Relationship Conflict, Low Goodwill Trust, Innovation Propensity—and Help? How to Encourage Helping Behaviours Even in Conflict-laden Work Settings

Abstract

To unpack the link between employees' relationship conflict and helping behaviours, this study postulates a mediating role of the extent to which employees exhibit low goodwill trust in co-workers and a moderating role of their innovation propensity. As the findings confirm, emotion-laden conflict compromises employees' propensities to assist co-workers because they believe that they cannot count on co-workers’ goodwill, which, as we theorize, is informed by their desire to protect their self-esteem. The extent to which employees derive joy from generating novel ideas subdues this process. This study points to a notable mechanism (low goodwill trust) by which emotion-based tensions translate into low voluntarism and how this process is disrupted by an intrinsic motivation for innovation.