Leadership
Leadership plays a major role in ensuring that employees thrive and have a healthy and safe working environment. At the National Research Centre for the Working Environment (NRCWE), we conduct research both into managers’ own working lives and into how leadership affects the working environment.
About leadership
Leadership provides the framework for how employees carry out their tasks. This is crucial for cooperation and for employee well-being. Leadership also plays an important role in the local working environment initiatives, where the manager and the employees collaborate to identify and solve problems in the working environment. At the same time, it is important that managers themselves experience well-being in their jobs so that they can fulfil their leadership role in the best possible way.
What characterises good leadership?
Good leadership is characterised by high leadership quality. This means, among other things, that managers set a clear direction and foster motivation and well-being among their employees. In this way, managers help to create clarity in work roles and support employees in dealing with the demands of their work.
Research from NRCWE shows that positive leadership behaviour can help reduce the risk of mental disorders such as depression and anxiety. Positive leadership behaviour includes, for example, that the manager takes time to engage in the employee’s professional development and is able to explain the workplace’s goals clearly.
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Leadership at the workplace has a major impact on employees’ well-being and sickness absence. Research from NRCWE shows that:
- The risk of long-term sickness absence is lower when employees experience high leadership quality.
- High leadership quality increases the likelihood that employees thrive in their jobs and reduces the risk of developing mental health problems over time.
- High leadership quality supports good and effective task performance in the workplace.
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Leadership plays a key role in local initiatives to improve the working environment. This is particularly true for the immediate manager, who helps set the framework and motivates employees to contribute actively to the efforts.
NRCWE’s research shows that:
- Employees’ assessment of leadership quality is closely linked to their assessment of the working environment competency in their department – that is, the ability of managers and employees to jointly identify and solve working environment problems in the department.
- High working environment competency promotes a good psychosocial working environment, good task performance and employee well-being.
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Managers report long working days and a heavy workload. At the same time, they assess that they have a high level of influence in their work. They find meaning in their work and express high job satisfaction. This suggests that managers have busy and long working days, but that many of them thrive in several respects.
Social support from fellow managers, their own managers and subordinates is particularly important for managerial well-being. Their experience of influence at work also contributes to their well-being and to their ability to deal with the demands of the managerial role. However, managers may also experience loneliness in their jobs. It is therefore important that both managers and employees pay attention to each other’s well-being and provide ongoing mutual support.
Research on Leadership
Find Inspiration for Your Work with Leadership
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Will be updated soon
