An Investigation of the Effects of Open Leadership to Organizational Innovativeness and Corporate Entrepreneurship

Studies on different leadership styles have a long history in the field of industrial psychology and organizational research. Being one of the determinants of how things work in the organization, different leadership styles such as transactional, transformational, authentic or paternalistic leadership have different effects on organizational outcomes. Specifically, in small enterprises, the leadership style of company owner has a direct effect on employee attitudes. On the other hand, with the widespread increase in the use of different communication channels and in the ease of access to information, the information age has brought its own leadership requirements. The present study is designed to assess the effects of leadership on organizational performance through the mediation of knowledge management by comparing open leadership with other approaches to leadership. Adopting a survey methodology, data from a total of 422 participants were gathered through convenience sampling. It is apparent that open leadership is an approach that supports entrepreneurship and innovativeness, yet not so frequently observed in Turkey, compared to other leadership styles. The results are elaborated in the discussion section and several propositions are put forward in order to support open leadership with the aim of disseminating a culture of entrepreneurship in organizations. (C) 2015 Published by Elsevier Ltd.