Supervisor–subordinate conflict and perceptions of leadership behavior: a field study

Abstract

Although management scholars have generated a significant stream of research on workplace conflict, there has been a lack of attention to the specific features of conflict between persons at different hierarchical levels. The current study addresses this gap by examining the structure and correlates of conflict in vertical dyads. An analysis of data from 72 supervisor–subordinate pairs reveals that such conflict has a two-factor structure: one factor is pure emotional conflict, and the second factor is mixed conflict, a combination of emotional and task conflict. Both kinds of conflict have negative associations with perceptions of supervisors' leadership behaviors, but pure emotional conflict has stronger negative associations than mixed conflict.