When relational transparency backfires: examining the various impacts of authentic leadership on employee trust during the COVID-19 pandemic

Abstract

PurposeThis study examines how the different attributes of authentic leadership influence trust and employee organization fit and how such influences differ by gender and the level of positions during the COVID-19 pandemic.Design/methodology/approachThe study employed a survey to examine US employees' perceptions toward different attributes of authentic leadership during the COVID-19 pandemic.FindingsThe study showed that self-awareness, balanced processing and internalized moral perspective positively relate to trust in the employer, mediated through employee–organization fit. However, relational transparency has a backfiring effect, negatively related to trust through the mediation of employee–organization fit. Additionally, this study highlights the differences in gender and level of positions in reactions to authentic leadership.Originality/valueThis study contributes to the understanding of internal public relations in a turbulent crisis time by proposing a mediated model that explains the effects of authentic leadership on employees' trust through their fit with the organization. Additionally, it identified that gender and position level are important factors moderating such effects.

Editorial 29.2: Inclusivity and innovation

“…In the past three years, CCIJ has increased the publication of EDI/DEI topics by publishing works in a wider area of equality such as gender quotas (Lefley and Janecek, 2023, Hamplová et al , 2022), female journalists and their leadership experiences (Cunha and Lúcio Martins, 2023), female empowerment and internal communication (Li et al ., 2023), gender and the office culture (Polić and Holy, 2021; Tripathi et al ., 2023), femvertising (Lima and Casais, 2021), gender and leadership (Zeler et al ., 2022; Zheng et al ., 2023, Meng and Neill, 2023), CSA and gender equality (Marschlich and Bernet, 2024), JEDI issues and media irresponsibility (Painter and Sahm, 2023), CSR and gender (Painter et al ., 2022), and these are just articles published during my editorship and excluding some special issue articles. Therefore, CCIJ is emerging as a journal that increasingly publishes equality scholarship in corporate communication, contributing towards knowledge creation in this field as well as widening participation and bringing inclusivity to scholarship by opening doors to equality scholars in corporate communication.…”

Guest editorial: Shifting role and challenges of internal communication in an age of workplace turbulence/disruption

“…Zheng, Q. et al, When relational transparency backfires: examining the various impacts of authentic leadership on employee trust during the COVID-19 pandemic Zheng et al (2024) conducted an online survey with USA employees to examine the influence of attributes associated with authentic leadership during the COVID-19 pandemic. Through structural equation modeling, they found that self-awareness, balanced processing and internalized moral perspective can positively affect employee-organization fit, and both selfawareness and balanced processing are significantly associated with trust in the employer.…”