Impact of empowering leadership on voice behavior of engineering project employees: the mediating role of challenge–hindrance stressors

To address the issue of insufficient employee suggestions in complex, high-pressure engineering project environments, this article constructs a theoretical framework and investigates the underlying mechanisms linking empowering leadership, challenge-hindrance stressors and voice behavior. The study employs covariance-based structural equation modeling (CB-SEM) for empirical testing based on valid data from 356 professionals in the construction industry. The results indicate that while empowering leadership directly promotes employee voice behavior, it simultaneously increases both challenge and hindrance stress. Further analysis reveals a critical dual mediation mechanism: challenge stress positively mediates the relationship by enhancing employees' willingness to offer suggestions, whereas hindrance stress negatively mediates this relationship by diminishing their desire to speak up. The challenge-hindrance stressors model provides a crucial theoretical framework for understanding the underlying mechanisms through which empowering leadership influences employees' voice behavior.