leadership Quarterly, 10(2): 219–256.
Dickson, M. W., & Den Hartog, D. N. 2005. What good is this to me? Managerial implications of global leadership research. In R. R. Sims & S. A. Quatro (Eds.), Leadership: Succeeding in the private, public, and not-for-profit sectors: 348–366. Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe.
Dickson, M. W., Castaño, N., Magomaeva, A., & Den Hartog, D. N. 2012. Conceptualizing leadership across cultures. Journal of World Business, 47: 483–492.
Dorfman, P. W., Hanges, P. J., & Brodbeck, F. C. 2004. Leadership and cultural variation: The identification of culturally endorsed leadership profiles. In R. J. House, P. J. Hanges, M. Javidan, P. W. Dorfman, V. Gupta, & GLOBE Associates (Eds.), Culture, leadership, and organizations: The GLOBE study of 62 societies: 669–720. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Dorfman, P. W, Javidan, M., Hanges, P. J, Dastmalchian, A., & House, R. J. 2012. GLOBE: A twenty year journey into the intriguing world of culture and leadership. Journal of World Business, 47: 504–518.
Emrich, C., Denmark, F., & Den Hartog, D. N. 2004. Cross-cultural differences in gender egalitarianism: Implications for societies, organizations, and leaders. In R. J. House, P. J. Hanges, M. Javidan, P. W. Dorfman, V. Gupta, & GLOBE Associates (Eds.), Leadership, culture, and organizations: The GLOBE study of 62 societies. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Epitropaki, O., Sy, T., Martin, R., Tram-Quon, S., & Topakas, A. 2013. Implicit leadership and followership theories “in the wild”: Taking stock of information-processing approaches to leadership and followership in organizational setting. The Leadership Quarterly, 24: 858– 881.
Fiedler, F. E. 1967. A theory of leadership effectiveness. New York: McGraw Hill.
Field, A. 2013. Discovering statistics using IBM SPSS statistics (4th ed.). London: Sage. Giessner, S. R., & Van Knippenberg, D. 2008. “License to fail”: Goal definition, leader group prototypicality, and perceptions of leadership effectiveness after leader failure. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 105: 14–35.
Gupta, V., & Hanges, P. 2004. Regional and climate clustering of societal cultures. In R. J. House, P. J. Hanges, M. Javidan, P. W. Dorfman, V. Gupta, & GLOBE Associates (Eds.), Leadership, culture and organizations: The GLOBE study of 62 societies: 178–215. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Haslam, S. A., Platow, M. J., Turner, J. C., Reynolds, K. J., McGarty, C., Oakes, P., et al. 2001. Social identity and the romance of leadership: The importance of being seen to be “doing it for us”. Group Processes and Intergroup Relations, 4: 191–205.
Hofstede, G. 1980. Culture’s consequences: International differences in work-related values. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage.
Hofstede, G. 2001. Culture’s consequences: Comparing values, behaviors, institutions, and organizations across nations (2nd ed.). Newbury Park, CA: Sage.
Hofstede, G., & Minkov, M. 2010. Cultures and organization: Software of the mind: Intercultural cooperation and its importance for survival (3rd ed.). New York: McGraw-Hill.
House, R. J., Hanges, P. J., Javidan, M., & Dorfman, P. W. 2002. Understanding cultures and implicit leadership theories across the globe: An introduction to project GLOBE. Journal of World Business, 37: 3–10.
House, R. J., Hanges, P. J., Javidan, M., Dorfman, P. W., & Gupta, V. 2004. Leadership, culture and organizations: The GLOBE study of 62 societies. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
House, R. J., Hanges, P. J., Ruiz-Quintanilla, S. A., Dorfman, P. W., Javidan, M., Dickson, M. W., Gupta, V., et al. 1999. Cultural influences on leadership and organizations: Project GLOBE. In W. F. Mobley, M. J. Gessner, & V. Arnold (Eds.), Advances in global leadership, 1: 171–233. Stamford, CT: JAI Press.
Hoyt, C. L., Burnette, J. L., & Innella, A. N. 2012. I can do that: The impact of implicit theories on leadership on leadership role model effectiveness. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 38(2): 257–268.
Javidan, M., House, R. J., Dorfman, P. W., Hanges, P. J., & Sully de Luque, M. 2006. Conceptualizing and measuring cultures and their consequences: A comparative review of GLOBE’s and Hofstede’s approaches. Journal of International Business Studies, 37: 897– 914.
Junker, N. M., & Van Dick, R. 2014. Implicit theories in organizational settings: A systematic review and research agenda of implicit leadership and followership theories. The Leadership Quarterly, 25: 1154–1173.
Kabasakal, H., & Bodur, M. 2007. Leadership and culture in Turkey: A multifaceted phenomenon. In J. S. Chhokar, F. Brodbeck, & R. House (Eds.), Culture and leadership around the world: The GLOBE book of in-depth studies of 25 societies: 835–874. Mahwah, NJ: LEA Publishers.
Kabasakal, H., Dastmalchian, A., Karacay, G., & Bayraktar, S. 2012. Leadership and culture in the MENA region: An analysis of the GLOBE project. Journal of World Business, 47: 519–529.
Lord, R. G., Foti, R. J., & De Vader, C. L. 1984. A test of leadership categorization theory: Internal structure, information processing, and leadership perceptions. Organizational Behavior and Human Performance, 34(3): 343–378.
Lord, R. G., & Maher, K. J. 1991. Leadership and information processing: Linking perceptions and performance. Boston, MA: Unwin Hyman.
Platow, M. J., Hoar, S., Reid, S. A., Harley, K., & Morrison, D. 1997. Endorsement of distributively fair and unfair leaders in interpersonal and intergroup situations. European Journal of Social Psychology, 27: 465–494.
Ronen, S., & Shenkar, O. 1985. Clustering countries on attitudinal dimensions: A review and synthesis. Academy of Management Journal, 10(3): 435–454.
Saunders, M., & Lewis, P. 2012. Doing research in business and management: An essential guide to planning your project. Harlow, UK: Pearson.
Schein, E. H. 1992. Organizational culture and leadership. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Schyns, B. 2006. The role of implicit leadership theories in the performance appraisals and promotion recommendations of leaders. Equal Opportunities International, 25: 88–199.
Thomas, D. C., & Ravlin, E. C. 1995. Responses of employees to cultural adaptation by a foreign manager. Journal of Applied Psychology, 80: 133–146.
Van Knippenberg, B. 2005. Leader self-sacrifice and leadership effectiveness: The moderating role of leader prototypicality. Journal of Applied Psychology, 90: 25–37.
