윤리적 리더십의 적하효과(trickle-down effect) : 교환 이데올로기의 조절효과를 중심으로

Recognizing the importance of ethical leadership, to understand the antecedent of ethical leadership has value to enhance the ethical leadership in organization. Especially, most of organizations in those days have complex and multi-level organizational structure, and this multi-level organizational structure creates multi-level leaders. High-level leaders influence the ethic culture in the organization and enhance their subordinates' ethical behaviors including low-level leaders' ethical leadership. Moreover, low-level leaders learn and imitate their supervisors', high-level leaders', leadership style. That is the reason why we should investigate the effect of high-level leaders' ethical leadership on employee outcomes through low-level leader's ethical leadership. However, there is research gab and limitations to investigate the antecedents of ethical leadership, especially the effect of high-level leaders' ethical leadership on low-level leaders' ethical leadership. The effect of high-level leaders on employee outcomes through low-level leaders has been called “the trickle-down effect,” “the cascade of leadership,” and “the falling dominoes effect” The purpose of this study is to investigate the antecedents of 1st-level leaders' ethical leadership. Especially, based on social learning theory, this study tested the effect of 2nd-level leaders' ethical leadership and the trickle-down effect of ethical leadership on employee task performance and organizational citizenship behaviors. The second purpose of this study is to test 1st-level leaders' individual characteristic to enhance the trickle-down effect of ethical leadership. Individual characteristics have been considered as the critical factor that determine the person's attitude and behaviors. As a result, 1st-level leaders' ethical leadership can be influenced by their individual characteristic. Based on previous research, this study tested the role of exchange ideology as 1st-level leaders' key individual characteristic that affect the trickle-down effect of ethical leadership. The data were collected from 231 leader-employee dyads from 6 major companies located in South Korea. Survey were distributed to 1st-level leaders and their direct subordinates. While 1st-level leaders measured their own exchange ideology, their direct supervisors' (2nd-level leaders') ethical leadership, and their direct subordinates's task performance and organizational citizenship behaviors, their subordinates measured 1st-level leaders' ethical leadership. Results supported the trickle-down effects of ethical leadership from 2nd-level leaders to 1st-level leaders that increase employees' outcomes (i.e., task performance and organizational citizenship behaviors). The results also supported the moderating role of 1st-level leaders' exchange ideology in the relationship between 2nd-level leaders' ethical leadership and 1st-level leaders' ethical leadership. 1st-level leaders show more ethical leadership influenced by 2nd-level leaders ethical leadership when 1st-level leaders have high exchange ideology than when they have low exchange ideology. This study suggests the theoretical and practical implications of ethical leadership and provides the directions for the future study. This study has also several limitation such as cross sectional research design and limited number of variables that influence the trickle-down effect of ethical leadership. Even though these limitations, this study makes an important contribution to investigate the antecedent of ethical leadership. Additional future research in this area seems not only warranted but critical to advance our understanding of ethical leadership at workplace.