Leader trustworthy behavior and organizational trust: the role of the immediate manager for cultivating trust

Abstract

Drawing from both trust-building theory and interpersonal trust literature, we investigate how trust between a leader and follower may be leveraged to influence organizational trust. We also explore the mediating mechanisms of this link and test a potential moderator. A cross-sectional, multifoci design was adopted and participants were 201 employees within a public sector organization. Leader trustworthy behavior was found to predict organizational trust, mediated by trustworthiness perceptions and trust in the leader. Support for the boundary condition was found; namely, when leaders were more senior, the relationship between trustworthy behavior and organizational trust was stronger. The findings suggest that leaders can meaningfully influence organizational trust perceptions through the enactment of trustworthy behavior, although the strength of this effect varied as a function of their position.

We Trust You! A Multilevel-Multireferent Model Based on Organizational Trust to Explain Performance

“…Second, although it has been recognized that trust in organizations occurs at multiple levels [ 19 ] and using different referents [ 3 ], there are no clear empirical findings on how trust in organizations operates simultaneously at different levels and with different referents [ 22 ]. The main finding of the current research is that when studying organizational trust simultaneously at the team and organization levels, the same social exchange process occurs at both levels.…”

“…Even more, we used a multilevel-multireferent framework by considering two collective levels of analyses (i.e., organizations and teams) and two referents (i.e., top managers and teammates) simultaneously. Legood et al [ 22 ] stressed the importance of looking at multiple referents of organizational trust simultaneously. This multidimensional point of view enables us to understand the different dynamics of trust at different organizational levels and how they are psychologically working.…”

The impact of group efficacy beliefs and transformational leadership on followers’ self-efficacy: a multilevel-longitudinal study

“…In this regard, leaders' behaviours influence cognitions, emotions, and behaviours of followers. Leggod, Thomas and Sacramento (2016) recently showed that leaders' trustworthy behaviour influenced organizational trust via trustworthiness perceptions and followers' trust in their leaders. Research suggests that a positive leadership style may exert its influence on followers through other psychological mechanisms such as self-efficacy (Stetz, Stetz, & Bliese, 2006).…”

Fostering Employee Trust via Effective Supervisory Communication during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Through the Lens of Motivating Language Theory

“…In internal communication literature, leadership communication has been widely recognized as an important factor that affects employee attitude and behavior given supervisory day-to-day interactions and communications with employees ( Van Quaquebeke & Felps, 2018 ). Supervisors are arguably the most trustworthy source of information for employees ( Legood et al, 2016 ; Men & Bowen, 2017 ; Whitener et al, 1998 ). During turbulent such as the COVID-19 pandemic, the role of supervisory communication is perceived to be even more crucial as employees expect to hear from their direct managers information that can ease concerns about uncertainties ( Skiba & Wildman, 2019 ) and receive clear guidance to help them to navigate disrupted work routines.…”