How and when does servant leadership promotes followers’ creative performance?

Purpose An individual’s creative performance is vital to an organization’s success, making its enhancement a key priority for managers. While prior research has established a strong link between servant leadership and employee creativity, the underlying mechanisms remain underexplored. This study investigates how servant leadership shapes the creative performance of frontline service employees through a moderated mediation model, focusing on the mediating role of ethical climate and the moderating effect of creative self-efficacy. Design/methodology/approach The model was tested using data from 285 supervisor-subordinate dyads across 15 five-star hotels. Data were collected at different points in time through separate questionnaires completed by employees and their direct supervisors. PLS-SEM was employed to validate the proposed relationships and assess the reliability and validity of the study measures. Findings The results indicate that ethical climate fully mediates the positive relationship between servant leadership and employees’ creative performance. Additionally, creative self-efficacy moderates this relationship, strengthening the effect of servant leadership on creative performance for employees with higher creative self-efficacy. Research limitations/implications Since the study was conducted within the Egyptian hotel industry, its findings may not be fully generalizable to other contexts. Future research could explore these dynamics in different sectors, such as government, corporate and nonprofit organizations. Additionally, this study focused on a single mediating mechanism-ethical climate-in the relationship between servant leadership (SL) and creative performance (CP). Future research should explore alternative mediators, such as climate strength, innovative climate, organizational justice and job crafting, to provide a more comprehensive understanding of the SL-CP link. Originality/value This research advances the servant leadership literature by examining its impact on the creative performance of frontline hospitality employees. Additionally, it introduces a new framework, grounded in social exchange theory, to explain the relationship between servant leadership and creative performance.