Empathic organizational culture and leadership: conceptualizing the framework

Abstract

Purpose This paper aims to conceptualize and discuss empathic organizational culture and leadership along with organizational implications. Design/methodology/approach The authors reviewed literature to conceptualize empathic organizational culture and leadership. They referred to Hofstede’s organizational culture concept and studies on empathy to explore how leader–follower relationships are influenced by a leader’s empathic disposition. Findings Organizational leadership is instrumental in shaping employee performance. While work design, culture, peer support and resource accessibility are discernible, leadership style, control and others are covert. Leaders’ empathic attitudes and dispositions can positively influence organizational functions for improved performance. This review suggests that organizational culture should support growth, proper functioning and effective coordination between employees for improved organizational effectiveness. Research limitations/implications The authors conducted searches in leadership and management journals to help conceptualize leaders’ empathic disposition. Future researchers may explore other bodies of literature and the cultural demographic differences in exhibiting empathic leadership and its effectiveness. Researchers can explore how empathic culture relates to job motivation, satisfaction and commitment. The authors suggest that future research may explore how employees’ and supervisors’ behaviors and interactions can create an empathic organizational culture. Practical implications The authors identify the characteristics in an empathic leader to articulate the role of empathy in leadership. Alignment between person, group norms and organizational values is more important than the existence of culture. Originality/value Empathy is studied by researchers from various disciplines. Similarly, employee well-being has received attention from organizational researchers from many fields. However, researchers have given inadequate attention to conceptualizing an empathic organizational culture and its interrelationship with leadership. The authors offer a more positive perspective to the leader-member exchange (LMX) research by describing how leaders can sustain positive relationships with employees rather than the purely transactional exchanges that characterize LMX.

The Role of Empathic Communication in the Relationship between Servant Leadership and Workplace Loneliness: A Serial Mediation Model

“…The results suggested that leaders' empathic communication mediates the relationship between servant leadership and followers' workplace loneliness, and servant leadership can indirectly ease followers' loneliness experience. This finding further supports the effectiveness of empathy in leadership and the fact that a leader's empathy positively predicts followers' well-being [80].…”

“…As an interpersonal helping strategy, empathy fosters positive leader-follower relationships and high-quality LMX [80,81]. Followers perceive servant leadership as possessing strong empathy [82], which may explain servant leaders' sensitivity to followers' needs [50].…”

Influence of quality of work life on psychological capital of organizational leaders using artificial neural networks: a study on learning in hybrid workplace

“…Optimism refers to a positive outlook on the future, while resilience reflects an individual’s ability to bounce back from adversity (Luthans, Avolio, Avey, & Norman, 2007c, Luthans, Avey, Avolio, Norman, & Combs, 2006, Luthans, Avey, & Patera, 2008, Luthans, Youssef, & Avolio, 2007b; Magnano, Craparo, & Paolillo, 2016). PsyCap has been found to have a positive association with favorable attitudes, behaviors, actions, effectiveness and mental and emotional well-being of staff members, as well as a potential conflict with skepticism, intentions to turn over and employee absenteeism (Arghode, Lathan, Alagaraja, Rajaram, & McLean, 2021; Darr & Johns, 2008; Kim, 2019; Riasudeen & Singh, 2021; Tanjung, Syahrizal, & Abror, 2021). Research has also shown that PsyCap is positively related to employee well-being, job satisfaction and work engagement (Luthans et al, 2015; Nair et al, 2022).…”

Improvement of Employee Performance at One Stop Administration Services (SAMSAT) Office in Takalar Regency Through Leadership and Employee Training and Motivation as Mediation Variable

“…In this research, it can be concluded that education and training have a positive and significant effect on work motivation (Elliott). Then study conducted by Arghode (2022), based on the research results, concluded that training has a positive and significant effect on work motivation (Arghode 2022).…”

“…The results of this study also support the results of previous research that leadership influences employee performance (Elqadri 2015). Furthermore, research conducted by Arghode (2022), based on the study results, can be concluded that it influences employee performance (Arghode 2022). Then the research was undertaken by Grossman 2014); based on the study results, it can be concluded that there is a leadership influence on employee performance (Grossman 2014).…”