How does mindful leadership affect individual innovative behavior in megaprojects?–A cross-level study

Purpose:
While mindful leadership attracts growing attention, research remains siloed in single-level analyses, neglecting cross-level dynamics between individual and organizational dimensions. This study investigates how mindful leadership drives individual innovation through individual-organizational multilevel interactions, with psychological empowerment mediating and organizational innovation climate (OIC) moderating these cross-level mechanisms.

Design/methodology/approach:
A non-probability sampling strategy was employed to gather data from 421 organizational members involved in the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge (HZMB) project. Subsequent analyses utilized SPSS 25.0 for preliminary diagnostics, AMOS 24.0 for confirmatory factor analysis, and HLM 6.08 for multilevel regression modelling, thereby rigorously testing the proposed theoretical framework.

Findings:
The multilevel analysis reveals that organizational-level mindful leadership significantly predicts individual innovative behaviour (γ = 0.26, p < 0.01), while simultaneously enhancing psychological empowerment across levels (γ = 0.31, p < 0.01). Psychological empowerment played a partial mediating role (indirect effect=0.15, p < 0.05). OIC both mediates the leadership-innovation link (γ = 0.28, p < 0.01) and moderates the empowerment-innovation relationship (interaction effect γ = 0.18, p < 0.05).

Originality/value:
These findings address the critical gap in multilevel leadership studies by revealing cross-level mediation-moderation mechanisms. The research extends the explanatory boundaries of mindful leadership theory through organizational-individual integration, providing empirical evidence for innovation management in megaproject contexts.