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In this study, the authors integrate the concept of leader support with a process model of innovation including the generation, promotion and implementation of innovative ideas to obtain an in-depth understanding of how leaders may support employees’ innovative efforts. The purpose of this paper is to develop an organizing framework and validate a measure for assessing leader support for innovation.

The authors validated the Leader Support for Innovation Questionnaire (LSIQ) in German and English using samples from Germany (n=1,049) and South Africa (n=129).

Although confirmatory factor analyses supported a three-factor model of the 12-item LSIQ (leader support for idea generation, promotion and implementation), strong intercorrelations between the factors provide only weak evidence for the three-factor structure. Positive correlations with individual and organizational innovation demonstrate adequate construct validity. The LSIQ explains additional variance in innovation beyond that explained by measures of transformational leadership and leader–member exchange.

The findings suggest that linking leader support and innovation more directly to one another matches the complexity of innovation processes. The LSIQ is a theory based and valid tool that enables more rigorous research on the role of leadership in facilitating innovation.

Previous studies using well-established leadership approaches have produced a considerable heterogeneity of findings on the relationship between leadership and innovation. Therefore, the authors introduce an integrative framework for defining and organizing leadership behaviors specifically supporting employees’ innovative efforts and validate a measure of leader support for innovation that may guide both theoretical developments and empirical research on the relationship between leadership and innovation in organizations.

Although nonwork mastery generates personal resources and improves employee well-being and performance, employees must invest personal resources to experience mastery during nonwork time. Drawing on conservation of resources theory and resource exchange perspectives, the purpose of this study is to examine the role of day-to-day provisions of affiliation resources by the leader in generating the personal resources necessary for employees to engage in nonwork mastery.

Daily diary data were collected from 198 employees (768 days). The proposed model was tested using Bayesian multilevel path analysis.

The results showed that on days when employees perceived that their leader provided more affiliation resources, they reported higher self-esteem and work engagement and, in turn, experienced higher levels of mastery. Furthermore, employees in high-quality (vs low-quality) leader–member exchange (LMX) relationships benefitted more from the affiliation resources provided by their leader in terms of work engagement.

The findings suggest that leaders can actively manage their employees' daily experience and functioning through seemingly ordinary demonstrations of warmth, care, and positive regard.

This study highlights the important role of leaders in improving employee daily work and nonwork experience and functioning and sheds light on the tangible resource provisions in the work context and the associated personal resources that account for daily variations in mastery. By distinguishing between daily affiliation resources and general perceptions of LMX relationship quality, this study contributes to a more nuanced understanding of the implications that resource provisions by the leader have for employees.

This study of leaders and followers working in day-care centers aims to use a multilevel perspective on supportive leadership to examine its role in linking workload at the leader level and emotional exhaustion at the follower level. Integrating theoretical work on social support with conservation of resources (COR) theory, leaders' workload is proposed to be positively related to followers' feelings of emotional exhaustion through constraining the enactment of supportive leadership.

Multisource survey data from 442 followers and their leaders from 68 teams were collected to test the hypotheses.

Multilevel analyses showed that leader workload was negatively related to followers' perception of supportive leadership, which, in turn, was positively related to followers' levels of emotional exhaustion. Leader workload was indirectly and positively related to follower emotional exhaustion via supportive leadership.

This study provides initial support for the idea that work contextual factors at the leader level create boundaries for the extent to which leaders may provide support to their followers and draws attention to the accountability of leaders' work contextual factors for followers' well-being.

The findings suggest that organizations must not focus narrowly on training leaders on how to benefit followers but should also aim to optimize leaders' levels of workload to enable them to act in a supportive manner.

By considering both the receivers (i.e. followers) and providers (i.e. leaders) of support simultaneously, we take a crossover approach to COR theory and acknowledge that work contextual factors at higher organizational levels may spread to employee well-being at lower levels of the organization.

Virtual influencers (VIs), who are fictional characters, have gained popularity in recent years, particularly among Generation Z and millennials. With the hype surrounding VIs, more research is required. Thus, this study aims to examine how Gen Z members and millennials react to VIs used for marketing purposes.

This study follows an exploratory approach. The data were collected from 29 participants (14 male and 15 female) through two focus groups and semi-structured interviews.

The authors found that opinions about VIs were mixed, and two main themes emerged from the study: (1) challenges and potential and (2) decision-making and psychological aspects.

This study broadens the paradigm for analysing the efficacy of VIs. This emerging topic is of relevance for the marketing sector as well as for transdisciplinary research and practice.