Authoritarian-Benevolent Leadership, Moral Disengagement, and Follower Unethical Pro-organizational Behavior: An Investigation of the Effects of Ambidextrous Leadership

Why does a leader's other-oriented perfectionism lead employees to do bad things? Examining the role of moral disengagement and moral identity

Introduction

Moral disengagement is an essential concept in organizational behavioral ethics, as it is strongly related to employee behaviors and attitudes. What is not clear, however, is which leader traits are directly associated with employees' moral disengagement and which are indirectly associated with unethical behavior. This study draws on a social cognitive perspective that links leaders' other-oriented perfectionism (LOOP) with unethical employee behavior. Specifically, we propose that LOOP provides employees with excuses and encouragement to engage in unethical pro-organizational behavior (UPB).

Methods

We analyzed data collected from 266 full-time employees at two-time points, and used mediated and moderated structural equation models to test the hypotheses, and the findings largely support our claims.

Results

The results suggest that LOOP effectively promotes employees' involvement in UPB. Moderated mediation tests suggest that the positive indirect impact of LOOP on employees' unethical behavior via moral disengagement was attenuated by higher employees' moral identity.

Discussion

In summary, the results indicate that when leaders emphasize only perfection and make unrealistic demands on their employees, the latter perceive that engaging in unethical behavior is demanded by the leader, that the responsibility is not theirs, and thus they are more willing to engage in unethical behavior. This study discusses the implications of these findings from both practical and theoretical perspectives.

Does paradoxical leadership influence employees' proactive work behavior? A study based on employees in Chinese state-owned enterprises

Paradoxical leadership has emerged as an increasingly important research topic in the context of Chinese state-owned enterprises, which are currently facing contradictions between maintaining stability and implementing changes, short-term profits and long-term sustainable development, and public nature and marketization. Based on social cognitive theory and social exchange theory, this study employed a questionnaire survey to explore the influence of paradoxical leadership on employees' proactive work behavior and the mediating role of superior-subordinate guanxi and self-efficacy. The study involved 540 employees working in Chinese state-owned enterprises. We conducted confirmatory factor analyses to test the validity of the measurement model and regression to evaluate the direct effects. Subsequently, we used bootstrapping to confirm mediation and serial mediation effects. The study found that (1) Paradoxical leadership can effectively enhance employees' proactive work behavior; (2) The superior-subordinate guanxi plays a mediating role between paradoxical leadership and employees' proactive work behavior, that is, paradoxical leadership enhances employees' proactive work behavior by improving the superior-subordinate guanxi; (3) Self-efficacy plays a mediating role between paradoxical leadership and employees' proactive work behaviors, that is, paradoxical leadership promotes employees' proactive work behavior by enhancing their self-efficacy; (4) The superior-subordinate guanxi and self-efficacy play a chain mediating effect between paradoxical leadership and employees' proactive work behavior, forming a chain of "Paradoxical leadership-Superior-subordinate Guanxi-Self-efficacy-Employees' proactive work behaviors." This study enriches the theoretical research on paradoxical leadership and provides suggestions for state-owned enterprises to enhance employees' proactive work behavior.

The effect of benevolent leadership on safety behavior: A moderated mediation model

INTRODUCTION

While high quality leadership is of great importance for enhancing safety behavior in the workplace, there has been a lack of research on how benevolent leadership influences such behavior. Subordinates' moqi (i.e., their unspoken understanding of the work expectations, intentions, and requirements of their superiors) and safety climate were introduced to examine this relationship.

METHOD

Based on implicit followership theory, this study explores the relationship between benevolent (well meaning, kindly) leadership and employees' safety behavior, as well as the mediating role of subordinates' moqi and the moderating role of safety climate. 608 employees of a petroleum company in China were randomly selected as participants, and the data were collected in two stages.

RESULTS

The results showed that: (1) Benevolent leadership is positively correlated with employees' safety behavior. (2) Subordinates' moqi mediates between benevolent leadership and employees' safety behavior. (3) Safety climate moderates the mediating role of subordinates' moqi between benevolent leadership and employees' safety behavior. (4) The positive effect of subordinates' moqi on employees' safety behavior is enhanced under a positive safety climate.

CONCLUSIONS

Benevolent leadership is an effective leadership style that enhances employees' safety behaviors by promoting a moqi state between supervisors and subordinates. The invisible environmental climate, in particular, the safety climate, should be a key focus in the promotion of safety behaviors.

PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS

This study further broadens the research perspective of employee safety behavior from the perspective of implicit followership theory. It also provides practical guidance for improving employee safety behavior, namely selecting and cultivating benevolent leaders, enhancing subordinates' moqi, and actively fostering a positive organizational safety climate.

Ambidextrous leadership and sustainability performance: serial mediation effects of employees' green creativity and green product innovation

Purpose

The purpose of this study is to explore the relationship between ambidextrous leadership and sustainability performance. In addition, this study also discusses how ambidextrous leadership affects sustainability performance through employees' green creativity and green product innovation.

Design/methodology/approach

This study obtained research data from a questionnaire survey of 307 manufacturing enterprise leaders in China and used regression and bootstrap analysis to test the research hypotheses.

Findings

(1) Ambidextrous leadership positively influences sustainability performance. (2) Employees' green creativity mediates the relationship between ambidextrous leadership and sustainability performance. (3) Green product innovation also mediates the relationship between ambidextrous leadership and sustainability performance. (4) The intermediary chain constructed by employees' green creativity and green product innovation has serial mediation effects on the relationship between ambidextrous leadership and sustainability performance.

Originality/value

This study contributes to the literature on leadership and corporate sustainability by clarifying the relationship between ambidextrous leadership and sustainability performance. Meanwhile, this study reveals the influence mechanism of ambidextrous leadership on sustainability performance by analyzing the serial mediation effects of employees' green creativity and green product innovation.

A Study on the Influence of Authoritarian-Benevolent Leadership on Employees' Innovative Behavior From the Perspective of Psychological Perception-Based on Fuzzy Set Qualitative Comparative Analysis

Employee innovation is the key to enhancing the core competitiveness of an enterprise, and leadership style plays an important role in stimulating employees' innovative behavior. This study explores the impact of unique ambidextrous leadership in the Chinese context, authoritarian-benevolent leadership, on employees' innovative behavior from the perspective of employees' psychological perception, based on research data from 430 employees of companies with direct leaders. Based on the configuration theory, using the fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis method, the configuration analysis was carried out by taking authoritarian-benevolent ambidextrous leadership and employees' psychological perception as the influencing factors and obtained five configurations of high-level employees' innovative behavior. The results show that the combination of individualized care, understanding, and forgiving of benevolent leadership and Shang-yan of authoritarian leadership can effectively stimulate employees' innovative behavior. Juan-Chiuan leadership is not conducive to employees' innovative behavior. Employees' high psychological safety and low uncertainty are important conditions for promoting employee innovation. In this study, the four dimensions of authoritarian-benevolent leadership and the psychological perceptions of employees are discussed in combination, and the paths of motivating employees to innovate actively are obtained. It is hoped that it can provide certain ideas for leaders to promote employee innovation.

Examining the Inverted U-Shaped Relationship Between Benevolent Leadership and Employees' Work Initiative: The Role of Work Engagement and Growth Need Strength

Benevolent leadership is generally considered to be beneficial for work initiative. However, based on social exchange theory, this paper explores an inverted U-shaped relationship between benevolent leadership and work initiative. Using a multilevel structural equation model that analyzed the data from 596 employees and 139 supervisors in multiple technology companies, our findings show that benevolent leadership had an indirect, negative curvilinear relationship with work initiative via work engagement at both the individual and team levels. Furthermore, we also indicate that growth need strength moderates the positive relationship between benevolent leadership and work engagement at the individual level. Theoretical and practical implications and future research directions are discussed.

How Authoritarian Leadership Affects Employee's Helping Behavior? The Mediating Role of Rumination and Moderating Role of Psychological Ownership

Interpersonal helping behaviors, i.e., voluntarily assisting colleagues for their workplace related problems, have received immense amount of scholarly attention due to their significant impacts on organizational effectiveness. Among several other factors, authoritarian leadership style could influence helping behavior within organizations. Furthermore, this relationship could be mediated by workplace stressor such as rumination, known as a critical psychological health component leading to depressive symptoms, hopelessness and pessimism. In the meantime, less research attention has devoted to probe the crucial role of psychological ownership, which can buffer the adverse effects of authoritarian leadership upon rumination. Building on conservation of resources theory, this study investigates the adverse impacts of authoritarian leadership on employees' helping behaviors through mediating role of rumination, and also examines the moderating effect of psychological ownership between the relationship of authoritarian leadership and rumination. The data were collected from 264 employees in education and banking sectors and the results show: (i) authoritarian leadership has adverse impacts on helping behavior, (ii) rumination mediates the relationship between authoritarian leadership and employees' helping behaviors, and (iii) psychological ownership moderates the positive relationship between authoritarian leadership and rumination. This study concludes that authoritarian leadership has adverse impacts upon helping behavior, which needs to be controlled/minimized. The findings are of great significance for managers, employees, and organizations in terms of policy implications. The limitations and future research directions are also discussed.

Paternalistic Leadership and Safety Participation of High-Speed Railway Drivers in China: The Mediating Role of Leader-Member Exchange

This research aimed to examine the effects of paternalistic leadership on the safety participation of high-speed railway drivers. Survey data were collected from 601 drivers in major Chinese rail companies. Structural equation modeling was conducted to analyze the influence of paternalistic leadership on safety participation via leader–member exchange (LMX). The results indicated that moral leadership directly promotes safety participation. Besides, benevolent leadership was positively associated with safety participation. Also, LMX partially mediates the positive relationship between benevolent leadership, moral leadership, and safety participation. Therefore, paternalistic leadership promotes the safety participation of high-speed railway drivers.

Leadership, religiousness, state ownership of an enterprise and unethical pro-organizational behavior: The mediating role of organizational identification

This study proposes a model in which organizational identification mediates the correlations among state-owned enterprises (SOEs), authentic leadership, Christian religiousness, and unethical pro-organizational behavior (UPB). The proposed theoretical framework is based on moral identity theory, social identity theory, and social exchange theory. We tested the hypothesized model using data (N  =  389) from employees of various companies and industries in Poland. Of the respondents, 49.1% worked in SOEs. The reliability and validity of the measures were established. The correlation coefficients among the analyzed variables were obtained using the bootstrap confidence interval method. To thoroughly examine the causal relationships among the variables, covariance-based structural equation modeling (CB-SEM) was adopted. Path analysis was conducted and used to verify a model in which organizational identification mediated the correlations among state involvement in the ownership of an enterprise, authentic leadership, Christian religiousness, and UPB. State involvement in the ownership of an enterprise, authentic leadership, and Christian religiousness were linked to increased organizational identification, which in turn was linked to the intensification of UPB. With the level of organizational identification controlled, state ownership of an enterprise was linked to lower UPB intensity. Limitations, implications and future research directions are discussed.

Unethical Pro-organizational Behavior: A Moderated Mediational Model of Its Transmission From Managers to Employees

This study explores the psychological mechanism underlying and the boundary conditions affecting the relationship between managers’ unethical pro-organizational behavior (UPB) and subordinates’ willingness to engage in UPB. Drawing upon social learning and social cognitive theories, employee moral disengagement was predicted to mediate the relationship between managers’ UPB and employees’ UPB willingness; in addition, the moderating roles of both leader–member exchange and ethical relativism were investigated within this relationship. The results, based on 29 managers and 200 subordinates in Vietnam, supported the proposed mediation model. The findings further indicated that leader–member exchange augmented the positive relationship between managers’ UPB and employee moral disengagement, whereas employee ethical relativism weakened the positive relationship between moral disengagement and employees’ UPB willingness. By elucidating the underlying mechanism and boundary conditions, our findings offer an empirical basis for considering managers’ UPB as a critical antecedent to employees’ willingness to engage in UPB and also inform effective intervention approaches for organizations to constrain UPB.

Leader-Follower Congruence in MD Propensity and UPB: A Polynomial Regression Analysis

Drawing on previous work on moral disengagement and balance theory, the (in)congruence effect of leader and follower moral disengagement (MD) propensity on followers' unethical pro-organizational behavior (UPB) was examined in this study. Dyad data were gathered from 185 CEOs and 555 followers from 185 firms located in China. The polynomial regression analysis results suggest that followers in the presence of leader-follower congruence in MD propensity conduct more UPBs. Moreover, followers conduct more UPBs with MD propensity in the presence of congruence. We also found asymmetrical incongruence effects. Followers engage more in UPBs when their MD propensity exceeds their leaders' MD propensity than when their leaders' MD propensity exceeds their own. Overall, the findings emphasize the value of considering followers' and leaders' traits for shedding light on the occurrence of UPBs.