尽责的领导会辱虐员工吗?环境不确定性和情绪耗竭的作用机制

Do Conscientious Leaders Abuse Subordinates?The Role of Environmental Uncertainty and Emotional Exhaustion

当前,学术界对领导尽责性与辱虐管理之间的关系仍然没有达成共识。以资源保存理论为基础,通过对95个团队、389名员工的两阶段领导—员工配对调查数据分析发现:环境不确定性是影响领导尽责性作用发挥的重要边界条件。环境不确定性水平越高,领导尽责性通过情绪耗竭对虐管理产生的正向影响越强。环境不确定性水平越低,领导尽责性通过情绪耗竭对辱虐管理产生的负向影响越强。

Conscientious individuals tend to be achievement-,detail-and planning-oriented.Several studies have found a consistent relationship between conscientiousness,overall job performance,leader emergence,and leader effectiveness.Despite these positive connotations,the relationship between leader conscientiousness and abusive supervision remains controversial.Empirical studies fail to draw a unanimous conclusion.Several studies argue that conscientious leaders tend to create a fair environment for their employees and engage in ethical leadership behavior.Others argue that the trait of conscientiousness may play a role in the emergence of abusive supervision since conscientious supervisors are highly goalachievement-oriented and may engage in abusive supervision due to performance-driven motives.Failing to figure out the above relationship is detrimental considering that conscientious individuals are more likely to get promoted.Accordingly,our goal in the present research is to shed light on the relationship between leader conscientiousness and abusive supervision in light of existing debates in the personality approach to leadership.We use conservation of resource theory(COR)as an overarching theoretical framework for the current investigation.COR theory is particularly relevant to our investigation because it inherently states what individuals do when confronted with stress and when not confronted with stress,which helps understand the processes and conditions under which conscientious leaders are more likely to abuse subordinates.In line with COR,we propose that the relationship between leader conscientiousness and abusive supervision is conditioned by environmental uncertainty.We also focus on leaders’feelings of emotional exhaustion,a state reflecting resource depletion,as an immediate consequence of the joint effect of leader conscientiousness and environmental uncertainty.Two-wave data collected from 389 employees and 95 supervisors showed that:(1)Environmental uncertainty moderated the relationship between leader conscientiousness and abusive supervision.(2)Environmental uncertainty could also moderate the relationship between leader conscientiousness and emotional exhaustion.(3)Emotional exhaustion was positively associated with abusive supervision.4)The indirect effect of leader conscientiousness on abusive supervision via emotional exhaustion was conditional upon environmental uncertainty,such that the indirect effect became increasingly positive as environmental uncertainty increases and increasingly negative as environmental uncertainty decreases.Our research offers three major contributions.Firstly,we extend understandings regarding the previously unclear relationship between leader conscientiousness and abusive supervision.Acknowledging that leader conscientiousness may not have straightforward effects on abusive supervision,we explore the possibility that other factors may condition this relationship.To this end,the second theoretical contribution is that our study answers calls to identify situational factors(i.e.,environmental uncertainty)that interact with leader personality to predict both proximal and distal outcomes.Our focus on environmental uncertainty(a boundary condition)and emotional exhaustion(a mediating mechanism)are particularly useful given that popular press attention for both constructs has so far outpaced scholarly investigations.Finally,our study adds to the relatively scant literature examining leader personality as antecedents of abusive supervision and,relatedly,provides needed attention for how intrapersonal factors affect abusive supervision.