Abstract

Previous researches on emotional labor have shown that the display of required emotions has an effect on the performances of the employees. How individual employees respond to customers and adjust their emotions accordingly can be considered a demonstration of innovative behavior. However, there exists limited prior literature examining how emotional labor influences an employee’s innovative behavior. Collecting cross-level data from male truck drivers employed by a large transportation company in Taiwan, this study tested the relationships among role identification, emotional labor (surface acting and deep acting), innovative behavior, and the cross-level moderation effects of competitive team climate. The results revealed different mechanisms through which emotional labor influences innovative behavior. Employees with high role identification are likely to engage in deep acting, and consequently emerge higher on scores of innovative behavior. Furthermore, a competitive team climate strengthens the relationship between surface acting and innovative behavior.  

Keywords

emotional laborinnovative behaviorcompetitive climate