Erosion of motivational climate strength: The role of leaders’ behaviour during socially distanced work

Abstract

This study examines how motivational climates change in response to external shocks (e.g. COVID‐19) and through leader behaviours that shape shared perceptions of success at work. Our study focuses on the perceived motivational climate in a context where employees move from in‐person to socially distanced work, that is, remote work and contact reduction in the workplace. We draw on the literature from organizational climate, achievement goal theory (AGT), and the social information processing (SIP) perspective to propose that both the average motivational climate level and motivational climate strength (consensus) decrease over time because of such contextual changes. Furthermore, we propose that mastery‐oriented and performance‐oriented leader behaviours attenuate this decrease in both the average motivational climate level and motivational climate strength (consensus). A three‐wave study of 37 work groups (612 employees) shows that both mastery and performance climate strength (consensus) erode over time and that mastery‐ and performance‐oriented leader behaviours attenuate this erosion. In addition, mastery‐oriented leader behaviour buffers any decline in the average mastery climate level. We discuss the implications of these findings for theory and future research.