African Journal of Leadership and Development

Ethical Leadership and Normative Commitment: Drivers of Urban Land Service Quality in Bahir Dar City-Ethiopia

Belay Sintie Zegeye, Matebe Tafere Gedifew — Sat, 27 Jun 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Urban land service delivery is becoming a key source of public discontent in developing countries despite that it is the driving engine of the urban economy. This study aims at examining the influence of ethical leadership on the perceived quality of urban land service quality through the link of normative organizational commitment in Bahir Dar City. The study followed the positivist research paradigm in a quantitative research approach with a correlational research design. Participants of the study were urban land customers who are seeking urban land for residential house and business buildings. Perceived Leader Integrity Scale was adapted to measure ethical leadership. Normative commitment was measured using the Meyer and colleagues tool. Perceived service quality was measured employing the service quality scale, excluding customer expectations. Data were collected from convenience sample involving 346 customers. Structured questionnaires were employed using the five point Likert scale. SEM-AMOS software was used to carry out the analysis. Findings indicated that ethical leadership has significant and positive influence on the Perceived service quality (β=0.476, R²=0.227) and the Employees’ normative commitment (β=0.499, R2= 0.249), partially mediated the relationship between ethical leadership and the perceived service quality (β=0.391, R²=0.15). The indirect effect (β=0.195, R²=0.038) supports the strong direct effect, yielding a total impact of β=0.671 (R²=0.450). This implies that appropriate ethical leadership practices and normative commitment contribute to improve urban land service quality. The study suggests that urban land administration organizations need to adopt ethical leadership and normative commitment practices to improve the ever-increasing challenges of urban land services in the study area.

Driving Public Sector Environmental Citizenship Behavior through Green Human Resource Management and Employee Commitment

Getachew Chebsi, Zerihun Kinde Alemu, Gebre Sorsa — Sat, 27 Jun 2026 00:00:00 +0000

The role of public sector organizations in promoting employee eco-friendly behavior remains underexplored in developing countries. To address this gap, the study examined effect of bundle green human resource management practices (GHRMPs) on organizational citizenship behavior for the environments (OCBEs), with employee environmental commitment (EEC) operating as a mediating pathway. Data were collected via self-reported questionnaires from 382 employees of Ethiopian ministries. Partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was used to test the proposed hypotheses. The finding revealed that GHRMPs has significant and positive influence on employee environmental commitment and discretionary sustainable behavior. Moreover, bundled GHRMPs synergistically enhance employee commitment, fostering discretionary sustainable behaviors. Beside, EEC serves as a complementary partial mediator, explaining 34.6% of the variance accounted for (VAF) in this relationship. The novelty of the study lies in applying social exchange theory to the environmental context by recognizing employees’ commitment as an intrinsic motivator, linking organizational green practices to voluntary behaviors. The results underscore strategic importance of integrating GHRMPs in Ethiopia’s ministries to foster employee commitment and pro-environmental behavior, providing guidance for managers, policymakers and advancing Sustainable Development Goals 12 and 13 through efficient resource use and climate action.

The The Moderating Effect of Gender on Leaders Emotional Intelligence and workplace Engagement of Employees: in Amhara State Public Service Bureau, Ethiopia

Mulugeta Alema Alemu, Melaku Mengistu Gebremeskel — Sat, 27 Jun 2026 00:00:00 +0000

This study examined the moderating role of gender on the emotional intelligence of leaders and workplace engagement of employees in Amhara State Public Service Bureaus in Ethiopia. Leaders’ emotional intelligence is suggested as a multidimensional constructs self-awareness, self-regulation, motivation, social awareness, and relationship management. Employee engagement measured in cognitive, emotional, and physical engagement dimensions. To achieve this objective, a correlational survey design was used. Quantitative data were collected from 358 valid employee responses selected through stratified random sampling from twenty-two public sector bureaus. Data were collected using questionnaires by using primary and secondary instrument. The collected data was analyzed using structural equation modeling. The results showed that employee’ engagement was significantly practiced at low level. Similarly, leaders’ emotional intelligence was practiced significantly at low level. The structural equation model results showed that gender moderates leaders’ emotional intelligence and employees’ workplace engagement significantly. This study concluded that gender significantly moderates leaders emotional intelligent and employees’ engagement. Thus, the findings have key implications. For practically, leadership development programs should be designed with sensitive to gender dynamics to maximize their effectiveness. From a policy perspective, policy makers should consider gender responsiveness approaches inhuman resource management strategies. From theoretically, they strengthen the link between gender, leaders’ emotional intelligence and employee engagement providing a basis for future research.

The conditional Indirect Effect of Leadership Styles on Employee Performance: The Moderator Role of Employees’ Educational Level

Meseret Engida Tesemma, Tesfaye Debela Woddo, Deribe Assefa Aga — Sat, 27 Jun 2026 00:00:00 +0000

The purpose of this study is to test a moderated mediation model in which transformational, transactional, and laissez-faire leadership styles independently predict employee performance through the mediating role of public service motivation. Furthermore, this study examines whether educational level moderates the indirect relationship between leadership styles and employee performance via public service motivation. Using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM) and data from a survey of employees working in public institutions in Ethiopia's Oromia region, the results show that transformational leadership has a strong positive impact on public service motivation and a significant direct effect on employee performance, whereas transactional leadership exhibits smaller positive effects and laissez-faire leadership shows negligible influence. While transformational and transactional leadership enhance performance through public service motivation across the workforce, this process is not uniform among employees. The findings show that employees with bachelor's degrees have a stronger motivational relationship than their postgraduate counterparts. The study contributes to leadership and public administration literature by demonstrating that leadership effectiveness functions through a conditional motivational process. Consequently, these results suggest that organizations must move beyond "one-size-fits-all" development programs.