For good and for bad: The distinctive effects of successors’ leadership behavior on collective engagement and organizational performance.

Abstract

Leadership transitions are a fact of organizational life, yet the impact of successors' leadership behavior on organizational outcomes is little understood. Building on change readiness, uncertainty management, and romance of leadership theory and research, we propose a novel theory describing the distinctive effects of successors' versus incumbents' leadership behavior in driving change in collective engagement and organizational performance. We theorize that when employees perceive a great need for organizational change, successors' vision communication and coaching are more likely than incumbents' to yield improvements in collective engagement and organizational performance. But when employees perceive little need for change, successors' vision communication and coaching are more likely than incumbents' to yield declines. To test our model, we conducted a longitudinal, quasi-experimental study of principal succession in a sample of 113 U.S. elementary schools. As predicted, when employees perceived a great need for change, successors' coaching sparked gains in collective engagement and organizational performance. When employees perceived little need for change, successors' coaching backfired, spurring declines in collective engagement and organizational performance. As predicted, the effects of incumbents' coaching were muted. Finally, contrary to our predictions, neither successors' nor incumbents' vision communication drove change in collective engagement and performance. Our theory and findings illuminate the distinctive risks and benefits of successors' leadership behavior in driving change in collective engagement and organizational performance. For good and for bad, successors' coaching changes their organizations in ways that incumbents' leadership does not.