Purpose: To describe and explore emotional leadership meta-resources based on traits (self-esteem, emotional intelligence, leadership intelligence, empathy, Big Six, narcissism) and coping resources (e.g. cognitive), using Hobfoll’s motivational Conservation of Resources (COR). Our hypothesis was that leadership resources would be positively related to work engagement and negatively to perceived stress.

Methodology: Participants (N = 344) were leaders aged between 23 and 65 years (M = 49, SD = 8.6; 58% women) who completed an online questionnaire including measures of common traits and coping resources. Work engagement was measured by Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES-9; Schaufeli & Bakker, 2004), and stress by Perceived Stress Scale (PSS-10; Cohen & Williamson, 1988). We used an exploratory factor analysis approach to describe and structure our data, and structural equation modelling (SEM) to test whether an emotional leadership meta-resource factor would be positively related to work engagement and negatively to perceived stress.

Results: The investigated traits and resources could be described along four broad emotional leadership resource factors: (1) Externalizing; (2) Moral goodness; (3) Destrudo; (4) Rational mastery. As expected, the emotional leadership meta-resource factor showed a strong convergence (~.80) with both work engagement (positively) and perceived stress (negatively). 

Research/Practical Implications: The results imply that organizations may strengthen work engagement and reduce stress by recruiting leaders possessing valuable emotional leadership resources.

Originality/Value: Our study is the first to describe emotional leadership resources based on traits linked with work engagement and perceived stress in a novel fashion (meta-traits, based on structural trait analysis).