Journal article
When differentiated empowering leadership hurts team performance: The roles of information sharing and tenure diversity
Human relations (New York)
18 Dec 2024
Abstract
The empowering leadership literature supports that empowering team members can result in a host of positive outcomes for work teams. These findings, however, largely assume that leaders uniformly empower their followers and overlook the potential consequences when leaders differentially empower members of the same team. In this study, we develop a theoretical model to delineate how and when differentiated empowering leadership affects team task performance. Drawing from social comparison theory, we position differentiated empowering leadership as adversely affecting team information sharing and subsequent team task performance. Moreover, we propose the indirect effect of differentiated empowering leadership on team task performance via team information sharing is conditional on organizational tenure diversity. To test our proposed model, we conducted a three-wave field study with 74 teams and their leaders from 17 South Korean firms. The results suggest that differentiated empowering leadership negatively affects team task performance through reduced team information sharing. This negative indirect effect was stronger in teams where organizational tenure diversity was low, compared with when it was high. The conclusions drawn from our research can help managers, HR professionals, and leadership coaches better understand and manage the complexities of empowering leadership to enhance team effectiveness.
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Details
- Title
- When differentiated empowering leadership hurts team performance: The roles of information sharing and tenure diversity
- Creators
- Biyun Hu - Shanghai International Studies UniversitySoojung Han - Univ St Thomas, St Thomas, MN USACrystal M. Harold - Temple UniversityLauren D'Innocenzo - Drexel UniversitySoojin Lee - Korea Univ Sejong, Sejong, South Korea
- Publication Details
- Human relations (New York)
- Publisher
- Sage
- Number of pages
- 28
- Grant note
- Young Scholars Research Grants from the Fox School of Business at Temple University
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Language
- English
- Academic Unit
- Management
- Web of Science ID
- WOS:001380127600001
- Scopus ID
- 2-s2.0-85212400381
- Other Identifier
- 991022016380504721
InCites Highlights
Data related to this publication, from InCites Benchmarking & Analytics tool:
- Collaboration types
- Domestic collaboration
- International collaboration
- Web of Science research areas
- Management
- Social Sciences, Interdisciplinary