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Archives of Business Research – Vol. 10, No. 1

Publication Date: January 25, 2022

DOI:10.14738/abr.101.11529. Amri, K., Kholil, K., & Widowati, D. (2022). The Effect of Organizational Communication, Transformational Leadership and

Organizational Learning to OSH Performance: A Case Study in PT Waskita Karya. Archives of Business Research, 10(01). 1-11.

Services for Science and Education – United Kingdom

The Effect of Organizational Communication, Transformational

Leadership and Organizational Learning to OSH Performance: A

Case Study in PT Waskita Karya

Amri K.

Doctoral Student of Communication Science

Sahid Unicersity Jakarta

Kholil Kholil

Post Graduate School of Sahid University

Dewi Widowati

London School of Public Relation

ABSTRACT

Cases of work accidents are still happening today, including the construction

service company. It indicates that the safety performance of construction service

companies is not optimal, so it is important and needs to be investigated, especially

safety culture, organizational communication, learning organization, and

transformational leadership. Hence, this study explores the role of organizational

communication in mediating the influence of transformational leadership and

learning organization on safety culture and safety performance. The study used a

quantitative approach through a survey with a questionnaire instrument designed

on a Likert scale. The participant is 218 workers of PT. Waskita Karya (Persero)

Tbk. Data analysis using structural equation modeling. The results

showed that transformational leadership, learning organization, and safety culture

had a positive and significant direct effect on work safety performance and safety

culture, in addition the result also confirm that the key success factor for safety

performance is organizational communication. Based on these findings,

practically it is recommended that organizational communication among the

workforce needs to be improved continuously to make a greater contribution to

safety culture and performance.

Keywords: organizational communication, transformational leadership, organizational

learning organization, safety culture, safety performance.

INTRODUCTION

Work accidents can be still found in Indonesia. As an illustration, in 2019, there were 157,313

accidents. This shows that the work safety performance is not optimal. Work safety

performance is the behavior shown by employees to promote and comply with safety in the

workplace which is reflected in the safety compliance and safety participation.

Wirahadikusumah and Ferial (2005) show that the low level of compliance of construction

implementers to Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) guidelines is a trigger for work

accidents. This also indicates that the cultural values of work safety in the construction services

sector have not been upheld by construction workers. Fang et al. (2006) stated that safety

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Archives of Business Research (ABR) Vol. 10, Issue 1, January-2022

Services for Science and Education – United Kingdom

culture, especially in construction projects, is an important factor since most of the works is

still done by humans. In addition, Fang et al (2006) said that safety culture can be used as the

basis for developing safety management strategies. Chen et al. (2018) proved that safety culture

has an effect on work safety performance. Work accidents tend to be dominated by unsafe

behavior (Afandi et al., 2014). On the other hand, the implementation of an occupational health

and safety management system is an organizational and managerial approach to creating a

safety culture within the company (Cooper, 2001).

However, Bosak et al. (2013) emphasized that OSH regulations in companies can be an

additional burden for workers, in terms of production targets that must be met. This condition,

among other things, triggers a work safety culture that has not worked well. Less optimal safety

performance can also be influenced by transformational leadership, namely the leader’s

capability to influence, motivate, manage activities and interactions between individuals that

allows others to build vision and self-confidence. Therefore, they can contribute to the

achievement of organizational goals as reflected in the influence of idealism, inspirational

motivation, intellectual stimulation, and individual judgment. If a construction service company

can provide effective transformational leadership, it has the potential to encourage increased

safety performance.

Lievens and Vlerick (2014) stated that transformational leadership has a positive impact on

nurses’ safety performance. Work safety performance can also be influenced by learning

organizations, namely organizations with people who continuously expand their capacity to

create the desired results by nurturing new thinking and patterns of expansion, collective

aspirations are set free, and people are continually learning how to learn together, as reflected

in managerial commitment, systems perspective, openness and experimentation, and transfer

and integration of knowledge. If the learning organization in a construction service company is

well established, it can improve work safety performance. Karim and Rahman (2018) revealed

that learning organizations have an effect on performance, including work safety performance.

THEORETICAL REVIEW AND HYPOTHESIS DEVELOPMENT

Organizational communication is the process of sending and receiving messages within groups

in either formal or informal organization (DeVito, 1997). In addition, organizational

communication is the process of creating, sending, and receiving messages in a complex system,

involving integrated internal and external network relationships, containing individual work to

manage organizational ambiguity and achieve results or goals (Baldwin, Perry & Moffitt, 2004).

Moreover, organizational communication reflects patterns, networks, and communication

systems within an organization that are designed with the aim that organizational members

work effectively to achieve organizational goals (Febrial & Anik, 2020). In a subjective

perspective, organizational communication is the organizational behavior and how those

involved in the process transact and give meaning to what is happening. In this perspective, the

emphasis is on the process of creating meaning for interactions that create, maintain, and

change organizations. While the objective definition is the activity of handling messages

contained within an organizational boundary. In this perspective, the emphasis is on

communication as a tool that allows people to adapt to their environment (Ernika, 2016).

So et al. (2018) stated that organizational communication determines how organizational

culture is distributed throughout the company. Barrett (2011) saind that organizational

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Amri, K., Kholil, K., & Widowati, D. (2022). The Effect of Organizational Communication, Transformational Leadership and Organizational Learning to

OSH Performance: A Case Study in PT Waskita Karya. Archives of Business Research, 10(01). 1-11.

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.14738/abr.101.11529

communication is built on core skills. There are skills that individuals need when they interact

with other people, either one-on-one, with groups, or in a broader organizational context.

Organizational communication skills begin with emotional intelligence and interpersonal skills,

which are needed to interact effectively with others as individuals or groups. Furthermore, this

section covers literacy and cross-cultural communication, which involves the ability to

understand and appreciate cultural differences and communicate successfully across and

working in different cultures. The communications section of the organization includes leading

meetings and managing teams, both of which are important skills for the leaders.

Transformational leadership deals with motivating people to overcome their personal interests

for the good of the group (Bateman & Snell, 2015). According to Miller (2009), transformational

leadership is leadership through a communication process, creating a relationship between

leader and follower that helps followers reach their full potential and has the potential to

change both leaders and followers. In practice, transformational leaders are able to influence

others by using charisma, paying attention to followers, and stimulating others (Ivancevich,

Kanopaske, & Matteson, 2016). Transformational leadership is needed by organizations in

order to grow, develop, and compete. The transformational leadership model produces

significant organizational changes because this form of leadership emphasizes a higher level of

intrinsic motivation, trust, commitment, and loyalty from subordinates (Kinicki & Kreitner,

2012). Transformational leadership focuses on how leaders create good performance from

followers through transcending self-interested behavior by demonstrating a high need for self- actualization, holding personal values, and implicating motivation of followers. The point is a

common bond between leaders and followers in a mutually beneficial goal (Gupta & Surie,

2004). Shen et al. (2017) stated that transformational leadership is very important in

construction safety management.

A learning organization is an organization that has developed its capacity to continuously learn,

adapt, and change (Robbins & Coutler, 2016). Learning organization is organization that

focuses on improving learning and knowledge disseminated throughout the company (Drafke,

2009). White and Burton (2007) stated that organizational learning is the acquisition of

knowledge through the application and mastery of new information, tools, and methods. Jerez- Gomez, Cespedes-Lorente, and Valle-Cabrera (2005) said that measuring learning

organizations can be done through several dimensions as follows: (a) managerial commitment

including managerial support, shared vision and mental models, personal efficacy, leadership

management, strategic direction, leadership and intentions, involved leadership, facilitative

leadership, and learning orientation; (b) systems perspective including shared vision, systems

thinking, systems perspective, clarity of vision intent, and systems orientation; (c) openness

and experimentation including openness to new ideas, independent problem solving,

continuous innovation, culture of experimentation, integration of external knowledge,

creativity, continuous learning, learning from past experiences, learning from others,

entrepreneurship, and operational variety; and (d) knowledge transfer and integration

including teamwork, team learning, internal knowledge integration, knowledge transfer, group

problem solving, and team orientation.

Safety culture is related to the organization. Hudson in Lyndon et al. (2015) and Chen et al.

(2018) define safety culture as the shared values, cognitions, commitments, beliefs,

communication and attitudes and norms of organizational members that influence their safety