Spiritual leadership and work engagement: a mediating role of spiritual well-being

Abstract

Purpose – Recently, both researchers and practitioners have been very interested in the impact of leadership on employee engagement. Thus, I aimed to examine the relationship between spiritual leadership and work engagement through the mediating role of spiritual well-being at work. Design/methodology/approach – I assessed spiritual leadership, engagement, and well-being in an empirical study based on a sample of 223 employees. I collected data through a survey-based method and analyzed them using structural equation modeling (SEM). Findings – The present study contributes to the existing knowledge in the leadership field, especially spiritual leadership. The results revealed that spiritual leadership impacts employees’ work engagement by indirectly influencing employees’ spiritual well-being. Research limitations/implications – Theoretically, the findings imply that spiritual well-being can be one of the factors considered in enhancing work engagement through spiritual leadership. Practical implications – Finding evidence that spiritual leadership, like other leadership styles, can foster employee engagement. Therefore, leaders should take care of employees’ spiritual needs. Originality/value – Many researchers have indicated that well-being is associated with employee engagement. However, they overlooked employees’ spiritual well-being in the research. The study confirmed the unexplored mediating role of spiritual well-being between spiritual leadership and employee engagement.