This chapter gives more explanation about the research framework, research hypotheses, research sample and research instruments used during the research process. Data collection and data analysis will also be comprised. At last, the overall research process is described as bellows.
Research Framework
The model of this study is developed grounded on the research purpose and also in consistent with the literature review. It briefly covers and illustrates the whole study. First, the independent variable is leader mindfulness (X) which is measured by leader mindfulness scale. The study examines the relationship between this independent variable and the dependent variable that is employee engagement (Y). Moreover, the moderating effects of leader-follower social capital including goal congruence (MO1) and social interaction (MO2) on this relationship will be assessed in this study. Figure 3.1. is shown as bellows:
Figure 3.1. Research framework
Research Procedure
There was supposed to be nine steps which will be followed to complete this study as bellows:
22 Figure 3.2. Research procedure
To conduct this research, the topic needed to be determined first. A literature review then had to be performed in order to have a better understanding of the decided variables. After that, research questions and hypotheses were also identified, based on which a research framework was developed so that readers may have a general view about the relationship among chosen variables.
In addition, the quantitative method was used to analyze data in this study. In order to do that, the author already developed a set of instruments derived from previous researchers. After the proposal of this study, data collection and the analysis were carried out. Last but not least, research conclusions and suggestions were recommended based on the results of this study.
1 • Determine the research topic
2 • Review the literature
3 • Identify research questions and hypotheses
4 • Develop research framework
5 • Design the questionnaire
6 • Conduct the pilot test and revise the questionnaire
7 • Collect data
8 • Analyze the data
9 • Discuss the findings and give suggestions
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Research Hypotheses
Based on the research questions and related literature review which were already discussed in previous chapters, the following hypotheses are as follows developed. These hypotheses will examine the relationship between leader mindfulness and employee engagement, and also the moderating effects of goal congruence and social interaction on this relationship, of Vietnamese employees in Food and Beverage industry.
H1: Leader mindfulness is positively related to employee engagement.
H2a: The positive relationship between leader mindfulness and employee engagement is moderated by goal congruence, such that the relationship is stronger when goal congruence is higher.
H2b: The positive relationship between leader mindfulness and employee engagement is moderated by social interaction, such that the relationship is stronger when social interaction is higher.
Research Sample and Data Collection
The sample of this study involved full-time employees from Food and Beverage industry in Vietnam whose direct supervisors. By restricting with a conditional question referring to a direct supervisor, participants were expected to have certain understandings about their supervisors.
Convenience sampling and snowball sampling were used to reach the participants in a faster and more convenient way. Because of the geographical distance, the sample data were collected using online-based survey to test the three variables: leader mindfulness, employee engagement and leader-follower social capital. With previous experience in Food and Beverage industry in Vietnam, the researcher contacted 3 human resource managers currently working in this field and asked them to spread the survey to their employees. 170 individuals in the author’s personal networks were also sent e-mails with the direct link to the content of the questionnaire. Within the next two months, this group was reminded twice. The author also took advantage of social networks such as Facebook, LinkedIn, etc. to post that link while at the same time encouraged participants to forward the information to as many of their network connections as possible. Data collection period was done within five months from August to December in 2019. In total, there were 258 respondents completing the questionnaire. However, the author had to exclude 2 respondents who were not serious in answering by only choosing 1 answer for all the questions. Finally, a total of 256 qualified respondents were collected.
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Questionnaire Design
The questionnaire includes four different scales in total, each of which will measure one variable of this study: leader mindfulness, employee engagement, goal congruence and social interaction. All the questions measuring four variables were developed from previous research in the literature review. The survey comprised five main sections. The first section contained fifteen items measuring leader mindfulness from employee’s perspective. The second section contained nine items testing employee engagement. The third section contained four items testing goal congruence. The fourth section contained four questions testing social interaction. The last section dealt with participants’ demographic information such as gender, age, educational background, marital status and job tenure. B
Given that the participants were Vietnamese employees, Vietnamese version questionnaire translated by the researcher was used in this study. However, questionnaires for leader mindfulness, employee engagement, goal congruence and social interaction were originally developed in English. Therefore, back translation method was applied for the purpose of ensuring the consistency. Two experts were invited to review the adequacy and two peers were also invited to check English and Vietnamese translation and conducted back translation as well.
Measurements Leader Mindfulness
Because this study does not aim to differentiate different mindfulness dimensions, the Mindfulness Attention and Awareness Scale (MAAS; Brown & Ryan, 2003) was chosen in this study. It is acknowledged as a unidimensional scale rather than a multi-dimensional scale like the Five Factor Mindfulness Questionnaire (Baer et al., 2008). In spite of some criticism of the MAAS, a substantial amount of validity and reliability evidence supports the application of this scale (e.g., Carlson & Brown, 2005; Höfling, Ströhle, Michalak, & Heidenreich, 2011; Hülsheger et al., 2013;
Roche, Haar, & Luthans, 2014). Employees evaluated their leaders’ mindfulness through the 15 items of the MAAS on a 6-point scale (1 = almost always, 6 = almost never). Sample items were
“My supervisor finds it difficult to stay focused on what’s happening in the present”, “It seems my supervisor is ‘running on automatic’ without much awareness of what (s)he doing” and “My supervisor finds himself/herself preoccupied with the future or the past”. Responses were reverse scored in that higher values suggest higher mindfulness. The Cronbach’s alpha value was 0.946 (See Table 3.1.).
25 Table 3.1.
“Leader Mindfulness Measurement
Code Questionnaire Component Cronbach’s
Alpha Author
LM1 My leader could be experiencing some emotion and not be conscious of it until sometime later.
.946 Brown & Ryan (2003)
LM 2 My leader breaks or spills things because of carelessness, not paying attention, or thinking of something else.
LM3 My leader finds it difficult to stay focused on what is happening in the present.
LM4 My leader tends to walk quickly to get where he/she is going without paying attention to what (s)he experiences along the way.
LM5 My leader tends not to notice feelings of physical tension or discomfort until they really grab his/her attention.
LM6 My leader forgets a person’s name almost as soon as (s)he has been told it for the first time.
LM7 I t s e e m s m y l e a d e r i s “ r u n n i n g o n automatic,” without much awareness of what (s)he is doing.
LM8 My leader rushes through activities without being really attentive to them.
LM9 My leader gets so focused on the goal (s)he wants to achieve that (s)he loses touch with what (s)he is doing right now to get there.
(continued)
26 Code Questionnaire Component
LM10 My leader does jobs or tasks automatically, without being aware of what (s)he is doing.
LM11 My leader finds himself/herself listening to someone with one ear, doing something else at the same time.
LM12 My leader drives places on ‘automatic pilot’ and then wonders why he/she went there.
LM13 My leader finds himself/herself reoccupied with the future or the past.
LM14 My leader finds himself/herself doing things without paying attention.
LM15 My leader snacks without being aware that (s)he is eating.
Note. Adapted from “The benefits of being present: Mindfulness and its role in psychological well-being,” by K. W. Brown & R. M. Ryan. 2003, Journal of Personality and Social
Psychology, 84(4), p. 822–848.”
Employee Engagement
Employee engagement was measured with a 9-item scale, a shortened version of the original 17-item Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES), which has an outstanding psychometric value (Schaufeli, Bakker, & Salanova, 2006). Because the three fundamental dimensions of work engagement (vigor, dedication, and absorption) are typically substantially correlated, this 9-item scale offers an excellent indicator of employee engagement (Schaufeli et al., 2006). Participants evaluated how often they undergone each of the nine statements on a 5-point scale (1 = strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree), such as “At my work, I feel bursting with energy”, “I am proud of the work that I do” and “I get carried away when I am working”. The Cronbach’s alpha value was 0.916 (See Table 3.2.).
Table 3.1. (continued)
27 Table 3.2.
Employee Engagement Measurement
Code Questionnaire Component Cronbach’s Alpha
value Author
EE1 At my work, I feel bursting with energy.
0.916 Schaufeli et al.
(2006) EE2 At my job, I feel strong and
vigorous.
EE3 I am enthusiastic about my job.
EE4 My job inspires me.
EE5 When I get up in the morning, I feel like going to work.
EE6 I feel happy when I am working intensely.
EE7 I am proud on the work that I do.
EE8 I am immersed in my work.
EE9 I get carried away when I am working (reversed).
Note. Adapted from “The measurement of work engagement with a brief questionnaire: A cross-national study,” by W. B. Schaufeli, A. B. Bakker & M. Salanova. 2006, Educational and Psychological Measurement, 66(4), 701–716.”
Goal Congruence
This study utilized a 4-item scale derived from previous research (De Clercq et al., 2011).
The response structure was a 5-point Likert scale with options ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree), which participants used to evaluate items such as: “My supervisor and I have a similar vision regarding the organization’s future” and “My supervisor and I think alike on most issues with respect to the organization”. The Cronbach’s alpha value was 0.829 (See Table 3.3.).
28 Table 3.3.
Goal Congruence Measurement
Code Questionnaire Component Cronbach’s Alpha
value Author
GC3 I am enthusiastic about my job.
GC4 My job inspires me.
Note. Adapted from “A closer look at cross-functional collaboration and product innovativeness:
Contingency effects of structural and relational context,” by D. De Clercq, T. Thongpapanl & D.
Dimov. 2011, Journal of Product Innovation Management, 28(1), p. 680–699.
Social Interaction
Based on previous studies (Bouckenooghe et al., 2013), social interaction was measured with a 4-item scale that reflects the intensity of the social relationships between employees and their own supervisors, such as “I spend significant time together with my supervisor in social situations”
and “I maintain a close social relationship with my supervisor”. The Cronbach’s alpha value is 0.846 (See Table 3.4.).
Table 3.4.
Social Interaction Measurement
Code Questionnaire Component Cronbach’s Alpha Author
SI1 I spend significant time together with my leader in social situations.
0.846 Bouckenooghe et al.
(2013) SI2 I maintain close a social
relationship with my supervisor.
SI3 I know my supervisor on a personal level.
SI4 My relationship with other colleagues is very informal.
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Note. Adapted from “Interpersonal Justice, Relational Conflict, and Commitment to Change: The Moderating Role of Social Interaction,” by D. Bouckenooghe, D. De Clercq & J. Deprez. 2013, Applied Psychology, 63(3), p. 509–540.
Control Variable
“To minimize the impact of method variances and to clarify the correlation between leader mindfulness, employee engagement, goal congruence and social interaction, some control variables were used in this study and maybe related to employee engagement. They are gender and tenure.
Gender. This study also controlled for gender because it may affect the level of employee engagement (Halbesleben et al., 2009). It was coded as 1 = Male, 2 = Female, 3 = Other.
Tenure. Previous research has shown that stability in employee engagement over time was higher for those who have longer tenure (Bal, De Cooman & Mol, 2013).”
Validity and Availability
This section contains two parts, the pilot test section explored the reliability of the instrument design, the main study section presented the result of construct and reliability.
Pilot Test
Because the target sample were Vietnamese employees, therefore before conducting the pilot test, two professional experts working in human resource field more than five years were contacted.
They are both Vietnamese native speakers and have a high level of English level education. As a result, these experts gave some suggestions about the English translation and made the necessary changes on the questionnaire.
After making some changes on the scales, the final questionnaire was ready for the pilot test.
The pilot test was applied to 50 employees working full-time in Food and Beverage industry in Vietnam with a direct supervisor. The designed questionnaire mainly contained 15-item leader mindfulness scale, 9-item employee engagement scale, 4-item goal congruence scale, 4-item social interaction scale, and other demographic questions.
The Cronbach’s alpha value was calculated to assess the reliability of the measurement usage, the commonly accepted criterion of the Cronbach’s alpha value is higher than 0.7 (Tavakol
& Dennick, 2011). Table 3.5. shows the reliability of these scales, the Cronbach’s alpha value of
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leader mindfulness was .918, employee engagement was .869, goal congruence was .708, and social interaction was .708. Thus, there was no need to modify in this stage.
Table 3.5.
Reliabilities for Each Variable of This Study (N=50)
Variable Total Item Number Cronbach’s Alpha
Leader Mindfulness 15 .918
Employee Engagement 9 .869
Goal Congruence 4 .708
Social Interaction 4 .708
Main Study
Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) was applied collectively to ensure the construct validity. Items of each variable were run through CFA using MPlus version 7.4 to see whether the data fit well with the theoretical measurement model. The fit between observed and proposed model was assessed by the following indices: the ratio of Chi-Square (X2) to degree of freedom (df) = 1.61, the Comparative Fit Index (CFI) = .95, the Tucker Lewis Index (TLI) = .94, the Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA) = .05 and the Standardized Root Mean Square (SRMR) = .04 were considered as the measurements of model fit which are commonly performed in literature. The criteria of fit indices and the model test result of this study are listed in Table 3.6.
Table 3.6.
Summary of Model Fit Indices and Model Test Results
Index Acceptable Level Satisfactory Level CFA Test Results
χ²/df < 5 2-5 1.61
CFI > 0.90 > 0.95 0.95
TLI > 0.90 > 0.95 0.94
RMSEA < 0.08 < 0.05 0.05
SRMR < 0.08 < 0.05 0.04
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Data Analysis
The quantitative approach was utilized in this study to examine the correlations among testing variables. After the data collection was completed, the author used the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) software version 23 and the following techniques to carry out data analysis.
Descriptive Statistics Analysis
Cronbach’s α test was conducted to assess internal consistency for each construct.
Descriptive statistics can give readers the whole image of the data collected during the research period. Frequency distribution, which comprises percentage and numbers, was used to represent the demographic information, including participants’ gender, age, educational background, marital status and job tenure. The author utilized the mean and standard deviation to examine all the variables of this study, which are leader mindfulness, employee engagement, goal congruence, social interaction, and control variables.
Pearson’s Correlation Analysis
The linear relation between two continuous variables could be considered as correlation, and researches adopted coefficient of correlation, also called Pearson’s product-moment correlation coefficient (Pearson’s r) to indicate the degree of the correlation. When the absolute value of Pearson’s r is closer to 1, the degree of the correlation is stronger. Moreover, the positive Pearson’s r means the correlation is positive; in contrast, the negative Pearson’s r means the correlation is negative. In this study, the author utilized the correlation analysis to examine the relationship between control variables and leader mindfulness, employee engagement, goal congruence, social interaction.
Hierarchical Regression Analysis
Hierarchical regression analysis was used to examine if the interaction of leader mindfulness, goal congruence and social interaction have impact on employee engagement, which at the same time can test the hypothesis 2a and 2b of this study. Control variables were put in the first model, then leader mindfulness, goal congruence and social interaction were in the second model. Lastly, the interaction term of leader mindfulness, goal congruence and social interaction were in the third model.
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