The Mediator Role of the Professional Ethics in the Relationship between Trustworthy Leadership and Organizational Citizenship Behavior among Employees of Urmia University

Effective leadership and management is one of the factors contributing to organizational success. The purpose of the present study was to determine the relationship between trustworthy leadership and organizational citizenship behavior with the mediator role of the professional ethics among the employees of Urmia University. This structural equation model based, descriptive-correlational study was conducted on 190 employees of Urmia University in 2017. The sample size was estimated using Krejcie and Morgan table and selected by simple random sampling method. The Cadozier’s et al Professional Ethics questionnaire (2011), Walumbwa’s et al Trustworthy Leadership questionnaire (2008), Podsakoff’s et al Organizational Citizenship Behavior questionnaire (1990) were used to collect data. Data were analyzed using SPSS 18 and Lisrel software at a significance level of 0.05. The direct effect of trustworthy leadership on professional ethics (β=0.39, t=3.84) and also the direct effect of professional ethics on organizational citizenship behavior (β=0.21, t=1/96) and direct effect of trustworthy leadership on organizational citizenship behavior (β=0.29, t=2.41) was significantly observed (p<0.05). The indirect effect of trustworthy leadership on organizational citizenship behavior was also significant with the mediator role of professional ethics (β=0.81, t=7.52). The fitting of the predictive model of the research variables is relatively good (X2/ DF=2/133). The findings suggest that university administrators promote organizational citizenship behavior among employees by fostering their sense of trust and self-awareness and the importance of observing professional ethics.