Contingent Reward Leadership Research Articles

The influence of deans’ transactional leadership behaviors on research productivity in public universities: The mediating effect of workplace learning capability

This study examined the effect of transactional leadership behaviors on research productivity in public universities, with organizational learning capability serving as a mediating factor. A quantitative research approach focusing on correlational design was utilized. Data were collected through a survey questionnaire administered to 519 respondents. Both measurement and structural model analyses were conducted, with deans, colleges, and individual academics serving as units of analysis. The findings revealed that deans’ contingent reward leadership behaviors significantly and positively influenced the research productivity of academics and colleges, even when controlling for workplace learning capability. Furthermore, the study demonstrated that deans’ contingent rewards and active-by-exception behaviors significantly and positively impacted workplace learning capability, accounting for 44.5% of the variance, with moderate and small effect sizes, respectively. Additionally, organizational learning capability exhibited a significant positive effect, explaining 54% of the variance in research productivity and demonstrating a moderate effect size, which indicates an unexplained variance of 46%. Bootstrapping tests confirmed that workplace learning capability partially and fully mediates the relationship between deans’ transactional leadership behaviors and research productivity. Consequently, it is imperative for college deans to enhance their contingent reward leadership behaviors and foster workplace learning capabilities to maximize their impact on research productivity.

The age of leadership: Meta‐analytic findings on the relationship between leader age and perceived leadership style and the moderating role of culture and industry type

AbstractManagers' leadership style has a substantial impact on employee and organizational outcomes. In the present study, we consider the role of leaders’ chronological age in predicting followers’ perceptions of their leadership style. Whereas ample research uncovers relationships between individuals’ age and how these individuals are perceived by others, little is known about how leaders’ chronological age impacts others’ perceptions of their style. Even less is known about how such relationships vary across cultures and industries. We conducted a meta‐analysis (164 unique studies; N = 397,456 observations) to explore these relationships, using the Full‐Range leadership model. We found that leader age was negatively related to perceptions of transformational and transactional leadership, and positively related to perceptions of passive leadership. Further, some of these effects varied on several cultural dimensions: The negative relationship between leader age and transformational leadership was weaker in collectivistic cultures, while the negative relationship with transactional leadership was stronger in high power distance cultures. Industry type also mattered: the relationship between leader age and both transformational and contingent reward leadership styles was amplified in the public sector. Lastly, perceptions of older leaders were more negative when ratings were provided by followers rather than the leaders themselves. Our findings offer both theoretical and practical implications for leading in an increasingly age‐diverse workforce, such as better informing the workforce of present age stereotypes and their imminent effect on organizations.

The Impact of Socially Responsible Human Resource Management on Employees’ Environmental Citizenship Behavior: The Role of Psychological Safety and Contingent Reward Leadership

The Impact of Socially Responsible Human Resource Management on Employees’ Environmental Citizenship Behavior: The Role of Psychological Safety and Contingent Reward Leadership

Role modeling of safety-leadership behaviors in the construction industry: A two-wave longitudinal study.

The construction industry is heavily affected by occupational accidents, and it is important to investigate how leadership behaviors promoting safety on construction sites are fostered among construction-site managers. The overall aim of this study was to investigate how safety-leadership behaviors can be developed in the construction industry, specifically focusing on managerial role modeling. A two-wave longitudinal cohort study with approximately four months between measurement occasions was conducted among construction-site supervisors in Sweden (n = 51). Supervisors' ratings of their site managers' and their own generic and safety-specific contingent reward (CR) leadership behaviors were obtained by means of questionnaires. Cross-lagged panel models were tested within a path model framework to test the hypothesis that site managers' leadership behaviors prospectively influence supervisors' leadership behaviors. Site managers' CR behaviors prospectively influenced supervisors' CR behaviors, both generic CR behaviors (β= 0.29, p = 0.01) and safety-specific CR behaviors (β= 0.22, p = 0.04). For safety-specific CR behaviors, a reversed effect (β= 0.26, p = 0.03) was also found, implying that supervisors' behaviors prospectively influenced site managers' behaviors. Site managers act as role models for supervisors when it comes to developing safety-leadership behaviors on construction sites. The results also indicate that site managers are influenced by their subordinate supervisors' safety-leadership behaviors. Hence, there seems to be reciprocal interaction between site managers and supervisors in which they influence each other and together shape safety-leadership practices at their construction sites.

Individualized behavior-based safety-leadership training: A randomized controlled trial

Introduction: Construction site managers play a critical role in occupational safety in the construction industry. This study aimed to develop and test a method for training construction site managers in positive feedback and active listening by incorporating the behavioral training components of behavior analysis, goal setting, practice with behavior feedback, homework, and maintenance planning into individualized behavior-based safety-leadership training (IBST), and to assess the effect of IBST on construction site managers’ safety-leadership behaviors and performance. Method: In a naturalistic randomized controlled trial, construction site managers were randomly assigned to an experimental group (n = 16) or a control group (n = 19). The experimental-group managers received IBST, while the control-group managers received no training. Paired sample t-tests on pre- to post-training (i.e., six weeks after the final training session) were performed separately for the experimental- and control-group managers. Results: The safety-leadership behaviors of the experimental-group managers improved in terms of favorable feedback (d = 0.99, p <.01), safety-specific feedback (d = 0.89, p =.02), behavior-specific feedback (d = 0.66, p =.02), antecedent listening (d = 0.68, p =.02), and consequential listening (d = 0.78, p =.01). In addition, safety-leadership performance improved in terms of transformational leadership (d = 0.78, p =.01) and contingent-reward leadership (d = 0.64, p =.02). No significant change was found for the control-group managers. Conclusions: The results indicate that behavior analysis, goal setting, practice with behavior feedback, homework, and maintenance planning are effective behavioral training components of safety-leadership training. Positive feedback and active listening were also found to be important behavioral requisites for transformational and contingent-reward leadership. Practical applications: IBST can be used to develop occupational safety in the construction industry by improving construction site managers’ safety-leadership behaviors and performance.

Can the Project Manager's Transformational Leadership Lead to Project Success?

Project-based organisations face the challenge of persistent project failures, leaving researchers and practitioners struggling to identify the best leadership style for project success. Data was collected from 289 project organisations and analysed to reveal that the project manager's transformational leadership behaviour and empowerment significantly improve project success. Additionally, empowerment mediates the impacts of transformational leadership and goal clarity on project success. Goal clarity was found to mediate the relationship between transformational leadership and empowerment, but not between transformational leadership and project success. Lastly, contingent reward leadership does not moderate the effect of empowerment on project success. The findings have theoretical and practical implications in the project management field.

The inverted-U influence of leader benevolence on extra-role customer service behavior

Leader benevolence is a leadership style pursued by enterprise supervisors, especially in enterprises rooted in Chinese Confucian culture. Based on reciprocity theory, this paper aims to explore the effect of team leader benevolence on employees’ extra-role customer service behavior through work effort and the moderating effect of contingent reward leadership. By analyzing data from 405 employees and 102 team supervisors in Chinese hospitality firms, the results show that leader benevolence has a significant inverted U-shaped relationship with employees’ work effort. Specifically, work effort mediates the relationship between leader benevolence and extra-role customer service behavior. The effect of leader benevolence on work effort is moderated by contingent reward leadership which in turn moderates the indirect effect of leader benevolence on extra-role customer service behavior through work effort. Aside from the contribution to leadership and organizational behavior literature, our conclusions and implications can also benefit hospitality firm managers and employees.

Does motivation matter? How leader behaviors influence employee vigor at work

PurposeThis study supposes to provide new insights into the role of leader behaviors in motivating employees by examining how and when spiritual leadership and contingent reward leadership facilitate employee vigor at work.Design/methodology/approachDrawing from self-determination theory (SDT), the current study proposes that spiritual leadership intrinsically motivates employees, whereas contingent reward leadership extrinsically motivates employees – both of which subsequently improve employee vigor at work. The theoretical model was tested through a sample of 191 employees collected across three time points in China.FindingsResults revealed that spiritual leadership positively facilitates employee vigor at work through enhancing their work enjoyment, and employees' need for achievement can amplify the effects of spiritual leadership. In addition, employees' performance-reward expectancy transmits the effects of contingent reward leadership on employee vigor at work, and leaders' performance expectations play a key role in strengthening the positive influences of contingent reward leadership.Originality/valueBased on SDT, this study provides a comprehensive explanation of how and when two patterns of leader behaviors affect employee vigor at work. Therefore, the authors provide significant insights for leadership and work design in human resource management.

Direct and indirect influence of project managers’ contingent reward leadership and empowering leadership on project success

Leadership is considered to be a viable solution to avoid persistent project failures in an increasingly volatile and uncertain competitive business environment; however, practitioners and researchers have yet to reach a consensus on the best leadership style to prevent project failure. Although past studies have examined different leadership models in the project environment, they have overlooked the importance of emerging leadership styles in managing new business realities. This article thus attempts to determine whether two leadership styles, that is, contingent reward and empowering, directly and indirectly achieve project success. Data were collected from 289 project team members in the IT sector and analysed using partial least squares structural equation modelling. The results demonstrate the positive impact of empowering leadership on employee self-leadership, which leads to project success. Further, employee self-leadership positively mediates the link between empowering leadership and project success, while goal clarity moderates the influence of self-leadership on project success. However, contingent reward leadership neither directly nor indirectly (through self-leadership) showed any significant relationship with project success.

Does Contingent Reward Leadership Enhance or Diminish Team Creativity?

Although prior research has shown that contingent reward transactional leadership is, on average, nearly as highly related to team outcomes as is transformational leadership, few studies have examined the mechanisms whereby and the conditions under which contingent reward leadership is related to team creativity. Drawing on social exchange theory, we argue that contingent reward leadership can enhance team knowledge sharing and, in turn, team creative performance because it specifies effort-reward contingencies for knowledge sharing and because it motivates team members to reciprocate for consistence and transparent treatment their leader exhibits towards them. Moreover, we propose that this relationship is moderated by leader unpredictability, which can undermine the otherwise positive effects of contingent reward leadership. In a two-source, lagged design (three-wave) field study with data from 70 organizational teams, we found a conditional indirect (moderated mediation) effect of contingent reward leadership on team creative performance through team knowledge sharing. This conditional indirect effect was positive when leader unpredictability was low, and negative when leader unpredictability was high. Our research suggests that consistent and predictable contingent reward leadership can be an effective tool for leaders to foster creativity in teams.

The passion bug: How and when do leaders inspire work passion?

SummaryDrawing from signaling theory, we propose a work passion transfer model where leaders' passion is transmitted to employees through the former's leadership style and is contingent on employees' perceived importance of performance to self‐esteem (IPSE). Data from 201 supervisor–employee dyads from the health‐care industry show that leaders' harmonious passion led to employees' harmonious passion through charismatic leadership, whereas contingent reward leadership accounted for the transfer of obsessive passion; IPSE did not play a moderating role for either form of passion. Results from a supplementary study further reveal that the link between leadership and employee passion operated through employees' perception of leader passion and that employees' IPSE accentuated for the relationship between perceived leader obsessive passion and employees' obsessive passion. This study advances research in work passion, leadership, and signaling theory and provides important implications for managerial practice.

How transformational and contingent reward leaderships influence university faculty's organizational commitment: the mediating effect of psychological empowerment

ABSTRACT University faculty members’ organizational commitment has been undermined facing with the increasing managerialist pressure. Against the backdrop, this study examined the effects of departmental-level academic leaders’ transformational and contingent reward leaderships on university faculty's organizational commitment through the mediating role of psychological empowerment. A total of 1278 university faculty from 25 research intensive Chinese universities participated in a questionnaire survey. The results showed that both transformational and contingent reward leaderships had positive effects on university faculty's psychological empowerment and organizational commitment. They further showed that university faculty's psychological empowerment positively mediated the relationships between both transformational and contingent reward leaderships and organizational commitment. More empirical studies should be conducted to confirm the positive effect of academic leaders’ contingent reward leadership on university faculty's psychological empowerment and organizational commitment in higher education contexts across countries. The limitations and implications of this study were discussed.

Embedding corporate sustainability: An empirical analysis of the antecedents of organization citizenship behavior

AbstractThe relation between organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) and the performance of both safety and environmental management systems has led researchers to investigate the drivers of safety‐specific and environmental‐oriented OCB. However, although the management of environmental and safety issues is often fully integrated into organizational and managerial practice, a holistic perspective of the drivers of health, safety, and environmental (HSE)‐oriented OCB is still lacking. Thus, the aim of the present study is to investigate the antecedents of HSE‐related OCB (OCBHSE). Drawing on both the OCB and sustainability literature, data from 135 manager–direct report dyads collected from eight large Italian companies are analyzed, to assess the effect of both situation‐related antecedents (i.e., organizational ambidexterity and leadership style) and person‐related antecedents (i.e., prosocial values) on prosocial and proactive OCBHSE. Organizational ambidexterity emerges as a direct situation‐related antecedent of both prosocial and proactive OCBHSE, whereas management by exception and passive leadership have a negative effect on the OCBHSE in direct reports. Surprisingly, transformational and contingent reward leadership styles do not emerge as significant drivers of OCBHSE. In terms of person‐related antecedents, the results highlight that prosocial values in direct reports significantly influence prosocial but not proactive OCBHSE. Finally, as OCBHSE is conceptualized in the study as a dimension that is complementary to formal HSE management structures, our findings can contribute to the general organizational effort to improve HSE performance.

Perceived leadership behaviours and their effects on IT departments in Swiss financial companies

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of perceived transformational, transactional and laissez-faire (LF) leadership behaviours on both the effectiveness of the leader and satisfaction with the leader, as perceived by information technology (IT) subordinates in the Swiss financial sector.Design/methodology/approachIn total, 182 IT professionals from 45 Swiss financial companies rated their perceptions using the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (MLQ 5X short). Results were evaluated using partial least squares based structural equation modelling.FindingsIdealised influence (attributed) and individualised consideration as well as contingent reward (CR) leadership are positively related to effectiveness and satisfaction. LF leadership had a strong, significant negative effect on both outcomes. No augmentation effect of idealised influence and/or inspirational motivation over the effects of CR was found. These results are partly contradictory to findings of earlier studies. Additionally, stability problems/discriminant validity issues were found for some of the examined constructs.Practical implicationsManagers and leaders in IT departments in Swiss financial institutions should be advised of the possibly strong effects of CR on outcomes, together with the risks of potentially highly negative impacts of LF leadership, as well as the possible limitations of the stability and validity problems found. Leadership training could be used to this end. The paper gives specific advice on how the different findings could be included in such training.Originality/valueIT can significantly contribute to a firm’s success, and leading people who deliver technology is becoming more important in an increasingly digitised world. No previous research has illustrated the effects of leadership behaviours on IT departments in Swiss companies.

Congruence effects of contingent reward leadership intended and experienced on team effectiveness: The mediating role of distributive justice climate

We examined why congruence in contingent reward leadership (CRL) between leaders and teams can stimulate positive team processes and effectiveness. Specifically, our study explored the effect of congruence between perceptions of CRL intended by leaders and experienced collectively by team members. We hypothesized that team distributive justice climate serves as an emergent team state through which the positive effects of CRL congruence on team effectiveness occur. We found support for hypothesized congruence effects and discuss the implications of our findings as well as future research possibilities.Practitioner points Our study demonstrates the benefits of getting leaders and teams to ‘see eye to eye’ on critical workplace perceptions such as CRL intended and experienced. The study findings indicate that distributive justice climate underlies the process through which leader–team agreement on CRL intended and experienced influences team effectiveness. Our study emphasizes the importance to examine CRL from the perspectives of both leaders and teams. Our results suggest that organization HR specialists and line managers should work together in executing compensation strategies.

Authentic leadership as a contemporary leadership model applied in Nigeria

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine the extent to which each dimension of authentic leadership (AL) is related with employee organizational commitment (OC) and assessment of leadership effectiveness for employees in Nigeria and to investigate the moderating effects of contingent reward leadership behaviors on these relationships. By testing the dimensions of AL with employee outcomes, this study provides further validity and empirical evidence to the theoretical structure of AL theory across cultures.Design/methodology/approachThis empirical study used cross-sectional survey data collected from a sample of 212 Nigerian employees from 16 organizations across various sectors.FindingsThe results of hierarchical regression analysis of this study showed a positive relationship between AL behaviors and the outcome variables of OC and perceived leader effectiveness (LE) among Nigerian employees. The moderation result shows that the leader’s contingent reward behaviors reduce the effects of the internal moral perspective dimension of AL. As authentic leaders interact with followers and followers experience high levels of moral and ethical behaviors, contingent rewards become less important to followers.Practical implicationsLeadership effectiveness and OC are desirable organizational outcomes across cultures. From a practical standpoint, the results indicate several authentic dimensions are related to OC and leadership effectiveness among Nigerian employees. This extends the applicability of AL into the African countries. Particularly, it provides additional insight into a contemporary leadership model that can positively impact the leadership development in Nigeria. While the interactive effects of contingent reward were limited, they do suggest that some combinations of behaviors should be considered to effectively meet situational needs.Originality/valueThis is the first study that examines the relationship of the components that constitute AL with OC and perceived LE in the context of Nigeria, a major African nation.

The relationship between elementary school principals’ transformational leadership and spiritual well-being

The aim of this study was to determine the relationship between transformational leadership and spiritual well-being among elementary school principals. A correlational research or ex post facto method was used in this study. The sample population comprised 141 subjects, of which 69 were male and 72 were female. Bass and Avolio’s Transformational Leadership Questionnaires and Ellison’s Spiritual Well-Being Scale were used. The results obtained indicated that the assessment of domains related to transformational leadership style would show, relatively, the importance of a ‘without intervention’ leadership style; however, values for passive avoidant leadership, management-by-exception and contingent reward were greater than the other dimensions used. There was a positive correlation between spiritual well-being and its dimensions, as well as transformational leadership and its dimensions, excluding the religious dimension and intellectual stimulation, contingent reward, management-by-exception and passive avoidant leadership, and between dimensional being and leadership without intervention in other dimensions (though low). The results of this study also showed that the spiritual well-being dimension can predict 12.7% of the behavior of transformational leadership of principals.

Validation of a German Version of the Ethical Leadership at Work Questionnaire by Kalshoven et al. (2011)

The present study evaluates the psychometric properties of a German version of the Ethical Leadership at Work questionnaire (ELW-D), and further embeds the construct of ethical leadership within its nomological network. Confirmatory factor analyses (CFAs) based on the total sample of N = 363 employees support the assumed seven-factor structure of the German translation. Within a sub-sample of N = 133, the ELW-D shows positive correlations with related leadership behaviors (transformational leadership, contingent reward, and servant leadership), and negative correlations with destructive ones (passive leadership, autocratic leadership, and abusive supervision), approving convergent validity of the scale. Comparisons of correlated correlation coefficients reveal restrictions of its discriminant validity. In support of the criterion-related validity (N = 100), the ELW-D relates to work-related attitudes (e.g., job satisfaction, satisfaction with the leader, trust in the leader) and follower behaviors (e.g., extra effort, organizational citizenship behavior) in the way expected. Besides, ELW-D-dimensions show incremental validity over and above the Ethical Leadership Scale, emphasizing the added value of this questionnaire.

Different ways to get the job done: comparing the effects of intellectual stimulation and contingent reward leadership on task‐related outcomes

AbstractTwo experiments were conducted to compare the effects of intellectual stimulation and contingent reward leadership on performance, task enjoyment, and extra effort. Participants (N = 78 and N = 158) viewed one of three videos and performed an in‐basket exercise. Several interesting differences emerged. Across both studies, participants in the control and contingent reward leadership conditions generated more ideas than their counterparts in the intellectual stimulation condition. Additionally, participants reported more willingness to exert extra effort when the leader was either intellectually stimulating or emphasized contingent reward leadership, as compared to the control condition. Finally, while task enjoyment was higher in the contingent reward leadership condition than in the control condition in Study 1, no significant differences emerged among conditions for enjoyment in Study 2.

Leadership in Extreme Contexts

This study sought to investigate whether leaders tend to adapt their leadership style, within the full range of leadership model, between normal and extreme event firefighting contexts; as well as assess the extent these leadership styles are related to followers’ performance across both contexts. The correlational research design was coupled with a cross-sectional retrospective survey using hierarchical regression analysis. Results indicated that transactional contingent reward leadership style was the dominant predictor of followers’ performance in extreme events. Results showed that in normal contexts, transformational leadership style was the dominant predictor of followers’ performance. Leader behaviors tended to change (adapt) between normal contexts and extreme events, as the same leaders were less transformational in their behaviors in extreme events as compared with normal contexts. Theoretical and practical implications for adaptive leadership responses are discussed along with recommendations for future research.