Managing Millennials with ethics: The effectiveness of ethical leadership and work meaningfulness on organizational commitment

The purpose of this study is to examine the effectiveness of ethical leadership, which is the leadership style that could help Millennials become more committed to their organizations. In addition, the mediating effects of work meaningfulness itself and its subfactors was examined in the manner in which the ethical leadership affects the Millennial generation's organizational commitment. Participants were 212 Millennial generation employees in South Korea. The results indicated that ethical leadership is effective in eliciting Millennial employees’ organizational commitment through work meaningfulness itself and two subfactors of work meaningfulness. Specifically, the more ethical the Millennial generation employee perceives their leaders, the higher the perception of belonging to the organization, and at the same time, they can be more immersed in the organization by receiving positive influence such as inspiration from the leader. The theoretical and practical implications, limitations, and direction of future research were discussed.