When Does Abusive Supervision Affect Job Performance Positively?

Abstract

Purpose

By combining the Job Demand–Resources model with Arnold’s action sequence as the overall logic, this study explores the connections between abusive supervision and job performance.

Participants and Methods

This study employed two-point surveys, with 474 valid responses, to reduce the risk of common method bias. On this basis, confirmatory factor analysis was used to test the reliability and validity of data, and Smart-PLS was used to test the hypotheses.

Results

Our findings suggest that abusive supervision has a significant positive impact on job performance. Furthermore, challenge stressors and innovative work behavior partially mediate the relationship between abusive supervision and job performance, and these two factors also form a chain mediating effect. Leader-member exchange moderates the relationship between abusive supervision and job performance, as higher levels of leader-member exchange are associated with a stronger positive effect of abusive supervision on job performance.

Practical Implications

This study provides insights to managers about the link between abusive supervision and employee performance. In addition, it recommends that leaders at all levels adopt abusive supervision when they can properly consider a specific employee’s perception of the reasons for their behavior and must consider the previous inclusion in the manager’s circle of members, as well as the link between the challenging pressures they face and innovative work behavior to deal with such management behaviors.

Originality

Most research on abusive management has focused on its negative effects on employee performance. This study, by contrast, explores whether there are positive impacts from abusive management and when such positive effects will occur.

Keywords:

• abusive supervision
• challenge stressors
• innovative work behavior
• leader-member exchange
• job performance

Acknowledgment

This research was supported by Hunan Key Laboratory of Macroeconomic Big Data Mining and its Application; Hunan Provincial Social Science Achievement Review Committee Project (No. XSP22YBC199); The Outstanding Young Project of Education Department of Hunan Province (No. 21B0051).

Disclosure

The authors report no conflicts of interest in this work.