Impact of authentic leadership on employee safety performance: Role of knowledge hoarding, support, and passion

• Authentic Leadership Enhances Safety Performance. • Knowledge Hoarding and Perceived Organizational Support as Mediators. • Work Passion Plays a Dual Role. • Novel Contribution to Leadership and Safety Literature in an emerging Arab country context. This study examines the impact of Authentic Leadership (AL) on employee safety performance, focusing on Safety Compliance (SC) and Safety Participation (SP). It also investigates the indirect effects of Knowledge Hiding (KHo), Perceived Organizational Support (POS), and work passion on the relationship between AL and employee safety performance. A self-administered questionnaire was distributed to randomly selected employees working in Abu Dhabi’s public sector organizations within hazardous industries in the UAE. The results revealed that AL positively influences both SC and SP. Additionally, KHo and POS were identified as partial mediators in the relationships between AL and SC, and AL and SP. Harmonious Work Passion (HWP) positively moderated the AL–SC relationship, whereas Obsessive Work Passion (OWP) negatively moderated both the AL–SC and AL–SP relationships. This research contributes to the relatively understudied literature on AL by exploring KHo, POS, and work passion as novel outcomes. To the best of our knowledge, it is the first study to examine the roles of KHo and POS in the link between AL and employee safety performance. The findings offer valuable insights for leaders in the UAE’s hazardous industries on leveraging AL to enhance employee safety performance.