How leadership style matters for innovative work behavior

Abstract

Purpose- It is a clear fact that innovation and the ability to innovate is essential for organizations. Especially, actions of individuals are essential for continuous innovation and improvement. That’s why innovative behaviors of the individuals at a workplace have the utmost importance to achieve innovation regarding organizational level. Hence, to uncover the relationship between leadership styles and innovative work behaviors of the employees is the purpose of this study. Methodology- In this study, the data has been collected through a questionnaire survey within the sample of white-collar employees of one of the special banks which operates in Turkey by using convenience sampling method. As a means of measurement, Leadership Style (MLQ) Scale by Bass and Avolio (2000) and Turkish Translation by Yurtkoru (2001) and Innovative Work Behavior Scale by de Jong and den Hartog (2010) and Turkish translation by Çimen and Yücel (2017) have been applied. Exploratory factor analysis, correlation and multiple regression analysis have been conducted. The main question to which this research tries to find answer is whether leadership styles have any significant effect on employees’ innovative work behavior or not. Findings- Research results revealed that the leadership behaviors of the leader affect the employees’ innovation tendency or in other words, their innovative work behaviors. Conclusion- Both transformational leadership and transactional leadership types have a significant effect on innovative work behavior of the employees. On the other hand, laissez-faire leadership type has no effect on innovative work behavior of the employees. In addition, this study provides conclusive evidence for further research that organizational culture, psychological factors and innovation climate in the organization can be put into the model as well to see the mediating or direct effect of leadership styles on employees’ innovative work behavior.