Journal
LEADERSHIP QUARTERLY
Volume 29, Issue 3, Pages 389-402Publisher
ELSEVIER SCIENCE INC
DOI: 10.1016/j.leaqua.2017.09.002
Keywords
Employee voice; Leadership; Social identity; Language; Intergroup context
Categories
Funding
- Swiss National Science Foundation [100014_138545/1]
- Swiss National Science Foundation (SNF) [100014_138545] Funding Source: Swiss National Science Foundation (SNF)
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Although it is known that leaders can have a strong impact on whether employees voice work-related ideas or concerns, no research has investigated the impact of leader language on voice-particularly in professionally diverse contexts. Based on a social identity approach as well as on collectivistic leadership theories, we distinguish between implicit (i.e., First-Person Plural pronouns) and explicit (i.e., invitations and appreciations) inclusive leader language and test its effects on voice in multi-professional teams. We hypothesized that implicit inclusive leader language promotes voice especially among team members sharing the same professional group membership as the leader (in-group team members) while explicit inclusive leader language promotes voice especially among team members belonging to a different professional group (out-group team members). These hypotheses were tested in a field setting in which 126 health care professionals (i.e., nurses, resident and attending physicians), organized in 26 teams, managed medical emergencies. Behavioral coding and leader language analyses supported our hypotheses: Leaders' WE-references were more strongly related to residents' (in-group) and explicit invitations related more strongly to nurses' (out-group) voice behavior. We discuss how inclusive leader language promotes employee voice and explain why group membership functions as an important moderator in professionally diverse teams.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available