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This paper addresses the concept of workplace spirituality as it relates to leadership effectiveness based on measurable variable elements. The theories of spiritual leadership and social exchange surface with a review of previous literature on the concepts. Altruistic love, a characteristic of spiritual leadership, is addressed as an independent variable, which produces a relationship that leads to organizational commitment, appearing as a dependent variable to ascertain if the spiritual leadership element will produce the outcome of continued commitment from employees. The employee's sense of his/her work as a calling as a moderating effect on the effectiveness of the leader's altruistic love was measured with the expected result of a lessened dependence upon the leader's altruistic love to produce organizational commitment in the follower. Results indicate that altruistic love does have a positive relation to affective and normative commitment, but is not significant in relation to continuance commitment. No significant relation was demonstrated in the moderating effect of the employee's sense of work as a calling on the altruistic love of the leader as it pertains to organizational commitment.
Keywords Spiritual leadership, Altruistic love, Work as a calling, Commitment.
Introduction
An increased emphasis on workplace spirituality as it relates to leadership effectiveness warrants additional research to further comprehend the ramifications of spiritual leadership in regards to the effects of elements included in workplace spirituality upon individual employee's commitment to the organization. This paper examines the theory of spiritual leadership within measurable variables to procure additional applicable information that will aid in further research and workplace implementation in order to increase the likelihood of organizational commitment among employees. Altruistic love remains, within the context of spiritual leadership theory, whereby leaders and followers have a sense of wholeness, harmony, membership and demonstrate genuine care and concern for both self and others (Fry, 2003; Fry, Vitucci, & Cedillo, 2005; Smith, 1992). Fry, et al., (2005) present the Spiritual Leadership Theory questionnaire as a measurement instrument for studying the effects of altruistic love on performance outcomes. Work as a calling appears as a strong source of motivation for followers as well as leaders (Markow & Klenke, 2005). When employees view their work as a calling rather than a career or a job, increases have been documented in life, health,...