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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Psychol.
Sec. Organizational Psychology
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1441660
This article is part of the Research Topic Employee Resilience View all 5 articles

The Effect of Shared Leadership on Employee Resilience: Wielding the double-edged sword

Provisionally accepted
Ma Hao Ma Hao 1Yan ai min Yan ai min 1liu Jie liu Jie 1Deng Yuling Deng Yuling 2*
  • 1 School of Business, Central South University, Changsha, Hunan Province, China
  • 2 Department of Health Management Center, Third Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha, Anhui Province, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Shared leadership, which is characterized by distributed leadership influence within an organization, fosters collective involvement and a shared sense of power and responsibility. This investigation delves into the ambidextrous impacts that shared leadership imparts on the resilience of employees through the incorporation of the Job Demands-Resources framework to delineate the underlying mechanisms. A two time point research with a analysis of 246 valid questionnaires revealed that the relationship between shared leadership and employee resilience is positive, and shared leadership enhanced employee resilience by promoting flexible work arrangements while simultaneously increasing role overload, with a potential negative impact. Furthermore, this study examined the influence of goal clarity in moderating these dynamics, which strengthened the positive influence of shared leadership on flexible work arrangements and could reduce the negative effect of shared leadership on role overload, all of which could benefit to employee resilience. This research contributes to the scholarly discourse by illuminating a more comprehensive understanding of the relationship between shared leadership and employee resilience. It also offers practical insights into implementing shared leadership in a manner that harnesses its potential while mitigating its downsides on employee resilience.

    Keywords: Shared leadership, Employee resilience, Flexible work arrangements, Role overload, Goal clarity, Job Demands-Resources model

    Received: 31 May 2024; Accepted: 27 Jan 2025.

    Copyright: © 2025 Hao, min, Jie and Yuling. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Deng Yuling, Department of Health Management Center, Third Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha, Anhui Province, China

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.