A moderated mediation examination of Kahn’s theory in the development of new product performance

Purpose: This study aims to propose a multilevel moderated mediation model of transformational leadership, corporate social responsible, organization-based self-esteem and job engagement to detect Kahn’s theory and predict new product development performance. Design/methodology/approach: This study used a longitudinal study over a six-month period to test the multilevel moderated mediation model. Empirical testing used a survey of 1,655 employees from 165 different R&D work group in Great China. Findings: Transformational leadership, corporate social responsible and organization-based self-esteem well predict employees’ job engagement and new product development performance and are moderated by open discussion of conflict. Originality/value: This study is the first to propose a multilevel moderated mediation model to detect Kahn’s job engagement theory and predict new product development performance.