Authoritarian leadership in projects: An integrated model to understand the team members’ task and innovative performance

Although authoritarian leadership (AL) behaviour is critical to organisational performance, its impact in different cultural contexts has received scant academic attention especially for managing bespoke projects which require temporary organisations to be formed. Drawing from self-determination and expectancy theories, this present research develops an integrated model to interpret the underlying impacts that the two dichotomous groups of ALs (i.e. discipline- and dominance-focused) have on project team members' task and innovative performance in China. The model developed was tested using the data collected from 316 Chinese project team members. Empirical evidence indicates that psychological empowerment acts as a ‘mediator’ via which the discipline- and dominance-focused ALs can positively and negatively affect the team members' task and innovative performance respectively. Additionally, the aforementioned indirect relationships are moderated by outcome expectancy, implying a positive interdependency between them. This research enriches an understanding of ALs and project team in terms of task completion and innovation and is useful for developing interventions to improve project team performance. • The two authoritarian leadership (AL) styles influence project member's task and innovative performance differently. • The two ALs interact with project member's outcome expectancy in influencing task and innovative performance.