Despite extensive research on leadership’s role in influencing employee outcomes, there is limited understanding of the specific impact of entrepreneurial leadership on employees’ innovative behavior. Little is known about how entrepreneurial leadership enhances employee work passion, which in turn influences employees’ innovative behavior. Additionally, the potential moderating role of growth need strength in this relationship has been under-explored, leaving a gap in understanding how interactions between leaders may further shape these outcomes. Based on affective events theory, this study examined how entrepreneurial leadership affects employees’ innovative behavior through the mediating role of employee work passion and the moderating role of growth need strength. The consistent PLS-SEM approach was applied to analyze valid data from 354 employees from 20 enterprises. The empirical results reveal that: (1) There is a positive effect of entrepreneurial leadership on employees’ passion for work. (2) Work passion partially mediates the positive relationship between entrepreneurial leadership and employees’ innovative behavior. In other words, entrepreneurial leadership positively impacts employees’ innovative behavior through work passion. (3) Growth need strength plays a positive moderating role between entrepreneurial leadership and work passion. It also moderates the mediating effect of work passion on the relationship between entrepreneurial leadership and employees’ innovative behavior. When employees have a high level of growth need strength, entrepreneurial leadership can promote employees’ innovative behaviors through work passion; on the contrary, it cannot do so when employees have a low level of growth need strength. The results of the study reveal the mechanisms and boundary conditions of entrepreneurial leadership that affect employees’ innovative behavior, which provides theoretical insights and practical guidance for enterprises to enhance innovative behavior in complex situations. This research further adds to the existing pool of knowledge that holds implications for organizations, top management, researchers, and government concerning entrepreneurial leadership, employees’ innovative behavior, work passion, growth need strength, and preparation for challenges in the future.
Xu et al. (Fri,) studied this question.