The interaction effects of proactive personality and empowering leadership and close monitoring behaviour on creativity

Abstract

In today's hurried information-oriented business environment, it is crucial to examine under what conditions individuals may perform for creativity. Taking an interactional perspective, this study investigates how the interactions of proactive personality and empowering leadership or close monitoring behaviour may influence employee creativity in opposite directions. Data from 163 samples indicate that proactive personality promotes creativity, while close monitoring behaviour lowers creativity.Furthermore, the study shows that proactive employees are likely to engage in creativity when their leaders demonstrate high levels of empowering leadership.Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

How to face the unexpected: Identification and leadership in managing bricolage

“…Third, this study contributes to the integration of social identity theory and leadership literature , by illustrating that empowering and fair leaders are more effective in influencing bricolage when individuals are highly identified. While empowering leadership and interactional justice provide the resources (Shaw, Wild, & Colquitt, 2003;Zhang & Bartol, 2010) As analyzed in the theoretical background, extant research has focused on understanding how leadership affects creativity and innovation, highlighting in particular the positive role of the empowering, transformational aspects of leadership (Byrne et al, 2009;Chong & Ma, 2010;Kim, 2019), as well as starting to focus on a more ethical dimension of the supervisor-coworker relationship to favor innovation (Pasricha & Rao, 2018). The present study builds on this research to illustrate how autonomy, trust, cooperation, and fairness should be combined in order to understand bricolage.…”

“…As analyzed in the theoretical background, extant research has focused on understanding how leadership affects creativity and innovation, highlighting in particular the positive role of the empowering, transformational aspects of leadership (Byrne et al, 2009; Chong & Ma, 2010; Kim, 2019), as well as starting to focus on a more ethical dimension of the supervisor–coworker relationship to favor innovation (Pasricha & Rao, 2018). The present study builds on this research to illustrate how autonomy, trust, cooperation, and fairness should be combined in order to understand bricolage.…”

“…Another study of 335 employees from four Australian hospitals found that transformational leadership is positively associated with innovative work behavior (Reuvers et al, 2008). Finally, a study of 163 individuals from a variety of firms located in South Korea concluded that close monitoring of employees' behavior lowers creativity, while high levels of empowering leadership are positively associated with employees' engagement in creativity (Kim, 2019).…”

The users' perspective on how creativity techniques help in the idea generation process—A repertory grid study

“…Existing research investigates inhibitors of creativity and describes the importance of perceived barriers in addition to real barriers because perceptions influence behaviour (Groth & Peters, 1999). Other studies focus on different approaches to enhance creative abilities and outcomes, such as extrinsic incentives (e.g., Burroughs et al, 2011; Kachelmeier et al, 2019), gamification elements (e.g., Agogué et al, 2015; Zimmerling et al, 2019), leadership behaviour (e.g., Hughes et al, 2018; Kim, 2019), or creativity training (e.g., Burroughs et al, 2011; Valgeirsdottir & Onarheim, 2017). Furthermore, a substantial body of literature focuses on creativity techniques that are defined as specific sessions to facilitate the creative process by providing strategies and heuristics to develop new ideas (e.g., Herrmann & Felfe, 2014; Meinel & Voigt, 2017).…”

To what extent are digital influencers creative?

“…The creative process may be subdivided into several subprocesses: identification of F I G U R E 1 Digital influencer characteristics the problem; information search, in which the employee gathers and processes information to develop an understanding of the identified problem; and the generation of ideas. Proactivity and support from a supervisor are equally critical to the success of the creative process (Caniëls, 2019;Kim, 2019).…”