How and When Does Leader Humility Enhance Employee Proactive Career Behavior

Abstract

In this research, we drew upon implicit leadership theory to examine the joint effects of leader humility, follower power distance, and follower narcissism on proactive career behavior via perceived leader competence. Specifically, we proposed that leader humility would be perceived as more competent for the employees with lower power distance; we also proposed two competing predictions about the interactive effect of leader humility and follower narcissism on leader competence from two different theoretical perspectives (i.e., opposite-attraction perspective vs. similar-attraction perspective). We tested our hypotheses using a multi-waves and time-lagged survey with 281 subordinate-supervisor dyads from 87 teams. The results of our studies demonstrate that the followers with low power distance and low narcissism are more likely to perceive higher leader humility to be more competent and thus increase their proactive career behavior. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.