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CEO environmentally specific transformational leadership and firm proactive environmental strategy: roles of TMT green commitment and regulative pressure

Chen Yang (School of Management, Chongqing University of Technology, Chongqing, China)
Lu Zhang (The School of Business Administration, Guizhou University of Finance and Economics, Guiyang, China)

Personnel Review

ISSN: 0048-3486

Article publication date: 20 September 2022

Issue publication date: 9 November 2023

332

Abstract

Purpose

This research aims to focus on the environmentally specific transformational leadership (ETFL) of a chief executive officer (CEO) and aims to examine the effect of CEOs' ETFL on firm's proactive environmental strategies (PESs), by indicating the top management team's (TMT) green commitment as a mediator and regulative pressure as a moderator to understand the relation.

Design/methodology/approach

This study used multisource data from 170 small-to medium-sized manufacturing firms in China.

Findings

The results indicated that CEOs' ETFL was positively related to the TMT's green commitment, which, in turn, enhanced the firm's PESs. Moreover, regulative pressure strengthened the direct effect of CEOs' ETFL on their TMTs' green commitment and the indirect effect of CEOs' ETFL on the firm's PESs via TMTs' green commitment.

Originality/value

The tested importance of regulative pressure as an external condition that strengthens the effectiveness of CEOs' ETFL offers new theoretical insights to advance the literature on PESs.

Keywords

Acknowledgements

This research was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 71902015), the Social Science Planning Project of Chongqing (Grant No. 2019QNGL24), the Humanities and Social Sciences Research Planning Project of Chongqing Municipal Education Commission in 2019 (Grant No. 19SKGH136), the Qiankehe platform talents' project, Guizhou University of Finance and Economics (Grant No. [2018]5774-035), and the Sichuan Federation of Social Science Associations for funding this research project under Grants [Grant No. SC21ZD010].

Citation

Yang, C. and Zhang, L. (2023), "CEO environmentally specific transformational leadership and firm proactive environmental strategy: roles of TMT green commitment and regulative pressure", Personnel Review, Vol. 52 No. 9, pp. 2363-2374. https://doi.org/10.1108/PR-02-2021-0114

Publisher

:

Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2022, Emerald Publishing Limited

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