Inclusive leadership and employees’ voice behavior: A moderated mediation model

Abstract

The number of studies dedicated to organizational inclusion is rapidly growing. Using relational leadership theory (RLT) as the overarching framework, the current study aimed to examine how inclusive leadership indirectly influences the voices of Chinese employees via leader-member exchange (LMX). The boundary conditions of these relationships were also explored by using employee achievement values as a potential moderator. A total of 814 full-time Chinese employees were recruited. The results showed that LMX mediated the positive effect of inclusive leadership on employee voice behaviors. Specifically, inclusive leadership enhanced LMX, and employees were then more likely to express ideas in front of supervisors. Moreover, achievement values moderated the positive linkage of LMX–voice. When building the high quality LMX relationships, employees with higher achievement values were more willing to speak up compared to their counterparts holding lower achievement values. We further found that the magnitude of the mediating effect of LMX on the relationship between inclusive leadership and voice also relied on employee achievement values (i.e., a second-stage moderated mediation model). This indicates that the indirect effect was stronger when the employees had higher achievement values. The conceptual and applied implications of our findings are also discussed.