You Don’t Actually Want to Get Closer to the Star: How LMX Leads to Workplace Ostracism

Abstract

High-quality leader-member exchange (LMX) is commonly seen as beneficial to employees. However, this is not always the case in the eyes of other members of the same team. Based on social comparison theory, we propose that members who have high-quality LMX relationships with team leaders might face workplace ostracism through being envied by other members of the same team. Further, we hypothesize that this indirect influence is mitigated by the high-quality LMX member’s agreeableness. Based on data from 196 employees, we found that though ostensibly LMX quality directly led to less workplace ostracism, it had a positive effect on workplace ostracism through being envied by other team members, and agreeableness buffered this indirect positive effect. Theoretical and managerial implications are discussed.

Keywords

Leader-member exchange / Being envied / Agreeableness / Workplace ostracism

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2018 Higher Education Press and Springer