LAUSR

This research examines the impact of authentic leadership style on project success through mediation effects of psychological empowerment and job engagement in the software industry of Pakistan. Data were collected from 343 self-reports of employees working on different software projects in Pakistan. As per results, authentic leadership enhanced project success directly and indirectly through the serial-mediation effects of psychological empowerment and job engagement. The current findings contribute to prior literature in many ways: (i) social exchange theory—by identifying new antecedents and outcomes of job engagement; (ii) leadership literature—by offering an integrated framework with psychological empowerment and job engagement as two explanatory mechanisms (mediators) linking the under researched authentic leadership to project success; (iii) project management literature—by unwrapping new antecedents (i.e., authentic leadership, psychological empowerment, and job engagement) to project success; offers an empirical case for the potential applications of the undermined leadership style, authentic leadership, in the software sector.