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Emotional exhaustion and depression pose a threat to employees’ psychological health. Social relationships at work are important potential buffers against these threats, but the corresponding psychological processes are still unclear. We propose that the subjective experience of high-quality relationships with supervisors (i.e., Leader–Member Exchange [LMX]) is one of the protective factors against psychological health issues at work and that this effect is mediated by psychological empowerment. We tested these assumptions with two studies (one cross-sectional and one time lagged) on diverse samples of employees from different organizations. The first study employed emotional exhaustion as the outcome measure; the second used depression. Results from both studies support the proposed process by showing that LMX positively affects empowerment, which negatively affects emotional exhaustion (Study 1) and depression (Study 2). Additionally, Study 2 also showed that Team–Member Exchange is as important as LMX for preventing psychological health issues among employees.

Both leader–member exchange (LMX) and team–member exchange (TMX) measure the quality of reciprocal exchange among employees in the workplace. Although LMX focuses on supervisor–subordinate relationships while TMX examines the relationships among team members, both have theory-based and empirically proven relations with workplace outcomes such as job performance, organizational commitment, job satisfaction, and turnover intentions. However, it is not yet known which has more of an impact on such workplace outcomes—specifically, it is not clear if an employee’s time is best spent developing vertical relationships among supervisors and subordinates (LMX) or on the horizontal relationships among team members (TMX). Accordingly, this meta-analysis explores the incremental validity and relative importance of these two social exchange-based constructs. The theoretical logic underlying LMX and TMX is clarified, and the parameter estimates between LMX, TMX, and work outcomes are reported. Results demonstrate that TMX shows incremental validity above and beyond LMX for some outcomes (organizational commitment and job satisfaction), but not others (job performance and turnover intentions). Also, LMX shows greater relative importance across all four outcomes. In sum, the clarification of the theoretical and empirical landscape lays a foundation for recommendations for future research.

We investigated the mediating role of the leader-member exchange (LMX) in the association of abusive supervision and employee work behaviors (task performance and organizational citizenship behaviors toward the organization and individuals). Using data collected from 366 supervisor-subordinate dyads, we found that LMX fully mediated the negative effects of abusive supervision on all three work behaviors. In addition, we conducted a supplementary study on the basis of the data collected from 54 supervisor-subordinate dyads from a garment company, and we found that LMX mediated the relationship between abusive supervision and employee objective future performance with interactional justice controlled.

In this study we explored the influence on employees of interpersonal relative leader-member exchange and intergroup relative leader-member exchange in regard to work behaviors with different levels of risk and uncertainty (i.e., task performance vs. innovative behavior), depending on subgroup uncertainty. We examined our theoretical model by surveying 309 employees in 58 member subgroups. Results showed that both interpersonal and intergroup relative leader-member exchange were positively associated with internal and temporary workers' task performance, interpersonal relative leader-member exchange was positively associated with the innovative behavior of internal workers but not temporary workers, and intergroup relative leader-member exchange was positively related to temporary workers' innovative behavior but negatively linked to internal workers' innovative behavior. Our findings suggest that the effects of interpersonal and intergroup relative leader-member exchange on members' behaviors may vary with the subgroup identities.

Leader humor is effective in enhancing superior-subordinate relationships in the workplace, and plays a crucial role in stimulating employee voice behavior. In this study we investigated the impact of leader humor on employee voice behavior, along with the mediating role of leader-member exchange. Through analysis of data obtained from 321 employees in China, the results showed that leader humor had a significant positive impact on both promotive and prohibitive employee voice behavior. Furthermore, leader-member exchange served as a mediator of the relationship between leader humor and both promotive and prohibitive employee voice behavior. These findings not only contribute to expanding empirical research on leader humor but also offer leaders a new perspective for effective promotion of employee voice behavior.

Previous studies have shown the positive effect of high-quality leader-member exchange (LMX) on members' task performance, but further research is needed to establish if this effect varies according to boundary conditions. In this study we examined the effect of group size on the LMX process by constructing a framework integrating social exchange and social comparison theories. We predicted that decreasing group size would enhance the relationship between LMX and members' task performance. Specifically, we anticipated that the positive relationship between LMX and task performance would be strongest for members working in small groups with high LMX differentiation. By analyzing data collected from 368 supervisor-subordinate dyads employed at 39 bank branches in southeast China, we found that the positive relationship between LMX and task performance was stronger for employees working in smaller groups than for those working in large groups. However, the three-way interaction term was not significant. The findings enhance understanding of the role played by group structure factors in the process of how LMX influences members' task performance.

Drawing upon leader-member exchange theory, this study investigated the relationship between leaders' contingent punishment behavior and subordinates' ingratiation behavior, focusing on the mediating role of subordinates' subjective sense of power and the moderating role of power distance. We surveyed 681 employees and managers in southwestern China working across various sectors. The results showed a positive correlation between leaders' contingent punishment behavior and subordinates' ingratiation behavior. Subordinates' subjective sense of power mediated this relationship, while power distance acted as a moderator. These findings underscore the significance of cultural and contextual factors in shaping leader-subordinate relationships, contributing to a holistic understanding with implications across various settings.

Due to social comparison in the team, leader-member exchange (LMX) differentiation has been shown to play a crucial role for explaining follower outcomes. LMX differentiation may be beneficial for some followers, but also detrimental for others, when perceived as unfair. In order to understand the impact of LMX differentiation on work-related outcomes, LMX differentiation should be described by three properties (relative LMX position, LMX variability, and team-level LMX). The aim of the study is to focus on LMX differentiation and test relationships between different properties of LMX and followers’ psychological strain. In sum, 75 teams with 322 followers answered an online survey about their leaders’ LMX and their individual levels of psychological strain. Results of multilevel modeling showed that the relative LMX position was negatively related to psychological strain on the individual level. This relation was moderated by LMX variability and team-level LMX. However, we did not find significant relations between team-level LMX and team-level psychological strain. The present study extends previous research by looking at relations between LMX and psychological strain on an individual follower level as well as on the team level. Our results suggest that the relative position of LMX within a team seems to play a crucial role for individual follower psychological strain. Results imply that leaders should aim to improve LMX relationships within their team and to reduce differences between team members. Leadership trainings should impart knowledge and skills to improve LMX quality and include elements about LMX differentiation, its origins, as well as consequences.

In the context of the New Normal and the VUCA (volatile, uncertain, complex, ambiguous) era, organisations face adjustments to the changes brought by the COVID-19 pandemic, especially the shifting to new work modes and configurations with their consequences on employees’ wellbeing, in terms of exhaustion, resignation, and quitting tendencies. This study, rooted in the psychology of sustainability and sustainable development, employs a primary prevention perspective to examine a relational factor, the leader–member exchange (LMX), which might shield employees from exhaustion and turnover intention. Specifically, we propose a double-chained mediation model to investigate how high-quality LMX fosters a positive adjustment to employees’ specific work modes, in-person or hybrid work, subsequently reducing employees’ feelings of exhaustion and their intentions to leave the organisation. A convenience sample of 257 Italian employees participated in this study by completing an online self-report survey. Hypotheses were tested using the PROCESS macro in SPSS 25.0 (Model 6). The results indicate that positive LMX and adjustment to the work mode reduce exhaustion and turnover intention; furthermore, they highlight the existence of a more complex dynamic linking LMX to turnover intention through a double-chained mediation of adjustment to the work mode and exhaustion. Indeed, higher LMX quality favours adjustment to the work mode, decreasing employees’ feelings of exhaustion and, in turn, their turnover intention. Specifically, the findings of this study add a novel contribution to the literature on the psychology of sustainability and sustainable development by emphasising the significance of positive LMX in becoming a factor of wellbeing and sustainability in the workplace through the promotion of the adjustment to both in-person and hybrid work modes. Organisations may benefit of this approach to LMX that, through the consideration of employees’ needs, may favour their adjustment to different work modes, thus becoming a sustainable LMX, and a promoter of employees’ wellbeing and retention.

Extensive research has demonstrated the positive effects of mindfulness on individual well-being and performance within organizational settings. Yet, its impact on interpersonal dynamics, particularly between leaders and followers, has not been thoroughly explored. Drawing upon research in mindfulness and person-supervisor (P-S) fit, this study examines the congruence effect of leader and follower dispositional mindfulness on their relationship quality, conceptualized here as leader-member exchange (LMX) quality. Moreover, we explore the question of which pro-relationship behavior on part of the follower carries the proposed mindfulness congruence effect. Using cross-level polynomial regressions across 189 leader-follower dyads, our findings corroborate a theoretical framework that associates the congruence of leader-follower mindfulness with enhanced relationship quality. This relationship is mediated by followers’ engagement in relationship-directed voice behavior—a form of upward influence behavior specifically investigated for its role in this context and validated across three further samples ( N  = 434). By examining both the joint effects of leader and follower mindfulness and the behavioral mechanisms underlying these effects, our research contributes to a more comprehensive understanding of mindfulness’s role in shaping leadership dynamics and improving leader-follower relationships.