Driving employee engagement: how personality trait and leadership style impact the process

Purpose The purpose of this study is to contribute to the understanding of how personality traits and leadership styles impact employee engagement. Design/methodology/approach A field study involving a total of 100 participants was conducted to investigate the relationship between honesty-humility, authentic leadership and employee engagement. Hypotheses were tested using correlation and regression analyses. Findings The results show that honesty-humility impacts employee engagement and that authentic leadership functions as a substitute for honesty-humility. Originality/value This study extends the understanding of the role of individual differences beyond the established Big Five model, by adding the honesty-humility dimension. In addition, the authors examine the moderating effects of authentic leadership on the relationship between honesty-humility and engagement.