The Relationship between Leadership Style and Employee Performance: Evidence from Employees in Indonesia

This study aims to analyse the relationship between leadership style and employee performance in organisations in Indonesia. Leadership style is understood as a set of behaviours exhibited by leaders when providing direction, communicating, motivating, offering support and feedback, treating employees fairly, and involving employees in work processes. Employee performance reflects an individual's ability to produce high-quality work, meet targets, complete tasks on time, demonstrate responsibility, collaborate, take initiative, and adapt to change. The study employed a quantitative approach with an explanatory survey design. Data were collected through an online questionnaire in March 2026 using a 1–5 Likert scale. The sample was selected using purposive sampling based on the criteria that respondents worked in organisations in Indonesia, had a direct supervisor, and had been employed for at least six months. A total of 230 eligible responses were analysed using validity and reliability tests, descriptive statistics, regression assumption tests, Pearson's correlation, and simple linear regression. The results indicate that leadership style is positively and significantly associated with employee performance, with a Pearson correlation coefficient of 0.712 and a p-value of less than 0.001. The regression coefficient of 0.781 indicates that higher leadership-style scores are associated with higher predicted employee-performance scores. An R-squared value of 0.507 indicates that leadership style explains 50.7% of the variation in employee performance. This study contributes to leadership research by examining leadership behaviour among respondents from various organisational sectors in Indonesia. From a practical perspective, the results highlight the need to develop leadership practices that are communicative, supportive, fair, participatory, and focused on employee development.