Leadership as a Trigger for Employee Commitment to Enhance Organization Performance in Era of Pandemic

I. INTRODUCTION

Unquestionably, companies are treasuring commitment among their personnel as it is believed that commitment will result in better performance of employees and thus increased productivity. However, this relation is moderated by employee satisfaction as a direct consequence of employee commitment. Lo, Ramayah and Min (2009) believes that commitment is important and this is a key to decrease withdrawal actions and more willingness to accept change as committed employees are satisfied personnel. It is imperative to know how to develop the sense of commitment among employees especially after the spread of COVID 19 and the change in the behavior of organizations and this change entails support of all employees in the hierarchical structure. To compete, companies are required to decrease the turnover rate which is an outcome of employee satisfaction.

Tumwesigye (2010) assures that performance of employees plays a vital role in determining the success of organizations. Ajila and Awonusi (2004) concluded that one of the antecedent factors of employees' performance is believed to be employee commitment. Leaders should know how to extract the best of employees and motivate them to perform at their best. In the last two years, COVID 19 forced a new leadership style around the world and commitment was visualizes as a very vital source (EL Zein & Srour, 2021). Additionally, employees commitment linked to performance also was linked to the ability of organizations to adapt in a changing environment but this correlation is increased tremendously with leadership guidance (EL Zein & Srour, 2021).

II. LITERATURE REVIEW

Working in a corporation today is seen as complicated as it simply demands advanced problem-solving skills to face conflict and reach consensus. This fact is perceived by some fresh entrepreneurs as overwhelming, yet it's an absolute idea to many tycoons currently. For instance, if we examine the case of the majority of organizations, we so much scrutinize what happens between team members where either group think occurs or conflict creates a burden to development and productivity. Why? This is simply a common feature in the human nature as such interactions involve too much conformity or too much rebellion. However, these interactions should shape the outcomes of the work done, the goals that are set, and the decisions that are made.

Many studies criticize organizations, including governmental ones and non-profit organizations, for relying on management rather than leadership. Over-managed companies strive to make required developments that are made in a slow pace, and therefore, these companies have less accomplishments than their potential. Employees, in such establishments with poor leadership skills, do not have an optimistic view towards the company. In an atmosphere of mistrust, workers discover that managers can behave in a difficult manner, or that they don't seem to contribute to the establishment's wellbeing. This type of poor management paves the way to lack of motivation, which if left to last for long, will lead to a defected establishment. Such organizations have to confront the realistic consequences of changes, but above all, it has to operate with the pressure of unmotivated workers that have no confidence in the mechanism or the manager's capacity to develop the company.

Such type of critique only shows how important true leadership is. While every company states its interest in being more efficient and hence successful, that is unlikely to happen without true leadership. All different leaders in managerial positions such as authorized governmental representatives, department managers, board supervisors, and all other workers would have to play active parts, both in their organization and with partners and investors, in facilitating, networking, and establishing connections. For an organization to achieve distinction, the head leaders will have to achieve their tasks perfectly, especially the tasks that relates to developing and maintaining the organization's core competencies. These are the requirements that enables a learning establishment to attain its image, reputation, and trust. Leaders as change agents are responsible for developing organizations to reach their goals and commitment is one of the triggers of organizational success.

III. EMPLOYEE COMMITMENT

According to Lumley et al. (2011), significant concern was pulled in to estimate the level of organizational commitment by understanding the level of dedication a worker has to the organization. Meyer and Allen (1997) linked organizational commitment to how deep an employee identifies with the institution itself and how much he is willing to contribute to its achievements. Another association is made by Fuller et al. (2006) where the sense of belonging is linked to organizational commitment which will generate satisfaction. Similarly, conferred, organizational health is dependent on the organizational commitment and dedication (Grego-Planer, 2019) and satisfaction as a moderator. A solid positive relationship among institutional dedication and organizational efficiency, proficiency, satisfaction and productivity is established by several researchers (Meyer & Herscovitch, 2001). Thus, personal and institutional efficiency can be affected by the organizational commitment. Lots of scholars and researchers have attempted to establish a hypothetical system for understanding organizational commitment and to contribute for maintaining organizational commitment for a longer period. Newstrom and Davis (2002), through investigating organizational conduct in individuals and groups, proposed that institutional commitment can be evaluated through the desire and readiness of the institution's members to work for the institution. Other factors also affect workers' dedication such as the image of the institution and the care and support an institution projects to its workers (El Zein, Aridi, 2018). Hence, employees who had worked with an institution for a longer period of time are considered more dedicated since it's linked to their experience and successes they had with that institution (Beheshtifar & Herat, 2013). Organizations which value its staff members are proven to have dedicated employees who show eagerness in doing more than their assigned tasks and more satisfied in performing their tasks. Briefly, organizational commitment is evaluated through the degree of devotion an employee has and his eagerness to remain working with the organization (Saha & Kumar, 2018).

The modern advancement and recent technology, alongside innovative approaches and global rivalry had imposed changes on the workplace, and thus, managers started to understand that an institution's advantages are found in its intangible assets such as the expertise and competencies of their employees. Nowadays, employees are accomplished, well-educated, and waiting for enablement and empowerment. The study by Neininger et al. (2010) showed that organizational commitment is directly related to the work results and through it we can forecast the worker's dedication, satisfaction, worker turnover, and performance, in addition to organizational and career outcomes. Gellatly (1995) showed an adverse connection between the absence of the employees and organizational commitment, and it proposed that when the employee is more dedicated, the likelihood of his absence decreases (Grego-Planer, 2019) and thus employee turnover decreases (Neininger et al., 2010).

IV. ORGANIZATION PERFORMANCE

It is essential to find what stimulates and influences organizational commitment and employee satisfaction. So what drives an employee's behavior? And how can those in leadership positions contribute to workers' long term commitment? Every organization should take these questions into consideration in order to enhance the organizational achievements and accomplishments. Hellriegel, Slocum and Woodman (2001), in their study, discovered that causes of commitment aren't exclusive, and that establishing organizational commitment isn't simple because employees have various and complex prospects and principles. In addition, degrees of organizational commitment of workers is subjected to fluctuate with time. The attitude and behavior of an employee, along with their prospects and practices, constitute the preliminary form of organizational commitment. Organizational commitment is also influenced by individual attributes, hierarchy, and organizational attributes. Employees' age, gender, and educational attainment are examples of individual traits that contributes to the degree of commitment to an organization (Meyer & Allen, 1997). Researchers such as Buchanan (1974) and Beheshtifar and Herat (2013) proposed that having an organization that cares about its employees can affect the latter's behavior to the organizational results and thus can positively affect institutional commitment. Researchers, such as Buchanan (1974) and Mowday et al. (1982), also confirmed the positive effects of social networks and close interactions in the workplace on the employees' commitment to an organization. Financial reimbursement can also be an influencing factor to organizational commitment, but in modern work climates having good financial resources is not enough (Nelson, 1996). In modern work environments, workers want to be more involved in decision making and have a sense of value to grow their networks and grow their personal skills and it all plays a part in influencing organizational commitment.

Scholars ensures that employee commitment outcomes in companies in a number of ways such as decreased absenteeism and lower turnover rate which are the foundations for increased performance (Udu & Ameh, 2016).

V. METHODOLOGY

5.1 Sample

This study is carried out in Lebanon, with a particular focus on young employees. Data is collected using random sampling for a total of 100 questionnaires received, with 86 of the 100 questionnaires valid. The 14 unreturned questionnaires were excluded from this analysis.

5.2 Measure

The data is obtained by sending a standardized questionnaire, composed of four parts. The first part measures the independent variable which includes the employees' commitment. This section contains questions about the impact of leaving their jobs on their lives, such as: The employees' obligation to remain in their organization; the scarcity of employment alternatives; the employees' loyalty to their organizations; their sense of obligation to the people in it; their sense of "belonging" to their organizations; and the timing for leaving the organization.

The second part measures the independent variable that includes the employees' Satisfaction which contains questions about: Satisfaction with having work-related responsibilities; Tasks are important for the institution; Satisfaction with the physical conditions; Chances to have access to opportunities in the department; Distribution of workload among employees in the department; Clarity of job description; Satisfaction the style of supervisors; Satisfaction with the cooperation between colleagues in the department; and Satisfaction of rewards and appreciations, resulting from performing well.

The third part measures the dependent variable that includes the organization performance, which contains questions about: Continuing their career in the same organization; Understanding the criteria of performance review in their organization; The ability to resolve unexpected schedules on time; Ability to carry out assigned duties effectively and efficiently; Maintaining good records of attendance in their organization; and Appropriateness of the organization atmosphere and work pressure for the employees to deliver good performance.

The fourth part measures the dependent variable that includes leadership to enhance performance in era of pandemic, which contains questions about: Motivation at the work place; Satisfaction with the amount of communication received from the organization leaders; Authority given by the leaders of the organization to make decisions to complete the job duties; Leaders fostering organization wide collaboration; Freedom given by supervisors to solve problems; Supervisors believe employees need to be supervised closely they are not likely to do their work; and Sense of security about the work.

Employee satisfaction is measured by 9 questions, employee commitment is measured by 8 questions, employee performance is measured by 7 questions, and leadership to enhance performance in era of pandemic is measured by 9 questions.

The above variables are assessed by asking respondents to rate their agreement or disagreement with a series of statements describing leadership to enhance performance in era of pandemic, employees' commitment, employees' performance, and employees' satisfaction on a five-point Likert-type scale ranging from "1 = strongly disagree" to "5 = strongly agree".

VI. DATA ANALYSIS

The data is analyzed statistically. Various statistical approaches are utilized to interpret the findings of the data acquired. Prior to statistical analysis, the missing values were also checked. In this investigation, the sample size to variable number ratio is 30:1. The survey contains 87 questionnaires in total. The dependent and independent variables are then factored in the following phase, as indicated in table 1. Cronbach's alpha is utilized to determine the internal consistency of each variable in the study. There is a high level of internal consistency in this study, since the value for each variable is 0.865 larger than 0.7. In table 2, the KMO value is determined to be 0.798 more than 0.5. The Bartley significance test is also used, and the value for each variable is less than 0.5. The extracted total variance test is more than 60%.

Extraction Method: Principal Component Analysis. a. When analyzing a covariance matrix, the initial eigenvalues are the same across the raw and rescaled solution.

Following that, the simple correlation and regression tests are used. The correlation test is used to analyze the strength and direction of the relationship, as shown in table 3, which demonstrates a relatively good positive relationship between employee commitment and employee satisfaction, organizational performance, and leadership to improve performance in the face of a pandemic. Also, a good positive relationship between employee satisfaction and employee commitment, employee performance and leadership to enhance performance in era of pandemic. As well as a good positive relationship between organization performance and each of employee commitment, employees' satisfaction and leadership to enhance performance in era of pandemic. Finally, a good positive relationship between leadership to enhance performance in era of pandemic and each of employee commitment, employees' satisfaction, and organization performance. The values are statistically significant at 0.05 level of significance.

The sample correlation coefficient between the response variable and the predictor variables is explained in table 4 were R = 0.707. For this model the level of variation in the response variable (organization performance) is 70.7% which is explained by leadership to enhance performance in era of pandemic and employee satisfaction and employee commitment, employee performance.

Table 5 shows the P-value (Sig), which is = 0.00, a very small number smaller than the predetermined significance level, $\alpha =0.05$. Therefore, the test results are statistically significant, which corresponds to a significance level of 5%. This result proves that the Predictor variables make a significant contribution to predicting the response variable. The table shows that the predictor variables: leadership to improve performance in the age of the pandemic, employee satisfaction and employee engagement, employee performance make a significant contribution to the model as its p-values is less than 0.05, the standard significance level.

VII. CONCLUSION

Leaders with a considerate style demonstrate a high degree of empathy and understanding for others. Such leaders will search for and consider recommendations, consultation with workers on crucial topics in advance, and evaluate the work instead of the workers. A leader who is focused on the beginning of the structural style must stress the well specified objectives and priorities, be able to incorporate his ideas effectively, delegate roles and tasks to others, and closely track their actions. This leader should also sets demanding levels of success, demands adherence to standards, and fosters competitiveness between workers. Both styles are strong determinants of the actions of a leader, as a style indicates the leader's propensity to behave. In various sort of incidents, such as variations in job types and/or employees, each style has been proved successful. In units of specialists and innovative workers, such as R&D units or tasks classes, for instance, consideration style tends to fit well.

On the other hand, it would be beneficial to implement activities where comprehensive supervision, teamwork, tracking and demand for performance are needed (Yukl, 1981). Yet, while studies have pointed out a positive connection between commitment, satisfaction and performance (Giffords, 2009), outcomes are more definite when it comes to the performance effect of a leader's task-oriented conduct (Yukl, 1998). This study proved with strong correlation that employee commitment moderated with satisfaction will outcome in enhanced performance. In addition, as a consequence of this study, leadership will trigger positively this relation.

Finally, leadership is one of the primary drivers of business efficiency enhancement (El Zein & Srour, 2021). Leaders, the primary decision-makers, establish when corporate tools are acquired, developed and deployed, how they are turned into useful goods and services and how they value organizational stakeholders. They are also strong sources of revenue and therefore a sustainable competitive advantage (Avolio, 1999).