How CEO passion promotes firm Innovation: The mediating role of Top Management Team (TMT) creativity and the moderating role of organizational culture

Existing literature increasingly identifies the effect of CEO passion on firm innovation. However, the understanding on how and when CEO passion promotes firm innovation remains limited. We examine the role of the top management team (TMT) creativity as the intervening mechanism in the link between CEO passion and firm innovation, and explore the different roles of flexibility-oriented and control-oriented cultures as contingencies. By using survey data of 245 firms in China, we find that flexibility-oriented culture positively moderates the relationship between CEO passion and TMT creativity, but negatively moderates the relationship between TMT creativity and firm innovation. By contrast, control-oriented culture negatively moderates the relationship between CEO passion and TMT creativity, and insignificantly moderates the relationship between TMT creativity and firm innovation. We also discuss our theoretical contributions and provide some practical implications.