Empowering leadership and job crafting: the moderating role of regulatory profiles

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the independent and joint effects of regulatory focus (promotion and prevention) on the relationship between empowering leadership and job crafting. Methodology – An online survey was completed by 145 white collar employees from seven knowledge-intensive organisations. In addition to the main effects, two- and three-way interactions were conducted to test hypotheses. Results - Findings from this study showed that each of the regulatory profiles relate differently to each dimension of job crafting, based on the availability of empowering leadership, and that empowering leadership is especially beneficial to individuals with high promotion and prevention foci, stimulating crafting behaviours aimed at increasing scope of responsibilities and decreasing of stressful interpersonal connections. Moreover, individuals with a high promotion-high prevention profile display susceptibility to resource availability in relation to behaviours aimed at increasing work complexity and scope of responsibilities. Discussion/Practical Implications – The development and demonstration of employee job crafting are contingent not only on the provision of resources, but also on psychological processes, particularly with respect to regulatory focus. Organisations will encourage and develop job crafting behaviour to the extent that they provide workplace resources and stimulate both promotion and prevention perspectives on resource utilisation. Theoretical Contributions - This study adds to limited research examining the interaction between promotion and prevention, and to assess the role of regulatory foci profiles in workplace factors