Abstract
We develop a theoretical model of empowering leadership that integrates role-based views of followership and social information processing theory and adds a reciprocal component to research on empowering leadership. Our theoretical model proposes that employee task performance and the quality of the supervisor-employee relationship serve as cues that shape supervisor empowerment behaviors, which, in turn, serve as cues that influence employee voice through employee state promotion focus. Data from 223 supervisor-employee dyads supported our hypotheses and showed that supervisors engage in more empowerment behaviors with employees who perform well and with whom they have a good relationship. Supervisors’ empowerment behaviors elicit a state promotion focus in employees, which stimulates these employees to express their concerns, ideas, and opinions in order to improve the functioning of the employee, the team, or the organization.
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Notes
Empowering leadership involves empowerment behaviors of leaders and supervisors. Therefore, we will use the terms empowering leadership and supervisor empowerment behaviors interchangeably.
Promotion and prevention foci can not only emerge as a chronic component (a personal disposition), but also as a situational component that is induced by contextual factors (Higgins, 1997, 1998) and research has shown that leaders, through their language and behaviors, can shape the regulatory foci of their employees (Johnson et al., 2017; Kark, Katz-Navon, & Delegach, 2015).
We assessed employee state prevention focus with nine items (α = .87) adapted from Lockwood, Jordan, and Kunda’s (2002) prevention focus scale. We adapted the items to assess prevention focus as a state rather than a trait and to refer to the workplace. Employees rated their agreement with the items on a scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree).
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This work was supported by Innovative Method Special Project of Ministry of Science and Technology of China [Grant No. 2017IM050100], and the National Natural Science Foundation of China [Grant No. 71772138].
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Wang, S., De Pater, I.E., Yi, M. et al. Empowering leadership: employee-related antecedents and consequences. Asia Pac J Manag 39, 457–481 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10490-020-09734-w
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10490-020-09734-w