Exploring Explanatory Mechanisms of Adjustment-Specific Resources Underlying the Relationship between Leader–Member Exchange and Work Engagement: A Lens of Conservation of Resources Theory

Abstract

The sustainable competitiveness of an organization is largely dependent upon its effectiveness in developing and maintaining high levels of socializees’ work engagement. Based on COR (conservation of resources) theory, the present study proposes an integrative model of work engagement pathway to organizational socialization. LMX (leader–member exchange) is seen to create fertile or infertile ground for the creation or limitation of six adjustment-specific resources (e.g., task mastery), which in turn affect work engagement. SmartPLS 3.0 is employed to analyze the data with 455 respondents from 15 luxury hotels on China’s Hainan Island. As a result, the six adjustment-specific resources collectively and fully mediate the LMX–engagement relation. LMX positively influences all six adjustment-specific resources, which then either directly or conditionally affect work engagement. While engagement’s relationship with task mastery is moderated by income, its relationship with fitting in is moderated by line vs. staff department. The foregoing findings are exploratory and insightful, particularly considering that the work engagement pathway to organizational socialization has become a new paradigm with important implications for theory, research, and practice.