Environmentally specific empowering leadership and organisational citizenship behaviour in the workplace :a study of hotel employees in Gauteng Province, South Africa

Abstract

As there are increasing concerns over climate change, resource depletion, and environmental degradation, there is a growing need for organisations to adopt sustainable practices and behaviours to mitigate their impact on the environment. Environmentally specific empowering leadership (green empowering leadership), characterised by leaders who empower their employees to engage in sustainable practices, can serve as a catalyst for promoting organisational citizenship behaviour for the environment (OCBE) among employees. Leaders who prioritise environmental sustainability, provide support and resources for sustainable initiatives, and involve employees in decision-making processes related to sustainability, can inspire and motivate employees to adopt environmentally friendly behaviours and contribute to the organisation's environmental goals. By engaging in environmentally responsible behaviours, such as energy conservation and waste reduction, and promoting sustainable practices, employees can contribute to reducing the organisation's ecological footprint and fostering a culture of environmental responsibility. Therefore, green transformational leadership, environment-specific servant leadership, and OCBE have received considerable theoretical and empirical attention; however, the impact of Environmentally specific empowering leadership in encouraging sustainability-oriented behaviour has received less theoretical and empirical attention. To explicitly address this gap, this study examines the role played by leadership, organisational factors, and the OCBE of employees and co-employees in hospitality firms. The study provides a comprehensive understanding of the relationships between green empowering leadership, mediating variables, moderating variables, and OCBE within the hospitality industry. The sampling procedure involved selecting a representative sample of mid-level managers in various three-, four- and five-star hotels to ensure the generalisability of the study’s findings. A convenience and purposive sampling technique was employed, and data collection was conducted through the distribution of structured questionnaires to the selected sample of mid-level managers. The questionnaire was designed based on established measurement scales from previous literature and was validated through pilot testing to ensure reliability and validity. The data was collected across the Tshwane and Johannesburg municipalities from 525 participants. The collected data was entered into statistical analysis software for PLS-SEM analysis (Smart-PLS 4.0), which involved assessing the measurement model to ensure the reliability and validity of the constructs and then testing the structural model to examine the hypothesised relationships among the variables. The study utilised bootstrapping techniques to estimate the significance of direct and indirect effects in the model and assessed the overall fit of the research hypotheses. The empirical findings of this study demonstrate that there is a significant positive relationship between green empowering leadership (GEL) and OCBE of hotels. The study further shows that the relationship between GEL and OCBE is partially mediated by a green organisational culture (GOC), green learning orientation (GLO), employees’ psychological ownership (EPO) and green work engagement (GWE). The relationship is also moderated by environmental concern (EC) at an average weight. The contributions of this study are that it unravels GEL as a unidimensional construct and the effect it has on OCBE. The second contribution was assessing the roles of mediating and moderating variables that influence the GEL-OCBE. This study fills a gap in the literature by exploring external business variables mediating and moderating the relationship between GEL and OCBE. It also contributes to the discussion on the contradictory results regarding the relationship between GEL and OCBE. The theoretical contribution focuses on uncovering the mechanisms through which environmentally specific empowering leadership influenced employees' engagement in environmentally sustainable practices. The findings offer valuable insights into how organisational practices and employees’ perceptions contribute to fostering a culture of environmental responsibility within hospitality firms. Moreover, the study reveals that environmental concern, such as a moderating variable, adds an overview understanding of the complexities surrounding sustainable leadership and employees' environmental behaviours. Considering the importance of Environmentally specific empowering leadership in driving employees' environmental behaviours and attitudes, the study offers a practical implication for hospitality firms looking to enhance their sustainability efforts. The findings of this research inform leadership practices, organisational culture development, and employees’ engagement strategies aimed at promoting environmental responsibility and sustainability within the hospitality industry. The policy contribution focuses on environmentally specific empowering leadership within the hospitality industry, a context that has not been extensively studied in relation to sustainable leadership practices. The unique challenges and opportunities within the hospitality sector, such as resource-intensive operations and high consumer demand for sustainability, make the exploration of environmentally specific empowering leadership especially relevant and significant for policymakers, industry practitioners, and scholars.