The Role of Leadership Styles on Employee Performance, Motivation, and Job Satisfaction in a Remote Setting

Chapter 2: Literature Review

The advent of remote work, accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic, has brought a new dimension to leadership research. Leaders in remote settings face a unique challenge in ensuring that employees remain motivated, productive, and satisfied. Notably, remote work settings are unique because they lack face-to-face communication, which can lead to a lack of trust, communication, and collaboration (Kirkman, Rosen, Gibson, Tesluk, ; McPherson, 2002). In a remote work setting, leaders need to create a sense of community and maintain open communication channels to ensure employee engagement and productivity.
Various authors argue that leadership style is an essential factor that can influence employee behavior, performance, motivation, and job satisfaction in a remote setting (Chen, Liu, ; Zhang, 2020; Goleman, 2000). According to Goleman (2000), there are six leadership styles: coercive, authoritative, affiliative, democratic, pacesetting, and coaching. Each style has a different impact on employee behavior and can be effective in different situations. For instance, a study by Wang and Huang (2020) found that affiliative leadership style positively affected employee job satisfaction in a remote work setting. Similarly, Chen et al. (2020) found that democratic leadership style positively affected employee job satisfaction and motivation in a remote work setting. For the purpose of this research, five leadership styles will be considered, including structural, participative, servant, freedom-thinking, and transformational.
According to Robbins and Judge (2017), Structural leadership is a leadership style that emphasizes strict adherence to rules and regulations. Structural leaders are generally known for their expertise in organizing and developing efficient and effective systems and structures within the organization. Such structures are typically characterized by clear lines of authority, precise job descriptions, and formalized procedures. Research has shown that the structural leadership style has both positive and negative effects on employee performance, motivation, and job satisfaction. On the one hand, the structural leadership style can lead to improved organizational efficiency and productivity. O’Reilly and Chatman (1996) establish that structural leaders often have a clear understanding of the organization’s goals, which allows them to develop processes that enable employees to work more efficiently.
However, on the other hand, structural leaders
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Chapter 3

Amekí Williams
South University
Doctoral Dissertation Preparation
Dr. Widner
1/29/2023

The Role of Leadership Styles on Employee Performance, Motivation, and Job Satisfaction in a Remote Setting

Chapter 3: Methodology

Introduction

The purpose of this quantitative causal-comparative study was for remote workers to identify what leadership style their supervisors or managers are. The chapter included an overview of the research design and rationale, study participants, sampling method and instrumentation, data collection, analysis, and ethical considerations taken in the design. Chapter 3 contains a descriptive discussion of the conduct of this study, and how it informed the problem. The detailed explanation supports future design replication, data collection, and analysis. The description of the population and sample ensured that the reader could understand the research participants. The Multivariate Analysis of Variance (MANOVA) data analysis approach allowed valid and reliable data processing. As described, data analysis procedures, followed ethical practices. The chapter’s discussion on limitations and delimitations expands the discussion in chapter 1.

Research Design

Quantitative Causal Comparative Design

Based on the application of this design in establishing the connection between variables (independent and dependent) (Bloomfield, ; Fisher, 2019), this quantitative casual comparative study is objectified to establish the significance of various leadership styles on employee performance, motivation, and job satisfaction in a remote setting. It is without a doubt that working remotely has been continuously adapted, particularly after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. In correlation to this, it is paramount to have an understanding of the aspects of remote working and what it entails in terms of productivity. As Bloomfield and Fisher (2019) establish, a quantitative casual comparative study supports the comparison of two variables. As such, this study’s selected design will facilitate the comparison of five essential levels of leadership styles commonly associated with working environments in relation to job satisfaction, motivation, and employee satisfaction. With the aid of questionnaires, this study’s research questions will include; 1) whether structural leader rewards and punishes team members based on performance insist on clear goals experiment, 2) whether servant leader listens empathy awareness, 3) whether participative (democratic) leader are open-minded and encourage effective communication, 4) whether freedom-thinking leader give employees freedom to perform and stays out of the way as well as comments and helps when
The Research Proposal: An Explanatory Template for BUS8115 and BUS8120 for Chapters 4 – 5 of the Dissertation

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THE RESEARCH PROPOSAL BUS8115 AND BUS8120

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Abstract

Dedication

Acknowledgements

List of Tables