TY - JOUR
T1 - What are the career implications of "seeing eye to eye"?
T2 - Examining the role of leader-member exchange (LMX) agreement on employability and career outcomes
AU - Epitropaki, Olga
AU - Marstand, Anders Friis
AU - Van der Heijden, Beatrice
AU - Bozionelos, Nikos
AU - Mylonopoulos, Nikolaos
AU - Van der Heijde, Claudia
AU - Scholarios, Dora
AU - Mikkelsen, Aslaug
AU - Marzec, Izabela
AU - Jedrzejowicz, Piotr
PY - 2021
Y1 - 2021
N2 - Are there career benefits to leaders and followers agreeing about the quality of their leader–member exchange (LMX) relationship? Is LMX disagreement always detrimental for a follower's career? Can the examination of LMX agreement as a substantive variable help us cast new light on some of the inconclusive findings of past research on LMX and career outcomes? These questions motivate our research. Using theories of social exchange and sponsorship, and responses from 967 leader–follower dyads of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) professionals in seven European countries, we examined the role of LMX agreement on subjective and objective career outcomes. After conducting polynomial regression combined with response surface analysis, we found that both follower-rated and leader-rated employability were higher when the leader agreed with the follower at a high level of LMX (vs. a low level of LMX). In case of disagreement, strong support was found for leader-rated employability being higher when the leader's perceptions of LMX exceeded those of their follower. Furthermore, follower-rated employability was found to mediate the relationship between LMX (dis)agreement and perceived career success, promotions, salary, and bonuses. Support was also found for the mediating role of leader-rated employability in the case of perceived career success, promotions, and salary but not for bonuses. Our findings highlight the importance of LMX (dis)agreement for career outcomes and further point to the possibility of employability offering an alternative explanation for the mixed findings of past LMX–career research.
AB - Are there career benefits to leaders and followers agreeing about the quality of their leader–member exchange (LMX) relationship? Is LMX disagreement always detrimental for a follower's career? Can the examination of LMX agreement as a substantive variable help us cast new light on some of the inconclusive findings of past research on LMX and career outcomes? These questions motivate our research. Using theories of social exchange and sponsorship, and responses from 967 leader–follower dyads of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) professionals in seven European countries, we examined the role of LMX agreement on subjective and objective career outcomes. After conducting polynomial regression combined with response surface analysis, we found that both follower-rated and leader-rated employability were higher when the leader agreed with the follower at a high level of LMX (vs. a low level of LMX). In case of disagreement, strong support was found for leader-rated employability being higher when the leader's perceptions of LMX exceeded those of their follower. Furthermore, follower-rated employability was found to mediate the relationship between LMX (dis)agreement and perceived career success, promotions, salary, and bonuses. Support was also found for the mediating role of leader-rated employability in the case of perceived career success, promotions, and salary but not for bonuses. Our findings highlight the importance of LMX (dis)agreement for career outcomes and further point to the possibility of employability offering an alternative explanation for the mixed findings of past LMX–career research.
KW - Career outcomes
KW - Employability
KW - Leader–
KW - Member exchange agreement
KW - leader–member exchange agreement
KW - employability
KW - career outcomes
UR - https://www.webofscience.com/api/gateway?GWVersion=2&SrcApp=wos-integration-pure&SrcAuth=WosAPI&KeyUT=WOS:000589919300001&DestLinkType=FullRecord&DestApp=WOS
U2 - 10.1111/peps.12432
DO - 10.1111/peps.12432
M3 - Article
SN - 0031-5826
VL - 74
SP - 799
EP - 830
JO - Personnel Psychology
JF - Personnel Psychology
IS - 4
ER -