Leadership and Followers’ Innovative Work Behavior Relationship Research: Connecting the Dots Using Systematic Bibliometrics

Empirical research established that leadership is a critical determinant of followers' innovative work behavior, and has reached a sufficient level of maturity to warrant a comprehensive review. However, the existing reviews frequently examined leadership and followers’ innovative work behavior (IWB) separately, resulting in a distorted picture of the development and relevance of their joint contribution. To address this gap, the paper aims to review the studiesexamining the relationships between leadership and IWB through a hybrid review. Hence, bibliometric analysis and systematic review were conducted to understand the phenomenon. The data analysis included performance analysis and science mapping by employing VOSviewer and bibliometrix, alongside content analysis of studies obtained from the Scopus database covering the period from 2008 to 2021. Results revealed that transformational leadership was most studied, followed by empowering, inclusive, and servant leadership. Most studies employ social exchange and social cognitive theory. The majority of the studies adopted a quantitative cross-sectional research design. The research examined the mediators and moderators utilized to explore the relationship between leadership and IWB and discovered variations in the empirical results. The prospects for future research are shown in terms of constructs, theoretical lenses, and methodologies.