The Mechanism Of Charismatic Leadership Behavior Inlfuencing Subordinates’ Work Engagement Based On Social Identity Theory

According to theories of charismatic leadership and transformational leadership,the effectiveness of leader style would be impacted by subordinates’ identificationwith their leader and work-group. The charismatic leadership theory of Conger andKanungo(1998) emphasized personal identification as a central mechanism throughwhich charismatic leaders influence their followers. Thus, it could be seen thatidentification played an important role in effectiveness of leaders’ behavior. Therewere many extensive and in-depth foreign studies of identification with leader andorganizational identification. So far some relevant domestic researches results wereobtained, but overall researches of identification with leader and organizationalidentification especially for Chinese were in the initial stage. So, studies onidentification with leader and organizational identification under China culturalcontext had significantly theoretical and practical meanings.On the basis of previous theoretical and empirical researches, this study attemptedto investigate the interactive effects among charismatic leadership behavior,identification with leader, organizational identification and work engagement. Then atheoretical model was established. This study paid attention on the process ofcharismatic leadership behavior influencing on employees’ work engagement.Seeingfrom the angle of social identification theory, the purpose of this study was trying toexplore the medium mechanism of identification with leader and organizationalidentification in the above process. Through questionnaire surveys of275employeesfrom several enterprises in China and SPSS statistical analysis (such as descriptionanalysis, correlation analysis, regression analysis and so on), this study concluded thefollowing findings:(1) Charismatic leadership behavior had a positive impact on subordinates’ workengagement;(2) Identification with leader played as an intermediary variable in therelationship between charismatic leadership behavior and subordinates’ workengagement;(3) Organizational identification partially mediated the relationship betweencharismatic leadership and subordinates’ work engagement;(4) Identification with leader partially mediated the relationship betweencharismatic leadership and subordinates’ organizational identification; (5) When demographic variables were different, the effects of charismaticleadership behavior, identification with leader, organizational identification andemotional intelligence would have some differencesFinally, suggestions for improving employees’ work engagement and managers’(or supervisors) charisma in practice were put forward based on the conclusion of thestudy. The main innovation of the research was that two constructs of identification,identification with leader and organizational identification, were selected as mediatingvariables in the process of charismatic leadership behavior influencing on employees’work engagement. Especially, the intermediary role of identification with leader andpartially mediating role of organizational identification were validated. The studyextended applications of social identification theory in Chinese organizationalsituation. Besides, the findings also had some guiding significance in the enterprises’practice.