Enough is enough! The impact of core self-evaluation on the relationship between despotic leadership and individual outcomes

Abstract

Recently, there has been a surge of studies on the dark side of leader behaviors. The current research builds around a newly emerging concept in this line of inquiry–despotic leadership. We add to the despotic leadership research by investigating: (1) How leaders’ despotic behaviors damage the supervisor-subordinate relationship and subsequent follower outcomes, and (2), More importantly, how subordinates’ trait disposition engenders differing reactions to leader despotism. Specifically, we investigate how employees’ core self-evaluation (CSE) engenders differing reactions to despotic leadership. In doing so, we draw on self-verification theory to predict that the negative impact of despotic leadership on subordinate outcomes becomes deteriorating further under the presence of high CSE. Our empirical analyses of 226 supervisor-subordinate dyads demonstrated that despotic leadership is negatively associated with leader-member exchange (LMX), thereby undermining subordinates’ task performance and knowledge sharing. Most conspicuously, the self-verification view of CSE regarding the despotism-outcome link indeed received strong support. Given that prior studies on the role of CSE have produced somewhat mixed results, we timely extended the current discourse by explicating why despotic leadership could potentially be more harmful to those individuals high on CSE.

Appendix

Despotic leadership (De Hoogh and Hartog 2008).

• 1. My immediate supervisor is punitive; has no pity or compassion.

• 2. My immediate supervisor is in charge and does not tolerate disagreement or questioning, gives orders.

• 3. My immediate supervisor acts like a tyrant or despot; imperious.

• 4. My immediate supervisor tends to be unwilling or unable to relinquish control of projects or tasks.

• 5. My immediate supervisor expects unquestioning obedience of those who report to him/her.

• 6. My immediate supervisor is vengeful; seeks revenge when wronged.

LMX (Scandura and Graen 1984).

• 1. My immediate supervisor understands my problems and needs.

• 2. My immediate supervisor recognizes my potential some but not enough. (R)

• 3. My immediate supervisor would personally use his/her power to help me solve my work problems.

• 4. I can count on my immediate supervisor to bail me out at his/her expense when I really need it.

• 5. I have enough confidence in my immediate supervisor to defend and justify my decisions when I am not present to do so.

• 6. My working relationship with my immediate supervisor is extremely effective.

• 7. I always know how satisfied my immediate supervisor is with what I do.

Core self-evaluation (Judge et al. 2003).

• 1. I am confident I get the success I deserve in life.

• 2. Sometimes I feel depressed. (R)

• 3. When I try, I generally succeed.

• 4. Sometimes when I fail I feel worthless. (R)

• 5. I complete tasks successfully.

• 6. Sometimes, I do not feel in control of my work. (R)

• 7. Overall, I am satisfied with myself.

• 8. I am filled with doubts about my competence. (R)

• 9. I determine what will happen in my life.

• 10. I do not feel in control of my success in my career. (R)

• 11. I am capable of coping with most of my problems.

• 12. There are times when things look pretty bleak and hopeless to me. (R)

Task performance (Williams and Anderson 1991).

• 1. This person performs tasks that are expected of him/her.

• 2. This person adequately completes assigned duties.

• 3. This person fulfills responsibilities specified in the job description.

• 4. This person meets formal performance requirements of the job.

• 5. This person engages in activities that will directly affect his/her performance evaluation.

• 6. This person neglects aspects of the job that he/she is obligated to perform. (R)

• 7. This person fails to perform essential duties. (R)

Knowledge sharing (Srivastava et al. 2006).

• 1. This person shares his/her special knowledge and expertise with others.

• 2. If this person has some special knowledge about how to perform the task, he/she is likely to tell others about it.

• 3. This person exchanges information, knowledge, and sharing of skills with other employees.

• 4. This person freely provides others with hard-to‐find knowledge or specialized skills.

• 5. This person helps others in developing relevant strategies.

• 6. This person shares a lot of information with other employees.

• 7. This person offers lots of suggestions to other employees.

Abusive supervision (Mitchell and Ambrose 2007).

• 1. My immediate supervisor ridicules me.

• 2. My immediate supervisor tells me my thoughts or feelings are stupid.

• 3. My immediate supervisor puts me down in front of others.

• 4. My immediate supervisor makes negative comments about me to others.

• 5. My immediate supervisor tells me I’m incompetent.