Servant Leadership Style and Employee Voice: Mediation via Trust in Leaders

Abstract

Servant leadership has been identified as extremely important for organizational performance and success; therefore, much focus is placed on developing and maintaining leaders’ positive attitudes and behaviors toward their subordinates. Different servant models have been put out by earlier scholars. Nevertheless, only a small number of studies have focused on employee voice as a key precursor to servant leadership. The goal of this study is to look at the impacts of servant leadership style on employee voice by focusing on the mediating role of trust in a leader. Time-lagged data were gathered from 336 employees of small- and medium-sized enterprises in Pakistan. The perceived servant leadership style was positively and significantly associated with employees’voices mediated by trust in leaders. This study upgrades the comprehension of the components underlying the servant leadership and employee voice model by recognizing the intervening role of trust in the leader. Nonetheless, the survey design was not longitudinal, which restricts the study’s capacity to affirm causality. The results of this study acknowledge that servant leadership style and trust in leaders can promote constructive employee voice behavior. This study addresses the unproven mediating procedure of the link between servant leadership style and employee voice and offers new bearings for servant leadership and employee voice research, which, to the best of our knowledge, has not been explored before.

1. Introduction

Many studies have found that employees are not willing to share potential information with their teammates and authorities (Perlow & Williams, 2003). Certainly, many international organizational mishaps, for instance, the demise of Enron and the British Petroleum oil-rig explosion, and national tragedies, for example, the destruction of Pakistan steel mills and the recent crash of Pakistan Airlines in Karachi, were exacerbated by failures of employees to convey their voice to the authorities and by a lack of information about irregularities among those in positions of authority. These tragedies have occurred due to the information gap between employees and decision-makers. The above examples are high-level tragedies but within small and medium organizations employees encounter issues that put them in between whether to voice or devoice potentially useful information. The employees always feel anxiety about whether to share their ideas for improvement, work-related issues/solutions, organization and team performance. The main goal of this study is to review and integrate the existing literature and to provide some direction for future applications by digging out the unexplained questions that need to be solved for employee voice. Voice as the employees’ constructive behavior refers to developing positive ideas and sharing opinions to improve organizational functions (M. Kim et al., 2018; Brinsfield & Edwards, 2020). Voice is optimistic behavior to bring about improvement rather than whistle-blowing, which refers to curbing an activity (Akinwale, 2019; Jha, 2021), and dissent, which ignores suggestions for effectiveness and promotes objections (Ejaz et al., 2022) and always gives voice to dissatisfaction (Pohler et al., 2020). Employees and businesses both benefit from voice and this is a win–win situation to achieve organizational goals. Employee voice could be shared through any medium including face-to-face conversations between employees and administrations, written forms, group discussions, and any electronic media (Ewing et al., 2019). Two torrents of voice research are involved in investigating the manager’s behavior in generating voice (Ficapal-Cusí et al., 2020) and employee motivation to encourage them to speak up (Lin et al., 2019). In recent eras, organizations have encountered universal problems such as misuse of power (Karabati, 2021), unethical behaviors (Gupta & Purohit, 2021), social boycotts and hostility in the workplace, harmful emotions, and alack of workers’ psychological well-being and work–life balance (Poulose & Sudarsan, 2018). These persistent problems have increased the importance of servant leadership. S. I. Wong and Kuvaas (2018) conducted a study on the empowerment of leadership, in which the goals to be accomplished and the orientation indicated that servant leaders tend to understand the needs of the people and are capable of measuring different characteristics and creating a proper connection. All the scholars argue that the selection of the best leadership style is needed. However, they must be in line with the management practices followed in firms (Nobari et al., 2014). Still, the impact of the leadership style on the overall performance of companies is ambiguous because no study has presented the most effective leadership style that can be followed in all companies. Bavik et al. (2017) argue that uniformity and acquaintance are rated as the primary foundation of authentic leadership. They presented the argument that the behavior of employees is heavily impacted by the confidence, dedication, inspiration, organizational citizenship, and optimized performance of the leader. Employee voice is also followed in the organization because of the leadership style. The argument is that leaders must be confident and their actions should be based on achieving commitment and motivation, which can be achieved by following the appropriate leadership style in the workplace. This discussion of employees’ voices has motivated us to conduct this research in the Pakistani context.

Even employee voice is not heard in large-size firms due to the lack of sharing information between subordinates and their leaders, as mentioned in the first paragraph of this chapter. International large-size firms like Enron and large national companies, for instance, Pakistan steel mills, collapsed due to a lack of communication between subordinates and their leaders. While multinational and large firms encounter communication problems, someone must analyze the situation of small and medium enterprises, which is out of the picture, where rules and regulations are not followed properly, even thoughSMEs contribute a huge share of GDP. One study (Tambunan, 2011) found that small and medium enterprises’ (SMEs) gross domestic product share was more than that of large enterprises in Indonesia. The role of SMEs in the economic development of Pakistan is acknowledged, as SMEs constitute nearly 90% of all enterprises in the formal sector. Their advancement can help in reducing unemployment in Pakistan (Umair & Ullah, 2013); SMEs utilize their meager capital efficiently and have better linkages with other sectors of the domestic economy (Niethammer et al., 2007), while SMEDA is responsible for facilitating SMEs to overcome their endogenous weaknesses (Rutashobya & Jaensson, 2004). Small and medium enterprises in developing countries, such as Pakistan, primarily face issues relating to business regulations and boundaries, funding, person reserve capability, and technical capability (Iftikhar et al., 2012). SMEs can mainly obtain better manufacturing skills as well as productivity using humanizing members of staff through technological competence and mental satisfaction. Equipment enhances SMEs’ competences, diminishes costs, and widens market reach, nationally and internationally (Xu et al., 2008). The above-detailed discussion clearly indicates the research gap of the problem that exists in our context. Though several studies have provided discussion related to servant leadership, less attention has been given to employees’ voices that influence the trust of employees in their leadership in Pakistan. If employees trust their leader’s qualities, then they become more committed to their organization. Most of the studies conducted on servant leadership are conducted in developed regions like Europe and the US and less in the Asian region (Yiğit & Bozkurt, 2017). So, there is a scarcity in the literature when it comes to the Asian region. Particularly for Pakistan, research related to servant leadership, employee trust and employee voice is needed, so this study would fill the gap in the literature. Different SMEs in Pakistan are working effectively, and to improve the overall performance, leadership plays an important role. Also, my personal interests in SMEs lie in the position they enjoy in the market of the Pakistani industry; both have motivated us to study the role of servant leadership in the context of employee voice and the development of the mediating role of trust of the employees on their leadership. SME significance scope suggests that there is a significant potential to enhance their growth through appropriate systems and endorsement. In particular, small- and middle-sized enterprises (SMEs) face issues in the development of their employees due to low experience and budget. It is important that people in the workplace be motivated to achieve high growth, mission and vision. The employees raise their voices if their leaders have not supported them. Therefore, servant leaders must be aware to identify the resources for solving the issues that exist in the workplace. Continual improvement methods and strategies in employee performance should be adopted and provide empowerment to employees. This study is an attempt to explain the best strategy which should be adopted by the leader to solve the issues for the development of high-quality relationships between the employees and the leader. The issues can be solved if the employees are treated effectively by their leader and solved one by one. The common problem found in the leadership style is trying to solve too many issues at once, which ultimately results in poor development and a worse working environment in the workplace. Additionally, the employees in the workplace should be provided with increased opportunities in terms of highly effective developments and allow them to work according to the demands. Only one issue should be addressed at a time, and it must be ensured that people working in the workplace are motivated and satisfied by the management. Abusive, transformational and paternalistic leadership to the voice behavior of sub-ordinates has received attention but is in dire need of the hour to conduct research studies on servant leadership and employees’ voice behavior in public management of government (Yan & Xiao, 2016). Research scholars have studied several devices of servant leadership, and different findings were presented by different authors, trust (Franco & Antunes, 2020), procedural justice (Qiu & Dooley, 2022), organization performance (Katzenbach & Smith, 2015) and so on, but the “black box” of servant leadership still has potential to dig out (Conley, 2018). This discussion of servant leadership has motivated us to conduct this research in the Pakistani context in the SME enterprises sector for the betterment of employees and organizations as well.

Subsequently, the goal of the current study is to display an image of the interest in Employee voice (EV), Trust in leader (TL) and Servant leadership (SL) and to decide how they might be achieved. Furthermore, the existing state of knowledge on Servant leadership and employee voice does not fully explain how the construct may be hypothesized. Therefore three significant contributions are made by this study. First, it presents a self-positioning perspective and highlights servant leadership and trust in leaders as elements that support employee voice. This perspective strengthens existing theoretical frameworks by emphasizing servant leadership’s role in promoting employees’ self-positioning. Second, it examines the mediating impact of trust in leaders, revealing when the beneficial effects of servant leadership are amplified. Third, studies on employee voice have largely been conducted in Western nations, but this gap still exists in Pakistan; thus, we use samples from Pakistan (SMEs) to test the generalizability of the voice models in a context where social and cultural variables may discourage employee voice. To achieve these objectives (PLS-SEM), partial least squares structural equation modeling was used with Smart PLS v3.3.6. This study establishes research hypotheses and statistically evaluates the conceptual framework utilized by data obtained from various SMEs in Pakistan.

The paper is designed as follows sections. In Section 2, the literature review of the model variables is presented. In Section 3, we explained the research model and hypothesis procedures. In Section 4, we explained the methods implemented for our research. Data assessment and empirical results are explained in Section 5. Section 6 spotlights the discussion, trailed by the conclusion to this research in Section 7.

2. Literature Review

2.1. Servant Leadership Style

Heyler and Martin (2018) Greenleaf’s essay entitled “The Servant as Leader” is considered the origin of servant leadership. Servant leader believes in serving first and then leading, which differentiates servant leaders from others. A servant leader who knows and fulfills subordinates’ needs. Servant and leader were merged by Greenleaf and considered servant-leadership as a management style. A servant leader can strengthen service and leadership in a positive manner (Doolittle, 2021). Some of the qualities of a servant leader include selflessness, humbleness, humility, positive approach to organizational behavior. Hafenbrack et al. (2020) argued that servant leadership and organizational behavior positively correlated with motivating employees and helping them realize their full potential. The concept of servant leadership focuses on self-positioning, which corresponds to the philosophy and practices of Jesus Christ. In terms of servant leadership, the goal is to present the services and care to the people at work before considering oneself (Gabriel et al., 2018). Thus, servant leaders play a vital role in taking care of the organizational agendas and committing themselves to the services.

2.2. Characteristics of Servant Leadership

Setiawan and Irawanto (2020) stated that while every leadership style comprises varying attributes, servant leaders tend to offer efforts to build fruitful relationships among the employees within the organizational environment. In this regard, Dean (2022) suggested that it requires the supervisors or leaders to develop understanding at the initial point in order to gain trust and faith from the team members so that the relationship would not suffer from any challenge that would harm the growth of the organization. However, sufficient practices result in maintaining an effective culture in the organization so that productivity and performance might not be affected at any level (Jeyaraj & Gandolfi, 2019). Thus, servant leaders are offered massive training at the initial level for which their roles, responsibilities, and skills are enhanced in order to supervise service teams according to achieving organizational success (Gandolfi & Stone, 2018).

Servant leaders follow the voluntary subordination that is related to the fulfillment of the needs of others that are legitimate. Voluntary subordination is difficult for leaders who do not show their goals or their motives. Servant leaders emphasize more on the constructive development of their employees. In many studies, it is stated that servant leaders can develop a distinct trait that encompasses the exchange relationship with the followers so that leaders can affect the outcomes of their followers (Iqbal et al., 2020), improve job satisfaction Finley, and encourage innovative ideas related to the tasks of work Jenkins. When the leaders adopt the servant leadership model in the organization, their followers or subordinates gain more confidence, value, a sophisticated sense of responsibility towards the leader and devotion (Kumar, 2018). In addition to this, Callen et al. (2022) stated that the servant leadership style also helps the employees to seek guidance and support from them so that employees become more eager to be involved in appropriate and volunteer actions. The employees who have more trust in their leaders are likely to speak up more about the issues and use more communication exchanges so that leaders can also respond to the encouraging performances.

The covenantal relationship is an important dimension of servant leadership that is related to the mutual commitment of the individuals with some important characteristics like commitment, mutual trust, shared values, and concerns related to the welfare of the other side (Woo, 2018). The covenants are intensely personal bonds belonging to the individuals whose motivated efforts for the common objectives are not identified. The strong ties that might bind the different covenantal partners are seen and the relationship could not be threatened or broken as a result of any conflict (Sendjaya et al., 2016). The covenantal relationship is related to the behavior of the leadership that might foster effective and long-lasting relationships with the employees (Anderson, 2017). Anderson (2017) explained that different covenants are intensely related to the personal bonds that might engage different people with their efforts related to the achievement of common objectives that could not be identified further. In a relationship based on the covenant usually, mutual commitment is exemplified by different leaders, and thus, the followers are seen to have shared values and mutual trust; commitment is usually demonstrated by the leaders to be followed and is characterized by different features. This would develop a positive attitude towards the different organizations and, thus, would lead to different desirable outcomes, including commitment, creativity, and participation. Trust is considered to be the central element in the development of the trust and the exchange that needs to be accepted.

Xie (2020) mentioned in the article that while all leadership styles correspond to encouraging transformations in the organization, it is evitable for a servant leader to possess transformational qualities so that the subordinates can perform better with the influence of servant leaders. As a vital source of transformation, service leaders perform their responsibility to recognize the attributions of their fellow members and employees in order to bring positivity to the work environment (Seto & Sarros, 2016). In this scenario, the servant leaders profoundly develop the understanding for identifying the processes that would be effective in mitigating the potential risks towards the employees. Some of the proposed solutions are also taken into consideration so that the employees would perform in such a way that leads to accomplishing the desired goals and objectives with respect to the organization (Eva et al., 2019). Most of the time, the goals and objectives of the organization are under mined because of the fact that hurting one individual may hurt all other associated people (Thebo et al., 2021). No other option is better than the option to help anyone overcome the obstacles of life if anyone wants to build a relationship with someone. Hence, it can be said that it is a fool proof way to be associated with people by achieving comprehensiveness together. Intelligent and wise people always learn from their mistakes, which implies that healing and overcoming are part of the learning process (Orabi, 2016). In this way, the servant leaders are aware that there are equal numbers of people who can be either hurt or healed. Mahembe and Engelbrecht (2013) state that servant leadership has the greatest strength, which is the perspective of healing and influencing others. There are a lot of people who have been suffering from a range of emotional breakdowns and trauma, and some of them ever possess broken spirits. Servant leadership works best in scenarios that require human understanding. It is also necessary to help such people and servant leaders identify that they hold the opportunity for them to bring them out of their depressed emotional state by contacting them. Seto and Sarros (2016) said that the one who is a leader as a servant holds something subtle that is communicated to the followers to lead the implication that employees share wholeness with their leaders and understand its importance.

Servant leadership is different from the other approaches of leadership as it needs to greatly emphasize development and, especially, the area of morality (Hoch et al., 2018). Moreover, servant leaders are those who develop the leaders and the employees both through the development of their moral actions (Morrison et al., 2011). This particular area of servant leadership includes moral reasoning, different moral actions, and dimensions of the different servant leaders and the other leaders who are principled. A common pattern of the alignment of different things, including deeds and principles, with different actions and values has also discussed the different moral actions. According to (Jiang et al., 2018), servant leaders are those who believe in the principles; therefore, one can expect to see that their actions and words are not contradictory. They do what they say and do not want to deviate from their path (Seto & Sarros, 2016).

Moral reasoning is related to the complete understanding of the cognitive processing that is needed to be justified properly (Nobari et al., 2014). However, it does not need to measure the strengths and the weaknesses of different moral positions. It provides the signals at different levels in which cognitive reasoning for the maintenance of the different moral points is needed. It needs to be more focused on the different actions (Hood et al., 2011). Hence, it is needed to focus on different moral values, and thus, it would bring improvement in the moral decision-making of the leadership. Responsible morality needs to reflect the importance of ethics and morality in leadership actions and objectives. It is important to consider whether the prohibition of the different compromised principles would bring some positive results or not (Sendjaya et al., 2016).

Another important aspect of servant leadership includes transcendental spirituality and it is the one that is contested the most. Spirituality could be limited to different private spaces and has no contributions to the public sphere (Nobari et al., 2014). Spirituality in the workplace is expected to bring problems rather than solutions. Neel and Hoch et al. (2018) stated in the research that leaders who are seen to be fostering spirituality in the workplace are seen to be creating a culture in which employees experience different things, such as the sense of transcendence, meaning, and interconnection. It is not necessary that the different indicators might be mutually exclusive indicators (Sendjaya et al., 2016). A culture that is based on spirituality is the one having a positive impact on the workplace spirituality and the followers and the leaders, it also promotes ethical behavior and increases creativity with elevated levels of productivity (Walumbwa & Schaubroeck, 2009). The concept needs to be considered in the different concentric levels in which the leaders would be occupying the position to influence the social stratum and then attain the different objectives of the organizations for identity (Wang & Hsieh, 2013). It is among the important parts of leadership that are seen to be fostering wholeness in the different processes of healing. Servant leaders are those who need to look for the wholeness of different things and then understand the different things that might be needed for sharing (Hassan et al., 2019; Sendjaya & Pekerti, 2010). Like all other leadership styles, servant leadership also encompasses some of the characteristics that are important for enriching the goals of leadership in order to provide numerous advantages to the organization as well which are defined in the below sections.

The servant leaders aim to cultivate their capabilities of enlarging the vision of the company. According to (Winston & Fields, 2015), the talent of servant leaders to view the problem from the perspective of conceptualizing implies that such leader thinks beyond the realities of routine work. When managers of the company want to adopt this trait, it requires obedience and exercise. For a servant leader, a subtle balance is required between the perspective of conceptualizing and thinking beyond the realities of routine work. However, the foresight of a servant leader is the quality that allows the leader to comprehend the lessons perceived from past mistakes in order to make a correct decision at the current time. This characteristic is intensely entrenched inside the insightful intellect. Parris and Peachey (2013) state that foresight is the most deserving area of leadership that needs to be given careful attention, yet it remains unexplored to a great extent.

Trust is the core construct associated with the work environment (T.-Y. Kim et al., 2018). Organizational citizenship behavior and procedural justice are mediated through trust studies (Stedham & Skaar, 2019), which pace and cement the relationship between management and employees. Ja’afaru Bambale (2014) has discovered that trust ensures responsibility in employees in the context of affective and cognitive dimensions. This implies that good reasons and availability of knowledge represent the individual’s trust in management. Trust in leadership creates harmony and connects employees and management to achieve the organization’s goals. Trust in leaders develops organizational citizenship behavior in employees and improves their productivity (Ja’afaru Bambale, 2014). Therefore, servant leaders maintain integrity and follow values to become role models for their subordinates (Kamaludin & Ismail, 2021). The social exchange theory suggests that when there is a high-quality exchange between subordinates and leaders, there is a trustworthy relationship between them. Trust in the leader demonstrates the extent to which subordinates react to the support provided by leaders. Trust is a controversial construct among scholars; they do not agree on whether this construct is a behavioral approach, an individual attribute, an organizational climate, or all of the above (Kamaludin & Ismail, 2021). A large number of scholars agree that trust is the collection of hope, moral duty, confidence, and dependability. Trust as a “psychological state comprising the intention to accept vulnerability based upon positive expectations of the intentions or behavior of another” (Cha et al., 2020).

The employee voice is the ability of an employee to share his opinion about the organization’s environment. In recent eras, the researchers’ interest gained momentum in the concept of employee voice about organizational performance and better systems of employee representation. Many studies have found that employees are not willing to share potential information with their teammates and authority (Morrison, 2014; Zia-ur-Rehman et al., 2018). The organization environment is more concerned with employee rights and legal regulations, labor election, 1997, revolutionized employment policy (Detert & Burris, 2007). EU Directive for Employee Information and Consultation rights is committed to labor flexibility (Wachsen & Blind, 2016). In recent eras, organizations are encountered universal problems such as misuse of power (Okolie & Idibra, 2021), bullying, unethical behaviors in the workplace (Kaptein, 2008), social boycotts and hostility in job place, harmful emotions, Koole et al. (2011) and the lack of workers’ psychological well-being and work–life balance (Delecta, 2011) these situations increased the importance of employee voice to be heard. Employees can express themselves in three ways, namely, prosocial voice (with the motive of constructive and cooperative behavior towards others), defensive voice (with the motive of self-protection, which is subject to fear), and defensive voice (with the motive of self-protection which is subject to fear and Acquiescent voice with the motive of disengaged expression of behavior) (Hsiung, 2012).

2.3. Prosocial Voice

Prosocial voice depicts productive activities and the performance of employees and the organization. Prosocial voice behavior suggests raising their voice for others. As mentioned by prosocial voice is an alternative to organizational citizenship behavior (Barry & Wilkinson, 2016), and it is necessary for the betterment of employees and their performance and, in turn, the organization’s productivity would be enhanced (Gao et al., 2011). The feelings, ideas, and knowledge related to the work environment are described as prosocial. However, according to (Wilkinson & Fay, 2011), not everyone in the organization will perceive prosocial voice as a positive behavior that should be implemented among the employees in the organization.

2.4. Defensive Voice

Self-defense is a defensive voice. In many situations, the employee voiceis for the sake of an organization rather than to defend/protect themselves (Amini & Ahmadi Zahrani, 2020). The described defensive voice is instrumental and expressive and might be high-intensity or low-intensity; the target of the defensive voice is the supervisor. Voice can be judged from many angles with different types of behavior and intensity levels. Duan et al. (2021) defined that voice is the employees’ attitude and behavior toward their bosses for unequal treatment. Duan et al. (2021) considered defensive voice could be constructive toward job and organization. For instance, speaking up defensively may persuade employees to ask others for help if they feel burdened; thus, it will increase their self-motivation and work performance.

2.5. Acquiescent Voice

The severed and lack of knowledge behavior are the reasons for the Acquiescent voice. Individuals (supervisors) show their avoid and pay no attention to the opinion of the majority (employees) of an organization to maintain their conformity (Brinsfield & Edwards, 2020). The individuals did not border to take the burden to express their voice. Acquiescent voice and Pluralist ignorance, which is an assumed individual unique, are the two sides of a coin (Barry & Wilkinson, 2016). Indeed, the other person seems not to agree with the idea yet the idea seems to be dominant (Huang et al., 2018). According to (Unler & Caliskan, 2019), within this behavior, employees express ideas that do not represent their opinions and knowledge. It can be considered that the individual is not willing to spend more time to find a better solution and accept it as it is.

3. Research Modeland Hypothesis Development

Based on the critical review of the literature presented in the previous section, we developed this study’s research framework, as shown in Figure 1. In the research model, servant leadership as an independent variable constitutes five facets: Voluntary Subordination, Covenantal Relationship, Transforming Influence, Responsible morality, and Transcendental Spirituality. Employee voice is a dependent variable. Trust in Leader serves as a mediator that investigates the relationship between Servant leadership and employee voice. We developed our hypotheses according to the literature, which is discussed in the following subsections.

3.1. Voluntary Subordination

Servant leaders follow the voluntary subordination that is related to the fulfillment of the needs of others that are legitimate. Voluntary subordination is difficult for leaders who do not show their goals or their motives. Servant leaders emphasize more on the constructive development of their employees. In many studies, it is stated that servant leaders can develop a distinct trait which encompasses the exchange relationship with the followers so that leaders can affect the outcomes of their followers (Yoshida et al., 2014), improve job satisfaction Finley, and encourage innovative ideas related to the tasks of work (Jenkins, 2014). Hence, we propose the following hypothesis:

H₁: 

Voluntary subordination is positively related to employee voice.

3.1.1. Covenantal Leadership

Covenantal leadership is an important dimension of servant leadership that is related to the mutual commitment of the individuals with some important characteristics like commitment, mutual trust, shared values, and concerns related to the welfare of the other side (Katopol, 2015). The covenants are intensely personal bonds belonging to the individuals whose motivated efforts for the common objectives are not identified. The strong ties that might bind the different covenantal partners are seen and the relationship could not be threatened or broken as a result of any conflict (Sendjaya et al., 2016).

H₂: 

Covenantal relationship is positively related to employee voice.

3.1.2. Transforming Influence

Seto and Sarros (2016) mentioned in the article that while all leadership styles correspond to encouraging transformations in the organization, it is evitable for a servant leader to possess transformational qualities so that the subordinates can perform better with the influence of servant leaders. As a vital source of transformation, service leaders perform their responsibility to recognize the attributions of fellow members and employees in order to bring positivity to the work environment (Leroy et al., 2012).

H₃: 

There isa significant effect of transforming influence on employee voice.

3.1.3. Responsible Morality

Servant leadership is different from the other approaches of leadership as it needs to emphasize great development, especially in the area of morality (Hoch et al., 2018). Moreover, servant leaders are those who develop the leaders and the employees both through the development of their moral actions (Hood et al., 2011). This particular area of servant leadership includes moral reasoning, different moral actions, and the dimensions of the different servant leaders and the other leaders who are principled.

H₄: 

Responsible morality has a positive impact on employee voice.

3.1.4. Transcendental Spirituality

Another important aspect of servant leadership includes transcendental spirituality, and it is the one that is contested the most. Spirituality could be limited to different private spaces and has no contributions to the public sphere (Nobari et al., 2014). Spirituality in the workplace is expected to bring problems as compared to solutions. Gandolfi and Stone (2018) stated in the research that leaders who are seen to be fostering spirituality in the workplace are seen to be creating a culture in which employees experience different things, such as the sense of transcendence, meaning, and interconnection.

H₅: 

Transcendental spirituality has a significant effect on employee voice.

3.2. Mediating Role of Trust in Leader

The two theoretical perspectives outlined earlier describe two different mechanisms by which trust might affect behavior and performance. The relationship-based perspective is based on principles of social exchange and deals with employees’ willingness to reciprocate the care and consideration that a leader expresses in a relationship. That is individuals who feel that their leader has, or will, demonstrate care and consideration tend to reciprocate this sentiment in the form of desirable behaviors. Gao et al. (2011) drew on this logic, suggesting that a social exchange relationship encourages individuals to spend more time on required tasks and be willing to engage in organizational citizenship behavior (i.e., going above and beyond the call of duty). In contrast, the character-based perspective focuses on how perceptions of the leader’s character impact a follower’s vulnerability in a hierarchical relationship. A construct validation study that assessed trust between boundary role persons found trusting personality to be positively related to willingness to engage in trusting behavior (Sankowsky, 1995). Leaders can gain trust by being principled, honest, consistent, and fair (Holley et al., 2019) because supervisors who possess these attributes are unlikely to engage in opportunistic behaviors, and employees will be less likely to feel the need to monitor the actions of their supervisors. Accordingly, we propose the following:

H₆: 

Trust in a leader mediates the relationship between Servant leadership and employee voice.

4. Methods

Population and Sampling

This study aims to examine, verify, and interpret the relations among servant leadership style, Trust in leader, and employee voice, with an aim to establish and centralize the fragmented parts of information available on the subject matter. The study primarily focuses on extending the prior research being carried out on servant leadership style and employee voice by investigating the stated relationships in the Pakistani context. The study is concerned with the responses of the respondents towards the studied variables in terms of their age, gender, education, and experience. This study uses a quantitative research approach because it statistically investigates the mediating role of trust in leaders in the link between leadership style and employee voice. The quantitative research approach aids in quantifying viewpoints and statistically demonstrating the impact of one variable over another. Primary data were collected from employees of small- and medium-sized enterprises in Pakistan through an online questionnaire created on Google Drive is consistent with (Sheehan, 2002) using similar web-based studies. During the data collection process, we emphasized that participation in the survey was voluntary and that the anonymity and confidentiality of individual questionnaires were strictly guaranteed. We asked 500 employees to participate in a survey. Out of 500 employees, 336 employees provided completed valid data on all variables (response rate was 67%).

Table 1. Descriptive statistics (own study).

Age	Freq	Qualification	Freq	Tenure	Freq	Designation	Freq	Tenure with Current Leader	Freq
20–29	79	Intermediate	2	0–1	24	CFO	32	0–1	58
30–39	171	Bachelor (BS)	54	2–3	73	HR Officer	66	2–3	118
40–49	73	Master	259	4–5	156	IT Officer	74	4–5	111
50–59	13	PhD	21	6–7	83	Marketing Officer	65	6–7	49
-	-	-	-	-	-	Director	65
-	-	-	-	-	-	Internee	34
Total	336		336		336		336		336

reports the information related designation of employees. According to the designation, most employees belong to computer-related roles, that is, IT Officers (74), and this is followed by HR Officers (66), Marketing Officers (65), Directors (65), Internees (34), and CFOs (32). We observed, on a daily basis and in official places, that issues occur in IT-related sectors that mess up all the employees and leaders as well; therefore, IT specialists face their bosses’ behavior on a daily basis. We are confident that their response would be better explaining their supervisors’ attitudes. Another three categories, HR Officers (66), Marketing Officers (65), and Directors (65), are also middle-level designations and have meetings with their bosses on a daily basis. In terms of tenure with the current leader, the greatest employee length of tenure is 2–3 years (118), and this is followed by 4–5 (111) years, 0–1 (58) years, and 6–7 (49) years. These results are more reasonable because adequate employees (118) have tenure with current leaders of 2–3 years with their leaders, and to judge leadership behavior, 2–3 years is a lengthy period; therefore, respondent responses would target the real picture of their leaders.

5. Analysis and Results

The goal of this study is prediction and theory development instead of confirmation; therefore, a PLS approach is preferred over a covariance-based (CB) approach (Hair et al., 2017). When the structural model is multifaceted, then the PLS approach utilizes latent variable values like this study as it has reflective, observed, and latent constructs all used for the same approach. Hair et al. (2017) suggested that PLS-SEM has two steps. First, check the validity and reliability of the model and structural/path model evaluated for hypothesis testing in the next step. The reliability of the measurement model was checked through composite reliability (CR) and Cronbach’s alpha, whereas validity was checked by discriminant and convergent validity tests. After confirmation of the reliability and validity of the measurement model, the next step is hypothesis testing for the structural model. Normality was checked through skewness and kurtosis, the numbers were within the range of ±2 as normal (Rahman & Gamil, 2019), and multicollinearity of the data was checked through VIF using SPSS 21, as shown in

Table 2. Descriptive and collinearity (VIF) statistics (own study).

	VS	CR	TI	RM	TS	TL	EV
Mean	2.850	2.850	2.980	2.730	3.050	2.890	2.900
Median	2.800	2.800	2.920	2.730	3.060	2.880	2.900
Std. Deviation	0.599	0.599	0.781	0.578	0.676	0.618	0.628
Variance	0.358	0.358	0.610	0.334	0.457	0.382	0.395
Skewness	0.045	0.045	0.059	0.082	0.062	0.066	0.071
Std. Error of Skewness	0.12	0.12	0.12	0.12	0.12	0.12	0.12
Kurtosis	−0.948	−0.948	−1.055	−0.702	−0.722	−0.879	−0.834
Std. Error of Kurtosis	0.23	0.23	0.23	0.234	0.23	0.23	0.23
VIF	1.64	1.79	1.56	1.62	2.19	1.62	1.94

Note: VS = Voluntary Subordination, CR = Covenantal Relationship, TI = Transforming Influence, RM = Responsible Morality, TS = Transcendental Spirituality, TL = Trust in Leader, EV = Employee Voice.

. VIF must be less than 10; in this study, the values amounted to VIF < 3. Hence, multicollinearity was not a problem for subsequent considerations (Ali et al., 2018).

5.1. Assessment of Measurement Model

Endogenous variables’ values variance was checked through the coefficient of determination R² and adjusted R² (AR²). The values of R² and AR² are very close and indicate high and medium effect sizes, as well as a well-fit model (Khan et al., 2020).

5.1.1. Reliability of the Measurement Model

Internal consistency is measured by Cronbach’s alpha, while CR measures the more lenient reliability of the variables. It suggested that Cronbach’s alpha is less than 0.60, suggesting that the items do not match well (see

Table 3. The measurement model’s reliability and validity (own study).

	R2	Adjusted R2	Cronbach’s Alpha	Composite Reliability	Average Variance Extracted
Voluntary Subordination			0.51	0.80	0.66
Covenantal Relationship			0.71	0.81	0.58
Transforming Influence			0.75	0.83	0.50
Responsible Morality			0.68	0.86	0.76
Transcendental Spirituality			0.71	0.82	0.53
Trust in Leader	0.513	0.506	0.87	0.89	0.51
Employee voice	0.301	0.299	0.87	0.89	0.54

). Accordingly, the model is well-suited except for the value of Voluntary Subordination, which is less than 0.60 (Khan et al., 2019).

Likewise, the CR values were greater than the 0.70 threshold, indicating the model fit well and demonstrated great reliability (Afthanorhan et al., 2020), as seen in Table 3 and Figure 2.

5.1.2. Model Validity

The validity of a model is important for a reliable model (Babin & Svensson, 2012); therefore, convergence and discriminant validity tests were applied in the study. Factor-loading values for all of the indicator variables are greater than the 0.70 cut-off point after deleting some weak indicators, and similarly, the AVE values > 0.50 for all constructions (Almansoori et al., 2021). Therefore, it demonstrates high levels of convergence among the indicators in assessing their respective constructs, as seen in Table 3 and Figure 3.

In this study, the discriminant validity (DV) of the constructs has been examined by correlation matrix and made comparison with each construct’s square root (SQRT) of the AVE. The diagonal indicates AVE square root values, and below–diagonal is the inter-correlation matrix values of each construct of AVE that are greater than the correlation coefficients of all within the same constructs and all other constructs in the same row or column. It is suggested that the entire constructs and measurement items of this study are suitable for the estimation of the developed propositions and structural model. It is the evidence that all constructs fulfill DV’s criteria and found no issues with the Fornell–Larcker criterion (Henseler et al., 2009), as shown in

Table 4. Correlation and the Fornell Larcker criterion (own study).

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7
1. Covenantal Relationship	0.73
2. Employee voice	0.46	0.67
3. Responsible Morality	0.48	0.42	0.87
4. Transcendental Spirituality	0.59	0.51	0.54	0.73
5. Transforming Influence	0.67	0.53	0.58	0.71	0.707
6. Trust in Leader	0.56	0.55	0.46	0.66	0.638	0.68
7. Voluntary Subordination	0.59	0.40	0.47	0.47	0.505	0.47	0.82

. However, Voorhees et al. (2016) reported that HTMT is the best approach for DV in PSL.

In

Table 5. Determining discriminant validity using HTMT ratio (own study).

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7
1.Covenantal Relationship_	1.000
2.Employee voice_	0.587	1.000
3.Responsible Morality_	0.688	0.550	1.000
4.Transcendental Spirituality_	0.829	0.657	0.792	1.000
5.Transforming Influence_	0.921	0.650	0.805	0.970	1.000
6.Trust in Leader	0.707	0.624	0.598	0.834	0.788	1.000
7.Voluntary Subordination_	0.982	0.608	0.783	0.795	0.809	0.700	1.000

, the HTMT values are lower than the cut-off value of ≤0.85 (Batool et al., 2021); except for transforming influence with covenantal relationship and transcendental spirituality and voluntary subordination with covenantal relationship, the remaining values have no issue with DV and show a fit model and revealed validity.

PLS-SEM model fitting was measured for a causal model as well as testing the study hypotheses. Numerous fit indexes were utilized through Smart PLS.

Table 6. Fit summary (own study).

	Saturated Model	Estimated Model
SRMR	0.064	0.075
d_ULS	2.867	3.969
d_G	1.009	1.029
Chi-Square	1882.641	1912.560
NFI	0.665	0.659

shows the model is well fitted as the SRMR value is 0.07 < 0.08 (Dash & Paul, 2021), and similar results were presented by d_ULS 2.867 and d_G 1.009, as values are lower than the estimated values (K. K.-K. Wong, 2013). In addition, the value of Chi-Square 1882.641 was smaller, and the value of NFI was 0.665, which was similar to the estimated values and showed that the model was a good fit (Hair et al., 2019).

5.2. The Predictive Validity

Predictive validity (Q2)Stone–Geisser indicators for small, medium, and high impact size are 0.02, 0.15, and 0.35, respectively (Khan et al., 2022a, 2022b; Cohen, 1988). In this study, endogenous latent variables of trust in the leader and employee voice are 0.213 and 0.126, respectively. Hence, according to Q2 results, (See

Table 7. Predictive validity (own study).

	SSO	SSE	Q2 (=1-SSE/SSO)
Voluntary Subordination	672.000	672.000
Covenantal Relationship	1344.000	1344.000
Transforming Influence	1680.000	1680.000
Responsible Morality	672.000	672.000
Transcendental Spirituality	1344.000	1344.000
Trust in Leader	3360.000	2643.802	0.213
Employee voice	3360.000	2935.947	0.126

) the model has a medium level of predictive accuracy, and the variables are indispensable for the usual modification of the framework.

5.3. Hypothesis Testing

Hypothesis testing is evaluated after confirmation of the validity and reliability of the measurement models. The results of hypothesis testing discovered that voluntary subordination had no relationship with trust in a leader (T 1.918, P 0.056). Accordingly, H1 was not supported. The covenantal relationship had an extensive positive effect on trust in a leader (T 1.966, P 0.050) that validated H2. Transforming influence had a tremendously positively significant effect on the trust in a leader (T 3.436, P 0.001), which supported H3. Responsible morality had no significant influence on trust in leaders (T 0.492, P 0.623), which did not confirm H4. Transcendental spirituality substantially affected the trust in leaders (T 5.353, P 0.00), confirming H5. Trust in leader significantly affected the employee voice (T 6.721, P 0.00), which validated H6 (see Figure 4 and

Table 8. Path analysis using bootstrapping (own study).

	Path Coefficient	Mean	Std. Dev.	t-Values	p-Values	Supported?
Voluntary Subordination -> Trust in Leader (H1)	0.103	0.109	0.054	1.918	0.056	No
Covenantal Relationship -> Trust in Leader (H2)	0.116	0.124	0.059	1.986	0.050	Yes
Transforming Influence -> Trust in Leader (H3)	0.244	0.240	0.071	3.606	0.001	Yes
Responsible Morality -> Trust in Leader (H4)	0.024	0.021	0.049	0.473	0.623	No
Transcendental Spirituality -> Trust in Leader (H5)	0.359	0.353	0.067	5.303	0.000	Yes
Trust in Leader -> Employee Voice (H6)	0.548	0.553	0.082	6.559	0.000	Yes

).

6. Discussion

This study is consistent with (Bucci & Lewis, 2016); the authors argued that servant leaders consistently provide legal assistance voluntarily, and such a voluntary nature reflects the leader’s character (Iyer, 2012). Rushing (2021) suggests that covenant-based relationships treat their followers with equality, reduce the distance, and increase mutual trust and concern for subordinate welfare (Sendjaya & Pekerti, 2010). Servant leadership is established when they serve and positively transform emotionally, intellectually, socially, and spiritually when dealing with subordinates (Sendjaya et al., 2008); servant leadership is transmittable (Boyum, 2012) and, in turn, accelerates positive changes in organization and society as well (Russell & Stone, 2002). Sendjaya and Pekerti (2010) argued that servant leadership promotes reflective behaviors, which bring about positive changes in the moral environment of the organization. Servant leaders have attributes such as covenantal relationships and morality that also permeate with spiritual values. Spiritual and servant leadership are theoretically interlinked (Jurkiewicz & Giacalone, 2004; Kumpikaitė-Valiūnienė, 2014). Humble leadership behavior significantly impacts the positive behavior of employees (C. Liu, 2016), humility brings leaders effectiveness (Rego et al., 2018), and authentic leadership has a positive effect on employee voice (Hsiung, 2012). According to Aarum Andersen (2009), servant leaders consider themselves servants to encounter organizational challenges and to serve the followers (subordinates’ voice), organization, and community rather than as a vehicle to attain personal power and prestige.

The results of the construct between the Voluntary Subordination and Trust in Leader (H1) have no association. Therefore this result is not consistent with these studies (C. Liu, 2016; Y. Liu et al., 2018). The results of the constructs Covenantal Relationship and Trust in Leader (H2) are positively significant that is an aligned with (Sendjaya & Pekerti, 2010) servant leaders consistently focus on the legitimate need of subordinates voluntarily and a willingness to take up opportunities to serve others (Blanchard, 2003; Van den Bos et al., 1998). The constructs of Transforming Influence and Trust in Leader (H3) are significant in that they support the viewpoints of Sendjaya et al. (2008) that Transforming-based leaders treat all people with fundamental equality and uphold equality in the organization through the distinctive attributes of servant leadership go beyond the willingness to serve others. The constructs of Responsible Morality and Trust in Leader (H4) are insignificant, which contradicts Sendjaya et al.’s (2008) assertion that Responsible Morality is the core aim of servant leadership. The constructs of Transcendental Spirituality and Trust in Leader (H5) are positively significant. (Fairholm & Gronau, 2015) argue that spiritual leadership and servant leadership are conceptually interlinked. The mediation role of trust in leader between employees’ voice and servant leadership (H6) is significant, and similar findings were presented by (Song et al., 2022; Jaiswal & Dhar, 2017), who argued that leaders play a decisive role in generating employee voice. Wu et al. (2013) found trust in a leader mediates the relationship between servant leadership style and employee voice. According to social exchange theory, the warm relationship between employees and leaders optimizes the output so as to more actively protect the interests of the organization or leadership and, therefore, present voice behavior (Guo et al., 2020). As Asencio and Mujkic (2016) argued, employees’ trust in leaders is developed after a long span of time and produces dynamic changes within the interaction. The Broaden-and-Build theory of positive emotions (Fredrickson, 2001) can bring a competitive advantage for individuals to improve actionability and reaction within a short time and enhance the flexibility of thinking, so there are more convenient conditions for employees to produce new ideas and suggestions.

6.1. Practical Implications

The results of this study acknowledge that servant leadership style and trust in a leader can promote employee voice behavior. According to these findings, SMSs Pakistan should adopt a servant leadership-oriented management approach to build trust in leaders and encourage employee voice. The results support the idea that organizational outcomes are the by-products of employees’ commitment, trust, and dedication. According to our empirical findings, servant leadership has a positive impact on employee voice, which suggests that organizations can benefit from implementing it. For example, organizations should emphasize equality and mutual respect between management and staff and reward employees for being just, friendly, and helpful to others. By analyzing the vast range of research articles, we suggested servant leadership is the one that forms the trust of employees with the help of ideas, beliefs, and ethics.

The suggestion of our research on the mediating role of trust in leaders, managers should look for ways to boost employee perceptions of their managers’ pattern of word-deed alignment, which encourages employee constructive voice behavior. Therefore, we believe that, in a similar vein, employees’ general inclination to trust others will influence their level of trust in their supervisor. It has been seen that employees resist speaking up in matters of the organization if they do not have trust in their leader and fear being mocked by others if they open up about their suggestions. For this problem, scholars suggested that a suitable role of the leadership style is necessary that will build their trust and maintain that trust throughout the leadership. Thus, we argue that trust develops the relationship smoothly and strongly between employees and leadership. If trust does not exist between employees and leadership, then employees feel uncomfortable under any kind of leadership. These findings make several contributions to our research on employee voice.

6.2. Limitations and Future Directions

This study extends knowledge added to the existing literature, but still, it has some limitations; therefore, the author recommended these limitations for future studies to be conducted. First, in this study, the author tested the mediating role of trust in leaders was limited between employee voice and servant leadership; therefore, the author suggests that other behavior effects could be tested that enhance the employee trust in leaders. Secondly, another limitation of this study is to check the effect of leadership style behavior on employee voice with the mediating role of trust in a leader; thus, the author suggests that future studies involve another leadership style with the mediating effect of trust in a leader. Third, in terms of reliability through Cronbach alpha, the voluntary subordination value is less than the threshold value of 0.60. Although an existing theory supports the voluntary subordination significance, future research needs to use voluntary subordination in terms of servant leadership style and employee voice and should use a larger sample size in different contexts and regions in order to address the weak relationship of voluntary subordination. Moreover, in this study, the author analyzed the effect of leadership behaviors on employee voice, but the author did not include Maslow’s personality traits, which can play a core role in developing trust in leaders; therefore, we strongly recommended that future research include the pessimistic and optimistic personality traits to explore new areas, as (Dutta & Khatri, 2017) found that employee proposed that when individuals are high on negative affectivity, they perceive their environment generally in negative views and, therefore, they perceive their work as negative which result in low job satisfaction, whereas individuals who are high on positive affectivity view working environment positively and, thus, feel more satisfied in their jobs. Steger et al. (2013) found that an optimistic nature improves job satisfaction.

In addition, the author collected data about employees’ attitudes or beliefs (perceptual data) about their leaders (Cansoy & Parlar, 2018) even though such perceptions can be “objectively” wrong. Nonetheless, the author suggests that multiple sources could be employed in future research to test the relationship between leadership behaviors and subordinate voice. Moreover, this study is conducted in SMEs, where employees are paid low wages and their voices are raised in vain, but in contrast, in large industries, employees are heard and high-waged; therefore, the author recommends leadership’s behaviors on voice in SMEs versus high contexts.

Finally, this study was conducted in small and medium enterprises in Pakistan; therefore, the generalizability is limited to the Pakistani SME industry. In order to increase the generalizability, future studies should be conducted in SAARC countries because of their more or less similar cultures.

7. Conclusions

This study was one of the first multi-level attempts to investigate the consequences of servant leadership style on employee voice in SME Pakistan. Based on self-enhancement theory, this study empirically examined a mediation mechanism that explains how and why servant leadership affects employees’ voices in a Pakistani context. Our research illustrates that through greater job engagement, which is in turn made possible by servant leadership, individuals can be self-motivated to express promotive voice. This is especially applicable to employees who have a high level of proactive personality.

This study tested the links between servant leadership and employee voice with the mediating role of trust in leaders. Our study examined the data collected from 336 employees. The empirical findings demonstrated the following. First, the results suggested that servant leadership behavior is positively and significantly associated with employee voice. That is when leaders exhibit more open-mindedness and kindness toward their employees. Those leaders who put their subordinates first and give priority to their issues in the workplace then employees become more satisfied with their jobs. Therefore, the more humbleness provided by the supervisors, the higher the employees’ trust and the employees’satisfaction in the organization. Ultimately, their efficiency will be high, and the organization will be more effectively performed. According to the results, we may conclude that supervisors’ exhibiting servant leadership style generates the employees’ perceptions that their ideas and opinions are given weightage and consider their strengths and contributions valuable. Subsequently, this perception might drive employees to receive more push towards performing more than their jobs. These results are consistent with the findings that servant leadership is established when they serve and positively transform emotional, intellectual, social, and spiritual subordinates (Heyler & Martin, 2018); this is transmittable (Jurkowsky, 2020) and positively impacts organizations and society (Dutta & Khatri, 2017; Imran, 2019). To analyze the objectives of the research, six hypotheses were formed, and four of them were supported. The findings of the research were established on the data being collected from SME, S Pakistan.