Given that few studies have examined relational bases for voluntary employee turnover, the purpose of the article is to examine whether work relationships explain employee turnover intention. Adopting a social relational perspective on employee turnover, we investigated the effect of receiving interpersonal citizenship behavior (ICB) from coworkers on the recipient’s turnover intention. We hypothesized that the association between receiving ICB from coworkers and turnover intention would be mediated by job satisfaction and moderated by employees’ communion-striving motivation and task interdependence. We tested our hypotheses regarding moderated mediation in a sample of 149 hospital nurses. The results show that there is an indirect (through job satisfaction) and negative effect of receiving ICB on turnover intention provided communion-striving motivation and task interdependence were high, but not when these were low. This study has implications for research and offers managers insights into task situations and employee characteristics that influence the importance of receiving ICB from coworkers.

Relationships with leaders do not happen in isolation from the relationships one has with one’s peers. Therefore, we examine the influence of leader‒member exchange on follower job performance in light of the larger social networks in which followers are embedded. Testing multilevel models with data that were gathered using questionnaires from a sample of 240 nurses and 20 supervisors working at four Dutch hospitals revealed that a positive relationship exists between leader‒member exchange and follower job performance when follower workflow network centrality and/or follower friendship network centrality are high but not when they are both low. The results of this study show how the different follower relationships with the supervisor and colleagues intertwine in explaining follower job performance and suggest that the larger network in which followers are embedded within their work teams is important for explaining variations in the results regarding the relationship between leader‒member exchange and follower job performance. Our study indicates that leaders should have an eye for the network position of their followers when developing high quality leader‒member exchange relationships. For followers, a good relationship with their leader is important, but its value depends on their relationships with colleagues.

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Advantageous structural positions in a social network provide opportunities for employees. In this study, we examined whether the interaction between the personality traits neuroticism and extraversion affects the extent to which employees benefit from network centrality. Data from a sample of 299 nurses from four Dutch hospitals revealed that affect-based network centrality was associated with higher job satisfaction and that in-degree advice network centrality was associated with higher ratings by supervisors with respect to job performance, but only for extraverts low in neuroticism and introverts high in neuroticism. The results show that the existence and magnitude of the positive relationship between affect-based network centrality and job satisfaction, and the positive relationship between advice network centrality and supervisor ratings of job performance, may crucially depend on the specific interactional combination of personality traits. These findings provide an explanation for the variation in results regarding the network centrality-job satisfaction link and extend empirical evidence for the network centrality-job performance link. The current findings offer team managers insight into how a combination of personality traits influences the effect of network centrality on individual work outcomes. Implications for social networks and selection of employees are discussed. Practitioner pointsThe positive relationship between affect-based network centrality and job satisfaction and the positive relationship between advice network centrality and job performance depend on the specific interactional combination of neuroticism and extraversion. Employees benefit most from network centrality when they are high on extraversion and low on neuroticism, or when they are low on extraversion and high on neuroticism. For jobs that require much social interaction, extraverts low in neuroticism are preferred.

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