8 REVIEW, DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION
This chapter concludes the thesis by discussing the research findings with regard
to the theoretical and practical implications that flow from them, and how future
research might build upon them.
Before looking to the future, the rationale for the research design is reviewed and
the model development process is summarised, highlighting the significant
modifications to, and important findings from, each iteration of the model. The
contributions of, and new conceptualisations from, the research are then
discussed along with suggestions for future research to address both the issues
that arise from the research findings and from the limitations of the current
research.
8.1 Précis of the research
This research has aimed to:
explore and evaluate the contribution of motivational leadership to employee
work motivation in hospitality services.
Addressing calls in the broader leadership (Lowe and Gardner 2000: 496-498)
and organisational studies (Johns 2001; Rousseau and Fried 2001) literature for
more integrated research approaches that link workplace phenomena (i.e. do not
study individual phenomena in isolation), motivational leadership has been
located within the broader organisational / motivational context by measuring a
number of non-leadership contributors (e.g. empowerment and employees’ work
values) to employee work motivation.
The following specific research objectives have been pursued:
- critically evaluate the field of hospitality leadership studies to identify relevant
issues and inform the research design; - develop a theoretical framework to:
a. locate the variables of interest in relation to existing organisational
psychology theories;
b. articulate the likely linkages between variables; and
c. guide the formulation of specific hypotheses;