The effect of servant leadership on organizational citizenship behavior: A study in five star hotel enterprises in Istanbul and Afyonkarahisar

In tourism industry, the labor-intensive structure of the hotel enterprises and the service producing feature of these enterprises increase the importance of the employees. For this reason, with its primary aim to render services to an intended audience, servant leadership is considered as a leadership approach relevant to tourism sector due to its humanistic aspect. Managers' servant leadership behaviours are claimed to invoke employees' organizational citizenship behaviours and thus to improve employees' performances, increase the quality of service and ensure customer satisfaction. Therefore, it is thought to be beneficial for hotel management. In this context, this study aimed to determine hotel employees' perceptions towards servant leadership and the effect of these perceptions on their organizational citizenship behaviours. The data was collected through questionnaire technique. At the end of the research, it was found that there is a significant relationship between servant leadership and organizational citizenship behaviour in a positive and moderate way. As to determining the effect of the subdimensions of the servant leadership on organizational citizenship behaviour, it can be said that empowerment, vision, and trust dimensions have a significant effect on organizational citizenship behaviour. On the other hand it was observed that love and altruism dimensions have no significant effect on organizational citizenship behaviour.