Servant Leadership and Goal Attainment Through Meaningful Life and Vitality: A Diary Study

Despite the emphasis of servant leadership theory on the attention provided to workers’ needs and goals, there is a lack of empirical knowledge on the relationship between servant leadership and employees’ goal attainment. We provide a theoretical model of the mechanism by which this strong focus of servant leadership on a worker’s individual development positively influences the worker’s goal attainment. Through a diary study with 126 workers over five consecutive working days, the results indicated a positive within-person indirect effect of servant leader behaviors on goal attainment a day later through two parallel paths: the meaning in life at night and vitality the next morning. These results provide the first empirical support for the assumption of servant leadership as a promoter of employees’ goals, and highlights how servant leadership positively influences the integration of work as part of life and the energy resources of workers to achieve their daily goals.

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