Leader-Member Congruence in Work Calling and Innovative Behavior

Abstract

The study includes middle leader, first-line leader and employee work calling into the model to discuss the relationship between leader- employee work calling fit and employee innovative behavior from “three-level interactive” perspective. Using polynomial regression and response surface methodology of 208 leader-employee dyads, we found that the relation of (middle and first-line) leader-employee congruence in work calling with innovative behavior conforms to the characteristics of “supplementary fit optimum”. Specifically, the higher the congruence an employee’s and his or her leader’s levels of work calling are, the better the employee innovative behavior. The optimal position of innovative behavior is the (middle and first- line) leader-employee “high-high” work calling. As for incongruence, the employee produces better innovative behavior in case of first- line leader-employee high-low work calling fit; there is no significant difference in innovative behavior between “middle leader high - employee low” and “middle leader low - employee high”.