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Building on social informational processing theory, the purpose of this paper is to develop and test a theoretical model of moderated mediation in which social loafing tendency serves as an intervening mechanism that explains associations among two dimensions of leader–member relationships (formal and informal relationships, namely, leader–member exchange and leader–member guanxi) and customer service performance.

The authors designed a field study to test the hypotheses presented in this paper. A survey of 304 supervisor–employee pairs and matched customers generally provide support for this model.

The authors found that social loafing tendency played a mediating role between leader–member relationships and customer service performance. Co-worker service-oriented OCB moderated the positive relationship between leader–member guanxi and loafing tendency.

More samples should be collected from both private and state-owned company. Both the informal and formal leader–member relationships should be unanimously included in examining how the leader–member relationships influence focal employee’s attitude and behavior, particularly in societies where the informal relationship plays noticeable role.

Managers should properly deal with formal and informal relationship with subordinates.

The influence of leader–member guanxi on employees and organization is controversial in extant literature. In some sense, this finding contributes to extant literature by further clarifying the influence of guanxi on the focal employee’s performance.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the underlying process of a relative leader–member dyadic communication behavior linking association between ethical leadership and organizational identification in Malaysia’s diverse workplace.

Based on relational dyadic communication, social comparison and social identity theories, the authors develop a mediation model. The model illustrates the link between the relative leader–member dyadic communication behavior processes, ethical leadership and organizational identification. The model was tested on a sample of 273 group members from 58 groups working in large government link corporations in Malaysia.

Results of hierarchical regression analysis provide support for the model. The authors found that ethical leadership was positively related to relative leader–member dyadic communication behavior based on the norms and values of budi context. Budi is a social norm in the Malaysian context that helps employees to know how they should interact with others. Budi is manifested through the use of language and should be used or present in the interactions or conversations with others.

The relative shared norms and values of budi mediate the relationship between ethical leadership and organizational identification after controlling for the perception of individual leader–member dyadic communication behavior on norms and values of budi.

This chapter examines how leader–member dyadic communication in the Malaysian workplace operates at the leader–member dyadic level in the context of cultural norms. We propose a model of leader–member dyadic communication based on the cultural norms of budi bicara, which in turn influences the perception of workplace mentoring in Malaysia. The model is tested by using hierarchical multiple regression with data obtained from a sample of 510 employees in three Malaysian organizations. Results show that leader–member dyadic communication in the workplace is linked with the career mentoring perceptions. These findings partially validate our proposed model and provide empirical support for the central roles of communication exchange processes in mentoring.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between the styles of conflict management and the quality of dyadic exchanges between leader and follower, controlling for age, gender, education, and organizational tenure.

The methodology was quantitative and incorporated the Rahim Organizational Conflict Inventory‐II and Leader‐Member Exchange Version 7 survey instruments.

There were significant findings with respect to quality of dyadic relationship and use of conflict management styles. The lower the dyadic relationship quality, the more moderating styles are introduced into the relationship.

The limitations of the study were: participants were selected by the vice president of human resources for this international company and were limited to current US employees; the study was limited to one company, thereby limiting the ability to generalize study findings; and the study focused on correlational data, and made no attempt to address the cause and effect issues related to conflict, conflict management, leader‐member exchange, or leadership.

The value of this study is its original contribution to the research literature, as no previous studies which incorporated both conflict management and leader‐follower relationship quality could be found during the exhaustive literature review.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how leader–member exchange relates to subordinate’s innovative work behavior through core self-evaluation (CSE), domain knowledge and creative process engagement. On the basis of an interactional approach, this study hypothesized that there is an interaction between leader–member exchange, CSE and domain knowledge that affects innovative work behavior, such that leader–member exchange has the strongest positive relationship with innovative work behavior when subordinates have high levels of CSE and domain knowledge; and creative process engagement mediates the effect that this three-way interaction between leader–member exchange, CSE and domain knowledge has on innovative work behavior.

Data were collected from 323 employees and their immediate supervisors (121) from automotive industry. First, subordinates completed measures of their leader–member exchange, CSE and domain knowledge. Then, the supervisors of these employees assessed their subordinates’ innovative work behavior.

The results showed that leader–member exchange, CSE and domain knowledge interacted to affect employee innovative work behavior in such a way that when CSE and domain knowledge were both high, leader–member exchange had the strongest positive relationship with innovative work behavior and creative process engagement mediated this relationship.

This study is the first of its kind to empirically examine the interactional perspective of leader–member exchange on innovative work behavior through domain knowledge, CSE and creative process engagement. Theoretical and practical implications and future area of research are discussed at the end.

The purpose of this paper is to explore whether surface-level actual similarity interacts with leader-member dyadic communication agreement in predicting group member performance ratings at earlier time periods in a work group’s development. Additionally, this research examines whether deep-level perceived similarity interacts with leader-member dyadic communication agreement in predicting group member performance ratings at later time periods in a work group’s development. The relationship between shared cultural context and perceived and actual similarity is also investigated.

This research analyzes longitudinal data from the study questionnaires at five occasions in a Malaysian organization.

Results based on a sample of 28 group projects and 141 matching dyad who completed the study questionnaires at 5 occasions reveal that there is no interaction between workgroup relational ethnicity and workgroup relational gender with leader-member dyadic agreement at early time periods in a workgroup’s development. Therefore, H1 is not supported. H2 posited that deep-level perceived similarity will interact with leader-member dyadic communication agreement in predicting group member performance ratings at later time periods in a workgroup’s development. H2 is supported. Results reveal that the interaction between leader-member dyadic communication agreement and perceived similarity explains 36 percent of the variance of perceived group members’ performance ratings. This is after accounting for the control variable and the independent variables. From a cultural standpoint, the findings in this study underscore that conversations based on the Malaysian cultural norm of “budi” reflect not only a cultural basis of communication, but also that this shared cultural context leads to perceived similarity between ethnic Malay, Chinese, and Indians, and also both genders in the Malaysian workplace.

Leader-member dyadic communication agreement reflects the social appropriateness and relationship quality between individuals, as well as the context of the leader-member workgroup interactions. The findings of this study underscore the premise that conversations reflect not only a cultural basis of communication, but also that shared cultural context leads to perceived similarity. This study specifically examines the role of ethnicity in Malaysia organizational workgroup (e.g. ethnic Malay, Chinese Malay, and Indian Malay) as well as gender.

This study systematically examines the influence of actual and perceived similarity in leader-member dyadic communication from a longitudinal and multilevel standpoint.

Leader-member exchange (LMX) generally refers to the leadership process centered on the interactions between leaders and direct reports. The basic premise of high quality leader-member exchange relationships holds that direct reports gain tremendous benefits through these partnerships. LMX is perhaps the most commonly researched theory of leadership. However, few studies have specifically examined the role of dyad members’ sex as a predictor of quality LMX. Several studies investigating the role of dyad members’ sex and quality LMX examined the effect of sex in an aggregated variable, demographic similarity, which often included other demographic characteristics such as age, education level and race, yielding mixed results. This article’s purpose is to (a) review the evolution of leader-member exchange theory, (b) examine literature regarding potential effects of sex of dyad members on quality leader-member exchanges, and (c) discuss implications and future research concerning the role of dyad members’ sex and leader-member exchanges.

While technological advances have been changing the way that services are delivered to customers, direct interaction between banks’ front-line staff and customers still holds its distinct position in the banking sector. This research investigates the relationship between interactional justice and the willingness of commercial banks’ front-line staff to engage in customer-centric behaviors, as well as the mediators behind this relationship.

This research combined both qualitative and quantitative research methods. In-depth interviews were employed to explore the potential mechanisms underlying the relationship between interactional justice and customer-centric behavior and to develop the specific measurement scale for customer-centric behavior in the banking service context. A survey was conducted to test the conceptual model using a sample of 312 customer contact employees working in Vietnamese commercial banks.

The research results indicate that interactional justice significantly enhances employees’ willingness to engage in customer-centric behaviors, and this relationship is partially mediated by overall job satisfaction and the leader-member exchange relationship.

This research faces several limitations. The first limitation concerns the fact that the data are based on self-reports, which might lead to common method biases. Second, this study used a sample drawn from the North of Vietnam only. Third, this study adopted a limited set of measurement items due to the concerns of model parsimony and data collection efficiency. Fourth, we followed prior justice work to assume the linear relationship between interactional justice and leader-member exchange, in which the leader-member exchange is hypothesized to be the outcome of fair treatment (Erdogan and Liden, 2006; Masterson et al., 2000). Last, we only considered how leaders treat their followers through the lens of interactional justice, while interactional justice differentiation has also been affirmed as a crucial determinant of leader-member exchange and employees’ performance.

This research is noteworthy that it is the first to take a social exchange perspective to examine customer-oriented behavior as an outcome of interpersonal interactions in the workplace. Accordingly, it delivers a key message to bank supervisors: “Treat employees the way you want your customers to be treated.”

As organizations increasingly rely on teams to provide high levels of customer service, one's understanding and research methods related to teams must expand so that multiple hierarchical levels of an organization are analyzed effectively. This study aims to propose and test a model examining multi‐level team relationships.

Survey data from customer contact teams in a banking setting were analyzed using hierarchical linear modeling (HLM), a method appropriate for investigating individual and group level variables within an organization.

Results indicate that team‐member exchange, a group‐level variable, is positively associated with employee performance and organizational citizenship behavior (OCB), and explained variance in outcomes above and beyond that explained by the individual‐level relationship between the supervisor and subordinate.

Analyzing both individual‐ and group‐level variables through HLM explicates team processes and outcomes. While this study examines the banking environment, certainly, teams are an area fertile for additional study in a variety of industries.

The results provide support for the importance of team development and training as organizations increasingly use teams to provide critical customer service. Attention to the employee‐manager relationship and team member interactions will improve performance.

The paper extends understanding of important team member outcomes in an environment that increasingly relies upon teamwork to serve customers. It examines team‐member exchange and its effects on employee performance and OCB in the context of customer contact teams. Additionally, investigates leader‐member exchange in the context of team‐member exchange, a relationship that provides a more robust understanding of team processes.

Drawing on engagement theory, this study aims to examine how leader–member relationships, including on-work relationship (leader–member exchange [LMX]) and off-work relationship (leader–member guanxi [LMG]), influence employees’ promotive and prohibitive voice. Furthermore, the study uses procedural justice as the moderator to distinguish the effects of LMG and LMX on employees’ psychological states and voice through a mediated moderation model.

The authors use a sample from a private and local company in Southern China to test their theoretical model.

The study finds that both LMG and LMX have positive effects on employees’ voice behavior through employees’ psychological states (psychological meaningfulness and psychological safety).

In a Chinese context, leaders have a more direct and powerful influence on employees than their counterparts in the Western society. Thus, the findings of LMX and LMG may not be generalizable to a Western context. A possible extension is to examine and compare the effects of social context (e.g., off-work leader–member relationship) on voice between the East and the West.

One important implication is that off-work relationship should be used by managers to encourage employee voice.

This study enriches the antecedents of voice with a new dimension of leader–member relationship, namely, LMG.