The Effect of Leadership Behavior on Employee Engagement: A case study of hotels in Mandalay, Myanmar

Abstract

The objectives of this study were (1) to examine hotel managers' leadership behaviors and their employees' engagement in Mandalay, Myanmar: (2) to investigate the impact of employee characteristics in terms of gender, age, education and work experience in the service related industry on employee engagement: and (3) to investigate the relationship between leadership behavior and employee engagement in hotel industry in Mandalay, Myanmar. Quantitative research using questionnaires was applied to collect data from Myanmar employees. One thousand five hundred were distributed and 459 usable completed were returned. The results showed that Myanmar hotel employees are somewhat engaged. Overall, most of the respondents perceived that their immediate supervisors exercise Informing, Coaching, Supports Team, Leading by Example, Effective Performance and Displays Integrity while only a few of the employees agreed that their managers exercise Participative Decision Making and Shows concern for the team members well-being. The results also showed that gender does not have any significant differences on the perception towards their leadership behavior. The results further showed that age, education and work experience in the service industry have some significant differences on the perception towards their leadership behavior. Employees' age has significant differences on the leadership behavior of "Coaching, Supports Team and Leading by Example". Employees' education has significant differences on the leadership behavior of "Supports Team" and employees' work experience in the service industry has significant differences on the leadership behavior of "Informing, Coaching, Supports Team, Shows concern for the team members' well-being and Effective Performance". For the engagement level, the research found that there are significant differences between gender, age, education level and work experience in the service industry of the respondents and employee engagement. The results also showed that display integrity, coaching, informing and supports team have a positive relationship with employee engagement when participative decision making has a negative relationship with employee engagement. In contrast, effective performance, leading by example and showing concern for employees' well-being do not have any impact on employee engagement. The results of the study will be useful for the hotel managers to know about the engagement level of their employees. This further suggested the managers to know which leadership behaviors to exercise to make the employees in Myanmar more engaged. This research also suggested the employers to know which factors they should concern while hiring managers. More research should be done in every sector in Myanmar