Empowering Leadership and Work Engagement Among Generation Z in the Indonesian Coal Mining Industry: A Multilevel Model Analysis

Background/Problem: The coal mining industry in South Kalimantan, Indonesia, faces increasing challenges in managing Generation Z employees, who now constitute a significant portion of its workforce. While this generation values flexibility, they often demonstrate low work engagement, characterized by high turnover, low motivation, and limited initiative, which threatens operational sustainability.Objective/Purpose: This study investigates the predictors of work engagement among Generation Z employees in the coal mining sector, utilizing social cognitive theory (SCT). It focuses on empowering leadership, self-efficacy, a supportive work environment, and team learning capability as direct and mediating variables.Design and Methodology: A quantitative, time-lagged survey design involving 432 participants from four coal companies was employed. Multilevel structural equation modeling (ML-SEM) was conducted to examine both individual- and group-level variables.Results: Empowering leadership significantly predicted work engagement directly and indirectly through team-level mechanisms. Specifically, self-efficacy (β = .93, p < .001) and a supportive work environment (β = .37, p <.01) acted as mediators in this relationship. In contrast, team learning capability did not demonstrate a significant mediating effect (β = .04, p = .13). These findings underscore the indirect influence of team-level variables on individual engagement outcomes. The final model accounted for 86.1% of the variance in work engagement.Conclusion and Implications: The study contributes a multilevel, SCT-based framework to explain engagement in labor-intensive industries. Enhancing self-efficacy and fostering supportive leadership and work environments can significantly improve Generation Z’s engagement. These findings provide actionable insights for developing sustainable workforce strategies in emerging economies.