When new leaders provide significant support and encouragement to their team members, they create a safer environment where individuals feel more comfortable speaking up and sharing their thoughts, particularly in contrast to less supportive predecessors. This finding emerged from a recently published research “Turn Over a New Leaf: The Impact of Leader Succession on Subordinate Silence and the Moderating Roles of New and Former Leader Secure-Base Support,” by Dr. Nate Zettna, co-written with Helena Nguyen (University of Sydney), Yiduo Shao (University of Iowa), and Mo Wang (University of Florida). Dr. Zettna’s team conducted their study in Thailand for over four months, involving 107 bank branches in seven provinces, capturing periods before and after a leadership change, with approximately half of the branches experiencing leader succession. “Employee silence, the withholding of opinions and concerns about work-related issues, is a pervasive phenomenon with often harmful consequences,” (Morrison, 2014). Dr. Zettna defined employee silence as when employees do not share their work-related thoughts. They may withhold their opinions, concerns, or feedback, intentionally or unintentionally, within the team environment. Team silence stems from employees feeling like their efforts to speak up are futile, or when they voice an issue or opinion, the leaders fail to listen. When a former leader is unsupportive, a succeeding leader who provides secure-base support can get the team members to start speaking again. “Leaders who provide secure-base support are responsive to the needs of team members, encourage their growth, and do not interfere unnecessarily,” said Dr. Zettna, who spoke on the topic at Sasin Research Seminar in 2024. He added that “leader succession represents a significant shift within a team, offering both challenges and opportunities for change,” (Lam et al., 2018). Supportive team leaders are crucial in fostering followership behavior, including behaviors such as obeying leaders, working collaboratively towards team goals, and showing respect for the leader’s authority, as discussed in literature by Pinder & Harlos (2001) and Brinsfield (2013). However, silence within the team can limit the ability of team members to engage in their followership roles (Zettna et al., 2025). The absence of communication and feedback can inhibit the team’s ability to function effectively, underscoring the importance of leadership in setting norms and facilitating open dialogue within their teams.

According to the research, three hypotheses were formed:

• Hypothesis 1: Leader succession reduces subordinate silence towards the new leader compared to the former leader.
• Hypothesis 2: New leader’s secure-base support moderates the relationship between leader succession and subordinate silence, such that the beneficial effect of leader succession in reducing subordinate silence is stronger when new leader’s secure-base support is higher compared to when it is lower.
• Hypothesis 3: There is a three-way interaction of leader succession, new leader’s secure-base support, and former leader’s secure-base support on subordinate silence, such that the effect of leader succession in reducing subordinate silence is strongest when new leader’s secure-base support is higher and former leader’s secure-base support is lower.

Dr. Zettna’s research found that the effect of leader succession on subordinate silence was strongest when the new leader demonstrated high secure-base support and the former leader demonstrated low secure-base support. In contrast, this effect was weaker and not statistically significant when both leaders were high in secure-base support, when the new leader was low and the former leader was high, or when both leaders were low in secure-base support. Taken together, these results suggest that subordinate silence decreased most significantly when the new leader provided strong secure-base support while the former leader had provided little. Therefore, Hypothesis 3 was supported (Zettna et al.). Dr. Zettna explained at Sasin Research Seminar that a new leader who provides higher levels of secure-base support promotes exploration and risk-taking in the context of change and uncertainty by providing a secure and safe environment. Removing someone who sets the norm in a workplace, gives the team an opportunity to reclaim their followership as a good citizenship of the team. “It allows you not to be silent since there is no one to set the norm,” he said. The research further indicated that while it may be difficult to remove the negative impact of former leaders, these organizations need to consider recruiting and training new leaders to gain leadership characteristics conducive to facilitating productive change processes for their subordinates. Nevertheless, Dr. Zettna warns that new leaders need to be understanding of the company culture and adapt to it. There are cases when after the first months of the honeymoon, the employees who speak up may become silent later if they feel that the leader doesn’t really understand them. In conclusion, a new leader can challenge the norm, disrupt team silence, and create change in team dynamics, resulting in a better team environment in the workplace provided that they create the support and psychological safety that fits in with the culture of the team members. Citation: Zettna, Nate, Helena Nguyen, Yiduo Shao, and Mo Wang. “Turn Over a New Leaf: The Impact of Leader Succession on Subordinate Silence and the Moderating Roles of New and Former Leader Secure-Base Support.” Journal of Organizational Behavior, published 18 Mar. 2025, https://doi.org/10.1002/job.2880.