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Entrepreneurship in public organizations: the role of leadership behavior

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Abstract

Despite increasing research on entrepreneurship in the private sector, little is known about entrepreneurship in public organizations in general and the effects of leadership behavior on entrepreneurship in the public sector in particular. Utilizing new data from the Australian Public Service Commission (2017), this study analyzes how three leadership behaviors—task-oriented, relations-oriented, and change-oriented leadership—affect public sector employees’ entrepreneurship behavior. The results of this study show that while all three types of leadership behavior are positively associated with public sector entrepreneurship, the effect is larger for relations-oriented leadership, followed by change-oriented leadership. A practical implication of this study is that relations-oriented leadership behavior is crucial to entrepreneurship in public organizations, suggesting the importance of developing relationships with subordinates.

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Funding

This study is funded by the Ministry of Education in Singapore (Tier 1). Grant No. R-603-000-270-133.

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  1. Mehmet Akif Demircioglu and Farzana Chowdhury contributed equally to this work. The first author is the corresponding author.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. The National University of Singapore, Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, 469C Bukit Timah Road, Oei Tiong Ham Building, Singapore, Singapore

    Mehmet Akif Demircioglu

  2. Durham University Business School, Department of Management and Marketing, Durham University, Durham, Durham, UK

    Farzana Chowdhury

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  1. Mehmet Akif Demircioglu
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Correspondence to Mehmet Akif Demircioglu.

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Appendix

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Table 6 Confirmatory factor analysis
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Table 7 Regression results: OLS model with separate models
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Demircioglu, M.A., Chowdhury, F. Entrepreneurship in public organizations: the role of leadership behavior. Small Bus Econ 57, 1107–1123 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11187-020-00328-w

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