A Cross-Level Examination of the Process Linking Transformational Leadership and Creativity: The Role of Psychological Safety Climate

Abstract

Drawing on the social information process perspective, we hypothesized that transformational leadership fosters psychological safety climate leading to enhanced individual-level creative process engagement. Furthermore, psychological safety climate was hypothesized to strengthen the relationship between creative process engagement and employee creativity. The hypothesized model was tested with data obtained from a sample of 358 employees and their supervisors from two organizations in the People’s Republic of China. Results of hierarchical linear modeling analysis revealed that transformational leadership influenced creative process engagement via psychological safety climate. Furthermore, psychological safety climate moderated the creative process engagement–creativity relationship such that the relationship was stronger in groups with high rather than low psychological safety climate.