Disruption in family life due to despotic leadership and COVID-19: the mediating role of emotional exhaustion

Abstract

PurposeThe fear of COVID-19, being an emerging research variable and a parcel of the ongoing pandemic, has not yet been fully studied with respect to leadership and employee family life. Based on the conservation of resources theory, the current study aims to investigate the relationship between despotic leadership and work-family conflict under the context of fear prevailing due to COVID-19. The paper also highlights the mediating role of emotional exhaustion between the two variables.Design/methodology/approachData were collected in two waves by using a time-lagged design from 225 nurses from hospitals in the Central Punjab region in Pakistan. Analysis was done through process macro in SPSS.FindingsResults showed that despotic leadership is positively related to work-family conflict directly and through emotional exhaustion indirectly. Furthermore, the moderation of fear of COVID-19 has also been noted such that its increase strengthened the direct as well as the indirect relationship between despotic leadership and work-family conflict.Originality/valueDuring the days of COVID-19, the pandemic posed a strong threat to employees' family lives, especially in the presence of despotic leaders at the workplace. Amidst the widespread fear and harmful effects of COVID-19 on economies and organizations, this study provides novel implications for policymakers, researchers and practitioners for mitigating the impact of despotic leadership on employees' family lives.

A bitter pill to swallow: the model of despotic leadership, bullying behavior, emotional intelligence and well-being

“…Chaudhary and Islam (2022 b) noted that almost 95% of nurses encountered negative leadership styles at work including despotic leadership; as a result, 75% of the workforce engage in bullying behavior (Syed et al, 2020). Nevertheless, there is still a need to comprehend how negative leadership affects nurses' well-being in Pakistan (Rafiq et al, 2022). Thus, this study extends the literature by identifying the most common and unreported negative behaviors of nurse leaders such as despotic (Pishgooie et al, 2019).…”

“…It was observed that fear of COVID-19 has significantly impacted mental health and well-being over the previous three years T E D (Xing et al, 2020). However, the employees of the health-care industry experienced worst crisis during COVID-19 pandemic (Rafiq et al, 2022) as compared to any other industry, especially nurses. Nurses were required to work closely with COVID-19 patients (Sarwar et al, 2020).…”

Does workplace ostracism negatively affect family life during a pandemic?

“…The age and gender of the respondents were utilized as control variables taking the lead from earlier similar studies (e.g. Rafiq et al ., 2022; Sarwar et al. , 2022b) to ensure that the relations between the variables and overall results were not confounded.…”

“…Moreover, we have collected time-lagged data in two waves following the footsteps of similar previous studies (Rafiq et al, 2022;Sarwar et al, 2022b), however, future researchers are suggested to use 3 waved data collection to further reduce any chances of bias in data. Similarly, future studies may use key control variables other than demographic variables in order to further reduce the confounding effects on the tested relationships.…”

“…Throughout human history, there have been numerous pandemics (Callegari and Feder, 2022). Research has shown that these pandemics can lead to many issues among workers, impacting their engagement, job satisfaction (Sutarto et al, 2021), performance (Sarwar et al, 2022b) and work-family balance (Rafiq et al, 2022) and may necessitate remote work, or changes in job roles, which can affect collaboration, communication, and team cohesion (Yang et al, 2022). Research in this area can lead to the implementation of evidence-based policies and guidelines to safeguard workers and prevent the spread of infectious diseases (Sarwar et al, 2022b).…”