Authentic leader and internal whistleblowers: testing a dual mediation mechanism

Purpose - This study aims to extend the understanding of the role of authentic leadership in encouraging subordinates to become internal whistleblowers. The current study aims to seek whether authentic leadership can encourage internal whistleblowing (IW) through employee controlled motivation for IW and moral courage. Design/methodology/approach - The samples of this study were 221 employees working at 26 government organizations in one of the provinces located on Sumatera Island, Indonesia. Based on the cross-sectional survey method, this study used partial least square-structural equation modeling analysis with SmartPLS 3 software to test the hypotheses. Findings - The result revealed that employee controlled motivation for whistleblowing and moral courage significantly mediates the effect of authentic leadership toward IW. This result also indicates that the two mediating variables in this study fully mediate the effect of authentic leadership toward IW. Practical implications - This study highlights the critical role played by leaders in encouraging subordinates to IW in the workplace. The role of an authentic leader will have positively affected enhancing IW by employees, which has significant implications for the organization that particularly in manage organization wrongdoing in terms of eliminating or preventing unethical practice. Originality/value - Theoretically, the current study extends the understanding of the mechanism underlying the relationship between authentic leadership and IW. This study proposes employee controlled motivation for IW and moral courage as the new mediator variables to explain how and why authentic leadership may encourage IW. Empirically, the current study chooses the Indonesian Government as a context that rarely conducts in the prior study.