Orchestrating relationships in hybrid workplaces: An empirical study of leaders’ leadership behaviours

Purpose: Hybrid work offers benefits but also challenges interpersonal relationships by reducing spontaneous, synchronous interactions. This study aims to understand how leaders intentionally orchestrate social relationships in hybrid work environments. Methodology: Using a qualitative single-case study design, we examined an organization that pioneered hybrid work arrangements. Data were collected through in-depth interviews with leaders operating at different hierarchical levels and analyzed using a grounded theory approach to identify leadership behaviors aimed at fostering workplace relationships. Findings: Leaders actively engage in multilevel intentional relational practices that are modality-sensitive between digital or analog channels, with three sets of brokering-oriented behaviors: with individual team members, within teams, and among team members. Managerial implications: The study highlights the need for leaders to deliberately manage relational dynamics in hybrid work contexts. Managers are encouraged to explicitly focus on relationship cultivation and to sustain social cohesion. Limitations: The research is based on a single case study, which may limit the generalizability of the findings. Originality: The study advances e-leadership and brokering research by conceptualizing leadership in hybrid work settings as a multilevel, modality-sensitive relational process and by identifying emerging leadership behaviors in the orchestration of workplace relationships.