Managing Employee Engagement in Crisis Situations in Developing Countries: The Case for Responsible Leadership in the Public Sector in Ghana

Abstract

Responsible leaders (RL) play a significant role in ensuring employee engagement and their successful management during crisis. Guided by the Protection Motivation Theory (PMT), the purpose of the study is to identify the dominant characteristics of Responsible Leaders (RL) and how these ensure employee engagement during crisis situation to contribute to theory, practice, and knowledge. The research is quantitative and used a questionnaire to collect data from 132 respondents in the public sector and analysed using structural equation model (SEM). Results showed that degree to which responsible leaders think and operate relationally is the most dominant characteristic which help build employees� engagement in crisis situation in the public sector. The paper concludes with the limitations and recommendations for future research. � The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2023.