Leadership Styles and Employee Performance: Theoretical Perspectives and Research Trends
Keywords:
Leadership Styles, Employee Performance, Transformational Leadership, Employee Engagement, Adaptive LeadershipAbstract
Leadership style plays a significant role in shaping employee attitudes, behaviours and performance within contemporary organisations. This review examines the theoretical perspectives and emerging research trends concerning the relationship between leadership styles and employee performance. The discussion focuses primarily on transformational, transactional, servant, authentic, situational and passive leadership approaches and the mechanisms through which they influence employee outcomes. The review highlights motivation, employee engagement, empowerment, organisational culture, communication and organisational support as important mechanisms connecting leadership with performance. It further identifies organisational culture, work environment, industry characteristics and national context as important factors influencing leadership effectiveness. Recent research trends indicate growing interest in adaptive, shared, distributed and digitally oriented leadership approaches. Overall, the review suggests that leadership effectiveness is context-dependent and that employee-centred and adaptive approaches are increasingly important for improving performance in changing organisational environments.
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