Healthcare workers are concerned for their lives and are looking toward their leaders, hoping to develop and ensure safety measures in the hospitals. In this critical time, the role of leadership cannot be ignored Billings et al. While studies have shown that transformational leadership, inclusive leadership and servant leadership seems to be a suitable leadership style for managing employees working in education sector during this pandemic, there is no evidence on the effectiveness of these leadership styles in hospitals settings and occupational safety offered by these leadership styles Azizaha et al.
There is an urgent need to implement a leadership style that has a prime focus on the occupational safety of employees so that healthcare workers may feel safe in the hospitals while serving the COVID patients Labrague and De los Santos, ; Rosa et al. According to the limited literature available on safety leadership, safety specific transformational leaders are suitable for occupations with higher occupational hazards de Koster et al.
What makes them different from conventional transformational leaders is their extra emphases on employee safety Barling et al. They encourage employees to look for more effective ways of ensuring safety intellectual stimulation , inspire them to achieve safety standards with were considered unattainable in the past inspirational motivation , promote occupational safety as a core value idealized influence , and take a keen interest in the physical and mental well-being of every single employee individual consideration; Barling et al.
We believe that healthcare workers working under safety specific transformational leadership are less likely to develop COVID perceived risk due to all the additional occupationally safety measures taken by their leader. This is particularly true for those healthcare workers who have safety consciousness mainly because they are themselves concerned and mindful about their safety de Koster et al. Safety consciousness is different from consciousness personality trait as it involves awareness about safety rather than general awareness and consciousness.
Safety consciousness research is only limited to those organizations which carries a high risk of occupational hazards Chun et al. Since hospitals dealing with COVID patients also pose occupational hazards to the healthcare workers, it is important to investigate its moderating role in hospitals providing treatment for COVID infection.
Employees with safety consciousness are more careful about their and others' safety while carrying out their routine tasks Lee, ; Khan et al.
Hence, we believe that a safety transformational leader together with safety-conscious employees helps in mitigating COVID perceived risk up to a great extent. The primary rationale for choosing employee perception instead of emotions as an underlying mechanism is the scarcity of research on its antecedents and outcomes and a repeated call for studying it in the context of COVID Lam et al.
COVID perceived risk has recently emerged as an essential factor that is deemed responsible for a wide range of adverse employee outcomes Lam et al. Keeping in view its significance, there has been a repeated call for identifying the antecedents and consequences of COVID perceived risk Bae and Chang, ; Lam et al.
The existing literature available on COVID perceived risk has identified its detrimental outcomes for employees, particularly healthcare workers Gorini et al. According to some studies, it is the root cause behind an increase in mental health issues among healthcare workers and needs immediate attention from occupational health researchers Alsubaie et al. It is crucial to identify factors that can decrease COVID perceived risk among healthcare workers.
We propose that safety specific transformational leadership can significantly reduce COVID perceived risk among healthcare workers due to its focus on the occupational safety of healthcare workers. Research indicates that the stress and anxiety level of employees increases with an increase in COVID perceived risk Lam et al. The extant research on psychological and mental well-being suggest that employees satisfied with the preventive measures taken by their organization are less vulnerable to mental health issues during COVID Ahmed et al.
Despite the plethora of studies conducted on the well-being of employees, there is still a need to identify the role of leadership in enhancing employee well-being during COVID Dirani et al. We believe that safety specific transformational leadership in combination with employee safety consciousness decreases COVID perceived risk among employees, ultimately improving their psychological well-being. The major rationale for focusing on the employee psychological outcomes of safety specific transformational leadership is the repeated call for studying the antecedents of psychological outcomes among employees during COVID Wee et al.
A vast amount of studies has highlighted an increase in psychological health issues among employees during COVID Lam et al. It is crucial to investigate the factors that can enhance the psychological well-being of employees during COVID Gavin et al.
Some researchers have particularly identified the need to investigate the factors that can enhance psychological well-being among healthcare workers Chew et al. The proposed model gets its support from the high reliability organizational theory Roberts, ; La Porte, , which states that organizations can minimize occupational hazards by taking sufficient safety measures.
This theory states that high reliability organizations minimize occupational risks by engaging in activities that promote employee safety, which is beneficial for employees Ford, We believe that transformational leaders and safety-conscious employees decrease COVID perceived risk among employees, enhancing their psychological well-being. To summarize, the current study investigates the impact of safety specific transformational leadership on the psychological well-being of healthcare workers by taking into account the mediating role of COVID perceived risk.
The current study also aims to test safety consciousness as a boundary condition that strengthen the negative relationship between safety specific transformational leadership and COVID perceived risk. Figure 1 shows the proposed theoretical framework. Figure 1. Research model. Shows proposed model where safety specific transformational leadership enhances psychological well-being of employees by reducing COVID perceived risk at different levels of safety consciousness.
The current study is developed under the lens of high reliability organizational theory Roberts, ; La Porte, According to this theory, irrespective of the complexity of organizational tasks, highly reliable organizations minimize occupational hazards and maximize employee safety by strictly following safety protocols, helping them create a safe workplace for employees Roberts and Bea, ; de Koster et al.
This theory defines highly reliable organizations are those, which continuously strive to increase safety by focusing on all aspects of the tasks, going out of the way to implement safety measures, practice resilience by providing safety training to employees and getting regular feedback from employees on how to improve safety procedures Veazie et al. This theory mainly focuses on complex work units in which hazards are inevitable Wolf, The high reliability organizational theory states that employees working under a high reliability organization are less likely to experience physical and mental health issues Agwu et al.
We believe that safety specific transformational leadership, due to its enhanced focus on safety combined with employee safety consciousness, make hospitals high reliability organizations by minimizing COVID perceived risk and improving the psychological well-being of healthcare workers. Since hospitals are fairly complex work units that involve technical work, the high reliability organizational theory can apply to them.
This theory has frequently been used in studies conducted on occupational hazards and employee safety Roberts and Bea, ; de Koster et al. A careful review of existing literature on high reliability organizational theory suggests that it has frequently been used in the healthcare, nuclear industries, construction industry, aerospace, and oil and gas industry mainly because these industries pose a high occupational risk and require additional measures to ensure the safety of employees Enya et al.
Researchers believe that those organizations that emphasize safety and go to extreme lengths to avoid risks are deemed high reliability organizations Thomassen et al. Since safety transformational leadership and safety consciousness focus on safety and risk avoidance and help minimize perceived risk, we suggest that high reliability organizational theory supports our proposed model.
Research on safety specific transformational leadership is gaining attention mainly because of its positive outcomes for employees exposed to occupational hazards Barling et al.
Safety specific transformational leadership focuses on employee safety through inspirational motivation, idealized influence, intellectual stimulation, and individual consideration Smith et al. Inspirational motivation enables safety specific transformational leaders to motivate employees and encourage them to achieve those safety standards deemed unattainable Mullen and Kelloway, The idealized influence allows leaders to become role model in promoting safety by developing safety as a core value Conchie and Donald, Intellectual stimulation helps safety specific transformational leaders enhance employee safety by encouraging employees to find new and better ways to ensure safety Smith et al.
Lastly, individual consideration covers the supervisor-follower relationship by stating that safety specific leaders show great concern for their employees' physical safety and overall well-being de Koster et al. Altogether, these four core components of safety specific transformational leadership give employees the message that their leaders care for them, is concerned about their well-being and are willing to extra miles to make them feel safe at work Smith et al.
This may enhance psychological well-being among employees by making them feel safe from occupational hazards Johnson, The extant research also supports the positive association with positive forms of leadership and psychological well-being of employees Arnold, ; Park et al.
Safety specific transformational leaders maintain good relation with employees by giving individual consideration; they also give autonomy to the employee by asking them to find ways for improving safety standards Johnson, Also, they provide a safe workplace to employees where they can grow and prosper Smith et al. Taken together, safety specific transformational leadership promotes autonomy among employees, enables their personal growth, and develops good relations with them, all of which are essential components of psychological well-being Barling et al.
Hence, we propose that safety specific leadership leads to an increase in the psychological well-being of employees. H1: Safety specific transformational leadership is positively associated with the psychological well-being of employees. Occupational health researchers have identified safety specific leadership as a positive leadership style that decreases occupational hazards and makes employees feel safe at the workplace Mullen and Kelloway, Multiple studies have shown that safety specific transformational leaders pay extra attention to employee safety, due to which employees start considering their workplace less hazardous Conchie and Donald, ; Johnson, ; Smith et al.
Safety specific transformational leader minimizes the risk of incidents and other unwanted events at the workplace Willis et al. Safety transformational leadership is mainly studied in organizations exposed to occupational hazards, and employees working in these organizations revealed that they feel safe under a safety-specific transformational leader Smith et al.
Safety specific transformational leaders give priority to the safety of employees over the organizational goals, which may decrease COVID perceived risk among healthcare workers. Since safety specific transformational leaders take extraordinary measures to ensure that healthcare workers don't contain the virus from patients, these measures likely decrease COVID perceived risk among employees. Perceived risk of catching the infection is detrimental to the well-being of healthcare workers as they face this constant fear that their life is in danger and that they may also develop symptoms of COVID Gorini et al.
The current studies have also shown that occupational hazards affect employee well-being, whereas workplace safety yields positive mental health outcomes for employees Harrison, ; Amponsah-Tawiah et al.
The high reliability organizational theory Roberts, ; La Porte, also supports the mediating role of perceived risk between safety specific transformational leadership and the psychological well-being of employees.
This theory defines high reliability organizations as those organizations where extra focus is given to minimize occupational risks Enya et al. Some researchers also state that high reliability organizations face minimum errors and risks due to their continuous efforts to promote safety.
Employees working in these organizations show positive behaviors Thomassen et al. Since safety specific transformational leaders transform employees by encouraging safe behavior at the workplace Veazie et al. Hence, we propose the following hypothesis:. H2: COVID perceived risk mediates the relationship between safety specific transformational leadership and psychological well-being.
The research on employee safety has identified the importance of developing a positive attitude toward safety Remawi et al. Occupational health researchers suggest that leadership alone cannot prevent occupational health hazards; employees also need to play their role in making the workplace safer Mullen et al. Due to the negative consequences of occupational hazards, organizations are looking for employees with a higher level of safety consciousness as it helps avoid hazards Lee, ; Prussia et al.
According to a recent study, ethical leaders promote safety consciousness among employees, due to which organizational safety performance increases Khan et al. Safety consciousness refers to an awareness of safety issues present at the workplace, present at the cognitive and behavioral level both Barling et al. At a cognitive level, employees mentally feel mindful and attentive to safety issues present at the workplace, whereas safety consciousness at a behavioral level promotes safety behaviors at the workplace de Koster et al.
To summarize, employees with safety consciousness do not develop mental awareness regarding safety issues, but they also engage in safety procedures, which helps minimize the chances of injury or illness de Koster et al. The handful of studies conducted on safety consciousness have failed to investigate its role in the event of a pandemic like COVID The current study proposes that safety consciousness is an important individual factor, which, when joined with safety specific transformational leadership, helps mitigate COVID perceived risk among healthcare workers.
Other studies have also shown that the interactive effect of positive leadership style and safety consciousness yield positive outcomes Mullen et al. Safety specific transformational leaders take solid actions to enhance workplace safety, whereas safety conscious employees display safety behaviors. When followers of safety specific transformational leaders have safety consciousness and are taking measures to ensure safety against COVID, then COVID perceived risk automatically reduces.
The moderating role of safety consciousness between safety specific transformational leadership and COVID perceived risk gets its support from high reliability organizational theory, which focuses on risk prevention at the workplace Roberts, ; La Porte, According to this theory, high reliability organizations are those organizations in which leaders take solid actions to minimize occupational risks and hazards by developing an action plan and following strict guidelines to enhance safety Sujan, In addition, this theory also states that those high reliability organizations can minimize occupational hazards that create safety consciousness among the organizational members.
These organizations enjoy positive employee outcomes Ford, Since safety transformational leadership focuses on minimizing occupational risks and safety consciousness and promoting those behaviors that help reduce occupational risk, their interaction may help minimize COVID risk up to a great extent. Hence, we propose that safety consciousness moderates the relationship between safety specific transformational leadership and COVID perceived risk.
H3: Safety consciousness moderates the relationship between safety specific transformational leadership and COVID perceived risk such that the negative relationship will be stronger in case of high safety consciousness and weaker in case of low safety consciousness.
The current study is quantitative and time-lagged. Data were collected in three time lags with a gap of 3 weeks each through the questionnaire. Data for demographic variables, safety specific transformational leadership, and safety consciousness were collected at time 1. Finally, data for psychological well-being were collected at time three after a gap of another 3 weeks See Figure 1.
A unique I. Researchers believe that time-lagged research design has an advantage over cross-sectional research design as, unlike cross-sectional research, it minimizes common method bias Podsakoff et al. Other studies have also used a time-lagged research design to minimize common method bias Majeed and Fatima, ; Majeed et al.
Data were collected from those healthcare workers who were treating COVID patients in different government and private hospitals of Pakistan. We collected data from only those healthcare workers who met the inclusion criterion, which required working in the COVID ward in the hospitals and a minimum of 6 months of working experience as a full-time employee. The participation was done voluntarily, and we ensured participants that their data would be kept confidential.
We contacted healthcare workers by using our contacts and collected the email addresses of those healthcare workers who showed their willingness to patriciate in the survey.
The questionnaires were sent to their email address. Data were collected between May and July According to the Government of Pakistan's official website, 6,, confirmed cases of COVID were reported between February and June , whereas 10, people lost their lives Dil et al.
According to statistics shared by National Emergency Operation Center, more than healthcare workers got affected by COVID, out of which healthcare workers lost their lives to it Junaidi, The rule of thumb method is also called as N:q method, where N refers to cases or observations and q refers to the number of free parameters.
The major rationale for choosing this method is that many researchers have recommended using this method to find the sample size for studies involving structural equation modeling Bentler, ; Kline, ; Schreiber et al. The rule of thumb of 10 is the preferred rule of thumb compared to the rule of thumb of 5 Boomsma and Hoogland, ; De Carvalho and Chima, Hence, we used the rule of thumb of According to this rule, 10 responses are collected against each item.
Researchers widely use the rule of thumb to find the sample size Hair et al. Due to their demanding schedule, most of the healthcare workers refused to participate in the survey. We contacted only healthcare workers at the time, one out of which responses were received.
We sent the survey to these respondents at time two, but we received only responses. At time 3, we sent the survey to respondents who participated in time one and two. Out of these , fully complete responses were received, which were used for data analysis. Hence, our sample size is adequate.
We conducted a power analysis to make sure our final sample was appropriate. A Post hoc analysis was done by setting predictors to three while keeping other parameters to default settings i. The sample size generate a high power of 0. Out of respondents, were female, whereas the remaining 95 respondents were male. Sixty-seven percent of respondents were between 25 and 35 years of age. One hundred twenty-four respondents had a nursing diploma or Bachelor's degree, 47 had a Master's degree, whereas 61 respondents contained MBBS degree.
One hundred forty-seven respondents served as nurses, 61 respondents served as a doctor, and 24 respondents worked as paramedics staff. Fifty-seven percent of respondents had up to 5 years of working experience as a full-time employee. We adopted well-established scales for all the study variables. We distributed the questionnaire in English as it is the official language of Pakistan. Other researchers have also used the English language for collecting data from healthcare workers of Pakistan and did not face any language-related issue Majeed and Fatima, Data for safety specific transformational leadership were collected using a item scale developed by Barling et al.
Data for psychological well-being were collected using an item version of the scale developed by Ryff Safety consciousness was measured by using a scale developed by Barling et al. The scale contains seven items. Confirmatory factor analysis was performed to check the convergent and discriminant validity of the proposed model. The items loadings for all four factors were found higher than 0.
The correlations between all the latent factors were also found in the acceptable range. Furthermore, four factors model also yielded better fit indices i.
The fit indices for the four-factor are in line with recommended model fitness criteria Hu and Bentler, ; Hair et al. These results prove both convergent and discriminant validity of the proposed four factors model. The current study collected data for age, gender, education, designation, and job experience in addition to study variables. We conducted an analysis of variance ANOVA test to identify those demographic variables which have a significant relationship with the study variables.
These results show that none of the demographic variables shares a significant relationship with study variables. Hence, these variables were not controlled while conducting further analysis. Table 1 shows the results of mean, standard deviation, correlation and reliability analysis.
The Cronbach alpha value for all the variables is greater than the cutoff value of 0. Table 2 shows the results of direct effect and indirect effect. We used model 4 of Process Macro by Hayes for testing the mediation hypothesis. Hence, hypothesis 2 is also supported. We used model 1 of Process Macro by Hayes to test the moderating role of self-consciousness between safety specific transformational leadership and COVID perceived risk.
The rationale for using Process Macro for moderation is that it also gives results for the slope test by showing the variance in the relationship between independent and dependent variables at high, medium and low values of moderator.
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