The Relationship Between Transformational Leadership, Empowerment and Organizational Commitment: a Mediating Model Testing

The human resource development literature highlights that properly implemented transformational leadership style may have a significant impact on the organizational commitment. More importantly, a thorough review of such relationships reveals that the effect of transformational leadership on organizational commitment is indirectly affected by empowerment. The nature of this relationship is given less attention in the organizational leadership models; therefore, this study was conducted to examine the influence of empowerment in the relationship between transformational leadership and organizational commitment using a sample of 118 usable questionnaires gathered from employees who have worked in one US subsidiary firm in Sarawak, Malaysia (ONEUSFIRM). Outcomes of Stepwise regression analysis showed that the relationship between empowerment and transformational leadership is positively and significantly correlated with the organizational commitment. This result confirms empowerment acts as a full mediating variable in the transformational leadership model of the organizational sample. Further, conclusion and implications of this study are elaborated.