Influence of Transformational Leadership on Employees’ Innovative Work Behavior in Sustainable Organizations: Test of Mediation and Moderation Processes

Abstract

The main objective of this research was to examine how transformational leaders boost their followers’ innovative work behavior through trust in a leader, empowerment, and work engagement. Data were collected from 281 multinational organization employees in China. The Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) macro process was utilized to test the proposed hypothesis. The findings revealed that transformational leadership and work engagement were significantly related to innovative work behavior. The findings also demonstrated the significant impact of transformational leadership on trust in a leader, and its subsequent positive impact on the work engagement of the employees. Furthermore, the results supported a significant serial mediation between transformational leadership, trust, work engagement, and employees’ innovative behavior. The results also showed a significant moderating effect of empowerment on transformational leadership and innovative work behavior. For boosting employees’ innovative work behavior, leaders in the organization should strive to engage them effectively in their work by gaining their trust, which could help them participate in creative activities. This is the key study to investigate the different perspectives of how transformational leadership can stimulate followers’ innovative behavior through trust in the leader and work engagement within the Chinese organizational context.

Transformational Leadership and Job Performance: The Mediating Role of Work Engagement

“…Therefore, transformational leaders can enhance followers' performance and foster their helping behaviors, because they induce members' work engagement and enable them to exceed expectations. Our findings support these statements and are consistent with earlier research on transformational leadership (e.g., Breevaart et al, 2016;H. Li et al, 2019;Salanova et al, 2011;Song et al, 2012) that examine work engagement as the process underlying the effect of transformational leadership on members' behaviors.…”

“…Thus, work engagement could be a possible mediator that transmits the influence of transformational leadership on members' task performance and helping behavior. Second, unlike prior research (e.g., Breevaart et al, 2016;H. Li et al, 2019), this study attempts to clarify the mediation effect of work engagement and rule out alternate mediating mechanisms.…”

“…Moreover, our data came from two sources, which may reduce concerns regarding CMV (Podsakoff et al, 2012). The second strength of this study was that unlike prior research (Breevaart et al, 2016;H. Li et al, 2019), we ruled out the possible influences of LMX, role-based self-efficacy, and transactional leadership.…”

Impact of Knowledge Oriented Leadership on Knowledge Management Processes in the Middle Eastern Audit and Consulting Companies

“…Transformational leaders influence other individuals through promoting mutual trust, which is an important factor in the relation between the leaders and their subordinates. Transformational leaders encourage employees to be more creative, innovate and to make independent decisions leading to accomplish the organizational desired performance (Le & Lei, 2018;Park & Kim, 2018;Breevaart & Zacher, 2019;Li et al, 2019;Jada, Mukhopadhyay, & Titiyal, 2019). Transformational leaders communicate clearly the organizational vision and goals, and encourage employees to improve their skills seeking new opportunities for the development of the organization and accomplishment of its vision (Le & Lei, 2018;Guhr, Lebek, & Breitner, 2018).…”

The influence of information technology (IT) on organization leadership and performance

“…Organizations of all kinds are relying more on data and information processing systems than ever before. Investments in the tools of information technology (IT) infrastructures have been assumed to provide enhanced decision-making capabilities, increased efficiency, and improved productivity, and finally the leadership role in the organizations from the concerned industries [1]. A prime example for modern organizations, though not the only example, is that of 'big data' and 'analytics' These relatively new technologies have high expectations to enhance organizational outcomes for the leadership and, consequently, are invested in heavily.…”