Does Entrepreneurial Leadership Foster Creativity Among Employees and Teams? The Mediating Role of Creative Efficacy Beliefs

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to gain a better understanding of how entrepreneurial leadership relates to workplace creativity in organizations from the compatibility perspective. Drawing on social cognitive theory, we propose that individual creative selfefficacy and team creative efficacy beliefs mediate the relationships between entrepreneurial leadership and individual and team creativity. This study examines the relationship between entrepreneurial leadership and creativity through creative efficacy. Survey data were collected from multiple sources, including 43 leaders and 237 employees in eight Chinese companies. Cross-level relationships are tested by means of a hierarchical linear modeling analysis (HLM). The results reveal that entrepreneurial leadership is positively related to employee and team creativity, and these relationships are found to be mediated by both employee creative self-efficacy and team creative efficacy. Furthermore, team creative efficacy is found to exert a cross-level mediating influence on the entrepreneurial leadership-employee creativity relationship. This study suggests that employees and teams led by entrepreneurial leaders are likely to produce creative outcomes. The findings further confirm the important role of creative efficacy beliefs in explaining how entrepreneurial leadership relates to employee and team creativity, as such beliefs serve as a within-level and cross-level mediating mechanism in these relationships. Our study is among the first to empirically investigate the concept of entrepreneurial leadership in a broader organizational context. We examine how entrepreneurial leadership contributes to workplace creativity. Our study shows that creative efficacy beliefs exert both within-level and crosslevel mediating influences in the entrepreneurial leadership-creativity relation.

<p>Impact of Entrepreneurial Leadership on Innovative Work Behavior: Examining Mediation and Moderation Mechanisms</p>

“…[79][80][81] The literature on EL has acknowledged that the entrepreneurial leaders not only create new ideas themselves but also facilitate and encourage their employees to show their potentials in solving complex issues and performing challenging task through innovative means. 45,55,57,82 With their distinct characteristics, the leaders also develop employees' commitment and persistence to encourage their coworkers to generate new ideas and gain their support to realize them. [83][84][85][86] At an organizational level, directing the innovation process is a challenging task for business leaders as they have to facilitate perpetual new idea generation and exploitation.…”

“…77 Literature proclaimed that EL is a strong influential factor to stimulate and improve employees' innovative work behavior in a competitive business environment. 55,82 In a challenging business environment, an entrepreneurial leader can effectively direct the innovation process by facilitating their members in generating and realizing new ideas. 87 Characteristics of the entrepreneurial leader also effectively improve the impact of other leadership styles on the innovation process of their businesses.…”

“…52 Studies by Renko, El Tarabishy, et al 25 and Gupta et al 41 offered a comprehensive EL construct, arguing that this leadership influences and directs the synergetic performance of group members toward accomplishing those organizational goals that relate to recognizing and exploiting contingencies, which ultimately influence the success of EL. Drawing from the notion of "cast enactment" in EL theory proposed by Gupta et al 41 large numbers of the studies [53][54][55][56][57] have suggested EL as the most influential factor for innovative behavior, and highlighted its importance in stimulating and fostering innovation in highly dynamic and competitive business environments. So, it is critical to understand the mechanisms through which EL influences employees' innovative work behavior, and stimulates innovation performance of the organization.…”

Entrepreneurial Leadership: A Review of Measures, Antecedents, Outcomes and Moderators

“…(Ireland et al, 2003) Wealth Creation (Ireland et al, 2003), (Mccarthy et al, 2010) Innovation performance (Z. Yang et al, 2015), (Rutherford et al, 2003), (Chen, 2007) New Venture or Startup Performance (Zaech & Baldegger, 2017), (Ensley, Pearce, & Hmieleski, 2006) Employee Voice (Dedahanov et al, 2016) Creativity (Wu et al, 2008), (Sklaveniti, 2017), (Chen, 2007), (Cai et al, 2018), (Dedahanov et al, 2016)…”

An Investigation on Creativity Performance in the Context of Leadership Styles and Individual Entrepreneurship

“…Autonomy and freedom, challenge, openness, diversity/tension, support for creative ideas, trust, participative safety (Torres-Coronas, 2008), flexibility, fluency and originality (De Dreu, Baas, & Nijstad, 2012) must be provided for the development of creative performance in organizations. As the critical role of creativity in the workplace, organizational survival and competence has been recognized, researchers have investigated the impact of leadership on the creative performance of organizations (Cai, Lysova, Khapova, & Bossink, 2019). Creativity is also the keystone of successful entrepreneurship and sustainable competitiveness.…”