True north of servant leadership promoting innovative behavior

Abstract

Undoubtedly, leadership is essential in promoting the innovative behaviors of its leading members. Yet, there are two significant gap-findings from traditional Servant Leadership research in terms of (1) not focusing on followers’ viewpoints (e.g., the meaningfulness of work) and (2) the absence of leadership association with other leadership types (e.g., Authentic Leadership). First, little attention was given to the followers’ meaningfulness of work and sense-making based on their viewpoints on adapting Servant Leadership. From the context-attitude-behavior framework, this research delves into the sequential mediating effect of employees’ meaningfulness of work and intrinsic motivation on the overall link initiated from Servant Leadership to Innovative Behavior. Moreover, no leadership type works alone without any sense of association with other types of leadership. Especially for Servant Leadership, authenticity is crucial since fake leadership merely aimed at impression management will quickly fade away among employees. Therefore, moderated by Authentic Leadership, this research also focuses on the associated leadership effect that enhances the influence of Servant Leadership on Innovative Behavior, ultimately showing that different leadership types can coexist and interact.