The leadership literature has provided growing evidence regarding the power of leadership in facilitating follower creativity. Despite these advances, a noticeable omission in this body of research is humble leadership. The study extends previous research by developing a cross-level moderated mediation model and examining the roles that psychological safety and knowledge sharing may play in the relationship between humble leadership and follower creativity. Using a time-lagged data of 328 team members nested within 106 teams, the results show that: (a) psychological safety mediates the relationship between humble leadership and follower creativity; (b) knowledge sharing moderates the relationship between psychological safety and follower creativity; and (c) the indirect influence of humble leadership on follower creativity through psychological safety is stronger when knowledge sharing is high.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to develop a moderated mediation model to examine the roles that psychological capital (PsyCap) and growth need strength may play in the relationship between humble leader behaviors and follower creativity. Design/methodology/approach Data were collected from a three-wave survey study with a sample of 165 matched leader-follower questionnaires in China. Multiple regression analyses, moderated regression analysis and bootstrapping analysis were used to test the hypotheses. Findings The results show that humble leader behaviors positively influence follower creativity, PsyCap mediates this influence and growth need strength not only moderates the relationship between humble leader behaviors and PsyCap, but also amplifies the indirect relationship between humble leader behaviors and follower creativity via PsyCap. Research limitations/implications Common method bias may still exit, although the measures of research variables were gathered from different sources and with time separation. Additionally, this study is conducted in a single cultural context, which may raise the question about the generalizability of our findings to other cultural contexts. Originality/value The primary contribution is building and examining a conceptual model that focuses on the potential effect of humble leader behaviors on follower creativity. Additionally, by confirming the mediating role of PsyCap, the research further uncovers why followers under humble leader behaviors are more likely to engage in creativity, and the moderating role of growth need strength found in this study also offers additional insight into that followers may differ in the degree to which they are receptive to leader effect.

The study reported in this paper analyzed the influence of leader psychological capital (PsyCap) on employees’ innovative behavior and the roles of psychological safety and growth need strength (GNS) in this process within the context of positive psychology theory and conservation of resources theory. Three stages of questionnaire surveys were administered to 81 enterprise leaders and their 342 direct subordinates in South China to test our theoretical model. The results showed that leader PsyCap had significant and positive effects on employee innovative behavior, psychological safety had a partially mediating effect, and GNS positively moderated the relationship between psychological safety and innovative behavior. The results revealed the mechanism of PsyCap and external boundary conditions of the influence of leader PsyCap on employee innovative behavior. The study expands the research results of leader PsyCap theory and also provides guidance on how enterprises manage employees’ innovative behavior.

We proposed a model with which we jointly tested psychological capital (PsyCap) as the key psychological mechanism through which transformational leadership (TL) affects employee voice behavior (VB), and examined the moderating effect of employees' organizational identification (OI) on the PsyCap–VB relationship. Data were collected from employees in companies located in southern China and a small group of Master of Business Administration students who were also in paid employment (N = 237). Results showed that PsyCap fully mediated the TL–VB relationship, and that the effect of PsyCap on VB would be stronger when OI was high than when it was low. Both theoretical and practical implications of the study are discussed, as well as limitations and future directions for research.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore the influencing mechanism of coaching leadership (CL) on employee voice behavior (VB) based on cognitive-affective system theory of personality (CAPS). Specifically, the study intends to build a model of psychological security (PS) and openness to change (OC) that mediate the relationship between CL and employee VB at an individual-level and group-level from cognitive-affective dual perspective. Design/methodology/approach CL, employee VB, PS and OC were assessed in an empirical study based on a supervisor–subordinate dyads sample of 287 employees and 72 team leaders from enterprises in Southern China. Findings From CAPS theory perspective, the authors found that CL promotes employee VB and that PS and OC mediate the relationship between CL and VB. Practical implications Results underscore the importance of encouraging managers to engage in CL behaviors, which are conductive to enhancing employee PS and OC thereby improving employee VB. These results also highlight the significance of managerial attention to a secure voice atmosphere and the improvement of employees’ affective commitment to organizational change. Originality/value The research findings provide a significant contribution to the literature in that it shows PS and OC as crucial dual mediating mechanism through which CL influences VB. Moreover, this paper is one of the few studies answering the call to examine the effect of leadership at multiple levels.