Changing towards a Sustainable Future How to be successful in today’s contemporary business environment?
Summary
To be successful in today’s contemporary business environment, the development of a flexible and innovative workforce, in which employees show Change-Oriented Organizational Citizenship Behavior (CO-OCB), is crucial. Thus, the main purpose of this study was to contribute to the existing knowledge about what drives employees to show CO-OCB. Literature review has shown that the two main organizational antecedents of CO-OCB are Transformational Leadership (TL) and Learning Organization (LO), with leaders inspiring employees to engage in innovative behavior and a culture that embraces this. Through a cross-sectional study, it was examined whether TL was directly related to CO-OCB. Furthermore, the indirect effect of TL on CO-OCB through LO was studied, with LO functioning as a mediator. Using an online questionnaire, data were collected from 176 working adults in The Netherlands. No direct relationship was found between TL and CO-OCB, but mediation analysis showed an indirect relationship between TL and CO-OCB, with LO functioning as a mediator. This finding was interesting since it explained why no direct relationship between TL and CO-OCB was found by showing that LO is multifaceted; connecting TL, focusing on the unity of the group, with COOCB, challenging colleagues to continuously improve. As the first study to use LO as a mediator in the relationship between TL and CO-OCB, the results are promising and create a starting point for future research. Besides that, the present study provides knowledge that could help managers and consultants to make organizations more sustainable. Future research should aim to replicate the present findings, study the influence of individual differences on CO-OCB, discover other important mediating factors in the relationships between TL and CO-OCB, and look into the consequences of CO-OCB.