Empathic Leadership And Employee's Commitment In Small And Medium Scale Enterprises In Port Harcourt City Local Government Area, Rivers State

1.1 Background of the Study

SMEs (including micro enterprises) constitute the highest number of business enterprises in Nigeria but their slow pace of growth and lack of sustainability limit the overall contribution of these firms to Nigeria's GDP (Gbandi & Amissah 2014; Ikharehon & Briggs, 2016). SMEs in Nigeria hardly grow to large enterprises and are often characterized by poor performance (Agba, Ogaboh, & Ebong, 2015), with most of them closing down their operations within the first 5 years of existence (Ajike, Nnorom, Kwarbai, & Egwuonwu, 2015). The Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN; 2013) in a collaborative study with the National Bureau of Statistics found that SMEs in Nigeria fall short of their potential to promote economic growth especially in job creation and poverty alleviation. One of the reasons identified by SMEDAN (2013) for these shortcomings is that the nature of leadership within these SMEs did not support organizational performance and growth (SMEDAN, 2013) as most of the SME owner-managers do not understand the impact that leadership could have on organizational performance and growth.

Leadership has become quite a buzzword in the past two decades. The number of books on Amazon.com with the word ‘‘leader’’ in the title has run up to a staggering 49,297, while ProQuest, one of the major databases for scholarly journals, reports a total of 13,657 scholarly papers on the subject of leadership. Many scholars perceive the term leadership as more distinctive than management. Whereas, in the not so far past, it was an honor to be called a manager, this perspective seems to have shifted in the opinions of these scholars, and leadership is ‘‘hot’’ while management is ‘‘not.’’ McCrimmon (2010) puts it this way: ‘‘Once there was a notion that managers could do it all. But the notion fell into disfavor when ‘‘leadership’’ - for example, the heroic leader - emerged and pushed managers aside and stripped them of their responsibilities’’ (p. 1). 

McCrimmon (2010) praises John Kotter’s opinion that leaders and managers are different, and points out that inspiring leaders influence people to change direction while inspiring managers motivate them to work harder’’ (p. 1). Yet, there are also scholars who feel that management and leadership should complement each other. Nienaber (2010) reviews the opposing views among scholars about these two phenomena, and finds that, indeed, a large number of scholars describe leadership as an exalted concept that is imperative to companies’ successes, whereas they ban management to the mundane corner of uninspiring and tactical activities. However, Nienaber (2010) also comments on those scholars who share a different stance by perceiving leadership and management as an integrated whole. Nienaber’s study finds that these two concepts are interwoven, but the divergence of opinions will probably linger for many years to come. McLean (2005) shares these findings and stresses, ‘‘Both activities are essential to enable objectives and strategies to be achieved, business activities and human resources to be managed, change to be effectively achieved, and projected profits and organisational success to be achieved’’ (p. 16).

The leader of the company is in state of being bound to the company—financially, emotionally, by family obligations, or with other words—it is going about the involvement/commitment of the leader. The job involvement is positively related to job performance and “this implies that creating sufficient interest in the job objectively involves an individual to his/her responsibilities and this reflects on augmented performance levels” (Soumendu, 2011). Affective commitment and normative commitment were strong predictors of organisational citizenship behaviours in Nigeria SME’s (Uçanok & Karabatı, 2013). The leader of the company is connected to the company by way of an engagement by contract involving obligations and by way of feeling of other needs, who leads, takes the decisions, communicates and informs about. The use of communication and change management leads to sustainable performance and “it mentions that employees at high performance companies looked for leader’s characteristics” and also notes the role of communication for leaders to create clarity, deliver confidence, and build community (Wallage et al., 2013b). 

The leader is the one who leads and directs, the one who has the authority, the one whose qualities, roles, and leadership, together with initiative and responsibility, leads the organisation in a particular direction by way of his/her leadership. Directive leadership enhanced proactive behaviors for work units that were highly satisfied with their leaders, whereas empowering leadership had stronger effects on both core task proficiency and proactive behaviors for work units (Martin, Liao, & Campbell, 2013). The quality of the leader and the results of their behaviors can be interpreted by way of understanding of three concepts: commitment and leadership. It can be stated that the need for empirical testing of complete profile (businessperson characteristics) of the leader in SME and influence on behavior and performance is significantly noticed. Also, it motivates this research to develop and identify the clear dimension and future measurement of behavior determinants in SME sector.

First the study explained the three definitions of commitment and leadership (Missioura, 2013a). Then, the study showed the choice of the directors in SME sector (19 depth interviews) for “businessperson characteristics” concepts and discuss the original results of the presented data by used concepts (commitment/involvement, and leadership) deficit implies that decision makers systematically overestimate their capacity to reach stated goals. However, the study is on the emphatic leadership and employee’s commitment in small and medium scale enterprises in Port Harcourt City Local Government Area, Rivers State.

1.2 Statement of the Problem

SMEs (including micro enterprises) represent most of the business enterprises in Nigeria, but their slow pace of growth limit their overall contribution to Nigeria's. The evidence from the literature suggests specific problems in SMEs' business growth and performance may be the result of a poor leadership for these types of enterprises (Anggadwita & Mustafid, 2014; Franco & Matos, 2015; Ozer & Tinaztepe, 2014). Little has been done to examine the relationship between leaderships and management within the local context of SMEs.

There are a variety of meanings about the commitment. Commitment or involvement is linked to togetherness and connectedness through an emotional bond or obligations. Commitment in organizations is going about the feeling of the responsibility, engagement or positive orientation of the person to the organization/target/work etc. Countless problems in the organization cause ineffectiveness within organizational leaders. Problems like incompetence, legalistic rules, a quest for power, politics, helplessness, leadership nonparticipation, poor grassroot leadership appointments and lack of information. In line with the researcher’s curiosity in developing effective leadership model for ECOWAS Organization, this study explores the relevance of leadership effectiveness and implications given the presence leaders who desire power, position, and materialism. 

An exhaustive search for past studies on effective organization model was not pursued. This leaves the door opens to the possibility of the past research done on organization growth models but not referenced. The research had to deal with leaders within the organization having similar problems: i.e. miscommunication within the organization. The organization team only used sets avenues of organization of what should be said to the organization like every other society encountering as internal crisis.

A large number of organizations spend considerable huge amount on solving managerial problems. Besides, research on management’s leadership and organizational performance are limited and personnel do not know enough about management’s leadership and the organizational productivity. In order to maintain the growth and achieve higher objectives, the top management in the organization needs to understand the problems and make strategies to satisfy, retain, and motivate employees to exert extra efforts. In other words, it needs such leadership in its factory that can achieve organizational goals efficiently and effectively. Leaders should have the ability to motivate its employees to exert extra efforts to achieve higher goals. Moreover, the existing leadership should adopt such leaderships that help to augment subordinates’ satisfaction, their efforts and organizational performance. 

Leadership impacts the organization by affecting employee morale, productivity, decision-making speed, and metrics. Successful leaders carefully analyze problems, assess the skill level of subordinates, consider alternatives, and make an informed choice. By choosing the most appropriate leadership for the situation, an effective leader provides a lasting impact. The key influencers for organizational effectiveness are leadership and employee motivation. Leadership extensively influences employee’s commitment and dedication, while the correlation between leadership and motivation has been studied in a wide variety of sectors and in an equally wide variety of demographic settings, few of these studies focus on this relationship in the context of a corporate in oil and refinery segment (Gopal & Chowdhury, 2014). Leadership has a direct cause and effect relationship upon organizations and their success. 

Leaders determine values, culture, change tolerance and employee motivation. They shape institutional strategies including their execution and effectiveness. Leaders can appear at any level of an institution and are not exclusive to management. Successful leaders do, however, have one thing in common. All these which leaders should do and has to do in collaboration with their subordinates but all the above-mentioned functions and purpose of leadership is not known even there is a mix with management. The absence of effective leadership is a serious problem endemic in many organizations. It is obvious that the resultant outcome is poor staff performance, absence of motivation, poor growth and development of the institutions.

The general problem is that it remains unknown what role leadership plays in the long-term sustainability of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in Nigeria. The specific problem is that SME owner-managers in Nigeria need to gain an in-depth understanding of their leadership to objectively evaluate its implication on longterm performance and growth of their enterprise. Hence, this study is conducted to examine the leadership and employees’ commitment in small and medium scale enterprises.

1.3 Objectives of the Study

The main objective of this study is to investigate the emphatic leadership and employee’s commitment in small and medium scale enterprises in Port Harcourt City Local Government Area, Rivers State. 

Specific objectives include;

i. To examine how emphatic leadership help employee’s commitment in the small and medium scale enterprises in Port Harcourt City Local Government Area, Rivers State.

ii. To examine the barriers to the emphatic leadership and employee’s commitment in small and medium scale enterprises in Port Harcourt City Local Government Area, Rivers State.

iii. To examine the relationship between employee’s commitment and emphatic leadership in the small and medium scale enterprises in Port Harcourt City Local Government Area, Rivers State

1.4 Research Questions

i. How does emphatic leadership help employee’s commitment in the small and medium scale enterprises in Port Harcourt City Local Government Area, Rivers State?

ii. What are the barriers to the emphatic leadership and employee’s commitment in small and medium scale enterprises in Port Harcourt City Local Government Area, Rivers State?

iii. Is there any relationship between employee’s commitment and emphatic leadership in the small and medium scale enterprises in Port Harcourt City Local Government Area, Rivers State?

1.5 Research Hypotheses

H0: Emphatic leadership does not help in employee’s commitment in the small and medium scale enterprises in Port Harcourt City Local Government Area, Rivers State

H1: There is no relationship between employee’s commitment and emphatic leadership in the small and medium scale enterprises in Port Harcourt City Local Government Area, Rivers State

1.6 Significance of the Study

It is hoped that, when the study is successfully completed will serve as a source of policy guidance to the study organization and provide necessary incentive for increasing productivity. It will help to enlighten the management of the organization on the need and importance of having effective leaders in the organization. It will enlighten the employee on their roles and obligations to the leadership in the organization and other related matters. It will identify the reason why employees react positively to a particular leadership of a manager and also aim at discovering what makes workers to be dedicated and committed to their duties.

The research will help to challenge both the management and workers in the organization on both the importance attached to increase productivity.  

This study will be of immense benefit to other researchers who intend to know more on this study and can also be used by non-researchers to build more on their research work. This study contributes to knowledge and could serve as a guide for other study.

1.7 Scope of the Study

This study is on the emphatic leadership and employee’s commitment in small and medium scale enterprises in Port Harcourt City Local Government Area, Rivers State.

1.8 Limitations of the study

The demanding schedule of respondents at work made it very difficult getting the respondents to participate in the survey. As a result, retrieving copies of questionnaire in timely fashion is very challenging. Also, the researcher is a student and therefore has limited time as well as resources in covering extensive literature available in conducting this research. Information provided by the researcher may not hold true for all institutions but is restricted to the selected organization used as a study in this research especially in the locality where this study is being conducted. 

Financial constraint: Insufficient fund tends to impede the efficiency of the researcher in sourcing for the relevant materials, literature or information and in the process of data collection (internet, questionnaire and interview).

Time constraint: The researcher will simultaneously engage in this study with other academic work. This consequently will cut down on the time devoted for the research work.

Finally, the researcher is restricted only to the evidence provided by the participants in the research and therefore cannot determine the reliability and accuracy of the information provided.

1.9 Definition of Terms

Leadership:  A leadership refers to a leader's characteristic behaviors when directing, motivating, guiding, and managing groups of people. Great leaders can inspire political movements and social change. They can also motivate others to perform, create, and innovate.

Emphatic Leadership:  Empathetic leadership means having the ability to understand the needs of others, and being aware of their feelings and thoughts.

Commitment:  an agreement or pledge to do something in the future a commitment to improve conditions

Employees’ Commitment:  Committed employees take ownership of their work and are ambassadors for their company, both inside and outside of office doors. They are less likely to job hunt, be tempted by recruiters who seek out passive candidates and are most likely to pursue advancements and promotions.

Small and Medium Scale Enterprise:  Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are non-subsidiary, independent firms which employ fewer than a given number of employees.