The Effect of Asta Brata Leadership Practices and Interpersonal Communication on the Work Motivation of Public Junior High School Teachers in Indonesia

Teachers’ working motivation is vital for schools, as it is directly associated with institutional innovation and productivity. This study aims to examine the influence of Asta Brata leadership practices on interpersonal communication and the work motivation of public junior high school teachers in Denpasar City, Indonesia. The objectives were achieved through a quantitative research approach employing a survey research design. Research data were collected through the distribution of three Questionnaires—“Asta Brata Leadership Practices,” “Interpersonal Communication,” and “Work Motivation”—administered to 259 public junior high school teachers in Denpasar City, Indonesia. The collected data were subsequently analyzed using simple linear regression analysis with the assistance of SPSS software version 26. The results indicate that Asta Brata Leadership Practices have a significant effect on both Interpersonal Communication and the Work Motivation of public junior high school teachers in Denpasar City, Indonesia. These findings demonstrate that Asta Brata leadership values—such as role modeling, fairness, wisdom, and protection—are not merely normative in nature but also exert empirically observable effects on aspects of organizational behavior, particularly interpersonal communication and work motivation. The results of this study contribute to leadership scholarship by showing that interpersonal communication and work motivation can be simultaneously influenced by a local culture-based leadership approach grounded in local wisdom, thereby offering an alternative or complement to Western leadership models that dominate the existing literature.