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Fostering Sustainable Workplace Through Leaders’ Compassionate Behaviors: Understanding the Role of Employee Well-Being and Work Engagement

Author

Listed:
  • Martina Pansini

    (Department of Human Sciences, LUMSA University, 00193 Rome, Italy)

  • Ilaria Buonomo

    (Department of Human Sciences, LUMSA University, 00193 Rome, Italy)

  • Paula Benevene

    (Department of Human Sciences, LUMSA University, 00193 Rome, Italy)

Abstract

Social sustainability in organizations refers to fostering well-being, inclusion, and the development of supportive relationships that enhance individual well-being and collective resilience. This study explores the relationship between compassionate leadership and work engagement, focusing on the mediating role of employee well-being. Compassionate leaders actively engage with their followers’ needs, offering emotional support and practical help and aligning with social sustainability principles by promoting positive workplace outcomes and fostering a supportive environment. Despite compassionate leadership having generated growing interest, very few studies have adopted a quantitative approach to examining its specific effects on employee outcomes, creating a significant gap in the literature specifically concerning how compassionate leadership affects employee engagement or additional variables, such as employee well-being. Framed in the Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) Model, our study addresses this gap by examining whether compassionate leadership can serve as a job resource by increasing work engagement through employee well-being as a personal resource. The study was carried out on a sample of 225 Spanish workers, and the data were examined through a structural equation model (SEM) to test the proposed model. The results showed a good model fit to the data, showing that well-being acts as a key mediator in the relationship between compassionate leadership and job engagement. Although we did not find a direct association between compassionate leadership and engagement, we found that compassionate behaviors significantly improve employee well-being, which in turn promotes higher engagement. These results extend the JD-R model by demonstrating that leaders’ compassionate leadership can serve as a job resource, contributing to a supportive and socially sustainable workplace.

Suggested Citation

  • Martina Pansini & Ilaria Buonomo & Paula Benevene, 2024. "Fostering Sustainable Workplace Through Leaders’ Compassionate Behaviors: Understanding the Role of Employee Well-Being and Work Engagement," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(23), pages 1-16, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:16:y:2024:i:23:p:10697-:d:1538002
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Ilaria Buonomo & Martina Pansini & Sara Cervai & Paula Benevene, 2022. "Compassionate Work Environments and Their Role in Teachers’ Life Satisfaction: The Contribution of Perceived Collective School Performance and Burnout," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(21), pages 1-14, October.
    2. Simona De Stasio & Paula Benevene & Alessandro Pepe & Ilaria Buonomo & Benedetta Ragni & Carmen Berenguer, 2020. "The Interplay of Compassion, Subjective Happiness and Proactive Strategies on Kindergarten Teachers’ Work Engagement and Perceived Working Environment Fit," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(13), pages 1-17, July.
    3. Kan Jia & Tianlun Zhu & Weiwei Zhang & Samma Faiz Rasool & Ali Asghar & Tachia Chin, 2022. "The Linkage between Ethical Leadership, Well-Being, Work Engagement, and Innovative Work Behavior: The Empirical Evidence from the Higher Education Sector of China," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(9), pages 1-15, April.
    4. Cristopher J. Tietsort & Sarah J. Tracy & Elissa A. Adame, 2023. "“You Just Don’t Talk about Certain Topics”: How Concerns to Disclose Suffering to Leaders Constrain Compassion at Work," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(5), pages 1-19, March.
    5. Denise Parris & Jon Peachey, 2013. "A Systematic Literature Review of Servant Leadership Theory in Organizational Contexts," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 113(3), pages 377-393, March.
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    Cited by:

    1. Ivy Suzzete A. Lancian & Celso L. Tagadiad, 2025. "Empowering Leadership and Work Environment as Predictors of Innovative Work Behavior of Teachers," International Journal of Research and Innovation in Social Science, International Journal of Research and Innovation in Social Science (IJRISS), vol. 9(3), pages 1-15, March.
    2. Moussa Elkhweildi & Benard Vetbuje & Ahmad Bassam Alzubi & Hasan Yousef Aljuhmani, 2025. "Leading with Green Ethics: How Environmentally Specific Ethical Leadership Enhances Employee Job Performance Through Communication and Engagement," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 17(17), pages 1-31, September.
    3. Ma Ying & Mohammed A. M. Allaqtta, 2025. "The Impact of Safety Culture, Risk Mitigation, and Sustainability on Business Performance: The Mediating Role of Employee Engagement in Palestinian Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 17(10), pages 1-29, May.
    4. I-Hsiung Chang & Ru-Si Chen, 2025. "Fostering Organizational Loyalty in Preschool Teachers: The Role of Sustainable Workplace, Social Responsibility, and Leadership," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 17(7), pages 1-20, March.

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