Management Characteristics as Determinants of Employee Creativity: The Mediating Role of Employee Job Satisfaction

Abstract

Purpose/Research Question: Managers of organizations play a significant role in promoting sustainability by enhancing employee job satisfaction and employee creativity. Despite the number of studies on employee job satisfaction, much remains unknown regarding the mediating role of employee job satisfaction in the relationship between management characteristics (such as supervisor humility and abusive supervision) and employee creativity. Thus, the purpose of this study is to investigate how the links between supervisor humility, abusive supervision, and employee creativity are mediated by employee job satisfaction. Design/Methodology: We collected data from 352 highly skilled employees of manufacturing organizations in the Republic of Korea by conducting an online survey. A structural equation modeling procedure was used to evaluate the validity of the proposed hypotheses. Findings/Results: The results demonstrated that supervisor humility is positively related to employee job satisfaction, while abusive supervision is negatively related to employee job satisfaction. The findings also indicated that employee job satisfaction mediates the relationships between supervisor humility, abusive supervision, and employee creativity. Originality/Value: This work is the first to evaluate employee job satisfaction as a mediator of the link between characteristics of management (such as supervisor humility and abusive supervision) and employee creativity.