How narcissism, promotion criteria, and empowering leadership jointly influence creativity through diverse information searching: An expectancy perspective

Abstract

While narcissism is commonly regarded as a dark personality trait associated with many negative outcomes, it also carries potential benefits. How to suppress the negative aspects of narcissism and promote its benefits has important implications for both scholars and practitioners. This study proposes two managerial practices (i.e. promotions based on relative performance and empowering leadership) that motivate employees with high narcissism to bring benefits to the workplace. Drawing on expectancy theory, we theorize that narcissism, promotions based on relative performance, and empowering leadership each influence valence, instrumentality, and expectancy, respectively, thereby driving diverse information searching, which indirectly increases radical and incremental creativity. The results of a multi-time and multi-source field study of 462 employees on 88 teams indicate that narcissism is positively associated with diverse information searching when team leaders evaluate promotions based on relative performance and empower narcissistic employees. Moreover, there is an indirect relationship between a three-way interaction (i.e. narcissism × promotions based on relative performance × empowering leadership) and radical and incremental creativity via diverse information searching. We conclude by discussing the theoretical and practical implications of these findings, offering insights into more effective management of employees with high narcissism at work.