The Power of Productive Organizational Energy

The Power of Productive Organizational Energy

The Power of Productive Organisational Energy

Zeyad Abualhamael, Linda Alker1, Rosane Pagano2 and Ben Lupton3.

Department of Management, Business School- Manchester MetropolitanUniversity, All Saints Campus, Oxford Road, Manchester M15 6BH. 1,3Department of Management, Business School, Manchester MetropolitanUniversity, All Saints Campus, Oxford Road, Manchester M15 6BH. 2Department of Marketing, Operations and Digital Business, Business School, Manchester MetropolitanUniversity, All Saints Campus, Oxford Road, Manchester M15 6BH.

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Paper type Working paper

Abstract

Purpose – This paper reports the research design of a study inexamining the relationship between Leadership style, Productive Organisational Energy and Employee Performance. in the context of Saudi Arabia.

Design/methodology/approach – The present research is completely based on the quantitative approach towards research .A theoretical framework will be assessed in an empirical study in Saudi Arabia, to examine the impact of Leadership style on Employee Performance and the mediating role played by the productive organisational energy as observed in the relation between leadership style and employee performance.The data for the research would be collected from the employees of two educational institutions in Saudi Arabia with the help of a questionnaire.

Findings – This paper takes a conceptual approach as it presents the initial stage of the author’s study, by providing the main aim and presenting the theoretical framework.

Practical implications – The research focuses on thesubject of modern leadership styles, and Productive organisational energy, and shows their relevance to the Saudi educational system and business environment. The study offers significance for practical purposes, as it can benefit organizations in identifying their need of specific leadership style order to boost their employees’ energy. Organizations can understand the significance of Productive organizational energy, which will lead to higher performance of employee’s in different corporations.

Originality/value – The relationship between leadership style, Productive energy and Employee performance is explored theoretically and will be tested empirically in a Saudi Arabian context.

KeywordsLeadership Style, Employee Performance,Productive Organisational Energy, Saudi Arabia

Paper typeWorking paper

Introduction

Due to the increase in globalization and competition in organizations it has become extremely important for companies to focus on the enhancement of its employees’ performance and outcomes. Large numbers of management studies are focusing on the evolution of leadership theories and approaches to insure that the people-oriented behaviours and attitudes are managed effectively within the organisation. Not just that but also, researchers focused on examining the impact of leadership styles onemployees’ knowledge sharing and commitment (Yammarino et al. 1993; Xenikou and Simosi, 2006; Lin, 2013). Today, the awarenessof the researchers that the emotions, behaviors and thoughts of subordinates play a major role in shaping the actions of employees in the workplace and has resulted in increased scrutiny of the effects that positive psychological states can have in the workplace (Bruch & Ghoshal, 2003; Bruch & Vogel, 2011; Cameron Dutton and Quinn, 2003, Cole, Bruch & Vogel, 2012; Luthans & Avolio, 2009). The concept of energy becomes a valuable tool to gain a deeper understanding of how organizations can reach their full potential. There is some evidence to indicate that organizational energy can yield various benefits for individuals and organizations.The incorporation of the construct of productive organisational energy that include emotional, cognitive and even behavioural potentials of the employees and hence helps in providing a more comprehensive review of the behaviour of the employees. Looking at the organization and organizational behavior from this perspective, the author aims at examining whetherthe leadership style is the art of orchestrating energy in organizations.

In 1932, Saudi Arabia started their educational program that consists of 700 students and 12 small schools. The future of the educational system changed significantly after the discovery of the oil in 1938. By 1954, the Ministry of Education was established with reaching over 42,000 students in 365 different schools and since then the number has been increasing and developing. Despite the fact that the budget of the ministry of education increased dramatically, the education management system and especially the public higher education sector is struggling to overcome many issues. The main obstacle in public universities is bureaucracy with no clear venue for changes towards employees’ development. Due to the lack of motivation systems and discrimination of incentives and salaries the quality of teaching declined. The need formotivation and satisfaction is noticeable and therefor boosting employees’ energy in such organizations by implementing the right leadership style would benefit the whole system and increase the employee’s performance.

As per the knowledge of the author, there exists no study in the literature that focuses on the examination of the impact of leadership style and productive organisational energy on employee performance and hence the present research can add a new dimension and new findings that can be of practical relevance to the organisations as well as managers. While it is extremely important to understand the meaning of the constructs being used for evaluation, the originality of the research lies in the fact that it tries to not only link both these constructs but also tries to understand the cause and effect.

Research Aim and Theoretical Framework

The primary aim of the study is to examine the impact of top management leadership style i.e. Transformational and Transactionalas perceived by subordinated on their performance. The study also helps in demonstrating the mediating role played by the productive organisational energy as observed in the relation between leadership style and employee performance as explained in the figure below.

Figure 1: Research Conceptual Framework

Literature Review

Productive Organisational Energy

Productive energy refers to an energetic situation within an organization or a team that leads to higher productivity among the employees. However, it is important to analyze the productivity in terms of energy because it demonstrates the enthusiasm and willingness of the employees to be productive and exhibit better results and outcomes. Bruch and Ghoshal (2004) defined organizational energy as a collective approach of the organization, wherein the emotional, cognitive as well as behavioral potentials are mobilized in order to achieve the goals and objectives. The authors suggest that organizational energy becomes productive energy only when the quality and intensity of energy both are very high. Only when these conditions are satisfied do the employees are found to exhibit high levels of productive energy. Bruch and Vogel (2011) states that when an organization exhibits productive energy, the positive emotions within the organization are very intense and other characteristics like high alertness and the more effective sharing of goals and knowledge are also observed.

Bruch and Ghoshal (2003) have explained the concept of productive organisational energy and stated that the concept is extremely important for understanding the tools and methods that help organizations in reaching their maximum potential and hence is one of the most important aspects and point of focus of the studies that are focused on the study of organizational behaviour and performance. Cole et al. (2005) have explained the meaning of the term and states that the productive organizational energy acts as the fuel that is responsible for the running of a business. According to Cuff and Barkhuizen (2013), organisational energy not only has a positive impact on the overall performance of the organisation, but is also crucial from the point of view of individuals because it contributes to the overall development of an individual’s motivation, health and wellbeing and even creativity and performance.Cross, Baker and Parker (2003) discussed the application and importance of such energy in different fields and have proven that the service industry, including the professional services industries is among the sectors that are majorly impacted by its existence. According to Bruch and Ghoshal (2004), the productive organizational energy combines emotional, cognitive and behavioral aspects of the employees and suggests that all these three aspects work together for higher performance of the employees.

The research presented by Kunze and Bunch (2010) clearly established a correlation between the transformational style of leadership and productive organisational energy. The results demonstrated the existence of a positive and linear correlation between the two factors. Not only did the study establish a relation between productive organisational energy and leadership style, but also proved that the transformational style of leadership acts as a mediator in the productive organisational energy and age-based faultlines relationship (Kunze and Bunch, 2010). The association of productive organizational energy with the performance of employees has been also established by multiple academicians like Martin et al. 2012; Bruch and Vogel (2011); Bunse et al. 2011. Bruch and Vogel (2011) have established that high levels of productive organizational energy generally tend to lead to positive emotions among the employees, thus affecting their performance in a positive manner. Additionally, there are studies (Martin et al. 2012; Bunse et al. 2011) that have established the relationship between productive organisational energy and employee performance and it has been shown that productive organisational energy leads to an enhancement in the overall performance of employees and has been thus chosen as a mediating variable in the present research.

While there are studies that have focused on measurement of productive organisational energy and leadership styles, there are not many research papers that prove the same and hence that is the reason why these constructs are being studied and evaluated in the present paper. However, there is one huge challenge in the study of the concept productive organisational energy and that is the lack of enough literature. Since the concept of productive organisational energy was introduced late, not many studies have provided adequate literature and findings on the same. Hence, the researcher here aims at evaluating the concept and validating the same for the Saudi Arabian context.

Leadership style

Leadership has been one of the most commonly studied and researched subjects in different disciplines. Many researchers claimed that leadership theorists have defined leadership in various aspects of human endeavor such as academics, social works, politics and business (Obiwuru, Okwu, Akpa & Nwankwere, 2011; Paracha et al., 2012).

The concept has evolved and developed over a period of time with its implications defined in the psychological, philosophical and managerial perspectives.

Bass (1985) was among the first researchers who identified transformational and transactional as the two main styles of leadership. Transactional leadership on one hand is related to the lower level developments and leads to the establishment of better relationships and better conversations between the leaders and the subordinates, while transformational leadership on the other hand is required to fulfil the higher level needs by transforming the thoughts and beliefs of the subordinates. A large number of academicians (Sarros and Santora, 2001; Dai et al. 2013; Popper and Zakkai 1994) have focused on the evaluation of the existence and impacts of these styles of leadership in different scenarios. As shown by Paracha et al. (2012), both the styles of leadership, i.e. transformational and transactional lead to a positive impact on the performance of employees by enhancing their job satisfaction. Similar findings have been obtained by Sarros and Santara (2001), who proved that a company needs to adopt the four factors of transformational leadership and two factors of transactional leadership for the establishment of effective leadership.

Gupta et al. (2010) carried out a complete longitudinal study to assess the correlation between leadership and employee performance. The study proved that not only does the leadership of a team affect its performance but also the opposite impact of team’s performance on its leadership is also valid. Hon and Chan (2012) surveyed managers and employees in China that empowering leadership in a team has numerous positive direct, as well as indirect effects. The authors proved that leadership directly enhances the efficacy and performance of employees in the team and indirectly promotes creativity. Further, academicians like Yammarino et al. 1993; Stogdill, 1975; Stone et al. 2004 have proven that leadership has a significant impact on the employees, as well as the overall performance of the organizations. The differences in the existence and implementation of transformational leadership in private and public organizations can be identified on the basis of different studies that are present in the literature. Researchers like Alanzi, Drummond and Bryman (1992) have proven that the private organizations usually demonstrate transformational style, as compared to the public organizations. Even though there are no empirical findings that have established the presence of transformational leadership in private or public organizations, it can be predicted that since the leadership style is correlated to productive organizational energy and the energy levels are high in private organizations, even transformational leadership level would be high.

The Context of Saudi Arabia

Saudi Arabia is a Middle Eastern country, which is located in Southwest Asia and is near the borders of the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf (Al-Rasheed, 2010). The Arabian Peninsula is majorly occupied by the country. However, the exact size of the country cannot be determined accurately because a large portion of its boundaries remains undefined. The approximate size of the country is estimated to be around 2, 149, 690 square kilometers (Al-Rasheed, 2010).

People in Saudi Arabia follow Islam and are usually extremely religious and family oriented in nature. There are also multiple restrictions on the social and cultural conduct of people. According to Al-Rasheed (2010), what is commendable about the country that the country has witnessed significant developments despite the traditional culture and traditions that it follows. The country has witnessed major transformations and developments in its education and work culture (Al-Rasheed, 2010). The country currently houses a large number of universities, schools and colleges, wherein education is open to all and the government provides free books, education and even health services to the students. There are also special schools that have been developed for girls and the government is trying to further develop the overall education system (Albrithen and Briskman, 2014). Even the work culture in the country has been significantly growing and improving because of the entry of large multinational corporations (MNCs). The number of expatriates has been increasing in multiple fields such as IT, oil industry, banking and financial services and construction (Albrithen and Briskman, 2014).

Hence, since the globalization of the country is significantly expanding, leading to the growth and enhancement in the work culture, it is important to evaluate the way different leadership types can contribute to higher growth and development of these companies, not just that but to examine whetherProductive organization energy can stand as a mediator on the relationship between Leadership style and employee performance in the public universities in Saudi Arabia.

Research Methodology

Sample/Participants

The study has chosen public education institutions in Saudi Arabia for research because the country has been identified as the fourth largest country on the basis of movement of students around the world with around 105,000 students. As the literature review has identified, the country has large number of expatriates and is focusing a lot on the development of its education system. Hence, the study would help in identifying the way leadership styles can affect the performance of employees in these organisations for further development. Even the access and convenience of collecting data would be simpler in these institutions, as academics would be more helpful than the practitioners in the research.

The HR managers in the presented educational institutions i.e. Universities were contacted and were given an overview of the purpose of conducting the research and survey. The sample was chosen only after getting an approval and access to contact the people working at different levels of these organizations. Two altered educational organizations have been chosen for the research because these institutions are among the biggest institutions in the country and hence would allow examining the leadership styles and behaviors on the basis of the responses of people with different backgrounds, attitudes, culture and even different personal interests (Drummond and Al-Anazi, 1997; Abdul-Wahab, 1979).

King Abduallah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) has been chosen for research because it is one of the new and modern universities and institutes in the country and hence demonstrates new management and leadership style, which is relevant for the present research. While King Abduallah University of Science and Technology is one of the modern universities, taking a conventional university like King Abdulaziz University (KAAU) would also be helpful for getting a comprehensive overview. KAAU is one of the oldest universities and also has more than 21 faculties, which would assist in carrying out the research easily. The results hence can be generalized for the entire population of public universities in an easier manner.Hence, the use of the chosen sample can be of extreme significance because it will help in contributing to the literature by facilitating organizational studies in the context of Saudi Arabia, a country that has not been researched well.

Data Collection

The data for the research would be gathered via questionnaire instrument. Questionnaires are commonly used for the purpose of data collection because they help in collecting data for a large number of people and provide results that can be easily quantified and analysed further (Rhodes et al. 2003). The study makes use of self-completion questionnaire is being used in the research because it would help in gathering data despite of the existing geographical restrictions and constraints and would help in maintaining the anonymity of the respondents.