Understanding leader-employee conflict involvement: how leader perceived competence and age shape employee reactions

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate the factors that mitigate leader-employee conflict, given that leaders invest substantial time in managing such conflicts. Since employee perceptions of their leader play a key role in how employees treat their leader, in this study it was hypothesized that employees who perceive their leaders as more competent are less likely to engage in conflict with them. Furthermore, drawing on the framework of implicit leadership theories (ILTs), it was predicted that this relationship will be stronger when leaders are older. This is because older competent leaders are more likely to be perceived as embodying prototypical leadership qualities, such as generativity (the motivation to support employees’ growth and development), reducing in turn negative employee reactions such as employee conflict involvement with the leader. Design/methodology/approach To test these hypotheses, three studies were conducted: Study 1 was a dyadic field study ( n = 121 dyads) among employees and their direct supervisors. Study 2 was a time-lagged study among employees ( n = 227) and Study 3 was a scenario experiment ( n = 372). Findings In line with the hypotheses, Study 1 showed that leader age strengthens the negative relationship between perceived leader competence and employee conflict involvement with the leader. Study 2 and Study 3 showed that the leader’s perceived generativity mediates the age-conditional relationship between perceived leader competence and employee conflict involvement with leaders. Originality/value These findings underscore the importance of employee ILTs regarding prototypical leadership characteristics in shaping leader-employee conflict and highlight the moderating role of leader age in this relationship.