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| The Path and Boundary of Ambidextrous Leadership′s Negative Effect on Employees′ Innovative Behavior: A Dual Moderated Mediation Model |
| Jin Hui,Xu Hu |
| (School of Economics and Management, Jiangsu University of Science and Technology, Zhenjiang 212100, China) |
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Abstract Employees are the micro-subjects of independent innovation, and their innovative behaviors are related to the overall efficiency of enterprise innovation. It is widely believed that leadership styles have substantial impact on employees′ innovative behaviors. Since the external environment of organizations is unpredictable, and the internal management is also increasingly complex, it is difficult to cope with the contradiction dilemma in the process of organizational innovation with a single and unchanged leadership style. In this context, ambidextrous leadership has emerged. With the logic of compatibility, ambidextrous leadership switches the two seemingly contradictory leaders′ behaviors to achieve a flexible match between leaders′ behaviors and the complex environment, and it becomes an important driving force to resolve organizational conflicts and promote organizational reforms.#br#As the importance of ambidextrous leadership to innovation practices has grown, so has the attention of the academic community. Only a few literatures have identified the "dark side" to ambidextrous leadership. However, most previous studies only mentioned or verified the negative effects of ambidextrous leadership on employees′ proximal cognition or emotion, it is not known if it also has a "dark side" on employees′ innovative behaviors. Based on the conservation of resources theory, this study argues that when ambidextrous leaders flexibly switch contradictory behaviors, employees need to consume more cognitive resources to interpret the motivation of contradictory leaders′ behaviors and continuously adjust their work strategies. The consumption of cognitive and other resources during this process is likely to induce role stress. Employees under high role stress are in a state of continuous resource depletion and lack sufficient resources to engage in innovative behaviors. Moreover, from the perspective of individual resources and job resources, this study explores the key factors that can enhance employees′ recognition for ambidextrous leadership and reduce resource depletion. Therefore, this study selects employees′ role stress as a mediating variable and introduces employees′ Zhongyong thinking and organizational communication openness as moderating variables, which will reveal the paths and boundaries of the negative effects of ambidextrous leadership on employees′ innovative behaviors.#br#The survey sample is composed of employees and their direct team leaders in enterprises engaged in technology or R&D in the Yangtze River Delta region, from emerging industries such as communication technology, new material development and intelligent manufacturing. Data are collected by issuing three-stage leader-employee matching questionnaires. A total of 336 valid matching questionnaires are collected. This study adopts the multiple linear regression and Bootstrap analysis to test the hypotheses. The results show that ambidextrous leadership positively affects employees′ role stress, employees′ role stress negatively affects employees′ innovative behavior, and employees′ role stress plays a partial mediating role in the relationship between ambidextrous leadership and employees′ innovative behavior; employees′ Zhongyong thinking not only negatively moderates the relationship between ambidextrous leadership and employees′ role stress, but also further moderates the mediating effect of employees' role stress; organizational communication openness not only negatively moderates the relationship between ambidextrous leadership and employees' role stress and the relationship between employees′ role stress and employees' innovative behavior, but also further moderates the mediating effect of employees′ role stress.#br#This study verifies a "dark side" of ambidextrous leadership on employees' innovative behaviors, and breaks the inherent cognition that ambidextrous leadership promotes employees'innovative behaviors. It also provides a new theoretical perspective and path mechanism to explore the relationship between ambidextrous leadership and employees′ innovative behaviors. Moreover, from the perspectives of employees' thinking characteristics and organizational communication environment, this study expands the boundary conditions of the effects of ambidextrous leadership. Finally, this study highlights the important role of Zhongyong thinking in alleviating employees′ role stress in China, and enriches stress management research. Organizations are proposed to be alert to the potential "dark side" of ambidextrous leadership. Organizations can enhance employees′ role recognition and competence by publicizing organizational goals and implementing skills training, and strengthen the guidance of employees′ Zhongyong thinking by job rotation and building a harmonious atmosphere. Finally, an open communication environment should be created. A series of ways such as establishing open feedback channels, organizing group activities, and cultivating employees′ communication skills are effective approaches to enhance organizational communication openness.#br#
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Received: 15 November 2021
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