Leader work meaningfulness and employee trust: the mediating roles of empathy and perceived respect

Purpose This study investigates how leaders’ perceptions of work meaningfulness are associated with employee trust in the leader. While prior research has established the positive effects of work meaningfulness on individual outcomes, its relational benefits within leadership contexts remain underexplored. Addressing this gap, we examine how leader work meaningfulness contributes to employee trust through leader empathy and, in turn, employees’ perceived respect. Design/methodology/approach Data were collected from 333 leader–employee pairs across various organizations in South Korea. Leaders provided measures of work meaningfulness and empathy, while employees reported on their perceptions of respect as well as affect-based and cognition-based trust in their leader. We conducted path analysis to test the proposed model using Mplus 6.0 and assessed the significance of indirect effects using bias-corrected bootstrap confidence intervals (5,000 iterations). Findings The results indicate that leaders who perceive their work as more meaningful report higher levels of empathy. Furthermore, leaders’ work meaningfulness is significantly associated with employees’ affect-based and cognition-based trust indirectly via empathy followed by perceived respect, consistent with the hypothesized ordering. Originality/value This study advances research on leadership and meaningful work by suggesting the possibility that leader work meaningfulness may play a role in shaping positive leader–employee relationships. By identifying a theorized pathway through which leader meaningfulness is associated with employee trust – via empathy and perceived respect – it offers novel insights into how leaders’ experience of meaningful work may enhance trust-building processes.