Communicative Leadership, Working Environment and Employees’ Extra Role Performance ‘Providing Service’: A Case Study of South Jakarta Matahari Department Stores

Studies examine how communicative leadership influences employees’ extra role performance, and the influence of working environment on employees’ performance in the retail industry, both of which independently and collectively are rarely discussed. Competition in retail industries is getting tougher therefore the aim of this paper is to help companies improve their employees’ extra role performance which is providing service to customers by applying good communicative leadership and behavioral / non-physical working environment.A quantitative method study was conducted to address the research statements: leader communication behaviors / communicative leadership influences employees’ behavior performance. Behavior working environment factors influence the millennial front liners’ behavior performance which is providing excellent service to customers. Communicative leadership and behavior working environment collectively influence the employees’ behavior performance. Literatures on Communicative Leadership, Working Environment, and Service Excellence were used to guide the research.The research findings are: Communicative Leadership behaviors influenced 25.1% of Employees extra role Performance. Employee Performance was 48% influenced by Behavior Working Environment. Communicative Leadership and Working Environment collectively influenced 51.2% of Employee Performance. The case study research focuses on the influences of communicative leadership and working environment on employees’ extra role performance: providing service excellence. This quantitative research article can contribute and extend the discussion on the theory of communicative leadership, working environment, and enrich the notion of employees’ performance specifically in regard to service excellence Keywords: Communicative Leadership, Working Environment, Employee Performance, and Service Excellence. DOI: 10.7176/EJBM/12-20-01 Publication date: July 31 st 2020

The objectives of the research are to: a. Test whether communicative leadership behaviors that are also reflected in working environment articles influence the employees' behavior performances. b. Investigate whether working environment factors that involve interaction between leaders and followers influence front liners' behavior performance which is providing service excellence to customers. c. Test whether communicative leadership behavior and behavior working environment collectively influence MDS employees' behavior performances. The scope of research discussed communicative leadership behaviors and limited working environment factors are to four only as needed by the company as per mentioned by the MDS Regional Manager / General Manager in the interview.

Literature Review
Working environment is shaped and influenced by the organization leaders and communication applied by the employee (Johansson, Miller, & Hamrin, 2014), while "communicative leadership leads to higher levels of individual performance…higher level of performance at the unit level" (Johansson, Miller, & Hamrin, 2011). Working environment positively affects employees' performance but behavioral working environment has a greater effect on the employees' performance (Haynes, 2008;Leblebici, 2012). Job performance is the way how front liners perform their work such as dealing with customers (Rashid, Sah, Ariffin, Ghani, & Yunus, 2016). It is believed that all types of extra-role behavior performance contribute to the organization's performance (Podsakoff, Mackenzie, Paine, & Bachrach, 2000).

Communicative Leadership
The concept of communicative leadership was developed in Sweden in the late 1990s in response to business development environment (Högström et al. 1999cited by Johansson, 2011. Communicative Leadership is influenced by two communication approaches that focus on transmission of information and formation of meaning (Johansson, Miller, & Hamrin, 2011). In tradition view, communication in leadership is one way where leaders are sending the message and employees understand the message and act on it. As the concept developed, transmission view that was used by LMX theory as a guidance, improved to sense making which communication in leadership is a dynamic and circular interaction where both parties leaders and employees actively participate (Johansson, Miller, & Hamrin, 2011). Then we can define communicative leader as "one who engages employees in dialog, actively shares and seeks feedback, practices participative decision making, and is perceived as open and involved" (Johansson, Miller, & Hamrin, 2011). Leader communication behaviors that are applied in organizational context are classified into four categories or called profile of center communication behaviors (Johansson, Miller, & Hamrin, 2011): a. Initiating structure: for individual employees, leaders have to set goals and expectation, do planning and allocate tasks. While for the team they have to define a mission for the unit, do planning and allocate tasks, set goals and expectations for the unit. b. Facilitating work: for individual employees, leaders have to coach and train, and give performance feedback, for the group level leaders have to provide timely and effective feedback, engage employees in problem solving and decision making. c. Relational dynamic: for both individuals and teams, leaders have to be open as well as approachable, good listeners and, trustworthy. They also have to display supportive behavior and constructive approach on conflict-full issues. d. Representing employees and the unit: Leaders have to be able to apply upward influence and get resources from upper management. While for the unit leaders have to actively monitor opportunities and threats, build good networking internally and externally, manage the boundaries in working with other units as to protect the unit mission, and provide resources for the unit.

Working Environment
Front liners' good behavior performance cannot be taken for granted, they need to have good working conditions in order to be able to perform well, as a positive and supportive working environment will encourage and enable employees to perform effectively (Oswald, 2012). Working environment (WE) is defined as "a concept that encompasses the physical aspects, psycho-social and organizational surrounding of work" (Busck, Knudsen, & Lind, 2010) and the surrounding place in which a person works and interacts with others professionally and socially (Ollukkaran & Gunaseelan, 2012). Stallworth & Kleiner (1996) emphasized that WE is divided into two categories: physical which consists of components that relate an employee to his or her ability to connect with his or her office environment, such as ventilation, circulation and space. Secondly, non-physical or behavior which consists of components that relates to his or her interactions with colleagues such as social and work interactions. The researcher will only discuss behavior factors of WE as stated in the introduction such as goal setting, performance feedback, supervisor support, and mentoring / coaching. a. Goal Setting: Goal setting is one of the tools to attract employees' motivation as it is to guide their behavior and motivate them to perform better (Leblebici, 2012). Effective goals will help to gain commitment from both parties: the organization and the employees which results in people doing more than required and eventually it will increase performance (Erez, Earley, & Hulin, 2017). Leblebici summarized that effective goals should be specific not generalized ones, difficult not easy ones, and should be accepted by the group. It is necessary to have frequent and relevant feedback, and this should be done with open communication (2012). b. Performance Feedback: Performance feedback is an information given by an immediate supervisor or management on how an employee performs (Chandrasekar, 2011). The information can be both positive feedback meaning what an employee has been doing right, as well as feedback on what requires improvement (Oswald, 2012). Frequent or regular feedback and relevant feedback will create effectiveness in the employees' job activities. According to Prue & Fairbank performance feedback can be done in daily, weekly, bi & tri weekly, or on a monthly basis (1981). Based on their study, effective feedback can be done from a short glance or an extensive analysis, privately or publicly (which has greater effects), in a written, verbal, mechanical or self-recorded form (Prue & Fairbank, 1981). However, when feedback is not well accepted by employees, it would have negative consequences such as demoralized or unperformed state (Modaff, DeWine, & Butler, 2007).They also mentioned that feedback as a form of communication between members of an organization covers task guidance, personal guidance and other guidance if any both implicitly and explicitly (Modaff, DeWine, & Butler, 2007). c. Supervisor Support: According to Burke, Michael, Borucki & Hurley supervisor support is "the degree to which employees perceive that supervisors offer employees support, encouragement and concern" (1992). Supervisors who are concerned and supportive of their subordinates or employees' work by being helpful, supportive and trust worthy in the work climate, can be also categorized as supervisor support (Yoon, Beatty, & Suh, 2001). d. Mentoring / Coaching: Douglas (1997) defines mentoring as "an intense relationship in which a senior person oversees the career development and psychosocial development of less-experienced person". While coaching is a short and more focus form of mentoring that relates to job task, skills, and performed by giving instruction, demonstration and high impact feedback (Hopkin-Thompson, 2000).

Employee Performance: Service Excellence
The performance of employees is measured by the output they produce (Tetteh, Asiedu, Odei, Afful, & Akwaboah, 2012). Front liners' performance is measured by two things: outcome performance which generate $ (money) for the company and behavior performance which is providing service to customers and store activities as well as knowledge and skills (Yap, Bove, & Beveland, 2009). One of the extra-role behavior performance that Podsakoff, Mackenzie, Paine, & Bachrach (2000) identified is the helping behavior and it relates to providing service to customers voluntarily. Hence, front liners' extra role behavior performance is generated from their daily activities which is interacting with customers to provide service excellence. In measuring front liners' service to customers, the researcher uses Service Excellence a concept of the Johnston model in which four factors are involved: a. delivering the promise: the company through employees do what they say and the service is delivered consistently, b. providing a personal touch: the front liners treat customers like individuals, sales staff know customers without them having to tell them, c. going the extra mile: the front liners anticipate customers' need and they fall over themselves to help customers, and d. dealing with problems and queries: employees are happy and willing to sort things out when there is a problem (Johnston, 2004) and those factors are used by the writer to measure the service provided from an employees' point a view. The conceptual framework above explains the communicative leadership behaviors and behavior working environment that influence front liners job performance which is providing service excellence. Ha1. Communicative leadership behaviors influence employee behavior performance which is providing service excellence to customers Ha2. Non-physical working environment factors influence the front liners' behavior performance which is providing service excellence to customers Ha3. Communicative leadership and behavioral working environment influence front liners' behavior performance which is providing service excellence

Research Method
Using cross-sectional surveys, the study applied quantitative methodology, where SPSS for Windows version 22 was used to process the data.
Primary While in deciding which working environment factors to be studied the researcher conducted an interview with the Regional Manager / General Manager.

Result and Analysis
The researcher has already done the pre-test of 30 respondents in South Jakarta to test the validity and reliability of the questionaires. The stores tested are: MDS Kalibata 5 people, MDS Citos 10 people and MDS Pejaten 15 people. Creswell (2012) defines validity as "the degree to which all of the evidence points to the intended interpretation of test scores for the proposed purpose". Validity shows how far the measurement chosen can measure an item that is being measured. The question or indicator of the instrument can be categorized significant or valid if the calculated value r (correlation coefficient) is positive and higher than the table value which is 0.05 (Priyatno, 2017).  (3)

Reliability Test
An instrument is categorized reliable when the result is the same from any angle of measurement. Alpha Cronbach is usually used to test the reliability, If the alpha value is less than 0.6 it is categorized as unreliable, 0.7 is categorized as acceptable, and 0.8 as very good (Priyatno, 2017). Table 3: Variables Reliability Result The table 3 above shows that the value of Cronbach alpha is above 0.6 so it is categorized as reliable.  Vol.12, No.20, 2020 Table 4, reveals that variable communicative leadership has 4 dimensions. The dimension with the highest mean was facilitating work while the lowest mean was relational dynamic. The respondents' answers can be various categorized, but dimension facilitating work was more clustered as it had the lowest standard deviation among all. The overall communicative leadership index was 66 which is categorized as poor according to MDS standards and respondents' response scale was 3.3 meaning moderate. Table 5 indicates that 38.1% of 772 respondents, which is 295 people stated they were neutral and 28.5% respondents or 220 people answered agreed that MDS leaders had applied communicative leadership.  Table 6 shows that 296 respondents or 38% answered neutral, and 229 front liners or 30% agreed that MDS had practiced good non-physical working environment. Its index was 67 meaning still poor, while the scale of respondents' response was 3.2 meaning moderate.  Table 7 above shows the non-physical working environment variable had 4 items. Performance feedback had the highest score as its mean (19.8873) was the highest among 4 other dimensions. The data of respondents' answers spread out relatively. The most clustered or consistent data was from goal setting as it had the least standard deviation among other dimension while performance feedback data had the most spread score as it had the highest standard deviation. The survey showed that out of 772 respondents 51% of them or 344 respondents answered neutral, and 123 front liners or 16% agreed that they as the service providers of MDS had provided service excellence to customers. However, the index was only 61 meaning it was still poor. Whereas the respondents' response rate was 3.1 meaning moderate.  ISSN 2222-1905(Paper) ISSN 2222-2839(Online) Vol.12, No.20, 2020 7 Table 9 shows that the dependent variable had 4 items. The dimension with the highest mean was dealing with problems and queries: 3.6023, meaning most of the respondents agreed that they had dealt with problems and queries for this dimension. Whereas the dimension of personal touch had the lowest mean: 2.3199 and it meant most of respondents disagreed. Another dimension that also had a mean score in the disagreed range (2.4637) which was going the extra mile. While delivering the promise and dealing well with problems and queries dimensions had scores in the agree zone (3.5907 & 3.6023). Standard deviation scores of dimension in the Service Excellence variable were relatively close to each other, and yet there was a highest standard deviation that belonged to dealing with problems and queries dimension (.88136) meaning the data was spread out the most. Whereas the lowest standard deviation was personal touch dimension (.79392), meaning its data was the most consistent. Figure 3: Normality Test Graph  2222-1905(Paper) ISSN 2222-2839(Online) Vol.12, No.20, 2020 8  ISSN 2222-1905(Paper) ISSN 2222-2839(Online) Vol.12, No.20, 2020 9 Based on table 14, it shows that the Pearson correlation value of X1 (Communicative Leadership) was 0.501, meaning Communicative Leadership and Employee Performance had a moderate correlation whereas X2 (Working Environment) and Employee Performance had a strong relationship or correlation with Pearson as the correlation value was 0.693.   (0) (X1) and Working Environment variable values were 0, then Employee Performance (Y) was -1,410. The coefficients value (β) for X1 was 0.090 and positive, meaning every time Communicative Leadership increased Employee Performance: service excellence would increase 0.090 with an assumption that X2 value remained unchanged. The coefficients value (β) for X2 variable was 0.150 and positive, meaning every time X2 increased Y would increase 0.150 with an assumption that X1 value remained unchanged. European Journal of Business and Management www.iiste.org ISSN 2222-1905(Paper) ISSN 2222-2839(Online) Vol.12, No.20, 2020 Table 19 shows that the Working Environment variable had a strong coefficient correlation ® which was 0.693, and the coefficient determination (R²) value was 0.480 meaning 48% of Employee Performance (Y) was influenced by Working Environment, while the rest 52% was influenced by other factors that were not studied in the research.   Vol.12, No.20, 2020 11 0.000. The researcher concluded this regression model was significant to predict Employee Performance with the Working Environment. In other words, the independent variable: Working Environment (X2) influenced Employee Performance (Y).   Vol.12, No.20, 2020 b. Representing Employees and the unit was the dimensions in Communicative Leadership (X1) that had the weakest correlation with Employee Performance (Y), while Facilitating Work dimension had the strongest correlation with Employee Performance (Y). c. In Non-Physical Working Environment variable (X2) Mentoring and Coaching dimension had the strongest correlation with Employee Performance whereas Goal Setting dimension had the smallest or weakest one. d. When X1 (Communicative Leadership) was combined with X2 (Working Environment), the correlation with Employee Performance was stronger than when the independent variables stood alone. e. Working Environment had a stronger influence on Employee Performance. f. Personal touch dimension in Service Excellence had the lowest score.

Recommendations
Theoretical recommendations: In the future research it is suggested that another study be done to: a. Analyze how communicative leadership and non-physical working environment are implemented in department stores b. Analyze the study results about communicative leadership, working environment and employee performance quantitatively and qualitatively (mixed method). Practical recommendations: a. The company should improve communicative leadership behaviors implementation among all leaders in the organization by focusing on the dimensions especially representing the employees and the unit one in order to increase employee performance. b. The company should improve the internal communication system especially in conveying important messages from the management to front liners. c. The company's attention should be focused on the Relational dynamic as it had the lowest mean score among other dimensions in communicative leadership. d. The company should take immediate action to enhance the implementation of the Goal Setting dimension as it is at the core of where the company will lead to and yet it had the weakest correlation with employee performance in working environment variable (X2). e. The company's attention should also be focused on the Supervisor Support as it had the lowest mean score among other dimensions in the working environment. f. The company should also start implementing more personal touch and extra mile dimensions to provide better service