Followership practices as determinants of national innovativeness: a study across 56 cultures

Abstract

Purpose

There is a dearth of literature on what are the factors in terms of leaders’ and followers’ characteristics that impact innovation at the country level. The purpose of this paper is to build theoretical argument and provide empirical evidence of these factors using a cross-cultural mode of study across 56 nations.

Design/methodology/approach

The Bayesian modelling technique is used on data from the GLOBE survey.

Findings

Innovation at the individual, team and organisational levels has generally been associated with the relationship-motivated leadership, as opposed to task-motivated leadership. This study confirms that this premise holds at the societal level of analysis as well. The second finding is that in terms of followers’ cultural characteristics, out of three variables (power distance, collectivism and performance orientation) tested, only power distance orientation is found to have a predictive relationship with aggregate innovation. The moderator slope analysis unveils a nuanced understanding of how the interaction between leadership styles and followers’ cultural traits impact national innovativeness.

Research limitations/implications

Culture and leadership configurations that bolster innovation need to be studied more thoroughly.

Practical implications

This study has implications for multi-country teams involved in research and development activities.

Originality/value

To our knowledge, this is the first study to unpack leader−follower relationships as predictors of national innovation. A leadership-culture fit perspective is advanced.

Citation

Das, R. (2021), "Followership practices as determinants of national innovativeness: a study across 56 cultures", Leadership & Organization Development Journal, Vol. 42 No. 8, pp. 1282-1294. https://doi.org/10.1108/LODJ-05-2021-0240