Abusive supervision and employee creativity: a moderated mediation model

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine the harmful effect of abusive supervision on employee creativity through feedback-seeking behavior (FSB) and the moderation of this mediation by proactive personality.Design/methodology/approachThis study conducted hierarchical regression and path analysis to analyze the 341 manager–employee dyads data gathered from 11 companies in China.FindingsThe results reveal that abusive supervision had a detrimental effect on employee creativity partially mediated by employee FSB, and employees' proactive personality moderated the mediation.Research limitations/implicationsAlthough the findings of this research are based on multiple sources data, it is hard to draw causal inferences because the nature of the data is cross-sectional.Practical implicationsOrganizations should be aware of the deleterious effect of abusive supervision on employee creativity and should seek to inhibit supervisors' abusive behavior in the workplace.Originality/valueThis study re-examines the relationship between abusive supervision and employee creativity in the Chinese context from the social exchange perspective. The mediating role of FSB and the moderating role of proactive personality offer new insights in-to the mechanisms and boundary conditions associated with the relationship between abusive supervision and employee creativity.