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Does Perceived Societal Impact Moderate the Effect of Transformational Leadership on Value Congruence? Evidence from a Field Experiment
Author(s) -
Jensen Ulrich Thy
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
public administration review
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.721
H-Index - 139
eISSN - 1540-6210
pISSN - 0033-3352
DOI - 10.1111/puar.12852
Subject(s) - transformational leadership , congruence (geometry) , psychology , social psychology , value (mathematics) , public service motivation , public service , empirical research , argument (complex analysis) , structural equation modeling , public relations , political science , public sector , philosophy , biochemistry , chemistry , epistemology , machine learning , computer science , law , statistics , mathematics
Transformational leadership, it is argued, aligns employees' values with those of their organization. Empirical research has found a positive relationship between transformational leadership and value congruence. Yet studies rely predominantly on cross‐sectional research designs that limit causal conclusions and have not uncovered the potential contextual conditions of this argument. This article argues that transformational leadership positively affects value congruence in public service organizations, but only when employees see that their jobs impact the well‐being of other people and society. To test the relationship between transformational leadership and value congruence and the moderating effect of perceived societal impact, the article combines a field experiment on 79 managers of public service organizations and a balanced survey panel of their 583 employees. Consistent with the expectation, results indicate heterogeneous treatment effects, implying that employees' perceived societal impact is important to consider when transformational leaders strive to align the values of individual employees and the organization .