Focus on Human Resources

457240 CQXXXX10.1177/1938965512457240

Cornell Hospitality Quarterly

Cornell Hospitality QuarterlyRaub and Robert
2012

Empowerment, Organizational 54(2) 136­–148

© The Author(s) 2012
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DOI: 10.1177/1938965512457240

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Evidence from a Multinational Sample

Steffen Raub1 and Christopher Robert2

Abstract
Employee empowerment is widely viewed as a promising approach to improve operating efficiency and customer service.
But the most effective way to empower the staff is not always clear to hospitality managers, both in terms of what to do
and what to avoid. Using data from 640 frontline service employees and their supervisors working in sixteen different
properties of a multinational hotel chain in the Middle East and the Asia Pacific region, this study tested a model of
the relationships between empowering leadership, psychological empowerment, organizational commitment, and voice
behavior. Results suggest that psychological empowerment mediates the relationship between empowering leadership and
both organizational commitment and voice behavior (defined as identifying problems and suggesting improvements). The
study also found a particular pitfall for empowerment in high power distance cultures, in that the effects are much weaker
for high power distance cultures. As the value of empowering leadership seems clear, multinational companies may wish to
select employees and managers who are comfortable with an empowerment strategy, and make clear to all employees—
particularly those on the frontline—that the organization will support them as they take more initiative.

Keywords
empowering leadership; psychological empowerment; organizational commitment; organizational citizenship behavior;
voice behavior; power distance

Service industry practitioners have come to view empower-
ment as a way to improve operations and increase profit
(Biron and Bamberger 2007, 2010; Lashley 1995, 1999;
Meihem 2004; Rafiq and Ahmed 1998; Ueno 2008).
Research has suggested that empowerment is associated
with increased job satisfaction (Salazar, Pfaffenberg, and
Salazar 2006) and reduced burnout (Yagil 2006). Moreover,
service researchers have suggested that the ability of empow-
ered employees to take initiative and make quicker decisions
should result in faster online responses in the service deliv-
ery process (Bowen and Lawler 1992, 1995; Hon and Chan,
forthcoming). Hospitality research has found support for this
contention and has suggested that hospitality organizations
benefit from empowerment via increased service quality
(Geralis and Terziovski 2003; Goodale and Koerner 1997;
Ping, Murrmann, and Perdue 2010), improved service recov-
ery (Carson and Carson 1998; Hocutt and Stone 1998;
Sparks, Bradley, and Callan 1997), and ultimately, greater
customer satisfaction (Bradley and Sparks 2000; Brymer
1991; Peccei and Rosenthal 2001; Yagil 2006; Yagil and
Gal 2002).
Despite substantial evidence for the desirable effects of
empowerment, two important questions have not been ade-
quately addressed by existing research. First, what role
should leaders play in empowering their subordinates?
Second, what role do differences in cultural values play for
successful empowerment in the context of a multinational
hospitality organization?
With regard to the first question, empowerment research
has long suggested that the informal exchange between
leader and subordinate may be a more important determi-
nant of empowerment than formal organizational practices
(Conger and Kanungo 1988). As far as the role of cultural
values is concerned, cross-cultural research has noted that
management practices are often developed within particular
1
Ecole Hôtelière de Lausanne, Switzerland
2
University of Missouri, Columbia, USA
Corresponding Author:
Steffen Raub, Ecole Hôtelière de Lausanne, Route de Cojonnex 18, 1000
Lausanne 25, Switzerland
Email: steffen.raub@ehl.ch
Raub and Robert
cultural environments, and the effectiveness of these prac-
tices depends on certain unstated assumptions about the
values of managers and employees (e.g., Adler and Jelinek
1986; Hofstede 1993). In cultures where these assumptions
do not hold, researchers find that management practices and
theories are sometimes ineffective (e.g., Earley 1993;
Kirkman and Shapiro 1997).
The hospitality industry, with its multicultural workforce
(Iverson 2000), is a logical candidate for explicit consider-
ation of cultural values in employee empowerment. Not sur-
prisingly, numerous hospitality-related studies have proposed
the importance of taking values into account for employee
empowerment (Gill, Fitzgerald, et al. 2010; Humborstad
et al. 2008; Jha and Nair 2006; Sutton, Verginis, and Ettvik
2003; Umashankar and Kulkarni 2002). Our objective is to
examine the role of empowering leadership behaviors on
organizational commitment and voice behavior, two out-
comes of great importance in the hospitality industry. In
addition, we investigate whether the relationship between
empowering leadership behaviors and these two outcomes
is mediated by psychological empowerment. Finally, we
examine the impact of cultural values as moderators of
empowerment.
Theory and Hypotheses
Empowering Leader Behaviors and
Psychological Empowerment
In general terms, empowerment can be defined as a collec-
tion of practices that combine information sharing, delega-
tion of authority, and increased employee autonomy
(Blanchard, Carlos, and Randolph 1999; Randolph 1995,
2000) with an increased reliance on teams (Hon and Chan,
forthcoming; Lawler 1986; Manz and Sims 1987, 1993;
Randolph 1995). The promise of the empowerment approach
is based on the notion that empowered employees require
less direct supervision, thereby eliminating the need for
multiple levels of hierarchy and allowing supervisors to
focus on more strategic activities (Randolph 1995).
Research on empowerment is based on the fundamental
assumption that empowerment cannot be imposed on
employees, but instead they must feel “psychologically
empowered” (Spreitzer 1995). Psychological empowerment
has been defined as an individual’s active orientation to his
or her work role (Spreitzer 1995; Thomas and Velthouse
1990). Spreitzer’s (1995, 1996) research has provided
empirical support for the notion that psychological empow-
erment can be seen as a single higher order construct com-
posed of the following four dimensions. Meaning refers to
the value an individual attributes to a work goal or purpose.
Competence reflects the belief that one is capable of suc-
cessfully carrying out a task (similar to Bandura’s 1977
notion of self-efficacy). Self-determination reflects a feeling
137
of autonomy or a sense of choice in initiating work actions.
Finally, impact refers to the degree to which an individual
believes that he or she can influence work outcomes.
For organizations, it is important to understand how the
work environment fosters psychological empowerment, and
we suggest that leaders can exert a decisive influence in this
regard. This assumption is in line with initial conceptual mod-
els of the empowerment process (e.g., Conger and Kanungo
1988), but, to the best of our knowledge, no study has explic-
itly tested the notion that empowering leadership behaviors
lead to desirable attitudinal and behavioral outcomes via psy-
chological empowerment as a mediating mechanism.
Researchers have identified a number of leadership behav-
iors that can be characterized as empowering (Arnold et al.
2000; Conger and Kanungo 1988), including leading by
example, participative decision making, coaching, inform-
ing, and showing concern. We suggest that these empower-
ing leadership behaviors can enhance psychological
empowerment in followers by influencing each of the four
dimensions of meaning, competence, self-determination, and
impact (Hon and Chan, forthcoming; Spreitzer 1995).
Piccolo and Colquitt (2006) provide empirical support
for the notion that leaders exert influence on subordinates’
sense of meaning by showing that leaders can alter follow-
ers’ perceptions of the job, including dimensions that are
related to the experienced meaningfulness of the job.
Meaningful action involves activities that are perceived by
the individual as (a) contributing to the achievement of a
valuable goal and (b) affirming his or her connection to a
community (Podolny, Khurana, and Hill-Popper 2005). The
greater involvement of subordinates in decision making and
the enhanced personal attention and concern for subordi-
nates that are characteristic of empowering leadership
should contribute to those two key perceptions.
Empowering leadership also has a substantial impact on
employees’ competence by influencing followers’ percep-
tions of self-efficacy. Self-efficacy can be influenced by the
direct experience of mastering a task, by observing others’
successful performance, or through praise and encouragement
expressed by a superior (Bandura 1986). Greater involvement
of subordinates in decision making and closer interaction with
an empowering leader who models appropriate behaviors
should provide subordinates with multiple opportunities for
learning that will strengthen their self-efficacy.
Finally, empowering leadership can have a decisive
impact on the experience of self-determination and impact.
Again, higher levels of participation in decision making and
closer interaction with an empowering leader should result
in subordinates’ perception of enlarged decision influence
(Scandura, Graen, and Novak 1986), thereby fostering an
experience of self-determination. Moreover, it also signals
to subordinates that they “count around here” (Pierce and
Gardner 2004), thereby creating an experience of impact on
organizational activities. Based on the preceding theoretical
138 Cornell Hospitality Quarterly 54(2)
rationale, we expect that empowering leadership behaviors
will be positively related to subordinates’ experience of
psychological empowerment. Therefore, we suggest the
following hypothesis:
Hypothesis 1: Empowering leadership is positively
related to psychological empowerment.
Attitudinal and Behavioral
Outcomes of Empowerment
The cognitive perspective on empowerment implies that
empowering behaviors enacted by leaders will result in
desirable outcomes only when these behaviors result in
heightened psychological empowerment. Hence, we propose
that the influence of empowering leadership on work out-
comes is mediated by employees’ psychological empower-
ment. Moreover, we hypothesize that empowerment has both
attitudinal and behavioral consequences, and we focus our
study on two important work outcomes: organizational com-
mitment and organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) in the
form of voice behavior, which has been defined as construc-
tive, change-oriented comments intended to improve the
organization.
Empowerment and organizational commitment. Job atti-
tudes are believed to be important outcome measures not
only because they reflect employee well-being but also by
virtue of their relationship with other important outcomes
such as turnover, job withdrawal (Hulin 1991; Tett and
Meyer 1993), and job performance (Judge et al. 2001).
From a practical viewpoint, our focus on organizational
commitment is justified by the fact that it is a strong predic-
tor of turnover intentions (Tett and Meyer 1993) and that
empowerment may be associated with lower turnover (e.g.,
Gill, Mathur, et al. 2011).
Our theoretical argument for the relationship between
empowering leadership and organizational commitment is
supported by the notion of reciprocity (Gouldner 1960).
Empowering leadership signals to individuals that their con-
tributions are valued and that the organization cares for their
well-being. Individuals are likely to reciprocate empowering
leadership by exhibiting stronger identification with and
commitment to the organization (Liden, Wayne, and
Sparrowe 2000). In addition, empowered individuals invest
a substantial amount of psychological resources in their
work (Spreitzer 1995; Thomas and Velthouse 1990). The
feeling of being deeply involved with the organization and
the sense of meaning derived from being psychologically
empowered should result in strong commitment (Avolio
et al. 2004). Moreover, Robert et al. (2000) note that organi-
zational commitment will be higher in individuals who are sat-
isfied with various aspects of the job, and we suggest that an
increased sense of meaning, competence, self-determination,
and impact should engender that sense of satisfaction and
commitment. Therefore, we predict that psychological
empowerment and organizational commitment will be pos-
itively related. We also suggest that the positive relation-
ship between empowering leadership and organizational
commitment will be mediated by psychological empower-
ment. Formally stated,
Hypothesis 2: Psychological empowerment is posi-
tively related to organizational commitment
and mediates the empowering leadership—
organizational commitment relationship.
Empowerment and OCB. The relationship between
empowerment and OCB has received relatively little atten-
tion. OCB has been defined as discretionary behavior that is
not formally recognized by organizational reward systems
but promotes organizational effectiveness (Organ 1988). In
this study, we focus on voice behavior as a form of OCB
that is particularly relevant for the hospitality industry
(Stamper and Van Dyne 2001).
Voice behavior occurs when individual employees per-
ceive a problem that should be addressed. Importantly, the
employees must be sufficiently motivated to say something
about the problem, because pointing out such problems is
not technically part of their job. The hospitality industry
provides frequent opportunities to engage in voice behav-
ior, and employees can suggest effective improvement mea-
sures (Liao 2007; Liao and Chuang 2004; Stamper and Van
Dyne 2001).
Voice behavior is worth studying because it can entail a
challenge to the status quo (Van Dyne and LePine 1998).
Voicing suggestions implies the risk of material or social
losses for the individual and requires initiative and the will-
ingness to accept these risks. Voice behavior stands in con-
trast to more affiliative and therefore less controversial types
of OCB, such as organizational compliance or helping
behavior (Podsakoff, MacKenzie, Paine, et al. 2000). Our
theoretical rationale for a positive relationship between
empowerment and voice behavior builds on the inherently
discretionary and risky nature of the latter. Under conditions
of empowering leadership, employees are more strongly
involved in goal setting and can exert greater influence on
decision making. This should increase their perceptions of
negotiating latitude, that is, the extent to which superiors
permit subordinates to modify their tasks in line with their
own preferences (Dansereau, Graen, and Haga 1975).
Engaging in voice behavior will appear less risky when the
perceived negotiation latitude is high. Therefore, we suggest
the following hypothesis:
Hypothesis 3: Psychological empowerment is pos-
itively related to voice behavior and mediates
the empowering leadership—voice behavior
relationship.
Raub and Robert
The Role of Cultural
Values Related to Power Distance
Cultural considerations frequently complicate the imple-
mentation of empowerment, particularly in multinational
hospitality firms (Randolph and Sashkin 2002). Numerous
researchers have noted that the effectiveness of manage-
ment practices often depends on unstated assumptions
about the values of managers and employees (e.g., Adler
and Jelinek 1986; Hofstede 1993) and that in different cul-
tural contexts some practices can be ineffective and unsup-
ported (e.g., Earley 1993; Kirkman and Shapiro 1997).
In the case of empowerment, evidence presented by
Robert et al. (2000) suggests that the effects of empowerment
might be strongly influenced by cultural values. Although
other cultural value dimensions such as individualism-
collectivism, uncertainty avoidance, or masculinity (Hofstede
1980) might influence the effectiveness of empowerment
practices, the power distance dimension is the most theoreti-
cally relevant. A clear parallel can be established between the
concept of power distance and empowerment practices, as
the former essentially asks whether information sharing and
delegation of power and authority are appropriate. A better
understanding of the possible moderating effect of cultural
values such as power distance in the empowerment process
is of particular importance for the hospitality industry.
Hospitality managers are constantly confronted with the
challenge of effectively managing a highly diverse work-
force (Iverson 2000). Moreover, the international scope of
the industry and its reliance on expatriate managers in their
international operations (Kaye and Taylor 1997) leads to
frequent encounters between managers and employees with
different cultural backgrounds.
We hypothesize that empowering leadership will have a
weaker influence on psychological empowerment among
high power distance individuals. Empowered roles charac-
terized by cognitions such as self-determination and impact
might be rejected by high power distance individuals who
are likely to believe they should adopt a more traditional,
passive role that is appropriate to their lower level of sta-
tus. In addition, when leaders encourage participation,
show concern for employees, inform employees about the
organization, or coach employees (Arnold et al. 2000),
high power distance individuals might perceive such
behaviors as inconsistent with the traditional role of a
leader. Indeed, findings from the GLOBE study suggest
that in high power distance societies, people tend to believe
that effective leaders are those who make decisions auton-
omously, and engage less in participative leadership (Carl,
Gupta, and Javidan 2004). As a result, leaders who enact
empowering behaviors might lose credibility and the
respect of their high power distance employees. Formally
stated,
139
Hypothesis 4: The relationship between empowering
leadership and psychological empowerment is mod-
erated by cultural values such that there is a weaker
(positive) or a negative association for employees
who score high on power-distance-related values.
We also hypothesize that power distance will moderate
the relationship between psychological empowerment and
both organizational commitment and voice behavior. We
draw on the arguments of Hulin, Roznowski, and Hachiya
(1985) and others who have suggested that job attitudes are
formed by the comparison between the job conditions that
individuals expect, and the job conditions that they perceive
in their work environment. High power distance individuals
might expect to occupy a less active work role in which they
make few autonomous decisions, and have little direct
impact on their work environment beyond what their boss
asks them to do. However, if they find themselves occupying
an empowered work role, their experience would not match
their expectations of what their work role should be like, and
this discrepancy adversely affects organizational commit-
ment. Therefore, we suggest the following hypothesis:
Hypothesis 5: The relationship between psychologi-
cal empowerment and organizational commitment
is moderated by cultural values such that there is a
weaker (positive) association for employees high
on power-distance-related values.
We also predict that power distance will dampen the
relationship between psychological empowerment and
voice behavior. Unlike other OCBs like helping behaviors
that are expected and normative, engagement in voice
behavior might run counter to the behavioral norms that are
consistent with high power distance values. Although a high
power distance individual might feel psychologically
empowered in his or her work role, he or she might believe
it is not normative to actually enact behaviors that perhaps
should be directly accomplished or ordered by supervisors.
Therefore, we suggest the following hypothesis:
Hypothesis 6: The relationship between psychologi-
cal empowerment and voice behavior is moderated
by cultural values such that there is a weaker (posi-
tive) association for employees high on power-
distance-related values.
Method
Sample
We obtained survey data from frontline service employees
in sixteen properties of a large multinational hotel chain.
140 Cornell Hospitality Quarterly 54(2)
Exhibit 1:
Overview of Surveyed Properties
Number of
Geographic Region Properties Country Locations
Middle East 3 Egypt, United Arab Emirates
South Asia 1 Maldives
Southeast Asia 4 Indonesia, Malaysia,
Singapore,Vietnam
East Asia 5 China, Japan
Australia/Micronesia 3 Australia, Fiji
Total 16
Properties were located in twelve different countries in the
Middle East, South Asia, Southeast Asia, East Asia, and
Oceania (see Exhibit 1). For each participating frontline
employee, we asked the supervisor to complete a survey on
the employee’s degree of engagement in voice behavior.
Usable questionnaires with matching supervisor question-
naires were obtained from 640 employees. The average age
of these participants was 27.3 years (standard deviation
[SD] = 5.3), 55 percent were male, 95 percent indicated
full-time employment, and the average organizational ten-
ure was 3.1 years (SD = 3.4).
Procedures
The data collection process was facilitated by the vice
president of human resources (HR) of the chain’s Middle
East and Asia Pacific Division who encouraged property
managers to facilitate the local administration of the sur-
vey. The HR manager of each participating property dis-
tributed the questionnaires, and all respondents were
ensured full confidentiality.
Measures
Empowering leadership. To measure empowering leader-
ship, we used a fifteen-item version of the Empowering
Leadership Questionnaire, which was originally developed
and validated by Arnold et al. (2000) and was adapted by
Robert et al. (2000). This instrument, which has demon-
strated good reliability in a multinational sample, assesses
the five general categories of empowering leadership behav-
iors: leading by example, participative decision making,
coaching, informing, and showing concern for and interact-
ing with the team. Because the subscales for the five leader
behaviors are highly correlated, and other researchers have
done so (Arnold et al. 2000; Robert et al. 2000; Srivastava,
Bartol, and Locke 2006), the scales were aggregated to form
a single “empowering leadership” measure. Items in the
scale all have the stem “My supervisor . . ..” Sample items
include “works as hard as anyone in my team” (leading by
example), “listens to my team’s ideas and suggestions”
(participative decision making), “teaches team members
how to solve problems on their own” (coaching), “explains
his or her decisions and actions to my team” (informing),
and “shows concern for team members’ success” (showing
concern).
Psychological empowerment. We measured psychological
empowerment with the twelve-item psychological empow-
erment scale, which was originally developed and validated
by Spreitzer (1995). This scale’s four subscales are also
highly correlated and can be combined to create a single
psychological empowerment measure (Seibert, Silver, and
Randolph 2004; Spreitzer 1995, 1996). Sample items (and
subscales) include “The work I do is very important to me”
(meaning), “I am confident about my ability to do my job”
(competence), “I have significant autonomy in determining
how I do my job” (self-determination), and “I have signifi-
cant influence over what happens in my department”
(impact).
Organizational commitment. The Organizational Commit-
ment Questionnaire (Mowday, Steers, and Porter 1979) was
used to assess organizational commitment, and we adopted
Tett and Meyer’s (1993) recommendation to use the nine-
item version, which was based on their meta-analysis. Sam-
ple items include “This company inspires me to work hard at
my job” and “I really care about the fate of this company.”
Power distance. We measured individual power distance
values with three value types adapted from the Schwartz
Value Survey (SVS), the values scale most used in cross-
cultural research. Each of the three Schwartz values scales
we adopted overlaps theoretically with Hofstede’s (1980)
description of power distance. First, the five-item “Power”
scale concerns the degree to which status and power differ-
entials are accepted and expected—sample item: “AUTHOR-
ITY (the right to lead or command).” Second, the four-item
“Conformity” scale concerns the degree to which individu-
als are expected to “inhibit inclinations that might be socially
disruptive if interaction and group functioning are to run
smoothly” (Schwartz 1992, 9)—sample item: “OBEDIENT
(dutiful, meeting obligations).” Finally, the six-item “Tradi-
tion” scale concerns the degree to which individuals accept
the customs or traditions of their group—sample item:
“RESPECT FOR TRADITION (preservation of time-
honored customs).”
Voice behavior. To represent as comprehensive a construct
as possible, voice behavior was measured with items from Van
Dyne and LePine’s (1998) six-item Voice scale; Bettencourt,
Gwinner, and Meuter’s (2001) five-item Participation scale;
and Bettencourt, Brown, and MacKenzie’s (2005) four-item
Internal Influence scale. After removing redundant items
and those irrelevant to service contexts, the final measure
included ten items. A sample item is “speaks up in this
Raub and Robert 141

Exhibit 2:
Means, Standard Deviations, Scale Reliabilities, and Correlations Among Study Variables

Variable M SD 1 2 3 4 5
1. Empowering leadership 5.55 1.06 .96
2. Psychological empowerment 5.50 0.92 .46 .92
3. Organizational commitment 5.53 1.04 .47 .75 .91
4. Voice behavior 5.01 1.13 .26 .29 .25 .95
5. Power distance values 5.01 1.18 .36 .58 .58 .21 .92
Note: Bold numbers on the diagonal are Cronbach’s alpha reliabilities. Response scales for all measures except those measuring power distance values
ranged from 1 = strongly disagree to 7 = strongly agree. For power distance values, response options ranged from −1 to 7, where −1 was anchored by the
phrase “opposed to my values,” 0 was anchored by “not important,” and 7 was anchored by “of supreme importance.”

Exhibit 3:
Fit Indices for Measurement Model, Structural Models, and Multigroup Mediation Models

Model χ2 df RMSEA NNFI CFI

Measurement model 220.10 59 .069 .97 .97
Mediation Model 233.12 62 .068 .96 .97
Alternative Model 220.35 60 .068 .97 .97
Moderation by power distance
Baseline model 375.13 139 .091 .93 .94
Unconstrained path coefficients 330.74 136 .083 .94 .95
Note: df = degrees of freedom; RMSEA = root mean square error of approximation; NNFI = nonnormed fit index; CFI = comparative fit index.

department with ideas for new projects or changes in
procedures.”
Response scales. The response scales for all measures
except those measuring power distance values ranged from
1 = strongly disagree to 7 = strongly agree. For power dis-
tance values, in keeping with the original response scales
developed by Schwartz (1992), participants were asked to
indicate the importance of each value using a scale ranging
from −1 to 7, where −1 was anchored by the phrase “opposed
to my values,” 0 was anchored by “not important,” and
7 was anchored by “of supreme importance.”
Results
Exhibit 2 presents scale means, SDs, coefficient alphas, and
correlations for the variables in the analyses. Reliabilities
for all scales were acceptable (over .90).
All six hypotheses were tested with structural equation
modeling (SEM) using LISREL 8 (Jöreskog and Sörbom
1993). Fit indices for all measurement and structural mod-
els are reported in Exhibit 3. A four-factor confirmatory
factor analysis was conducted to examine the fit of a mea-
surement model, which was examined using three or four
multi-item parcels (i.e., an average of multiple items) per
construct rather than individual items. Because individual
items tend to be crudely measured (Bandalos 2002) and
result in less optimal variable to sample size ratios that
underestimate model fit (Bagozzi and Edwards 1998), statis-
ticians often recommend the use of item parceling strategies
(e.g., Drasgow 1995), particularly when the underlying
research questions involve relationships between the con-
structs rather than the functioning of individual items
(Labouvie and Ruetsch 1995). The loading of one of the
indicators of each factor was constrained to a value of 1.0 for
identification purposes. The fit of the measurement model
was acceptable (χ2 = 220.10, degrees of freedom [df] = 59,
root mean square error of approximation [RMSEA] = .069,
nonnormed fit index [NNFI] = .97, and comparative fit
index [CFI] = .97), and an examination of indicator loadings
and modification indices associated with cross-loadings
confirmed that the indicators loaded on their intended con-
struct. Therefore, we proceeded with the estimation of struc-
tural models designed to test the hypotheses.
The Mediation and Alternative Models
To test our first three hypotheses, which predicted that psy-
chological empowerment would be related to organizational
commitment and voice behavior, and that psychological
empowerment would mediate the relationship between
empowering leadership behaviors and both organizational
commitment and voice behavior, we fit to the data two
structural models, the “Mediation Model” and the
“Alternative Model.” In the Mediation Model, empowering
142 Cornell Hospitality Quarterly 54(2)
Exhibit 4:
Standardized Path Coefficients for the Mediation Analysis
Empowering .55*** (.53***)
Leadership
Note: Path coefficients in parentheses refer to the alternative partial Mediation Model.
*p < .01. **p < .001. ***p < .0001.
leadership behavior is exogenous, and predicts psychologi-
cal empowerment, which in turn predicts both organiza-
tional commitment and voice behavior. The Mediation
Model fit the data well (χ2 = 233.12, df = 62, RMSEA =
.068, NNFI = .96, and CFI = .97). Examination of the indi-
vidual path coefficients indicated that all paths were statisti-
cally significant (p < .0001; see Exhibit 4). The Alternative
Model adds paths directly from empowering leadership to
organizational commitment and from empowering leader-
ship to voice behavior. The fit of the Alternative Model, with
its two additional paths, was also good (χ2 = 220.35, df = 60,
RMSEA = .068, NNFI = .97, and CFI = .97). However, omni-
bus fit statistics indicated that the Alternative and Mediation
Models fit the data about equally well, and the change in
chi-square indicated that the fit of the Alternative Model
was only marginally better (Δχ2 = 12.77, df = 2, p < .01).
Moreover, although the direct paths from empowering lead-
ership to organizational commitment and from empowering
leadership to voice behaviors were significant (p < .01), the
coefficients indicated only weak direct relationships from
empowering leadership to organizational commitment and
voice behavior (i.e., .10 and .13, respectively), whereas the
mediational paths between empowering leadership and
psychological empowerment, and between psychological
empowerment and both organizational commitment and
voice behavior remained relatively strong and significant (p
< .0001). Although these results technically indicated “par-
tial mediation,” given the relatively weak direct paths from
empowering leadership to both organizational commitment
and voice behavior, and the fact that the more parsimonious
Mediation Model fit nearly as well as the Alternative
Model, we conclude that Hypotheses 1, 2, and 3 are
supported.
(.10**)
Psychological .84*** (.78***) Organizational
Empowerment Commitment
.31*** (.23***)
Voice
Behavior
(.13**)
Moderation by Values
After confirming that the fit of the Mediation Model was rea-
sonable, a series of models was fit to test Hypotheses 4 to 6.
To examine moderation, we divided the sample into thirds
based on individuals’ mean score on a combined power dis-
tance values measure. Specifically, because each of the three
Schwartz values measures (i.e., Power, Conformity, and
Tradition) was chosen based on its theoretical overlap with the
construct of power distance, and because the three individual
values measures were highly correlated with each other (i.e.,
between r = .67 and .78), we used the mean of the three
Schwartz values measures to define our composite power
distance values variable. We then divided the sample into ter-
tiles based on the power distance composite variable. Two
multigroup models were fit to the data to contrast individuals
who endorsed the power distance values composite strongly
(top third within the sample), with those who endorsed it
weakly (bottom third). A “Baseline” multigroup model was fit,
in which indicator loadings and paths between latent variables
(i.e., those specified in the Mediation Model) were estimated,
but constrained to equality across groups. A subsequent
“Unconstrained” model was then fit to the data, which allowed
only the paths between latent variables to differ across groups.
If the Unconstrained model fits the data significantly better
than the Constrained model (based on a chi-square difference
test), then the actual path coefficients can be examined to
determine the direction and magnitude of moderation.
A comparison of the fit of the Baseline model (χ2 =
375.13, df = 139, RMSEA = .091, NNFI = .93, and CFI =
.94) with the Unconstrained model (χ2 = 330.74, df = 136,
RMSEA = .083, NNFI = .94, and CFI = .95) indicated that
the Unconstrained model fit the data significantly better
Raub and Robert
Exhibit 5:
Standardized Path Coefficients for the Moderation Analysis
.39***
Empowering /.66***
Leadership
Note: The top number represents the coefficient for participants scoring in the top third of the power distance composite. The bottom number
represents the coefficient for participants scoring in the bottom third of the power distance composite.
*p < .01. **p < .001. ***p < .0001.
than the Baseline model (Δχ2 = 44.39, df = 3, and p < .0001).
More important, when the patterns of the path coefficients
are examined, the coefficients for participants in the high
power distance composite group are consistently lower than
the coefficients for the low power distance group, support-
ing our predictions about moderation by power distance.
Common metric standardized path estimates for respon-
dents in each group are presented in Exhibit 5, which shows
that the standardized path coefficient between empowering
leadership and psychological empowerment is substantially
lower in the high power distance group than in the low
power distance group (supporting Hypothesis 4). Similarly,
the paths between psychological empowerment and organi-
zational commitment and between psychological empower-
ment and voice behavior are lower in the high power
distance group than in the low power distance group (sup-
porting Hypotheses 5 and 6).
Discussion
Implications for Research
This study contributes to the literature on empowerment in
four important ways. First, the results provide support for
the assertion that psychological empowerment is strongly
related to organizational commitment and voice behavior.
This study examines both organizational commitment and
voice behavior simultaneously, demonstrating that psycho-
logical empowerment can have important attitudinal and
behavioral effects. Confidence in the relationship is also
bolstered by the fact that the psychological empowerment
and voice behavior data were collected from different
sources (i.e., employees and managers), avoiding possible
single source of data bias (Podsakoff et al. 2003). Second,
the results suggest that leaders’ attempts to empower sub-
ordinates are at least partially dependent on the degree to
which they can influence subordinates’ psychological
143
.49***
Psychological /.99*** Organizational
Empowerment Commitment
.19*
/.34***
Voice
Behavior
empowerment. The broad multinational sample used here
helps provide a third contribution to the literature. The fact
that the mediated model fit our data quite well reinforces the
notion that empowerment might be effective across a wide
variety of countries. Although our sample was not big
enough to evaluate each country individually, the results
should be encouraging for multinational corporations that
are currently using empowerment practices or intend to do
so in the future. The final contribution to the literature
comes from the analysis of moderation by culture. We
found that the relationships between empowering leader-
ship and psychological empowerment, and between psy-
chological empowerment and organizational commitment
and voice behavior, were substantially weaker among par-
ticipants who strongly endorsed values related to power
distance. Unlike Robert et al. (2000), we did not find a
negative relationship between empowerment and outcomes
in any high power distance society. Instead, our findings
indicate that the overall impact of empowerment is posi-
tive, but just less positive among individuals who are high
in power distance values.
Managerial Implications
Our results suggest that attempts to empower workers in
countries with high average levels of power distance (e.g.,
India, China, Malaysia) might be less successful than they
would be in countries with lower levels of power distance
(e.g., the United States, Switzerland, Scandinavian coun-
tries). However, there are two reasons why this should not
automatically discourage organizations from attempting to
empower employees in high power distance countries.
First, relationships between empowerment and the out-
comes were positive, even among those employees who
scored in the top third of power-distance-relevant values.
Second, because there is variability among individuals
within all countries, empowerment efforts might be highly
144 Cornell Hospitality Quarterly 54(2)
effective even in high power distance countries, particu-
larly if individuals with low power distance values are
attracted to organizations that use empowerment.
Indeed, organizations in which a worker empowerment
philosophy is a key managerial tenet might want to screen
employees based on power distance values and develop
recruiting practices that highlight the organization’s empow-
erment philosophy. In addition, given our finding that
empowering leadership is related to psychological empow-
erment, companies may want to recruit managers who are
comfortable being primary agents of empowerment. High
power distance managers might be particularly hesitant to
empower workers if they perceive that empowerment will
serve to decrease their own power and status. Therefore,
organizations that wish to use an empowerment philosophy
might find empowerment practices easier to implement if
they select low power distance managers, and if they send a
clear message that employee empowerment is a core value
of the organization’s culture.
The positive relationship between empowerment and
voice behavior is also of particular relevance for the hospi-
tality industry. It has long been argued that the success of
service organizations depends to a large extent on the perfor-
mance of frontline service employees (Singh 2000; Zeithaml,
Berry, and Parasuraman 1988). High-quality service gener-
ally requires the display of innovative and spontaneous
activity, except in the most routine of tasks (Victorino and
Bolinger 2012). When frontline employees feel empowered
to take initiative and address service-related problems by
making constructive suggestions for improvement, their
contributions are likely to lead to improved service quality.
Our results suggest three specific recommendations for
multinational hospitality organizations. First, employee
empowerment appears to be a promising approach for orga-
nizations seeking to stimulate higher levels of OCBs in their
frontline employees. This recommendation is highly rele-
vant for an industry characterized by policies and practices,
which have been described as “archaic” and “inflexible”
(Tracey and Nathan 2002, 17) and in which only a few orga-
nizations (e.g., The Ritz-Carlton, The Rezidor Hotel Group)
are known for their active implementation of empowerment
practices (Bacon and Pugh 2004). Second, the use of appro-
priate recruitment and selection procedures with the objec-
tive of employing individuals who will be most responsive to
empowering leadership is of great importance. Third, the
success of an empowerment strategy on an international scale
may benefit from selective implementation and adaptation
depending on national or regional cultural values. This is an
important caveat for an industry with a traditionally hetero-
geneous workforce that represents many different cultures.
Research on the implementation of empowerment in
high power distance contexts has emphasized the hierarchi-
cal nature in the social relationship between superiors and
subordinates and the heavy reliance of subordinates on the
managerial hierarchy (Li 1999). In such a context, one of the
keys to the success of an empowerment strategy lies in
employees’ perception of support from the organization and
their superior. Without adequate support, employees may
equate empowerment with “abandonment” and they will not
perceive the safe atmosphere that is necessary for empow-
ered behaviors (Humborstad et al. 2008). Moreover, empiri-
cal results from a study conducted in China also suggest that
the alignment of reward systems with desired empowered
work behaviors can play an important role for the success-
ful implementation of empowerment in a high power dis-
tance context (Humborstad et al. 2008).
Empowering leadership may also serve as a solution to
the hospitality industry’s need for workforce flexibility
(Lockwood and Guerrier 1989). Rather than rely on part-
time and casual workers, hospitality firms could apply an
approach of “functional flexibility” (Riley 1992), which
implies reliance on a multiskilled workforce capable of
switching between different jobs. When functional flexi-
bility is introduced, hospitality organizations can rely more
on full-time employees, who are generally viewed as more
dedicated to an organization, and more likely to engage in
OCBs (Moorman and Harland 2002; Stamper and Van
Dyne 2001). Unfortunately, attempts to introduce func-
tional flexibility approaches often fail due to the strong
departmentalization that is a characteristic feature of large-
scale hospitality organizations (Guerrier and Lockwood
1989). Employees fear that they lack the competencies
required in another department or are reluctant to intrude
on another department’s “turf.” Empowering leadership is
likely to contribute to increased perceptions of competence
and self-determination and might facilitate the introduction
of functional flexibility. Empowered employees may be
faster to notice problems that occur outside their immedi-
ate area of responsibility and more inclined to take initia-
tive by helping their colleagues or voicing ideas for
constructive improvements. However, research by Ahearne,
Mathieu, and Rapp (2005) suggests that contrary to popu-
lar belief, the employees who benefit most from empower-
ing leader behaviors are those individuals who have the
lowest amount of job knowledge and experience.
Therefore, empowering leadership behaviors might be
used to compensate for some of the shortcomings of staff-
ing options that rely more heavily on individuals with
relatively little knowledge or experience.
Finally, empowerment may also have important benefi-
cial effects for the productivity of managers in the hospital-
ity industry. In an empowered work environment, managers
may be able to rely on subordinates’ ability and willingness
to take initiative rather than spend their time assigning spe-
cific tasks and monitoring subordinates’ performance. For
managers, the result would be that valuable working time is
freed up and can be applied to tasks that add more value to
the organization.
Raub and Robert
Limitations and Suggestions
for Future Research
A chief limitation of this study is that we collected data
from a single multinational organization in the hospitality
industry, which limits the generalizability of our results.
Moreover, services require some behavioral discretion by
frontline service employees for their successful delivery.
Therefore, our results might not generalize to contexts in
which employee behavior is guided by stringent standard
operating procedures and discretion cannot be exercised to
the same extent as in the service context. Concerns regarding
generalizability may also stem from the geographic restric-
tion in our samples, although our sample includes more
countries than any other empowerment research of which
we are aware and includes nations that have rarely been
studied in the hospitality context.
Another limitation concerns the fact that our measures of
empowering leadership, psychological empowerment, orga-
nizational commitment, and individual power values all
relied on self-report, raising concerns about same-source
bias. However, it is important to note that voice behavior
was independently assessed by supervisors. This feature of
our data, combined with evidence of moderated and medi-
ated effects involving voice behavior, significantly addresses
concerns that our findings were substantially influenced
by single-source biases. A final limitation is that the cross-
sectional nature of our data does not allow for unambiguous
causal inferences.
Future research could adopt a longitudinal approach to
address the limitations of our cross-sectional study and gain
insight into how the effects of empowering leadership unfold
over time. An extension to a broader range of cultural con-
texts with a stronger representation of low power distance
cultures may also provide valuable insights. Moreover, we
would hope that future research extends our study by inves-
tigating additional outcomes that are of great relevance to
the hospitality industry, including turnover intention and a
broader range of OCBs. A final promising avenue for future
research might involve shifting the focus from subordinates
to leaders. Although our study focuses on the role of power
distance in shaping the attitudes and behaviors of frontline
service employees, differences in power distance values
could also affect the willingness of leaders to engage in
empowering leadership behavior. Future research along
these lines would hold the promise of providing managers
with a more complete picture of how the implementation of
an empowerment approach in a multinational organization is
influenced by differences in cultural values.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with
respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this
article.
145
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research,
authorship, and/or publication of this article.
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Bios
Steffen Raub is a Professor of Organizational Behavior at Ecole
Hôtelière de Lausanne, Switzerland. His research interests include
empowerment, organizational citizenship behavior, proactivity,
organizational climate, and work design, with a special focus on
service industries.
Christopher Robert is an Associate Professor of Management in
the Trulaske College of Business at the University of Missouri,
Columbia. His research involves cross-cultural and international
management issues, groups and teams, and humor in the
workplace.