Inclusive Leadership and Innovative Performance: A Multi-Level Mediation Model of Psychological Safety

Taking both individual and team levels into consideration has been called for years in terms of research on leadership. Inclusive leadership, a trending leadership style emerging from the global needs of managing the increasingly diversified workplace nowadays, has yet been rarely studied at both levels. To answer these calls, we specifically analyzed the relationship between inclusive leadership, team psychological safety, and innovative performance via a multilevel analysis. The results are based on a study of 356 employees from 90 working teams. Individual perceptions of inclusive leadership are positively related to the individual innovative performance through the mediation of individual psychological safety. Team perceptions of inclusive leadership are positively related to the team innovative performance through the mediation of team psychological safety. Moreover, team perceptions of inclusive leadership are positively related to the individual innovative performance through the cross-level mediation of individual psychological safety. Implications for both theory and practice are discussed.