The challenge of being a young manager: The effects of contingent reward and participative leadership on team‐level turnover depend on leader age

• Author: Claudia Buengeler,Astrid C. Homan,Sven C. Voelpel
• Date: 01 November 2016
• Published date: 01 November 2016
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/job.2101

The challenge of being a young manager: The

effects of contingent reward and participative

leadership on team-level turnover depend on

leader age

CLAUDIA BUENGELER

1

*, ASTRID C. HOMAN

2

AND SVEN C. VOELPEL

3

1

Amsterdam Business School, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, the Netherlands

2

Work and Organizational Psychology, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, the Netherlands

3

Business & Economics, Jacobs University Bremen, Bremen, Germany

Summary Effective leadership requires a leader claiming as well as team members granting the leadership position.

Contingentreward and participativeleadership may both facilitatethis mutual process.However, these behaviors

differ in the degree towhich they require a leader to have status and be prototypical. Their effectiveness might

thus depend on the status-related characteristics of the leader. In this respect,we propose that younger leaders,

by deviating from the leader prototype in terms of age, lack a natural status cue, which will determine the

effectivenes s of these two leadership behaviors in shaping turnover. Two pilot studies (N=113 and 121 individuals)

confirm that younger leaders are perceived as less prototypical and to have lower status than older leaders.

Examining 83 work teams, we show that leader age differently moderates the effects of contingent reward and

participative leadership on time-lagged team turnover. For younger (compared with older) leaders, contingent

reward was effective as illustrated by decreased voluntary turnover and increased involuntary turnover, whereas

participative leadership, which was associated with increased voluntary turnover and decreased involuntary

turnover, was ineffective. These findings point to the importance of incorporating natural status cues of leaders

for understanding the effectiveness of different leadership behaviors. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Keywords: (younger) leader age; contingent reward; participative leadership; team-level (in)voluntary

turnover

Introduction

Leaders cannot be successful without followers. According to the theory of leadership identity construction as a

social process (DeRue & Ashford, 2010), an individual’s identity as a leader is constructed not only by the person

himself or herself but also by team members (i.e., through relational recognition) and the organization (i.e., through

collective endorsement by peers and upper management). In order to be affirmed as a leader, not only individuals

must claim the identity of leader, but also others must grant them this role. Youth is one factor that may increase

the difficulty of being affirmed as a leader. Younger leaders cannot rely on the extensive experience and status

associated with older age (Avolio, Waldman, & McDaniel, 1990; Kearney, 2008; Nishii & Mayer, 2009; Pelled,

Eisenhardt, & Xin, 1999) and are seen as less prototypical for a leader (Junker & van Dick, 2014). As such, they

potentially struggle more with getting their team members to accept them and take them seriously. Leader age

may thus influence which leadership behaviors are effective.

In line with DeRue and Ashford (2010), we propose that both leader’s behaviors and prototypical characteristics

such as age affect his or her success in claiming and being granted leadership. Creating mutual influence relations

*Correspondence to: Claudia Buengeler, Amsterdam Business School, University of Amsterdam, Plantage Muidergracht 12, 1018 TV

Amsterdam, the Netherlands. E-mail: c.buengeler@uva.nl

Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Received 05 May 2014

Revised 10 February 2016, Accepted 12 February 2016

Journal of Organizational Behavior, J. Organiz. Behav. 37, 1224–1245 (2016)

Published online 29 March 2016 in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/job.2101

Research Article

with team members is one potentially effective behavioral way for leaders to claim and be granted leadership

(Keltner, Van Kleef, Chen, & Kraus, 2008). Mutual influence relations, or mutuality, entail a two-way influence

process between leader and followers (Hollander, 1980), which is a core focus of both contingent reward and

participative leadership (see, for instance, Hollander & Offermann, 1990; Hollander, 1992). Contingent reward

defines leadership behavior that answers high performance or beneficial follower behavior with rewards and

recognition in a contingent manner (Judge & Piccolo, 2004), instigating a mutually reinforcing two-way process.

Participative leadership describes leaders’seeking of input from followers and their involvement in decision-making

(Sagie & Koslowsky, 2000), again denoting a two-way influence. Although both behaviors enable mutuality, we

argue that whether contingent reward and participative leadership are effective in promoting leaders’claiming

and granting of leadership depends on the degree to which these leaders fit the leader prototype in terms of age.

Having prototypical attributes that match team and other organizational members’beliefs about the characteristics

of an effective leader (implicit leadership theory; Lord, 1985; Lord & Maher, 1991) also helps individuals success-

fully claim and be granted leadership (DeRue & Ashford, 2010). We argue that age is one such prototypical leader

characteristic. Societal-based attributions of higher status, competence, and expertise to those who are older (Berger,

Cohen, & Zelditch, 1972) can increase relatively older leaders’success in influencing their teams (Kearney, 2008).

In contrast, younger leaders deviate from the age-based leader prototype and may be seen as nonprototypical for a

leadership position (see also Ridgeway, 1991). Given the increasing age diversity in organizations (Rudolph &

Zacher, 2015) and the fact that age serves as an immediately available and salient cue of status and prototypicality

(Montepare & Zebrowitz, 1998; Ridgeway, Berger, & Smith, 1985), it is relevant to understand the role of leader age

in effectively leading teams. We thus argue that depending on the leader’s age, contingent reward and participative

leadership become more or less effective.

Within the present paper, we operationalize leader effectiveness as voluntary and involuntary team-level turnover

(Hausknecht & Trevor, 2011). Leaving through voluntary turnover and, thus, through one’s own decision might be

one of the most powerful and consequential actions that team members can take to refuse leadership to an individual

and thereby hinder successful leadership influence (Porter & Steers, 1973). By contrast, dismissals of followers that

are dysfunctional or continue to perform below par, which constitute an involuntary, equally impactful form of turn-

over, may reflect an individual’s claim of leadership in an organization. With an increasing reliance on team-based

work in modern organizations, both voluntary and involuntary turnover are crucial factors influencing organizational

and team success (Hausknecht & Trevor, 2011; Nishii & Mayer, 2009). The loss of valuable team members

threatens a team’s functioning and creates considerable replacement costs. Conversely, dismissing dysfunctional

team members can be vital for maintaining optimal team functioning.

With this research, we aim to contribute to the literature by providing an empirical test of DeRue and Ashford’s

(2010) basic distinction between granting and claiming leadership. That is, we examine the idea that leaders’

behaviors and demographic characteristics jointly determine the successful granting and claiming of leadership.

By studying the interplay of a leader’s age and behaviors in the context of implicit leadership theory, we also test

whether certain leader behaviors are more or less effective when the leader is nonprototypical on a relevant leader

characteristic. Lastly, we expand current research on age in work settings by focusing on younger leaders. Whereas

age(ing) research often focuses on the potential liability associated with older age (Hirschfeld & Thomas, 2011;

Kearney, 2008; Zacher, Rosing, & Frese, 2011), a recent review by Walter and Scheibe (2013) explicitly

acknowledged the importance of zooming in on the effects of younger age, in particular of leaders, as well. We

highlight that younger age may be a liability by making certain leadership behaviors less effective.

The Leadership Construction Process

Following DeRue and Ashford’s (2010) leadership identity framework, effective leadership develops based on

“reciprocal and mutually reinforcing identities as leaders and followers [that are] endorsed and reinforced within

LEADER AGE AND BEHAVIORS AFFECT TURNOVER 1225

Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. J. Organiz. Behav. 37, 1224–1245 (2016)

DOI: 10.1002/job