Transformational leadership and corporate entrepreneurship

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine how transformational leadership may relate to corporate entrepreneurship by adopting a multilevel approach. The authors also theorized and tested the top-down and bottom-up intermediate process linking transformational leadership and corporate entrepreneurship. Design/methodology/approach Multisource data across different timeframes were collected from 129 managers and 244 employees from 55 units of 27 firms. Findings The results showed that transformational leadership and corporate entrepreneurship were positively related at the unit level. Furthermore, unit-level collective efficacy mediated the relationship between unit-level transformational leadership and unit-level corporate entrepreneurship. The authors also found that the firm-level empowerment climate moderated the indirect effect of unit-level collective efficacy on the relationship between unit transformational leadership and unit-level corporate entrepreneurship. Originality/value First, the goal of this study is to extend the single focus of transformational leadership on corporate entrepreneurship (e.g. Ling et al., 2008) and develop a more thoughtful approach on determining how transformational leaders influence corporate entrepreneurship across levels. This study responds to calls for research to look at the impact of unit-level transformational leaders, such as middle managers, across levels (Ren and Guo, 2011) and creates a multilevel framework in which transformational leaders at the unit level influence the appearance of corporate entrepreneurship at the unit level.

The mediation between participative leadership and employee exploratory innovation

“…Knowledge on the relationship between participative leadership and employee innovation outcomes remains in its infancy. The majority of extant leadership studies focus on other forms of leadership and their impact on macro-level outcomes rather than micro-level outcomes, such as the role of transformational leadership for unit innovation, corporate entrepreneurship (Chang et al, 2017) or performance (Chang et al, 2018). Those studies that have sought to address this weakness have established that participative leadership is related to manager exploratory innovation (e.g., Jansen Mom et al, 2009;Mom et al, 2015;Li, Lin et al, 2015 Mors, 2014), but its relationship with employee exploratory innovation is not clear.…”

Linking Transformational Leadership, Absorptive Capacity, and Corporate Entrepreneurship

“…This positive nexus exists in collectivist Pakistan, strengthening the contentions by Bass (1985) that transformational leadership is more expected to appear in collectivist settings than in the individualistic contexts of the West, and that collectivists execute well under transformational leadership. Substantial studies stated a stronger positive influence of transformational leadership on individuals' and organizational outcomes of collectivists than individualists (Avolio et al 2004;Gumusluoglu and Arzu 2009;Chang et al 2017).…”

“…Given the factors of corporate entrepreneurship, ample literature is available on the antecedents that foster it, like leaders (Zahra 1996). Transformational leadership has been recognized by several scholars as one of the significant antecedents for promoting employees' corporate entrepreneurship (Ceptureanu et al 2017;Chang et al 2017). Because it involves being passionate about innovation and converting firms' turbulent business environment into business opportunity (Avolio et al 2004;Howell and Higgins 1990), transformational leadership is thought to encourage their employees to frequently adapt and expect environmental transformation through entrepreneurial activities (Su and Baird 2017;Waldman et al 2004).…”

Firm-level participative leadership and individual-level employee ambidexterity

“…To expand the generalization of the research, future researchers should further combine the self-identification theory and social identification theory to compare different leadership styles (e.g. direct leadership/ abusive leadership vs participative leadership/ transformational leadership; Chang et al, 2017Chang et al, , 2018Li et al, 2015) to see if they will strengthen or weaken the positive effect of on employee ambidexterity through personal identification and social identification.…”