A motivated information processing perspective on the antecedents of empowering leadership

Empowering leadership is an important influence on team effectiveness. This makes the question of what the antecedents of team empowering leadership are an important issue to consider. To address this question, we propose a motivated information processing perspective that holds that engaging in empowering leadership is based on social information processing, and that there are individual differences in how elaborate that information processing is. We argue that a key consideration in shifting control from the leader to the team is the extent to which empowering leadership is driven by leaders’ consideration of their trust in the team (i.e., an instance of social information processing), and that leader need for closure (a trait capturing the disposition to carefully consider decisions and actions) moderates the relationship between leader trust in team and empowering leadership. A survey of N = 156 work teams supported these hypotheses.     

Contingent leadership and effectiveness of trauma resuscitation teams

This research investigated leadership and effectiveness of teams operating in a high-velocity environment, specifically trauma resuscitation teams. On the basis of the literature and their own ethnographic work, the authors proposed and tested a contingency model in which the influence of leadership on team effectiveness during trauma resuscitation differs according to the situation. Results indicated that empowering leadership was more effective when trauma severity was low and when team experience was high. Directive leadership was more effective when trauma severity was high or when the team was inexperienced. Findings also suggested that an empowering leader provided more learning opportunities than did a directive leader. The major contribution of this article is the linkage of leadership to team effectiveness, as moderated by relatively specific situational contingencies.     

A MULTILEVEL INVESTIGATION OF LEADER– MEMBER EXCHANGE,INFORMAL LEADER EMERGENCE,AND INDIVIDUAL AND TEAM PERFORMANCE

This study examines the antecedents and outcomes of informal leader emergence in work teams. Drawing upon research in vertical and shared leadership, we hypothesized that the relationship between leader‐‐member exchange (LMX) quality and employees’ emergence as informal leaders is moderated by team shared vision such that there is a positive (negative) LMX—leader emergence relationship for teams with high (low) shared vision. Informal leader emergence, in turn, was expected to relate to higher individual and team performance. Results based on multisource and multimethod data collected at 3 points in time (361 followers in 74 work teams) provided support for these hypotheses. The findings highlight the role played by formal leaders and team shared vision in jointly promoting or inhibiting informal leader emergence and thereby impacting individual performance and team effectiveness.     

Getting What's New from Newcomers: Empowering Leadership,Creativity, and Adjustment in the Socialization Context

Researchers consistently argue that organizations need to generate creative ideas to ensure long‐term success and survival. One possible solution for increasing creativity is to inject “fresh blood” into the organization by hiring new employees. However, past work suggests there may be a number of impediments that stifle newcomer creativity and, further, that encouraging newcomer creativity may compromise other adjustment outcomes. Accordingly, the present research examines how empowering leaders, in conjunction with contextual and relational factors (i.e., organizational support for creativity and newcomers' trust in leaders), facilitate newcomer creativity. Study 1 indicates that empowering leadership positively predicts newcomer creativity and that this relationship is contingent on the organizational context. Study 2 reveals that a more specific and proximal contextual socialization factor–newcomers' trust in leaders–is a more potent moderator than organizational support for creativity. Further, these predictors operate through creative process engagement to influence creativity. Finally, results indicate positive links between empowering leadership and role clarity, attachment, and task performance, suggesting that empowering leadership may serve as an important, albeit overlooked, socialization tactic.     

高处不胜寒? 领导工作场所孤独感的多层次双刃剑效应

在组织中,由于存在权力和地位差异等因素,领导者往往难以获得充分的人际关系满足,孤独成为领导者这一群体的普遍体验。事实上,领导者的工作场所孤独感不仅会对领导者自身产生一系列影响,且还具有独特的社会功能,会给团队及其追随者带来后续影响。然而,目前组织管理领域有关孤独感的文献主要集中于探讨员工的工作场所孤独感,罕有研究考察领导工作场所孤独感究竟会造成何种影响。并且,现有研究普遍只关注孤独感的消极效应,缺乏对其潜在积极效应的挖掘。因此,本文将通过3个子研究,结合多层次、多理论、多研究方法的全景研究范式,全面考察领导工作场所孤独感的双刃剑效应及其机制。本研究不仅可以丰富和拓展工作场所孤独感的理论体系,也能为企业发挥领导工作场所孤独感的积极作用与抑制其负面效应提供管理启示。     

Meeting the need or falling in line? The effect of laissez-faire formal leaders on informal leadership

We consider the utility of two contrasting theoretical perspectives in explaining how laissez-faire formal leaders and team member motivation to lead (MTL) influences informal leadership and team task performance. The first perspective, functional leadership theory, is the dominant lens used currently to understand informal leadership. However, we suggest that social learning theory offers a compelling alternative account. In a multiwave survey study of 344 members of 72 work teams, we find support for the social learning theory predictions that laissez-faire formal leaders are perceived by team members to engage in less modeling of effective leadership and as a result are negatively associated with informal leadership and team task performance. We do not find support for the functional leadership theory predictions that laissez-faire formal leaders are positively associated with team members’ informal leadership and team task performance, which would be due to an increased perceived need for leadership. The social learning effects are stronger for teams that are lower in member MTL and weaker for teams that are higher in member MTL. These results suggest social learning theory may be preferable to functional leadership theory for understanding informal leadership in teams.     

Different roles of shared and vertical leadership in promoting team creativity: Cultivating and synthesizing team members’ individual creativity

Drawing on the componential model of creativity (Amabile), we examined how shared leadership and a formally appointed leader's transformational leadership jointly cultivate team creativity in two studies. We conducted an experiment with a sample of 109 undergraduate students (32 teams) enrolled in a business plan competition (Study 1) and a field survey based on multisource, time-lagged data collected from 251 full-time employees working on 64 research and development teams (Study 2). The results from both studies revealed that shared leadership enhanced team members’ individual creative self-efficacy and individual creativity, which in turn improved team creativity. Moreover, the results from Study 2 showed that a formally appointed leader's use of different transformational leadership behaviors had different impacts on individual and team creativity. Individual-focused transformational leadership strengthened the positive effect of shared leadership on team members’ average individual creativity, whereas group-focused transformational leadership facilitated the translation of teams with high average individual creativity into teams with high levels of team creativity. The theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed.     

授权型领导对员工反馈寻求行为的影响机制：领导差异化授权两阶段的调节作用

从员工直接感知的角度编制领导差异化授权问卷,并通过构建两阶段有调节的中介模型探讨了授权型领导对反馈寻求行为的影响机制与领导差异化授权在其中的调节作用。对388份问卷数据分析后发现：（1）授权型领导正向预测员工的领导认同与反馈寻求行为;（2）领导认同在授权型领导与反馈寻求行为中起中介作用;（3）领导差异化授权调节授权型领导通过领导认同对反馈寻求行为的中介作用,即调节了中介过程的第一段（授权型领导−领导认同）与第二段（领导认同−反馈寻求行为）。研究结果揭示了授权型领导影响反馈寻求行为的中介与调节效应,可为管理实践中促进反馈寻求行为提供科学参考。     

Empowering Leadership and Effective Collaboration in Geographically Dispersed Teams

Our research integrates theoretical perspectives related to distributed leadership in geographically dispersed teams with empowering leadership theory to build a multilevel model of virtual collaboration and performance in dispersed teams. We test the model with procurement teams in a major multinational corporation. Our results show a significant cross‐level effect of empowering team leadership, such that under conditions of high empowering team leadership, a team member's virtual teamwork situational judgment (VT‐SJ) is positively and significantly associated with his or her virtual collaboration behaviors and also indirectly with his or her individual performance in the team. At the team level, our findings also suggest that the impact of empowering leadership on team members’ aggregate virtual collaboration, and indirectly on team performance, increases at higher levels of team dispersion. These findings shed important light on the role of team leadership in fostering effective collaboration and performance of geographically dispersed virtual teams.     

领导授权行为的形成机制

领导授权行为通常被视为一种积极的领导行为类型。组织中管理者在授权实施过程中扮演着重要角色, 然而管理者出于维护威权等目的, 不想赋予员工自主权或相应资源的现象大量存在。鉴于此, 越来越多的学者开始探索领导授权行为的影响因素, 但目前研究较为零散, 亟待整合。研究发现：(1)更多的学者强调领导授权行为并非一种稳定的领导风格, 而是领导对不同下属所采取的差异化授权行为; (2)领导授权行为的影响因素可以分为环境因素、领导者因素以及员工因素; (3)领导成员交换理论、信任理论、社会认知理论与授权风险视角是解释领导授权行为形成的重要理论/视角。此外, 基于情境领导理论、CIP领导模型(魅力型-意识形态型-务实型)以及追随理论, 提出了领导授权行为影响因素的未来研究方向。     

Dimensions of Distributed Leadership and the Impact on Teachers' Organizational Commitment: A Study in Secondary Education

In this study, we first operationalized distributed leadership. Multilevel confirmatory factor analyses showed that distributed leadership can be defined from different dimensions: quality and distribution of support and supervision performed by the leadership team; cooperation within this team; and participative decision making. Second, the relation between dimensions of distributed leadership and teachers' organizational commitment was investigated. Multilevel analyses on data from 1,522 teachers in 46 secondary schools indicated that 9% of the variance in teachers' organizational commitment was attributable to differences between schools. Further, the analyses revealed that it is not the distribution of leadership functions among formal leaders that plays a key role in teachers' organizational commitment. The perceived cooperation within the leadership team and the quality of their support are crucial.     

自恋型领导对团队创造力形成过程的多视角研究

领导自恋是组织中的普遍现象, 自恋型领导是否能有效地整合团队知识形成创新是管理者不可回避的问题。在回顾已有研究基础上, 采用聚合观、过程观和社会网络三种视角, 全面地厘清自恋型领导对团队创造力的影响。其中, 聚合观强调个体创造力对形成团队创造力的重要作用, 过程观强调团队成员之间的交互作用在团队创造力形成过程中不可或缺, 而社会网络视角注重团队成员的相对位置和内外关系。三种视角相互补充, 明确了自恋型领导和团队创造力之间关系的内在机制以及边界条件。研究结论将为存在自恋型领导的团队干预策略提供参考, 有助于为管理者提高自恋型领导对团队作用的有效性提供借鉴。     

Empowering leadership,uncertainty avoidance,trust, and employee creativity: Interaction effects and a mediating mechanism

Taking an interactional approach, we hypothesized that (a) there is an interaction between empowering leadership, uncertainty avoidance, and trust that affects creativity, such that empowering leadership has the strongest positive relationship with creativity when the employees have high levels of uncertainty avoidance and trust their supervisors; and (b) creative self-efficacy mediates the effect that this three-way interaction between empowering leadership, uncertainty avoidance and trust has on creativity. In Study 1, we used a time-lagged research design, collecting multi-source data from 322 employees and their supervisors. The results of Study 1 supported our hypotheses. In Study 2, we used a more temporally rigorous research design in which data were collected in three stages, with a two-month time interval separating Stages 1 and 2, and Stages 2 and 3. On the basis of the time-lagged and multi-source data from 199 employees and their supervisors, Study 2 produced the same results as Study 1. We discuss the implications of these results for future research and practice.     

Centrality and charisma: comparing how leader networks and attributions affect team performance

When leaders interact in teams with their subordinates, they build social capital that can have positive effects on team performance. Does this social capital affect team performance because subordinates come to see the leader as charismatic? We answered this question by examining 2 models. First, we tested the charisma-to-centrality model according to which the leader's charisma facilitates the occupation of a central position in the informal advice network. From this central position, the leader positively influences team performance. Second, we examined the centrality-to-charisma model according to which charisma is attributed to those leaders who are socially active in terms of giving and receiving advice. Attributed charisma facilitates increased team performance. We tested these 2 models in 2 different studies. In the first study, based on time-separated, multisource data emanating from members of 56 work teams, we found support for the centrality-to-charisma model. Formal leaders who were central within team advice networks were seen as charismatic by subordinates, and this charisma was associated with high team performance. To clarify how leader network centrality affected the emergence of charismatic leadership, we designed Study 2 in which, for 79 student teams, we measured leader networking activity and leader charisma at 2 different points in time and related these variables to team performance measured at a third point in time. On the basis of this temporally separated data set, we again found support for the centrality-to-charisma model.     

差异化变革型领导对知识分享与团队创造力的影响:社会网络机制的解释

差异化变革型领导是团队领导领域的最新议题,现有的研究局限于探讨其社会心理方面的作用机制。本文从社会网络机制出发解释差异化变革型领导对团队知识分享及团队创造力的影响。基于65家企业的225个工作团队样本的结构方程模型分析表明,团队一致性变革型领导正向影响团队交流网络密度从而提高团队知识分享;个体差异性变革型领导正向影响团队成员交流网络密度差异性从而降低团队知识分享;团队知识分享正向影响团队创造力。本文的证据表明,在中国情境下,差异性团队领导行为不利于创造稠密的团队交流网络,以及团队知识分享,从而不利于提升团队创造力水平。     

Leader Network Centrality and Team Performance: Team Size as Moderator and Collaboration as Mediator

The social network perspective provides a valuable lens to understand the effectiveness of team leaders. In understanding leadership impact in team networks, an important question concerns the structural influence of leader centrality in advice-giving networks on team performance. Taking the inconsistent evidence for the positive relationship of network centrality and leadership effectiveness as a starting point, we suggest that the positive impact of leader centrality in advice-giving networks is contingent on team needs for leadership to meet communication and coordination challenges, which we argue are larger in larger teams. Developing our analysis, we examine the mediating role of member collaboration in the relationship of leader network centrality and team performance as moderated by team size. Based on a multi-source dataset of 542 employees and 71 team leaders, we found that leader centrality in advice-giving networks related positively to team performance in larger teams but negatively in smaller teams. Results supported the mediated moderation model via member collaboration in smaller teams, but not in larger teams.

     

Antecedents and Consequences of Creativity in Teams: When and How Leader Humility Promotes Performance via Team Creativity

The antecedents of team creativity and their effects on team task performance are explored in this study, with a particular focus on how leader humility promotes team creativity and when team creativity can be converted into performance. Hypotheses were tested via a multiple-source and time-lagged study with 341 employees and 104 teams from five different organizations in China. The results showed that leader humility promotes team creativity through team creative efficacy, and leader conscientiousness moderates this indirect effect. Furthermore, team creativity is more positively related to team task performance when teams are more future oriented. The theoretical contributions and management significance of these findings are discussed, followed by a discussion of limitations and directions for future research.     

Age differences between leader and followers as a moderator of the relationship between transformational leadership and team performance

In a field study of 49 R&D teams in the pharmaceutical industry, the age difference between the team leader and the team members was examined as a moderator of the relationship between transformational leadership and team supervisors' longitudinal ratings of team performance. Data collected from 285 team members and 21 team supervisors showed that this relationship was positive when the leader was older than the other team members, but non‐significant when the leader's age was closer to the mean age of the team members. This finding broadens the still fragmentary knowledge of the conditions under which transformational leadership is likely to have more or less positive effects on team performance.     

Positive Group Affective Tone and Team Creative Performance and Change‐Oriented Organizational Citizenship Behavior: A Moderated Mediation Model

Despite the vast amount of research on creativity and organizational citizenship behavior (OCB), little knowledge has been accumulated with respect to underlying mechanisms and boundary conditions affecting team creative performance and change OCB. To fill this research gap, this study aims at proposing and testing a moderated mediation model that delineates the relationships among positive group affective tone (PGAT), team reflexivity, team leader transformational leadership, team creative performance, and team change OCB. As hypothesized, PGAT was positively associated with team reflexivity, which in turn significantly predicted team creative performance and change OCB. In addition, the relationship between PGAT and team reflexivity and the indirect effects of PGAT on team creative performance and change OCB through team reflexivity were more pronounced when team leader transformational leadership was high than when it was low. These findings were validated in a post hoc analysis that compared the proposed moderated mediation model with alternative models.     

The impact of identity leadership on team functioning and well-being in team sport: Is psychological safety the missing link?

The purpose of this study was to investigate the role of psychological safety in explaining the impact of identity leadership on team performance and athlete well-being. Adopting a cross-sectional survey design, 289 handball players rated the identity leadership skills of their coach, their captain, and the informal leaders in the team, as well as various performance- and well-being-related measures. Structural equation modelling (controlling for the nested structure of our data) revealed that by demonstrating identity leadership, coaches, captains, and in particular informal athlete leaders, all had a unique contribution in strengthening their team members’ identification with their team. By this shared sense of ‘us’, athletes felt psychologically safe in their team to speak up, provide input, and take risks. In line with our hypotheses, this sense of psychological safety acted as a mediator between identity leadership and two subsequent pathways: (1) a team-oriented pathway in which psychological safety inspired good teamwork, which fostered team resilience and, in turn, enhanced athletes’ satisfaction with their team’s performance; and (2) an individual-oriented pathway wherein psychological safety buffered against athletes’ burnout, thereby enhancing their health. In addition to these pathways mediated by psychological safety, the informal leaders directly influenced the performance pathway (with total effect sizes being 10 times larger than those of coaches and team captains), whereas coaches had a direct influence on the health pathway (with total effect sizes being three times larger than those of informal leaders and captains). Given the often-underestimated importance of the informal leaders, sport teams can be recommended to adopt a structure of shared leadership in which team members are encouraged to engage in identity leadership. In conclusion, we found that by nurturing a shared sense of ‘we’ and ‘us’ within the team, leaders are able to foster a psychologically safe environment, which in turn paves the way for an optimal team functioning and a healthier team.