The Mediating Role of Affective Commitment between Creative Self-Efficacy, Authentic Leadership and Innovative Behaviour among Academic Employees of Higher Education Sector of Punjab, Pakistan

Abstract

The higher education sector in developing counties has undergone through dynamic changes in recent era due to highly innovative and competitive environment. The phenomenon of innovation behaviour has gained intensive importance due to its long-lasting impact on performance of industry. The growth of knowledge-based economy is linked with innovative initiatives of employees of higher education sector. The proposed research contributes to the body of knowledge by explaining the relationship between exogenous constructs and innovative behaviour based on the theories of social exchange and social cognition as both theories explains the innovative behaviour of employees. The proposed research intends to bridge the research gap and inconclusive results between constructs to explain the innovative behaviour of academic employees of higher education sector. Moreover, the mediation role of affective commitment is incorporated for deeper insight of innovative behaviour. The data was obtained from academic employees of the public sector universities of Punjab, Pakistan through simple random sampling and was analysed on Smart-PLS. The authentic leadership considered as one of the crucially important factors at workplace that influence the affective commitment and innovative behaviour. The study reported significant results for hypothesis H1 that affective commitment influences the innovative behaviour, the hypothesis H2 reported that creative self-efficacy influences the innovative behaviour, they hypothesis H3 reports that authentic leadership influence the innovative behaviour. The hypothesis H4 depicts that creative self-efficacy influences the affective commitment, the hypothesis H5 found that authentic leadership influences the affective commitment. Similarly, the mediation role of affective commitment reported as significant between authentic leadership and innovative behaviour, however no mediation role of affective commitment was reported between creative self-efficacy and innovative behaviour. The findings of the study assist universities management to ensure the appropriate and supportive workplace initiatives for inclined innovative behaviours among employees. The future study may be conducted on comparison of highly innovative universities and less innovative educational institutes.

Investigating the nexus between authentic leadership, employees’ green creativity, and psychological environment: evidence from emerging economy

“…The study further stated that authentic leadership acts as a role model to inspire employees. The direct effect of authentic leadership on self-efficacy and employees’ creativity is also confirmed by the previous research studies of Lee et al ( 2019 ), Lei et al ( 2021 ), Niswaty et al ( 2021 ), and Javed et al ( 2021 ).…”

Organizational Commitment: Boosting Innovation Through Knowledge Sharing

“…Innovative behavior is the ability of employees to discover innovative solutions to problems through new thinking processes while making additional efforts to enhance long-term performance, create advantages, and effectiveness (Javed et al, 2021). Creative and innovative behavior is necessary to generate fresh and applicable ideas that can enhance organizational efficiency (Shafaei & Nejati, 2023).…”

Mediating Role of Intrapreneurship Competency and Affective Commitment in the Influence of Training and Development on Employees’ Innovative Behavior

“…Employees have a good relationship with the organization and are proud to be part of the organization. Employees want the organization to be successful (Jafri, 2010;Javed et al, 2021).…”

“…Affective commitment is a derivative of the concept of organizational commitment which refers to the psychological state of employees who have a close relationship with the organization, which affects the motive to stay or abandon organizational affiliation (Javed et al, 2021). Emotional attachment and loyalty become a reference for an employee's commitment.…”

“…The innovation process is defined as a knowledge-based creative process which is the content of organized activities, carried out by individuals and creative teams (Panasiewicz, 2021). Innovative behavior is the ability of employees to find innovative solutions in solving a problem through new thinking processes while utilizing additional attempts to improve performance, create superiority, and long-term effectiveness (Javed et al, 2021). The innovative behavior of each member of the organization determines the achievement of organizational innovation.…”