Leaders' Trait Mindfulness and Transformational Leadership: The Mediating Roles of Leaders' Positive Affect and Leadership Self-Efficacy

Long a focus of research on psychological well-being, mindfulness is now attracting empirical interest in the organisational sciences and we investigate whether and how leaders' trait mindfulness is associated with transformational leadership. Drawing upon mindfulness and social learning theories, we hypothesise that leaders' trait mindfulness is associated indirectly with transformational leadership and that leaders' positive affect and leadership self-efficacy beliefs mediate this relationship. Using serial mediation procedures in PROCESS 3.0, multisource data from 183 leader-follower dyads showed that the effects of leaders' trait mindfulness on transformational leadership were mediated by leaders' positive affect and leadership self-efficacy beliefs, after controlling for leaders' age and negative affect. Conceptual, methodological, and practical implications are discussed.