Innovative work behaviors, employee engagement, and surface acting: A delineation of supervisor-employee emotional contagion effects
ISSN: 0025-1747
Article publication date: 21 March 2019
Issue publication date: 30 October 2019
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore the relationship between positive and negative emotional contagion by supervisors and innovative behavior by employees in the marketing department at China Mobile, as well as investigating the mediating roles of work engagement and surface acting in this path.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors analyzed emotional contagion on innovative behavior and investigated the mediation effect of work engagement and surface acting, and used structural equation modeling to test the hypotheses. Subjects in this study comprised 263 dyads of supervisors and employees (131 supervisors and 263 employees) in the marketing department at China Mobile.
Findings
The results indicated that positive emotions by employees mediated the positive effect of supervisors’ expression of positive emotions about employees’ work engagement; work engagement mediated the positive effect of employees’ positive emotions on their innovative behavior; and employees’ negative emotions mediated and did not significantly mediate the effect of supervisors’ negative emotions on employees’ surface acting and innovative behavior, respectively.
Research limitations/implications
This study recommends that future studies examine emotional labor by team members and investigate the types of mechanisms (such as psychological safety and team learning) adopted by such teams to increase their members’ levels of emotional contagion.
Practical implications
The authors recommend that enterprises implement courses that are relevant to emotional management for supervisors to enhance their ability to regulate and manage their own emotions. The authors also suggest that organizations offer adequate job resources to employees to inspire work engagement among employees.
Originality/value
This study explored the role of work engagement among employees, which serves as a motivational mechanism between positive emotional labor by supervisors and innovative behavior by employees. In addition, it investigated the role of surface acting by employees, which serves as an energetic mechanism between negative emotional labor by supervisors and innovative behavior by employees.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The authors are grateful for the valuable comments made by the reviewers. This research was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 71702059) and Social Science and Humanity on Young Fund of the Ministry of Education (No. 16YJC630136).
Citation
Wu, T.-J. and Wu, Y.J. (2019), "Innovative work behaviors, employee engagement, and surface acting: A delineation of supervisor-employee emotional contagion effects", Management Decision, Vol. 57 No. 11, pp. 3200-3216. https://doi.org/10.1108/MD-02-2018-0196
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2019, Emerald Publishing Limited