Counterproductive work behavior: Mitigating role of spiritual leadership

Spiritual leadership is achieving universal recognition as an effective leadership construct. However, the construct needs robust investigation of the relationship to diverse organizational behaviors in diverse cultural contexts. This study examined how spiritual leadership influences counterproductive work behavior (CWB) within a Korean cultural context. Research results confirmed that spiritual leadership positively impacts employees’ sense of work meaning, which in turn can help mitigate CWB to the organization. Additionally, research findings revealed that employees’ sense of work meaning mediated the relationship to CWB to the organization. However, the impact of spiritual leadership through employees’ sense of meaning or membership on CWB to the individual was not significant. The results of this study increase our understanding of how the effects of spiritual leadership can help alleviate employees’ counterproductive work behaviors to the organization.