Transformational Leadership, Diversity, and Creativity at Work: A Moderated Mediation Model

Abstract

Organizational leaders often seek to hire and retain innovative employees as a source of competitive advantage. Both transformational leadership and effectively managed workplace diversity have been theorized and shown to lead to increased employee creative performance at work; however, a full model of the relationships between leadership and the multi-dimensional construct of workplace diversity has not yet been tested. Using a sample of 371 employees in three Chinese high-technology firms matched with 64 supervisors collected at three time points, this study theorized and tested a moderated mediation path model in which transformational leadership and diversity climate were predicted to significantly interact to influence the workplace diversity constructs of organizational justice and organizational identity, which in turn, influence individual creative performance. Based on major theories of leadership, diversity, and creativity, several partial mediation hypotheses are presented, including diversity climate as a mediator of the relationship between transformational leadership and creative performance as well as organizational justice and organizational identity as mediators of the relationship between the interaction of transformational leadership and diversity climate and creative performance. Several single-and multilevel path analyses were conducted to test the model, using two measures of creative performance: self-ratings and supervisor ratings. The results showed that the interaction of transformational leadership and diversity climate significantly predicted self-rated creative performance, and organizational identity significantly predicted supervisor ratings of creative performance.

Exploring organisational diversity climate with associated antecedents and employee outcomes

“…This result translates to a situation where shared perceptions regarding diversity policies and practices will constructively assist employees in demonstrating commitment towards the organisation when they are exposed to the characteristics of transformational leadership in their specific workplaces. Thus, the mediation result for the path of transformational leadership to organisational commitment via diversity confirms the mediating promises of a diversity climate as demonstrated by Volpone et al (2012) and Taylor (2015).…”

“…We could also not find a similar South African study that has investigated diversity climate as mediating transformational leadership. However, from previous research conducted by Volpone, Avery and McKay (2012), Chrobot-Mason and Asomovich (2013) and Taylor (2015), we were able to find evidence that an organisational diversity climate demonstrates promising mediating characteristics. Volpone et al (2012) demonstrated that diversity climate mediates the relationship between employees' appraisal reactions and employee engagement.…”

“…In addition, Taylor (2015) was able to confirm that transformational leadership had a significant indirect effect on creative performance through diversity climate.…”

Assessing and Enhancing Emotional Intelligence among Nigerian Librarians

“…In their study on ethical preferences of transformational leaders, Priyanka Banerji & Venkat R. Krishnan (2000), and other scholars, recounted that transformational leadership includes inspiring, mustering, uplifting, and raising the moral objectives of the leader and of the led (Banerji & Krishnan, 2000;Lee, 2014;and Taylor, 2015). Going by the meta-analysis findings of studies in transformational leadership literature, K.B.…”

The Impact of Abusive Supervision on Employee Creativity, with the Mediating Effect of Emotional Exhaustion: A study on R&D Sector in Twin Cities of Pakistan

“…The word creativity is derived from the Latin word "Creatus" or "Creare", intends to make. The most normally acknowledged meaning of creativity in the U.S. is the creation of novel and valuable thoughts concerning items, administrations, procedures, and methodology that are acknowledged inside significant areas (Taylor, 2015). Creativity refers to the creative ability to begin or make new considerations, ideas, and thoughts (Asghar & Sultana, 2017).…”