The Janus face of paternalistic leaders: Authoritarianism, benevolence, subordinates' organization-based self-esteem, and performance

• Published in: Journal of organizational behavior Vol. 34; no. 1; pp. 108 - 128
• Main Authors: Chan, Simon C. H., Huang, Xu, Snape, Ed, Lam, Catherine K.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Chichester, UK John Wiley & Sons, Ltd 01.01.2013; John Wiley & Sons; Wiley Periodicals Inc
• Subjects: Authoritarianism; Benevolence; Employee management relations; Human performance; Job performance; Leadership; organization-based self-esteem; Organizational behavior; Personality psychology; Psychology; Self esteem; Selfesteem; Social psychology; Statistical models; Studies; Subordinate personnel; Subordinates; Task performance; China
• ISSN: 0894-3796; 1099-1379
• DOI: 10.1002/job.1797

We investigated how the two components of paternalistic leadership, namely authoritarianism and benevolence, jointly influenced work performance through their impacts on organization-based self-esteem (OBSE). Using a sample of 686 supervisor—subordinate dyads collected from a manufacturing firm in the People's Republic of China, we found that OBSE mediated the negative relationship between authoritarian leadership on one hand and subordinate task performance and organizational citizenship behavior toward the organization (OCBO) on the other. We also found that the negative effect of authoritarian leadership on subordinate OBSE, task performance, and OCBO was weaker when supervisors exhibited higher levels of leader benevolence. Also, OBSE mediated the joint effect of authoritarian leadership and benevolent leadership on subordinate task performance and OCBO.