Leader Empathy and Intrinsic Motivation Drive Employee Retention in Indonesia Livestock Feed Sector

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FORMOSA NEWS

Empathetic leadership and internal job satisfaction are the primary drivers of employee loyalty in Indonesia’s livestock feed industry, outperforming standard top-down managerial communication. A 2026 study conducted by researchers Eko Dwi Santoso and Kadarusman from STIE Malangkucecwara evaluated how leadership behaviors influence workforce retention during economic volatility. Published in the International Journal of Asian Business and Management, the empirical investigation reveals that active managerial care directly strengthens workers' emotional connection to their enterprise, offering actionable insights for human resource management in agribusiness.

The livestock industry serves as a foundational pillar for national food security. However, agribusiness enterprises currently navigate severe operational pressures, including inflated raw material costs, unstable feed supply chains, shifting market demands, and broader economic instability. Within labor-intensive processing facilities, maintaining high levels of affective commitment—defined as an employee's emotional attachment, identification, and voluntary loyalty to an organization—is essential to reduce turnover and sustain operational output. While prior organizational management literature frequently highlights corporate communication, little empirical research has examined how leader empathy specifically operates within agricultural manufacturing contexts.

To evaluate these workforce dynamics, the STIE Malangkucecwara research team executed a quantitative field study focusing on personnel at PT Charoen Pokphand Jaya Farm in Central Java, Indonesia. From an operational population of 100 employees, researchers established a representative sample of 50 respondents calculated via the Slovin formula. The team administered structured digital surveys using a five-point Likert scale to evaluate leader empathy, leadership communication, intrinsic motivation, and affective commitment. The resulting dataset was analyzed using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM) via SmartPLS 4 to measure direct and indirect structural relationships.

The statistical evaluation generated several key findings regarding workplace motivation and retention:

• Direct Impact of Leader Empathy: Leader empathy exerts a statistically significant positive effect on employees' affective commitment ($p = 0.049$). Supervisors who demonstrate perspective-taking, active listening, and genuine concern for personal well-being directly foster organizational loyalty.
• Influence of Intrinsic Motivation: Intrinsic motivation demonstrated the strongest overall impact on affective commitment ($p = 0.001$). Workers who experience personal satisfaction, task enjoyment, and meaningfulness in their daily duties display significantly higher organizational attachment.
• Empathy Enhances Motivation: Leader empathy directly increases intrinsic motivation among agricultural personnel ($p = 0.023$), proving that supportive management satisfies basic psychological needs at work.
• Inconvenient Reality of Leadership Communication: Standard leadership communication showed no statistically significant effect on employee affective commitment ($p = 0.114$) or intrinsic motivation ($p = 0.829$). Informational clarity and top-down directives without interpersonal care fail to build emotional bonds.
• Absence of Mediation Effects: Intrinsic motivation does not mediate the relationship between leader empathy and affective commitment ($p = 0.060$). Leader empathy drives employee retention directly through interpersonal trust rather than through intermediate motivational channels.

These findings offer practical applications for corporate decision-makers, HR managers, and industrial policy architects. Operational productivity in technical sectors cannot depend solely on administrative messaging or automated informational updates. Instead, commercial enterprises must invest in empathetic leadership development programs that train supervisors in emotional intelligence, active listening, and supportive supervision. Fostering an empathetic workplace culture directly secures human capital stability in strategic supply chain sectors.

As highlighted by Eko Dwi Santoso and Kadarusman of STIE Malangkucecwara, emotional engagement stems directly from authentic managerial care rather than structured corporate broadcasts. The authors noted that when leaders actively consider employee perspectives and fulfill their psychological needs, workers develop a durable sense of belonging that protects companies against high turnover risks during economic downturns.

Author Profiles

1. Eko Dwi Santoso, M.M. 

   Researcher and academic at STIE Malangkucecwara, Malang, Indonesia. His research specialization focuses on human resource management, organizational behavior, and employee engagement dynamics within industrial sectors.
2. Kadarusman, Ph.D. Senior Lecturer and Researcher at STIE Malangkucecwara, Malang, Indonesia. He specializes in strategic leadership, managerial communication, and organizational development. Corresponding author contact: kadarusman@stie-mce.ac.id.

Research Source

Article Title: How Empathy and Leadership Communication Foster Employees' Affective Commitment: The Mediating Role of Intrinsic Motivation
Journal: International Journal of Asian Business and Management (IJABM)
Publication Details: Vol. 5, No. 4, pp. 293–308
Publication Year: 2026
DOI: https://doi.org/10.55927/ijabm.v5i4.21

Official URL: https://journalijabm.my.id/index.php/ijabm/index