The roles of servant leadership style, LMX style and leadership effectiveness on employees' engagement in Medina hotels

Abstract

This study investigates the impact of servant leadership, with respect to leader-member exchange (LMX), on leadership effectiveness and employee engagement. This research was conducted in hotels in the city of Medina in Saudi Arabia. As a quantitative study, both probability and non-probability sampling methods were used to select the 220 participants, who were hotel employees from a variety of backgrounds. A survey data collection tool was used alongside a questionnaire, and the data was processed with SPSS software. The findings showed that the servant leadership style places a high value on helping followers instead of trying to align their interests with that of the company. Servant leadership plays a major role in influencing LMX. LMX was identified as a strong mediator of servant leadership. Also, it was found that LMX is an important mediator of follower engagement where leadership effectiveness is positively related to follower engagement.