Proactive yet refelctive? Materializing proactive personality into creative performance

Drawing on the agentic perspective of social cognitive theory and self- regulation model, this research examines how proactive personality relates to employee creative performance through task-related self-reflective processes and positive affective reactions. The authors define task-related self-reflection as the self-reflective processes about oneself and one’s performance at work and the causes behind, which can be differentiated into two types: self- reflection on successes and self-reflection on failures. Based on a multi-wave, multi-source field study, our findings show that proactive employees engage in both self-reflection on successes and self-reflection on failures; self- reflection on successes breeds joviality whereas self-reflection on failures arouses attentiveness; joviality and attentiveness–both of which are positive affective states–give rise to high creativity. In addition, proactive personality has a positive relationship with creativity via the serial mediating effects of self-reflection on successes and joviality and via the serial mediating effects of self-reflection on failures and attentiveness, respectively. Furthermore, we also bring in leader-member exchange (LMX) and identify it as an important boundary condition for these two serial mediating pathways. Implications for theory and practice are discussed.