article · SEISENSE Journal of Management
Staff engagement in higher education is vital for overall institutional performance. An evaluation of staff working across public universities in Uganda examines how socially responsible leadership influences employee job engagement, with a specific focus on the role of psychological safety. Drawing on quantitative survey data from 214 university personnel analysed through structural equation modelling, the results confirm that socially responsible leadership positively associates with higher job engagement. In addition, socially responsible leadership strongly supports feelings of psychological safety among staff, which in turn correlates with heightened engagement levels. Psychological safety acts as an intermediary mechanism through which socially responsible leadership translates into active job engagement. These insights offer institutional managers evidence-based approaches to strengthening workplace relationships, cultivating supportive professional environments, and increasing dedication among university personnel.
Understanding how leadership styles affect workforce commitment helps academic institutions build healthier working environments. By demonstrating that psychological safety connects responsible leadership directly to staff commitment, this research provides university administrators with clear priorities. Fostering safe and responsible workplace cultures can strengthen morale, collaboration, and daily productivity across educational institutions.
This research could inform leadership development curricula, workplace climate diagnostics, and human resource management programmes tailored to higher education institutions. The findings reflect applied survey research, but any resulting management consulting framework or training tool remains at an early concept stage, as no commercial product or formal service was tested.
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Purpose - This study looks into the connection between job engagement (JE) and socially responsible leadership (SRL) in public universities in Uganda.Methodology - The study is quantitative in nature and consisted of personnel working at Uganda's public universities supplied data. The information was gathered using a five-point Likert scale in an organized questionnaire. Expert judgment and content validity were used to assess the validity of the instrument. Warp PLS and smart PLS-SEM analysis was run on 214 legitimate responses among 250 public university staff. Findings - The findings demonstrated a positive correlation between JE and SRL. PS and SRL were found to be positively correlated. Furthermore, the results showed a positive correlation between PS and JE. Additionally, the findings demonstrated that PS acts as mediation in the relationship between SRL and JE. Originality – The study contributes to the understanding of the approaches related to improving employee job engagement in the education sector. The study adds to the body of knowledge concerning the association between job engagement and psychological safety a crucial aspect of socially responsible leadership by examining data from developing countries in addition to other countries which had previously been ignored. Practical implications - This study contributes to the corpus of research on SRL and PS, especially in the context of universities, in terms of JE. Additionally, it provides advice on how to use PS and SRL to enhance university workplace conditions such as JE. By emphasizing the crucial roles that a psychologically safe environment and leadership style that is socially responsible play in promoting positive social interactions at work, our article advances the understanding of social exchange theory.
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DOI: 10.33215/61rnkr91
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