Dynamic perspective of leader-member exchange and empowerment-enhancing practices in organizational change

Research demonstrates that leadership influences employees’ reaction to organizational change. Recognizing the dynamic nature of change, we investigate the effect of leadership as a relational job aspect before change and over time during change. As leadership in change situations does not happen isolated but is embedded in an organizational context, we examine in addition an organizational job aspect: empowerment-enhancing practices. Mediation analysis of a two-wave study before and after an organizational relocation (NT1=276; NT2=104) reveals unique effects of the indirect relationships: Pre-change relational job aspects increase turnover intention in organizational change, mediated by job satisfaction; and pre-change organizational job aspects reduce turnover intention in organizational change. Furthermore, adjustment in job aspects during change reduce the adjustments of outcomes during organizational change. Practical implications are discussed.