Translating Transformational Leadership and Organizational Innovativeness Into Creative Customer Behavior: Underlying Processes and Boundary Conditions

Abstract

This study investigates the mediating roles of customer engagement and customer depletion as well as the moderating role of an innovative climate on the relationship between organizational innovativeness generated from transformational leadership and creative customer behavior in the hospitality industry. A multilevel path analysis is conducted using a data set comprising 62 managers, 269 employees, and 681 customers from a South Korean restaurant chain. The findings show that transformational leadership in restaurants increases organizational innovativeness, which indirectly influences creative customer behavior through customer engagement and depletion. An innovative climate also moderates these causal relationships. This study integrates the service-dominant logic framework into research on innovation and creativity to better understand the role and impact of customers in cultivating innovation and creativity.