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Journal of Business Ethics

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27-01-2017 | Original Paper

The Curvilinear Relationship Between Ethical Leadership and Team Creativity: The Moderating Role of Team Faultlines

Authors: Shenjiang Mo, Chu-Ding Ling, Xiao-Yun Xie

Published in: Journal of Business Ethics | Issue 1/2019

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Abstract

In this study, we built and tested a theoretical model to determine how ethical leadership affects team creativity among teams composed of different characteristics. Following social learning theory and an antecedent–benefit–cost framework, we conducted analyses of multisource data from 50 team supervisors and 186 employees, which revealed an inverted U-shaped relationship between ethical leadership and team creativity. The teams exhibited more creativity when there was a moderate level of ethical leadership than when there were very low or very high levels. Moreover, from an interactional perspective, we found that team faultlines significantly moderated the curvilinear relationship between ethical leadership and team creativity such that the inverted U-shaped relationship was more significant among teams with weak team faultlines. The theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed.

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Title: The Curvilinear Relationship Between Ethical Leadership and Team Creativity: The Moderating Role of Team Faultlines
Authors: Shenjiang Mo
Chu-Ding Ling
Xiao-Yun Xie
Publication date: 27-01-2017
Publisher: Springer Netherlands
Published in: Journal of Business Ethics / Issue 1/2019
Print ISSN: 0167-4544
Electronic ISSN: 1573-0697
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-016-3430-1

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