When perceived innovation job requirement increases employee innovative behavior: A sensemaking perspective

• Author: Jing Zhou,Feirong Yuan,Shung Jae Shin
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/job.2111
• Published date: 01 January 2017
• Date: 01 January 2017

When perceived innovation job requirement

increases employee innovative behavior: A

sensemaking perspective

SHUNG JAE SHIN

1

*, FEIRONG YUAN

2

AND JING ZHOU

3

1

School of Business Administration, Portland State University, Portland, Oregon, U.S.A.

2

Department of Management, University of Texas at Arlington, Arlington,Texas, U.S.A.

3

Jesse H. Jones Graduate School of Business, Rice University, Houston, Texas, U.S.A.

Summary Building on the sensemaking perspective, we theorize and test conditions under which perceived innovation

job requirement increases employee innovative behavior. Using data consisting of 311 employee–supervisor

pairs from two companies in China, we found that perceived innovation job requirement had a more positive

relation with innovative behavior for employees with low intrinsic interest in innovation than for those with

high intrinsic interest. In addition, this positive effect for low-intrinsic-interest employees was achieved only

when these employees interpreted the job requirement as important either because performance-reward

expectancy was high or because perceived value for the organization was high. We discuss the implications

of these results for research and practice. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Keywords: perceived innovation job requirement; innovative behavior; sensemaking

Because employee innovative behavior—the development and implementation of new ideas concerning products,

services, and processes—is an important source of an organization’s competitive advantage (Anderson, Potočnik,

& Zhou, 2014; West & Farr, 1990; Wolfe, 1994), it is essential to identify factors that increase innovative behavior

(Anderson, De Dreu, & Nijstad, 2004). Kanter’s (1988) seminal writing suggests that while much literature empha-

sizes the “random, spontaneous, or deviant aspects”of innovative behavior, the requirement of one’s job may serve

as a key activating force for employees to engage in innovative behavior. Accordingly, a research stream focusing

on the relation between employees’perception of innovation job requirement and their innovative behavior has

emerged (Anderson et al., 2014; Shalley, 2008). The fundamental premise of this research stream is that when

employees perceive that their jobs require innovation, they will engage in innovative behavior (Shalley, 2008;

Unsworth, Wall, & Carter, 2005; Yuan & Woodman, 2010). If this view is supported by empirical evidence, its prac-

tical implication is profound: to the extent that organizations can shape employees’perceptions of job requirements,

an effective way to boost innovative behavior is to explicitly require it (Shalley, 2008).

Empirical results regarding the relation between perceived innovation job requirement and employee innovative

behavior, however, have been inconclusive (Gilson & Shalley, 2004; Tierney & Farmer, 2011; Unsworth & Clegg,

2010; Unsworth et al., 2005; Yuan & Woodman, 2010). Some studies found the relation to be positive (e.g., Gilson

& Shalley, 2004; Unsworth & Clegg, 2010; Unsworth et al., 2005). Other studies found this relation to be more

complex. For example, Yuan and Woodman (2010), while hypothesizing a positive job requirement effect on

employee innovative behavior, found a negative direct effect of perceived innovation requirement on innovative

behavior. Also, contrary to the hypothesized positive effect, Tierney and Farmer (2011) found a significant but

negative relation between changes in perceived creative job requirements and changes in creative self-efficacy

and creative performance. These unexpected results suggest that the relation between perceived innovation job

*Correspondence to: Shung Jae Shin, School of Business Administration, Portland State University, Portland, Oregon, U.S.A. E-mail: s.

shin@pdx.edu

Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Received 04 April 2015

Revised 18 March 2016, Accepted 14 April 2016

Journal of Organizational Behavior, J. Organiz. Behav. 38,68–86 (2017)

Published online 11 May 2016 in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/job.2111

Research Article

requirement and innovative behavior is more complex than previously thought, and that significant moderating con-

ditions are likely to shape this relation. Yet, to date, we still know little about the conditions under which perceived

innovation job requirement will increase innovative behavior. In this study, we take the sensemaking perspective

(Drazin, Glynn, & Kazanjian, 1999; Ford, 1996) to address this important question.

In particular, from the sensemaking perspective, given the fact that individuals tend to have varying degrees

of “trait-like”intrinsic interest in innovation to begin with (Hennessey, 2003; Hennessey & Amabile, 2010),

what is missing from the extant literature is an understanding of how the interpretation and effects of perceived

innovation job requirement may vary among individuals with different levels of intrinsic interest in innovation.

Trait-like intrinsic interest in innovation refers to individual differences in the enjoyment of and preference for

engaging in the generation and implementation of new ideas (e.g., Tierney, Farmer, & Graen, 1999; Yuan &

Woodman, 2010). While some individuals enjoy coming up with new ideas and implementing them, others

lack such an interest. Drawing insights from recent studies (e.g., Malik, Butt, & Choi, 2015; Robinson-Morral,

Reiter-Palmon, & Kaufman, 2013; Wu, Parker, & de Jong, 2014), in this study, we build on and extend the

sensemaking perspective by underscoring the importance of examining individual differences when under-

standing the effects of external influences on employee innovative behavior. Specifical ly, we propose that per-

ceived innovation job requirement would have a stronger positive effect on innovative behavior for employees

with lower levels of intrinsic interest in innovation. For these employees, the perceived innovation job require-

ment serves as an external cue that influences their sensemaking process so that they will interpret innovative

behavior as a potentially desirable thing to do.

Further, we theorize that employees with low intrinsic interest in innovation may follow the perceived innovation

job requirement only when their sensemaking effort resulted in their interpreting this requirement as important.

Based on prior research on work requirements (Hekman, Steensma, Bigley, & Hereford, 2009; Weaver, Trevino,

& Cochran, 1999; Yukl, Kim, & Chavez, 1999), we propose two situations when this is likely to happen: (1) when

they see a close association between fulfilling job requirements and their personal success in the organization (i.e.,

high perceived performance-reward expectancy) or (2) when they agree with the content of the innovation require-

ment in terms of its value for the organization (i.e., high perceived value for the organization). Perceived

performance-reward expectancy reflects a calculative self-interested perpspective, and perceived value for the orga-

nization reflects a normative value-based perspective, in understanding how employees interpret work requirements

(Greer & Downey, 1982; Tyler & Blader, 2005). We theorize and test if these conditions help them interpret the

innovation job requirement as important to follow.

This study makes several contributions to the innovation literature. First, building on the sensemaking perspec-

tive, our study theorizes and reveals the conditions under which perceived innovation job requirement is interpreted

as desirable via the sensemaking process and hence positively related to employee innovative behavior, an area that

we currently know little about. By doing so, our study also answers the call to identify contingency conditions for

the effect of innovation requirement (Shalley, 2008; Yuan & Woodman, 2010) and provides a plausible explanation

for the mixed results from previous studies.

Second, to our knowledge, this is the first attempt to investigate individual “trait-like”intrinsic interest in innova-

tion as a moderator for the effect of perceived innovation job requirement. As such, this study not only builds on but

also extends the sensemaking perspective by revealing how an extrinsic factor and a dispositional intrinsic interest

interact to influence employees’sensemaking processes with regard to innovation requirement and innovative

behavior. Prior theoretical work formulating the sensemaking perspective did not make this explicit theoretical

argument that employees’individual differences in intrinsic interest interact with external innovation requirement

to influence their making sense of engaging in innovative behavior.

Third, our study extends the interactionist perspective of individual innovation and creativity (Shalley,

Zhou, & Oldham, 2004; Woodman, Sawyer, & Griffin, 1993) by suggesting that the interaction between a sit-

uation factor and a person factor may be further shaped by an individual’s sensemaking and interpretations of

the situation factor. Examining these interpretations, from the sensemaking point of view, provides an in-depth

approach to understand person-situation interactions related to employee innovative behavior.

PERCEIVED INNOVATION JOB REQUIREMENT 69

Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. J. Organiz. Behav. 38,68–86 (2017)

DOI: 10.1002/job