The Impact of Agile Leadership on Burnout: The Mediating Role of Workload in Teacher Education Contexts in Malaysia

Burnout is an increasingly significant issue in higher education, particularly among lecturers who report being overloaded with tasks, buried in administrative duties, and facing changes to their teaching of students. This study examines the impact of Agile leadership, which places significant importance on flexibility, collaboration, and responsiveness, on the workload and burnout experienced by lecturers. Grounded in Agile Leadership Theory and the Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) and Demand-Control-Support (DCS) models, this research examines the role of these leadership styles in the evolving landscape of higher education concerning emotional well-being. The respondents were lecturers from teacher training institutions in Malaysia who completed standardised questionnaires to gauge their perceptions of agile leadership practices, work overload, and burnout. As a result of data analysis by SEM, a complex relationship among these three factors was uncovered. Results suggested that Agile leadership was associated with experiencing lower workload stress, partly due to its emphasis on efficient planning, granting lecturers the necessary authority, and fostering teamwork. It was also linked to increased rates of burnout. This constant push to change and be self-directed is probably what creates emotional weaknesses in lecturers as well. The study also found that burnout was highly associated with the volume of work that occupations perceived they needed to do, with emotional exhaustion in particular making workloads seem even heavier. These results reveal a paradox – agile leadership may decrease the difficulty of juggling work for lecturers, yet could increase the psychological cost if emotional support is not perceived as being offered adequately.

کلیدواژه ها:

Agile leadership ، Burnout ، Workload ، Teacher Education ، Structural Equation Modelling