19803: Leader Perfectionism and Employee Attributed Motives (session 25813)

Leader perfectionism is a pervasive phenomenon that can shape employee behavior in profoundly different ways. This study investigates when and why leader perfectionism elicits two distinct behavioral strategies—self-improvement behavior and cheating—from employees. Drawing on the perspective of motive attribution, we theorize that leader perfectionism toward employees can simultaneously increase employees’ perceptions of the leader’s developmental motive, thereby promoting self-improvement behavior, and employees’ perceptions of the leader’s exploitative motive, thereby fostering cheating behavior. Furthermore, task significance serves as a critical contingency for these relationships, influencing employees’ perceptions and reactions to leader perfectionism in the two opposing ways. Based on a multi-source, multi-wave field survey study, we find empirical support for these predictions. By revealing the dual and seemingly opposing effects of leader perfectionism on employees, this research advances the understanding of how employees attribute and respond to leader perfectionism, offering new insights into its complex role in the workplace.

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