Transformational leadership and service innovation performance: the role of knowledge sharing and innovation culture in the hospitality sector employees

This research examines how Indian hotels can systematically create “wow” moments for guests by translating transformational leadership (TL) into frontline employees’ service innovation performance (SIP) rather than treating innovation as ad hoc or leader‑driven in a vacuum. Drawing on social exchange theory, organizational learning theory, and the job demands–resources (JD–R) model, we develop and test a conditional process model in which TL shapes SIP through two distinct yet complementary mechanisms: knowledge sharing (KS) as a proximal learning behaviour and innovation culture (IC) as a deeper normative infrastructure, while psychological safety (PS) functions as a contextual resource that regulates how strongly these pathways operate. Survey data from 492 frontline employees in Indian hotels and resorts were analyzed using covariance‑based structural equation modeling (AMOS 29) and bootstrapped conditional process analysis (SPSS 29).

The results indicated that TL is linked to SIP through its relationship with KS and IC, and KS emerged as the stronger conduit. Moreover, PS strengthens the direct TL–SIP link once a minimum safety threshold is reached and simultaneously attenuates the TL → KS → SIP and TL → IC → SIP pathways, potentially reducing employees’ dependence on leader-driven KS mechanisms while enabling the translation of leader-driven cultural norms into SIP. These findings extend existing leadership–innovation theory in hospitality by distinguishing behavioural and cultural routes from TL to SIP, which are most consequential for SIP when PS acts as a booster vs a contextual ceiling, offering actionable guidance on how hospitality practitioners can align leadership development, knowledge systems, and PS‑building practices to achieve sustained, perceptible innovation outcomes.

We'd like to express our sincere gratitude to our institute for providing us study leave during data collection. We would also like to thank all the participants who took part in our survey process. In this paper, we employed AI software to improve language quality and perform thorough proofreading of our content.

This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors. Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur, Kharagpur, India The authors declare no competing interests. This study was performed in accordance with the ethical approval obtained from the Institutional Ethics Committee (IEC) of the Sponsored Research and Industrial Consultancy (SRIC) division, Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur, India (Reference No: IIT/SRIC/DEN/2025, Dated: 1st January 2025).

All data were collected in India at a single site; no multi-site or multi-country data collection was undertaken. Consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study by means of a digital consent form presented at the beginning of the online questionnaire. All participants were adults aged 18 years or over, and consent from a parent or legal guardian was therefore not applicable.

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