Impact of Leadership Styles on Employee Performance

Impact of Leadership Styles on Employee Performance
Employee performance is a critical factor that influences organizational success. The study seeks to provide insights into the association between leadership styles and employee performance. The problem statement section describes the problem and the gap that informs the focus of the study based on the existing literature. Based on the identified problem and gap, the purpose is described in the problem statement section. The research question that will guide the assessment is also identified and the relevant literature described in the annotated bibliography.
Part 1
Problem Statement
The problem is that among managers and employees of frontline teams in customer-centric work environments, there is limited understanding of how leadership styles influence important constructs of employee performance such as motivation, commitment to work, and engagement as indicated by the gaps within the literature. The phenomenon of interest that informs the highlighted problem statement is employee performance. The focus on employee performance is critical because it determines organizational productivity (Chandani et al., 2016; Turangan et al., 2016; Buil et al., 2019). As noted by Chandani et al. (2016), engaged employees work with passion, which could be vital in customer-centric work environments that rely heavily on frontline staff interaction with internal/external customers, vendors, and stakeholders. Existing evidence suggests that the relationship between leaders and employees could influence employee performance (Paais & Pattiruhu, 2020; Purwanto, 2022).
According to Purwanto (2022) and Chandani et al. (2016), leadership styles that promote employee mentorship, a clear articulation of the organization’s goals, inclusivity, visionary, show commitment and good communication are associated with a high degree of employee engagement. Chandani et al. (2016) based their observations on a qualitative assessment of the secondary data retrieved from existing literature. A quantitative case study carried out by Obasan Kehinde and Hassan Banjo (2014) indicated that unlike the transactional leadership style and laissez-faire leadership style, the transformational leadership style is best suited to promote employee performance. Obasan Kehinde and Hassan Banjo (2014) measured employee performance based on organizational commitment, organizational citizenship behavior and job satisfaction. Based on a qualitative study that involved in-depth interviews with five employees, Turangan et al. (2016) noted that autocratic leadership is associated with the lack of motivation and work discipline among employees. However, Turangan et al. (2016) did not report on other forms of leadership styles, which could be because the researchers considered only one organization and a small sample size.
The gap in this study is based on the studies by Chandani et al. (2016) that assessed association between leadership styles and employee performance. The reliance on methodological approaches that are not robust and systematic such as the literature review approaches adopted by Chandani et al. (2016) limits the making of meaningful conclusions. My study will fill the gap by exploring the experiences of managers and employees of frontline teams in a customer-centric work environment regarding how leadership style influences employee performance. Chandani et al. (2016) indicated that leadership approaches are the key drivers of employee engagement, but their conclusions were not based on the perspective of managers and employees.
Part 2
A. Purpose Statement
The purpose of this qualitative phenomenological study is to explore how leadership styles influence the aspects of employee performance including motivation, commitment to work, and engagement based on the experiences of managers and employees of frontline teams in a customer-centric work environment. The researcher seeks to understand how managers and employees of frontline teams describe the leadership styles adopted by frontline managers and the influence that such leadership styles have on employee performance.
Epistemology refers to a philosophical stance that guides the understanding and explanation of the approach of knowing what is known (Crotty, 2003). Constructivist epistemological stance indicates that meaning is constructed based on human interactions with their world (Schwandt, 1994; Antipina, 2019). Constructivist was adopted as the preferred epistemological stance because the research seeks to assess how leadership style influences employee performance based on the meaning constructed by the managers and employees of frontline teams from their experiences. Secondly, the researcher will not seek to determine what true or valid but instead will let various meanings emerge from the participants’ constructions. Ontology refers to the study of being or “the nature of reality” (Guba & Lincoln, 1989, p.83). Constructivist approach is based on the ontological assumption that the world being researched is occupied by individuals with varying thoughts, and meanings (Schwandt, 1994). Given that this study seeks to understand how managers and employees of frontline teams make meaning regarding the how leadership style influences employee performance based on their experiences, it fits within the constructivist ontology. Although the researcher occupies the outsider position because of the lack of experience working in customer-centric work environments, extensive reading of relevant literature has helped him develop some insights about the topic. However, the researcher will not rely on his experiences or prior knowledge and will use bracketing to limit bias. Bracketing facilitates the identification of preconceptions and helps the researcher acts non-judgmentally (McNarry et al., 2019; Shufutinsky, 2020). To address the highlighted research purpose, the research will use semi-structured interviews and focus groups to collect data from a selected call center.
B. Research Question
The following research question will guide the study.
What are the experiences of managers and employees of frontline teams in a customer-centric work environment regarding how leadership style influences employee performance?
C. Implication for Social Change
As leaders consider their positions of influence and responsibility to social change, it is important to determine how leadership models can effect change to encourage a shift in paradigm regarding how employees Think, Act, and Do. The concept of Social Change Leadership Model (SCM) approaches leadership as a purposeful, collaborative, values-based process that results in positive social change. According to Crawford et al. (2000), Social Change Leadership Theory (SCLT) focuses on what, how and why of leadership. It is about creating change – personal, organizational, and societal. It promotes the development of social change agents who address and solve community problems. The theory has three foundational principles: creating change, collaboration, and civic leadership. SCLT advocates contend that leadership is not what leaders do; rather leadership is what followers and leaders do together for the common good.
It is expected that the insights from the outcome of the study will help managers in frontline teams in a customer-centric work environment to understand and possibly adopt suitable leadership styles. By leaders adopting such styles, it is expected employees will enjoy their work and experience enhanced job satisfaction. The outcome of the study is also expected to positively impact organization effectiveness and productivity, as a result of employees’ willingness to perform better based on levels of leadership engagement, support, and mentorship to cultivate meaningful work relationships aligned with its mission.
Part 3: Results
A. Data Sources
The data sources will include semi-structured interviews and focus group discussion. The use of semi-structured interviews and focus group discussion will allow the obtaining of lived experiences of the managers and employees of frontline teams needed to explore how leadership style influences employee performance. Therefore, use of semi-structured interviews and focus group aligns with constructivist epistemological stance (Schwandt, 1994; Antipina, 2019). The semi-structured interviews and focus group discussion will be accomplished using the face-to-face interviews facilitated by zoom video conferencing. The researcher will develop semi-structured interview protocol with open ended that will guide the interview with individual participants. It is expected that 10-20 participants will take part in the semi-structured interviews. The focus group discussion will involve 5-7 participants and researcher will act as the moderator. The data collected from the semi-structured interviews and focus group discussion will include the demographic information and data that address the research question.
B. Instrumentation
The instrument that will be used will be a semi-structured interview protocol. The instrument will consist of semi-structured questions, which allow the researcher to ask predetermined questions relevant to the proposed study’s research question. The questions will be open-ended allowing the participants to exhaustively respond based on their experiences (Gill & Baillie, 2018). Follow-up questions will be incorporated to the protocol and used to prompt the participants to provided additional responses and insights. For the focus group discussion, open ended questions that will prompt discussion will be used. Unlike the semi-structured interviews, where the questions contained in the protocol will guide the entire interaction between the researcher and the participants, focus group discussion will allow participants to ask each other questions (Gill & Baillie, 2018). The semi-structured interview protocol and the open-ended questions used in the focus group discussion will be developed by the researcher. To enhance the credibility of the questions, the researcher will rely on the literature and expert opinion. The instruments will also be pilot tested (Gani et al., 2020).
C. Data Analysis
The data will be analyzed using thematic data analysis approach guided the recommendation provided by Williams and Moser (2019). First the recorded data will be transcribed verbatim and member checking used to ensure credibility of the transcription process. The codes will then be identified and aggregated to form themes.

Part 4: Trustworthiness
A. Credibility
Credibility refers to the features of the qualitative study that ensures that the research is believable (Amin et al. 2020; Kyngäs et al., 2020). The steps that will be taken to ensure credibility include member checking where the transcribed interviews will be checked by the participants to determine correctness. Triangulation will also be adopted where the research will rely on multiple data sources (interviews and focus groups).
B. Transferability
Transferability refers to the degree to which the research can be transferred to other contexts or settings (Amin et al. 2020). The researcher will use thick description to enhance the transferability of the research. Thick description refers to the detailed description of the methodological procedures and analysis of the data (Amin et al. 2020). The researcher will document detailed account of the interaction with the participants and the steps involved in the handling and analysis of the data.
C. Dependability strategies
Dependability to the degree to which results obtained from the qualitative study can be reproduced (Amin et al. 2020). To enhance the dependability of the research, audit trails will be provided. Audit trails refers to the transparent and comprehensive explanation of the steps followed from the beginning of the research project to the reporting of findings (Carcary, 2020). Dependability will also be achieved through consistency during the interview process by using an interview protocol.
D. Confirmability
Confirmability refers to the degree to which the results of qualitative study could be corroborated by other researchers (Kyngäs et al., 2020). Audit trails will be used to enhance confirmability. Additionally, bracketing will be used. Bracketing is important in qualitative research because it helps the researcher to identify personal bias and subjectivities, which enhances trustworthy interpretation of findings (Weatherford & Maitra, 2019).
Conclusion
The proposed study will to explore how leadership styles influence the aspects of employee performance including motivation, commitment to work, and engagement based on the experiences of managers and employees of frontline teams in a customer-centric work environment. The study will rely on qualitative phenomenological approach guided by constructivist epistemological stance. Data will be collected from managers and employees of frontline teams using semi-structured interviews and focus group discussion. The data collection instruments used will be semi-structured interview protocol and the open-ended questions. Data will be analyzed using thematic data analysis. Throughout the study, various steps will be taken to ensure trustworthiness by promoting credibility, transferability, dependability, and confirmability.
 
Annotated Bibliography
Chandani, A., Mehta, M., Mall, A., & Khokhar, V. (2016). Employee engagement: A review paper on factors affecting employee engagement. Indian Journal of Science and Technology, 9(15), 1-7.
The first article was authored by Chandani et al. (2016). The article provides insights into the influence of leadership styles on employee performance by focusing on engagement construct. The article focused on the identification of the factors that influence employee engagement and the resulting effects on performance. Based on the assessment of the secondary data retrieved from existing literature, the researchers defined employee engagement as the degree to which an employee achieves the expected task results, remains in the organization and acts as an ambassador of the organization. The article categorized the varying degrees of employee engagement as follows: engaged (high degree of engagement), not engaged (low degree of engagement) or disengaged (unhappy and showing no attributes of engagement). Chandani et al. (2016) also identified various aspects of leadership styles that could influence the degree of engagement among employees. According to the article, leadership styles that focus on employee mentorship and articulation of vision enhance employee engagement. The article also noted that leadership styles that embrace inclusivity and visionary approaches are associated with engaged employees. Chandani et al. (2016) also reported that leadership styles characterized by commitment and good communication between leaders and employees are associated with a high degree of employee engagement. Although Chandani et al. (2016) provided in-depth insights into the influence of leadership styles on employee engagement, it is not possible to determine whether the methodological approaches used in the collection of data were quality, robust and systematic.

Obasan Kehinde, A., & Hassan Banjo, A. (2014). A test of the impact of leadership styles on employee performance: A study of department of petroleum resources. International Journal of Management Sciences, 2(3), 149-160.
The second article was authored by Obasan Kehinde and Hassan Banjo (2014). The researchers sought to identify the effect of three forms of leadership styles (transformational, transactional and laissez-faire leadership styles) on employee performance. Obasan Kehinde and Hassan Banjo (2014) measured employee performance based on organizational commitment, organizational citizenship behavior and job satisfaction. The researchers defined transformational leaders as those who focus on motivating employees to go above and beyond the set expectations. The transactional leadership style was defined as one that is characterized by rewarding employees with valued outcomes as a result of acting according to the leader’s wishes. The laissez-faire leadership style was defined as one where leaders do not take any action to motivate or recognize employees. Based on a quantitative case study approach that involved the collection of data using questionnaires from 100 stratified randomly selected participants, the researchers noted that the assessed leadership styles significantly influence the performance of employees. According to Obasan Kehinde and Hassan Banjo (2014), the transformational leadership style is best suited to promote employee performance. However transactional leadership style and laissez-faire leadership style were associated with reduced organizational commitment, job involvement, and organizational citizenship behavior. It should however be noted that the use of the quantitative approaches in this study limited the access to contextual information and in-depth insights that could otherwise be obtained using qualitative approaches.

Turangan, R. B., Pangemanan, S. S., & Tielung, M. V. (2016). Employee performance analysis through leadership style, motivation & work discipline (at Waroeng Charity Manado). Jurnal EMBA: Jurnal Riset Ekonomi, Manajemen, Bisnis dan Akuntansi, 4(1), 1068-1076.
The third article was authored by Turangan et al. (2016). The researchers assessed how employee performance is influenced by leadership style, motivation, and work discipline.
Turangan et al. (2016) based their study on qualitative methods that involved in-depth interviews with five respondents recruited from a coffee shop. The interviews revealed that the company leaders use an authoritarian leadership style involving the total control of employees where employees have little or no input in decision-making. The interviews also indicated that employees of the company lacked motivation and work discipline. The researchers recommended the need for a good working relationship between leaders and employees in order to enhance employee performance. The researchers further noted that autocratic leadership needs to be reviewed because it does not suit employees.
 

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