Are you really doing good things in your boss's eyes? Interactive effects of employee innovative work behavior and leader–member exchange on supervisory performance ratings

• Author: Sebastian C. Schuh,Xin‐an Zhang,Frederick P. Morgeson,Peng Tian,Rolf van Dick
• Date: 01 January 2018
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/hrm.21851
• Published date: 01 January 2018

HR SCIENCE FORUM

Are you really doing good things in your boss's eyes?

Interactive effects of employee innovative work behavior and

leader–member exchange on supervisory performance ratings

Sebastian C. Schuh

1

| Xin-an Zhang

2

| Frederick P. Morgeson

3

| Peng Tian

2

|

Rolf van Dick

4

1

China Europe International Business School,

Shanghai, China

2

Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai,

China

3

Michigan State University, East Lansing,

Michigan

4

Goethe University Frankfurt, Frankfurt,

Germany

Correspondence

Xin-an Zhang, Antai College of Economics and

Management, Shanghai Jiao Tong University,

1954 Huashan Road, Shanghai 200030, China.

E-mail: xinanzhang@sjtu.edu.cn

Funding information

National Science Foundation of China, Grant/

Award number: 71472123; Fundamental

Research Funds for the Central Universities at

Shanghai Jiao Tong University

Organizations increasingly depend on employee efforts to innovate. However, the quality of

relationships between leaders and employees may affect the recognition that employees

receive for their innovative work behaviors. Drawing from a social cognition perspective, we

tested a model in which leader–member exchange (LMX) moderates the impact of employee

innovative work behavior on supervisory ratings of employee performance. Results from two

multisource studies combining self, colleague, and supervisor ratings consistently showed that

employees receive more favorable performance ratings by engaging in innovative work behav-

ior when they have high-quality LMX relationships. Moreover, we found that this interactive

relationship was mediated by leader perceptions of innovative employee efforts, providing sup-

port for a moderated mediation model. Implications for the literatures on performance

appraisal, LMX, and innovation are discussed.

KEYWORDS

employee innovation, innovative work behavior, leader-member exchange, LMX,

performance appraisal, performance ratings

1|INTRODUCTION

As organizations operate in increasingly dynamic and fast-paced busi-

ness environments, their ability to quickly adapt and advance their

processes, products, and services has become a key factor for success

(Janssen & van Yperen, 2004). Accordingly, researchers and practi-

tioners are increasingly interested in understanding employee innova-

tive work behaviors, defined as employees' intentional efforts to

generate, promote, and realize innovative ideas in order to benefit

work performance, the group, or the organization (Janssen, 2000;

West & Farr, 1990). As a key driver of innovative employee behavior,

effective leaders foster the creation and implementation of new ideas

by setting inspirational goals, fostering a climate of learning, and facil-

itating productive exchange among employees (Alfes, Truss, Soane,

Rees, & Gatenby, 2013; Basu & Green, 1997).

Despite considerable progress in understanding the role lea-

ders play in fostering organizational innovation, several important

questions have remained open for investigation. First, whereas

accu mulati ng evidence demonstrates that leaders foster employee inno-

vative work behaviors, little is known about a second aspect of leader

involvement: leaders' role in assessing innovative employee efforts.

Research into this question is important because evaluating employee

behavior is a fundamental leadership task (Arvey & Murphy, 1998; Ber-

nardin, Thomason, Buckley, & Kane, 2016). Leader assessments of

their employees affect k ey HR-related processes in organizations

such as promotions, bonus pay ments, and layoffs (Brat ton & Gold,

2012). Moreover, as many studies in the domain of human resource

management involve supervi sory ratings of employee beh avior as a

key variable, it is import ant to understand the degr ee to which

supervisor ratings actua lly reflect employee behav ior or whether

they are influenced by lead er interpretations of such behavior.

Second, although it is generally recognized that innovative work

behavior is inherently ambiguous, extant research has produced little

understanding of how innovative work behavior is actually perceived

by others. While generally benefiting the functioning of the organiza-

tion, innovative work behavior requires employees to challenge the

DOI: 10.1002/hrm.21851

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