Unlocking Organizational Support Through Psychological Empowerment: Identification and Test of Transformational Leadership as a Catalyst of Perceived Organizational Support

Abstract

Organizational support theory (OST) explains how employees develop and respond to beliefs about their organization, with perceived organizational support (POS) representing a central construct within this framework. Integrating psychological empowerment theory, we examine an intrinsic motivational pathway through which POS relates to employee in-role performance and identify transformational leadership as a contextual catalyst that may strengthen this process. We test a multilevel moderated mediation model using multisource and multi-time data from 217 employees and 41 supervisors. Results indicate that POS is positively related to in-role performance through the psychological empowerment dimensions of competence and self-determination. Moreover, transformational leadership strengthens the relationship between POS and psychological empowerment, such that the indirect effects of POS on in-role performance through meaning, competence, and self-determination are significant when transformational leadership is high, but not when it is low. These findings show how exploring additional mediating mechanisms within OST can reveal theory-driven boundary conditions that help explain why POS often, but not always, translates into performance. Practically, they suggest that organizations may improve returns on support-enhancing practices by pairing those investments with leadership behaviors that help employees convert organizational support into intrinsic motivation.