Towards Enhancing Leadership Styles and Skills through Organization Development Intervention to Increase Employee Engagement

Abstract

Today’s successful organizations depend on capable and efficient leadership to guide them through unprecedented changes. The quality of leadership can increase organizational performance as shown by some research underscoring the solid linkage between employee engagement and organizational performance. This study focuses on one of the leading financial service companies in Bangkok. Specifically, it looks at employee engagement – and disengagement – and at the factors impacting it and seeks to determine which leadership styles are the most appropriate to positively impact employee engagement. Correlation analysis and analysis of variance techniques were employed to determine the relationship between leadership styles and skills and employee engagement; two strengtheners of an organization’s human sales force capabilities. Data was collected from a sample of 321 managers and employees in a financial service company in Thailand. On the basis of the findings, it can be concluded that the application of transformational and transactional leadership skills along with the positive change approach of Whole Brain Literacy, Appreciative Inquiry and Appreciative Coaching combined to induce managers to positively engage their employees. By implementing the appropriate leadership styles and skills, managers can achieve a high level of employee engagement.