Social support from supervisors is a job resource that has been found to be an important antecedent to work engagement. However, there is a knowledge gap in understanding one of the key features of social support—i.e., supervisors’ active-empathetic listening—and its relation to employees’ work engagement. To bridge this gap, this study explores how supervisors’ active-empathetic listening is associated with employees’ work engagement. Using a national representative sample (N = 548), the results show that supervisors’ active-empathetic listening has a significant positive relationship with employee work engagement. Additionally, we show that active-empathetic listening does not affect all three dimensions of work engagement equally, with dedication being the most affected by supervisors’ active-empathetic listening. We argue that supportive leadership which uses conscious and active listening-centred communication is highly significant for employees’ work engagement. Therefore, we suggest that organisations experiment in training their supervisors in active-empathetic listening as part of a broader strategy to increase employees’ engagement at work.

The purpose of the article is to investigate whether female presence in microfinance institutions’ management team, i.e. board members, managers and loan officers, will improve their financial performance. We combine financial data on MFIs that is available from the MIX Market database with original data on the gender composition of MFIs’ management team, who include board members, managers and loan officers. This original dataset of 223 MFIs is analyzed using Logit-Tobit regression models with return on assets (ROA) as the dependent variable and proportion of female board members, female loan officers and female managers as the main independent variables. We find that a higher proportion of female managers and female loan officers improve financial performance in microfinance, while a higher proportion of female board members does not. Our results indicate that a major contributor to the financial sustainability of microfinance institutions is having a higher rate of women in vital decision-making roles, especially lower level management positions.

According to gender personality traits, women are more interested in people, whereas men are more interested in things. The goal of this research is to see if there is a gender gap in financial literacy and if these disparities can be explained by different areas of interest. A convenience sample of nearly a thousand responses was received in quantitative research. The findings clearly show that women have lower financial literacy than men, but there is no indication that this is due to men and women’s differing interests in people and things.

This study investigated how employees’ perceptions of their supervisors’ listening skills are associated with employees’ work-related quality of life. The study used a nationally representative sample of the employed Icelandic population (N = 453). Participants completed the Active-Empathic Listening (AEL) scale and Work-Related Quality of Life scale. Results showed that employees who rated supervisors to be higher on the AEL scale reported a higher general well-being score. More specifically, employees who perceived supervisors to have higher AEL rated their working conditions and control at work higher, reported being happier with their career and home-work interface, were generally more content with their life, and showed lower levels of stress compared to employees who perceived supervisors to have lower AEL.

Organizations are facing a serious challenge with employee burnout, which leads to a loss of productivity and employee morale. Despite its importance, there is still a knowledge gap in understanding one of the key features of employee burnout, namely, the personal characteristics of employees. This research aims to determine if grit can alleviate employee burnout in organizations. The study conducted a survey of employees in service companies, and results showed that employee grit was negatively associated with burnout. Moreover, the study revealed that grit does not equally affect all three dimensions of burnout, with emotional exhaustion and depersonalization being the most affected by employee grit. Increasing employee grit is therefore a promising strategy for companies that want to mitigate the risk of employee burnout.