Unpacking the relationship between leaders' age and active conflict management: The moderating role of generativity

This research investigates why and when leaders’ age influences their active conflict management strategies. Across two studies, we found that generativity beliefs shape the consequences of leaders' age for their conflict management. More specifically, in Study 1 we found that older leaders with low generativity perceived weaker leader-employee relationship quality (LMX), which negatively influenced their problem-solving and compromising strategies in conflicts with employees. In Study 2, we found that older leaders with high generativity demonstrated stronger emotion regulation knowledge, which was negatively related to their tendency to use forcing strategies in conflicts with employees.

These results offer new theoretical insights into how
(a) ...leaders’ age has the potential to both benefit and harm their active conflict management strategies through distinct socio-emotional mechanisms, and
(b) ...leaders’ generativity promotes age-related conflict management advantages, while reducing associated detriments.

The article authored by Fousiani, Scheibe, and Walter (2025) is available here.