Leadership for Social Impact: A Study of Transformational Leadership, CSR, and Performance in the Pakistani Nonprofit Sector

Abstract

Using a mediation analysis of corporate social responsibility, the study focuses on and investigates the link between transformational leadership, organisational innovation, and organisational success. We reorganized the Khan et al. (2017) model by including the CRS aspects of shareholders, customers, workers, and society. The main concepts of transformational leadership and organisational success are shown in this study to be mediated by CSR and organisational innovation. A closed-ended questionnaire was used to gather information from 201 respondents from over 50 different organizations. The respondents held top and middle management positions and worked in the banking, FMCG, consulting, and services industries in Karachi. Partial least squares structural equation modelling was used to examine the direct and mediated effects of the predictors (PLS-SEM). The findings show that transformative leadership has a major and beneficial direct impact on every CRS component. The results of the mediation study indicated that the link between organisational innovation (OI) and transformational leadership (TL) is considerably mediated by the dimensions of consumers, shareholders, and society. Furthermore, TL and performance are also mediated by the shareholders dimension. Finally, (OI) successfully moderate the relationship between society and performance. The results are discussed, and research, managerial, and theoretical implications are provided.