Supervisor’s behavioral complexity: Ineffective in the call center

• Autores: León, Federico R., Burga León, Andrés Alberto, Morales, Oswaldo
• Formato: artículo
• Fecha de Publicación: 2017
• Institución: Universidad de Lima
• Repositorio: ULIMA-Institucional
• Lenguaje: inglés
• OAI Identifier: oai:repositorio.ulima.edu.pe:20.500.12724/5732
• Enlace del recurso: https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12724/5732
• Nivel de acceso: acceso abierto
• Materia: Leadership; Employee monitoring; Absenteeism (Labor); Sales personnel; Telemarketing; Psychology, industrial; Call centers; Supervisión de los empleados; Absentismo laboral; Vendedores; Psicología industrial; Centros de atención telefónica; Liderazgo; https://purl.org/pe-repo/ocde/ford#5.01.00

An ample repertoire of leadership behaviors available to the manager is expected to guarantee his/her effectiveness transcending situations, but research in the call-center context has identified a specific form of effective supervision: people-oriented leadership. The purpose of this paper is to compare the effectiveness of leader behavioral complexity vis-à-vis people-oriented supervision. 268 employees out of 728 of a Peruvian call center filled in an on-line survey that included, among other questionnaires, the Competing Values Framework Managerial Behavior Instrument in reference to their front-line supervisor. The study analyzed the relationships between supervisory leadership and subordinate turnover intention and absenteeism. Behavioral complexity, like people-oriented leadership, predicted subordinate turnover intention but did not predict subordinate absenteeism, which people-oriented leadership did when other leadership orientations (to change, results, processes) were held constant. Our explanations consider that absenteeism is a concrete behavior and turnover intention an abstract attitude. The findings are consistent with the call-center literature, suggest important boundaries to the concept of manager behavioral complexity, and highlight the need for contingency theories of leadership effectiveness.