The roles of authentic leadership and future orientation in promoting employees' feedback-seeking behavior : two studies of the mediating and moderating processes
Creators: name: Qian, Jing
Publisher: name: The Australian National University
Year: 2012
Subjects: subject: HF5549.5.P35 Q11 2012
subject: Employee motivation.
subject: Feedback (Psychology)
subject: Leadership
subject: Supervision of employees
subject: Performance standards.

description: This research examines the authentic leadership of supervisors and future time orientation of employees as antecedents of employee feedback-seeking behavior. I also proposed two different mediating mechanisms to explain why authentic leadership and future time orientation could lead to employee feedback seeking, while boundary conditions were also examined. This research comprises two studies. Despite an increasing number of studies showing a positive relationship between characteristics of feedback source and feedback-seeking behavior, little is known about the influence that leaders exert on promoting follower feedback-seeking behavior when they serve as feedback sources. In study 1, I developed a model to fill this void by linking authentic leadership with feedback seeking. Specifically, I hypothesised that authentic leadership was positively related to employee feedback seeking behaviour and was mediated by both perceived instrumental value and image cost of feedback seeking. In addition, power distance was hypothesized to moderate the relationships between authentic leadership and the mediators. Testing the model with data from a sample of 237 supervisor-follower dyads, results revealed that (1) there was a positive relationship between authentic leadership and feedback seeking from the supervisor, (2) perceived instrumental value and perceived image cost mediated the relationship between authentic leadership and feedback seeking, (3) power distance moderated the positive relationship between authentic leadership and perceived value in such a way that the relationship was stronger for people higher, rather than lower, in power distance, (4) power distance moderated the negative relationship between authentic leadership and perceived cost in such a way that the relationship was weaker for people higher, rather than lower, in power distance. Drawing upon psychological ownership theory, Study 2 hypothesized a positive influence of future time orientation on feedback seeking from various sources (i.e., supervisors and co-workers). I also hypothesized job-based psychological ownership to be a driving force for feedback seeking and as an underlying mechanism through which future time orientation was positively related to feedback seeking from supervisors and co-workers. In addition, transformational leadership was hypothesized to moderate the relationship between future time orientation and job-based psychological ownership. Tested with data from a sample of 228 subordinate-supervisor dyads from China, the results revealed that (1) future time orientation was positively related to feedback seeking from supervisors and co-workers, (2) job-based psychology ownership was positively related to feedback seeking from supervisors and co-workers and mediated the relationship between future time orientation and feedback seeking form various sources. - provided by Candidate.