Empowering leadership, mindful organizing and safety performance in a nuclear power plant: A multilevel structural equation model

•Mindful organizing is a team mediator between leadership and safety performance.•Empowering leadership is positively associated to mindful organizing.•Mindful organizing relates to positive changes on safety compliance.•Managers in HROs should be concerned about developing mindful organizing.•Empowering leaders can contribute to develop mindful organizing in their teams. The aim of this paper is to develop and test a model in which empowering leadership is expected to contribute to developing mindful organizing, which in turn should contribute to safety compliance and safety participation. Empowering leadership was measured at Time 1, and the rest of the variables were measured two years later (Time 2). The sample used for the analyses in this study included 49 teams and 200 employees from a company in the nuclear generation industry with three different sites. The multilevel structural equation analysis performed to test the proposed model revealed an acceptable fit, and most of the paths were statistically significant and presented the expected sign. Results supported mindful organizing as a full mediator in the relationship between empowering leadership and the change in safety compliance. However, the mediator role of mindful organizing in the relationship between empowering leadership and the change in safety participation was not supported. Implications of these findings for the development of a theoretical framework for mindful organizing and practical implications are outlined.