The role of Employees’ Dynamic Capabilities in shaping job performance through fake and authentic leadership

Abstract

This article examines the role of Employees’ Dynamic Capabilities (EDC) in shaping job performance through the influence of authentic and fake leadership styles. It addresses a critical gap by exploring how EDCs moderate the relations between leadership styles and job performance, mediated by intraorganizational trust, work engagement, work motivation, and organizational commitment. Data obtained from questionnaires from 289 organizations in Poland were analyzed using multigroup path analysis. The findings show that authentic leadership positively influences job performance by enhancing trust, engagement, commitment, and motivation, and the strength of this influence is higher among organizations with higher levels of EDCs. Conversely, fake leadership negatively impacts job performance, with more pronounced effects in low EDC environments. Most importantly, high EDC levels can buffer against the negative effects of fake leadership. The study highlights the importance of fostering EDCs to leverage authentic leadership benefits and mitigate fake leadership harms.