Green Transformational Leadership and Team Green Behavior:An Indigenous Study from the Perspective of Social Cognitive Theory

min-hui TANG Jian PENG

Journal of Psychological Science ›› 2019, Vol. 42 ›› Issue (6) : 1478-1484.

PDF(750 KB)
PDF(750 KB)
Journal of Psychological Science ›› 2019, Vol. 42 ›› Issue (6) : 1478-1484.

Green Transformational Leadership and Team Green Behavior:An Indigenous Study from the Perspective of Social Cognitive Theory

  • min-hui TANG1,Jian PENG2
Author information +
History +

Abstract

Faced with the increasing environmental pollution, the society has called organizations to take the environmental responsibility and to adopt green management practice. Since leaders are always regarded as the monitors of organizational activities, scholars has gradually recognized the crucial role that the leaders play in organizations’ green management, i.e., encouraging members to strive for the green goals. Hence, the concept of green transformational leadership emerged in recent years. Green transformation leadership refers to that leaders motivate followers to strive for the organizational green vision and encourage followers to achieve green performance beyond the expectation. To date, green transformational leadership has been found to facilitate followers’ green behavior, which refers to a kind of behavior that contributes to the sustainable development of the environment in the workplace. Although prior studies contribute to our understanding of the function of green transformational leadership, we still know little about the team level consequence of green transformational leadership. Nowadays, many organizations have adopted the team structure consisting of various human resources to respond to the rapidly changing market. Under this background, it is necessity to explore the effect of green transformational leadership on team green behavior. Besides, to help us gain a more comprehensive understanding of the consequences of green transformational leadership, we also aim to reveal the underlying mechanism and boundary condition of the relationship between green transformational leadership and team green behavior. Specifically, we draw on social cognitive theory and propose the mediating role of team green self-efficacy and the moderating role of team collectivism climate. Overall, this study put forward a moderated mediation model wherein green transformational leadership exert strong positive effects on team green behavior through green self-efficacy when team has a high level of collectivism climate. To test out theoretical model, we surveyed 121 work teams in manufacture industry and get 104 effective responses. The results of regression analysis showed that: (1) green transformational leadership was positively related to team green behavior; (2) team green self-efficacy mediated the relationship between green transformational leadership and team green behavior; (3) team collectivism climate moderated the positive relationship between team green self-efficacy and team green behavior, such that green self-efficacy predicted green behavior more strongly under the condition of high collectivism climate; (4) team collectivism climate moderated the indirect effect of green transformational leadership on team green behavior through the mediating role green self-efficacy, such that green transformational leadership have stronger effect on team green behavior via green self-efficacy under the condition of high collectivism climate. This study contributes to the literature in several aspects. First, this study expands our knowledge about the consequences of green transformational leadership by shifting the focus from individual green behavior to team green behavior. Second, this study responds to the call for team studies in green management literature and contributes to the literature through identifying green transformational leadership as a facilitator of team green behavior. Third, this study serves as a complementary to the prior literature by revealing the mediating mechanism (i. e., green self-efficacy) and the boundary condition (i.e., collectivism climate). Finally, our results provide some insights for practitioners with regard to promoting workplace green behavior, such as developing leaders’ green leadership and enhancing members’ confidence about their green ability.

Cite this article

Download Citations
min-hui TANG Jian PENG. Green Transformational Leadership and Team Green Behavior:An Indigenous Study from the Perspective of Social Cognitive Theory[J]. Journal of Psychological Science. 2019, 42(6): 1478-1484
PDF(750 KB)

Accesses

Citation

Detail

Sections
Recommended

/