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Leadership research in hospitality has increased exponentially over the last decade as illustrated by recent systematic reviews (Elkhwesky et al., 2022). For instance, Hoang et al. (2021) conducted a systematic review of empowering leadership using 25 empirical studies. A review of abusive supervision (dark leadership) was conducted by Yu et al. (2020). Both Bavik (2020) and Chon and Zoltan (2019) reviewed servant leadership. Gui et al. (2020b) conducted a meta-analysis on servant leadership. A meta-analysis was also conducted on transformational leadership using 62 studies (Gui et al., 2021), and Chang et al. (2020) conducted a meta-analysis of outcomes of leader–member exchange (LMX) using 36 studies. These systematic reviews, however, mostly focused on one leadership theory. As an exception, Arici et al. (2021) conducted a quantitative review of leadership research (using bibliometric analysis) in hospitality to demonstrate the evolution and progress of leadership research by quantifying the most prevalent leadership themes. The current study builds on these reviews, as well as identifies and fulfills the following research gaps.
First, the current study uses a qualitative approach to review all the leadership research in hospitality rather than limiting it to one leadership theory. Specifically, a detailed qualitative review is conducted on the research on LMX, transformational, servant, empowering, abusive, ethical and authentic leadership. A qualitative approach can effectively guide the progress of leadership research in hospitality by developing a nomological network for each leadership theory. A nomological network for each leadership theory is necessary to guide future research by showing the unique antecedents and outcomes and their mediators and moderators. This approach will reveal overlapping and unique variables for each leadership theory. For example, frontline employee service performance has been found to be influenced by both transformational leadership (Yang et al., 2020) and servant leadership (Ye et al., 2019), but these relationships are mediated by different variables, such as organizational embeddedness (Yang et al., 2020) and customer orientation (Ye et al., 2019).
Second, the current qualitative approach reviews and critiques leadership research on all major leadership theories studied in hospitality. A critical analysis of leadership research from the hospitality literature will guide the progress of leadership in hospitality by revealing trends and limitations of the research designs, analysis and theories used...