The impact of emotional intelligence, servant leadership, and psychological safety on employee’s innovative behavior with the moderating effect of task interdependence in Lahore, Pakistan

Abstract

Our research aims to assess the influence of emotional intelligence, servant leadership, and psychological safety on employees’ innovative behavior, with the help of task interdependence’s moderation effect. A convenience sampling method was employed to gather pertinent information from Lahore, Pakistan’s I.T companies, and 230 questionnaires were considered for the results. Outcomes depict that emotional intelligence positively influences servant leadership. Results also demonstrate that servant leadership influences psychological safety, which further positively affects employees' innovative behavior. Additionally, task interdependence modifies the linkage between psychological safety and imaginative behavior in a favorable and meaningful way. The new study adds to the corpus of information by examining the potential for task dependency to spur employees to take unique actions.

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Current Psychology
https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-023-04990-7
The impact ofemotional intelligence, servant leadership,
andpsychological safety onemployee’s innovative behavior
withthemoderating effect oftask interdependence inLahore,
Pakistan
SidraMunawar1 · HummairaQudsiaYousaf1 · MuneebAhmed1· SumairaRehman1
Accepted: 12 July 2023
© The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2023
Abstract
Our research aims to assess the influence of emotional intelligence, servant leadership, and psychological safety on employ-
ees’ innovative behavior, with the help of task interdependence’s moderation effect. A convenience sampling method was
employed to gather pertinent information from Lahore, Pakistan’s I.T companies, and 230 questionnaires were considered
for the results. Outcomes depict that emotional intelligence positively influences servant leadership. Results also demonstrate
that servant leadership influences psychological safety, which further positively affects employees' innovative behavior.
Additionally, task interdependence modifies the linkage between psychological safety and imaginative behavior in a favorable
and meaningful way. The new study adds to the corpus of information by examining the potential for task dependency to
spur employees to take unique actions.
Keywords Emotional Intelligence· Servant Leadership· Psychological Safety· Innovative Behavior· And Task
Interdependence
Introduction
Information technology is crucial for generating wealth,
jobs, and economic growth (Broughel & Thierer, 2019).
Additionally, this sector has been named one of the most
significant sectors in the world (Oztemel & Gursev, 2020).
Pakistan's IT industry has experienced some of the world's
fastest growth and is currently increasing. Pakistan was
the fourth-best country in the world in 2019 for freelance
development, and several Pakistani software houses work
with major international corporations (Wafa etal., 2022).
In 2021, the value of the Pakistani IT sector increased by
an astounding 100%, reaching USD 3.5 billion, and USD 7
billion is expected in the next two to four years s(Wafa etal.,
2022). Most IT projects in Pakistan are outsourced from
other nations, and many foreign corporations have estab-
lished their offshore enterprises here due to the country's
affordable labor (Ali etal., 2022). States around the globe
are attempting to create policies that will maximize the
potential of their IT sectors. Despite its enormous success
and promise, Pakistan's I.T. sector still needs to be younger
than the global software industry.
Employee innovation is crucial to the sustainability
of an IT company due to the environment's high levels
of competition and dynamic nature. This has inspired
managerial scholars to cultivate insightful theories in this
area. Employee innovation is "an initiative from employ-
ees about introducing new processes, new products, new
markets, or combinations of such into the firm," (Åmo
& Kolvereid, 2005; Ulusal & Yüregir, 2022). Workers’
innovative behavior is essential for improving services,
excellent execution (Bani-Melhem etal., 2018), and ensur-
ing organizational success, survival, and competitiveness
* Sidra Munawar
Sidramir14@gmail.com
Hummaira Qudsia Yousaf
humaira.yousaf@superior.edu.pk
Muneeb Ahmed
muneeb@superior.edu.pk
Sumaira Rehman
sumaira.rehman@superior.edu.pk
1 The Superior University, 17-Km Raiwind Road, Lahore,
Pakistan

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(Guo etal., 2022). Employees who generate, market, and
execute novel ideas that are helpful to their work group's
or organization's performance and those that are novel
for their job function are performing innovative job tasks
(Guo etal., 2022). IT firms need to be aware of the indi-
vidual and contextual factors that affect employees' capac-
ity for innovation and their underlying mechanisms (Fis-
cher etal., 2019). Also, companies facilitate an innovative
culture for employees so they can suggest and try new
ideas by exhibiting innovative behavior.
One of the most challenging and vital competitive
advantages is valuing people at work as firms adopt a
diverse workforce. As a result, leaders have placed greater
emphasis on human resources being treated with respect
and compassion (Pratiwi & Nawangsari, 2021). Addition-
ally, leaders must comprehend, manage, use, and control
their own and their employees’ emotions to understand
their needs. As a result, it has long been believed that good
leaders are those who can control their own and their fol-
lowers' emotions (Mohyi, 2020; Ullah etal., 2022). Many
leaders can emphasize compassion, service, and develop-
ing relationships with others (Miao etal., 2021). Compa-
nies today believe that whenever it concerns leadership,
ethical considerations ought to be considered into account
(Eva etal., 2021). The requirement for leaders to have
servant leadership or a caring viewpoint for their subordi-
nates is thus highlighted by this circumstance. This type
of leadership is unique because it facilitates the mindset of
employees to feel psychologically safe at the workplace.
This is merely sinceinnovation is primarily an interper-
sonal endeavour that necessitates coming up with vari-
ousideas and successfully putting the most inspiring ones
into practice (Lv etal., 2021). People's ability to speak up,
provide novel ideas, take interpersonal risks, and learn
from failures, can lead to innovation (Liu & Keller, 2021).
Furthermore, task dependency also creates interpersonal
behaviors that improve team collaboration and communi-
cation for innovation (Rosen etal., 2018) .
Earlier, researchers conducted extensive research on the
effects of technology adoption (Kamal etal., 2020). Addi-
tionally, numerous researchers concentrated on resources
in the hope of gaining new resources for innovation in the
future to avoid potential resource losses (Sun & Qiu, 2022).
A team cannot work effectively and efficiently on their tasks
in an innovative manner without confidence and task inter-
dependency (Lázaro etal., 2019). Our research required
ascertaining the existence of and degree of task dependency
within a team that can affect psychological safety and inven-
tive behavior due to its importance. Hence, our research
aims to assess the influence of emotional intelligence, serv-
ant leadership, and psychological safety on innovative con-
duct through the moderating effect of task interdependence.
Literature review
Underpinning theory
The social learning theory is the most appropriate and
leading theory underpinning the entire research model.
Social learning is vital learning information by monitor-
ing how other people behave (Bandura & Walters, 1977;
De Felice etal., 2023; Lorenzo etal., 2012). Social psy-
chology, which involves learning from the experiences and
actions of others, is a crucial aspect of the social interacting
environment of an IT organization. Contrary to the focus
of behavioral psychology, which emphasizes how envi-
ronment and reinforcement impact the behavior of people
that might pick up new habits simply by observing others.
According to the social learning theory, leaders are looked
up to by their subordinates as role models for behaviors that
will lead to professional and personal success.
Leadership represents a leader's capacity to compre-
hend how their thoughts, feelings, and deeds affect those
around them in the organization. Leaders that prioritize
their subordinates' needs by empowering them and even
getting involved in community service are the best exam-
ples to follow (Abbas etal., 2021). Servants learn char-
acteristics like loyalty and collaboration through seeing
and interacting with positive role models (Firmansyah &
Saepuloh, 2022). Moreover, leaders inspire their subordi-
nates to believe that taking interpersonal risks, speaking
up for ideas, sharing thoughts, and acting independently
on essential issues will result in innovative activities
(Edmondson & Lei, 2014a; Mahmoud etal., 2022). Fur-
thermore, it has been shown that followers who view
their boss as an inspiration eventually copy their actions
to become more effective and innovative at work (Zhu &
Zhang, 2020).
Hypothesis development
Emotional intelligence andservant leadership
The capability to manage one’s personal and other’s emo-
tions, distinguish among good and bad emotional impacts,
and to use emotional intelligence to influence one's
thoughts and behaviour is known as Emotional Intelli-
gence (Moroń & Biolik-Moroń, 2021). Instead of focusing
on authority, legality, and personal care, servant leader-
ship emphasises the bigger picture and is focused on kind-
ness, compassion, and the idea of assisting workers early
(Pratiwi & Nawangsari, 2021). When servant leaders can
manage their emotions, they may demonstrate empathy

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and ethics (Lee, 2019). Since emotional intelligence is all
about recognizing one's needs and those of others, (Miao
etal., 2021) think it is closely related to leadership phi-
losophies like ethical and servant leadership. Many pieces
of research have examined in the previous written work at
the association among two variables (Anwar & Abdullah,
2021). Servant leaders may struggle to satisfy their emo-
tional and mental expectations if they are not in good men-
tal and emotional health (Kumari etal., 2022). Concerning
a study, leaders who score highly on emotional intelligence
are substantially more efficient in their work environments
than persons with lower emotional intelligence scores (Gao
etal., 2023). Similarly, servant leaders, in conjunction with
high-level E.I., are highly efficient in comprehending their
emotions and feelings, which makes them able to interact
with others in a manner that satisfies others' expectations.
Additionally, highly emotionally intelligent servant lead-
ers are excellent communicators who can positively con-
vey their thoughts and feelings to their deputies to achieve
organizational goals (Winton, 2022).
An enormous number of previous investigations sup-
port the outcomes of our study, i.e., emotional intelligence
affects servant leadership in many aspects. Likewise, high-
level emotional intelligence makes it easier to comprehend
others' feelings and emotions, therefore, servant leaders with
high-level emotional intelligence are often extremely good at
recognizing the needs of those they lead (Miao etal., 2021).
Hence, we suggest that:
H1: Emotional Intelligence is positively associated with
servant leadership.
Servant leadership andpsychological safety
Psychological safety is a person's awareness of the effects
of taking risks, owning up to mistakes, and considering the
welfare of others (Erkutlu & Chafra, 2019). It depicts an
environment where people are at ease, admitting errors,
exchanging ideas, speaking up, and challenging the status
quo (Capodaglio, 2022). In a world that is quickly chang-
ing, servant leadership behavior is considered an antecedent
of psychological safety which ensures that individuals “feel
comfortable at work to grow, learn, contribute, and perform
well" (Mahmoud etal., 2022).
The notion that employees won't be embarrassed, dis-
regarded, or penalized due to their opinions on problems
makes sense regarding psychological safety; they will be
given a sense of assurance instead. This belief and admira-
tion among supervisors and supervisees cause this confi-
dence. Therefore, the servant leader's actions and behavior
at work may impact the subordinates' perception of psycho-
logical safety or belief. This assertion is consistent with the
fundamental principle of social learning theory, which holds
that servant leaders increase followers' trust by empowering
them for growth and success through their ethical behavior
(Bantha & Sahni, 2021; Brohi etal., 2018). Employees can
take the initiative to actively copy and pick up on various
extra-role behaviors, including taking care of others (Han
etal., 2019). The sense of assurance that individuals won't be
punished or rejected for voicing their thoughts and making
judgments is increased by supervisory qualities including
emotional healing, prioritizing subordinates, and fostering
growth. Most earlier literature used transformational, ethical,
and transactional leadership styles to increase employees'
perceptions of psychological safety (Edmondson & Bransby,
2023; Edmondson & Lei, 2014b). However, even though
servant leadership can more accurately predict employees'
behavioral results than other leadership philosophies, (Ying
etal., 2020), scholars need to pay more attention to it. There-
fore, a key factor in boosting followers' psychological safety
is how servant leaders treat them (Brohi etal., 2021), it is
anticipated from the literature that supervisors who exhibit
traits of servant leadership will be seen as indicators that will
boost followers' confidence.
Hence, it is assumed that:
H2: Servant leadership is positively associated with psy-
chological safety.
Psychological safety andinnovative behavior
Innovation is a tool to boost a company's power and ability
to compete (de Oliveira Sousa etal., 2022), and the behav-
ior of employees to generate valuable ideas or procedures
that could assist the company’s development and succession
is referred to as innovative behavior of employees (Umali-
hayati etal., 2022) for smooth workflow and enhancement
of efficiency. In this modern era of technology, employees
of companies continually work to creäte new products and
services (Wang etal., 2022), to foster innovation (Stieler &
Henike, 2022). An increasing body of literature has proven
that taking risks while learning, trying, sharing failures, and
chasing unpredictable results are all essential components
of the entire innovation process, from idea to application
(Ancillai etal., 2023). In other words, risk-taking and social
connection are characteristics of innovative work, and both
necessitate that employees perceive their surroundings to be
psychologically safe (Javed etal., 2019).
The psychological safety of workers is a crucial cogni-
tive mechanism (Ou etal., 2018). People are more inclined
to "employ or express themselves physically, cognitively,
and emotionally" when they feel psychologically safe (Kim,
2020; Mukerjee & Metiu, 2022). It improves workers' pro-
ductivity, and they cannot show positive performance and
innovative behavior without feeling safe in an organization
(Okeke, 2019). Moreover, employees are more satisfied with

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and more productive in their jobs when they feel psychologi-
cally safe. In prior studies, organizational identity and psy-
chological safety were linked to worker creativeness (Kim
etal., 2021) and servant creativeness as a result of the mod-
erating impact of information exchange (Ji & Yoon, 2021).
Still our recent research emphasizes that employees who
feel psychologically safe at work are more innovative and
creative, and they consider different approaches to complet-
ing assigned tasks. Due to their higher levels of satisfaction
and risk-taking behavior, they develop and implement new
thoughts and ideas. Additionally, it was found that innova-
tive activity is favorably correlated with psychological safety
(Cao & Zhang, 2020). In light of the previous arguments, the
claim that follows can be made:
H3: Psychological safety is positively associated with
innovative behavior.
Task interdependence asamoderator
Task interdependence refers to how much team members
must communicate with and rely on one another to do tasks
successfully. To coordinate and perform job activities,
employees subject to high task interdependence must often
interact and speak with one another (Raineri & Valenzuela-
Ibarra, 2022). For instance, it was found that members are
typically not motivated to assist one another when a team
is designed with individual goals for each team member
rather than a shared goal for the entire group (Strode etal.,
2022). As a result, members are unwilling to engage in
cooperative behaviors that reflect their goal structures. It is
doubtful that team-like behaviors can evolve without these
structures (coordination, objective, and authority) in place to
help members in orchestrating their work (Courtright etal.,
2015). To put it another way, task interdependence forces
staff to interact and share thoughts, knowledge, and exper-
tise, which leads to the development of innovative workable
solutions. As a result, workers would not conceal job-related
knowledge when task dependency is strong, even though
they are unwilling to invest the time and effort necessary to
spread their expertise to others.
High task dependency encourages people to develop a
group of shared interests (Nauman etal., 2022), therefore
keeping information hidden from coworkers can be harm
their innovative behavior and success. Employees are more
likely to choose knowledge concealing as a resource protec-
tion technique when they feel threatened by their resources,
which increases tension and pressure (Khassawneh etal.,
2023). Although team members may feel insecure, they
often remain ready to facilitate one another by sharing strate-
gies in a situation of high task dependency, which reduces
the risk of hiding knowledge for innovation. In other words,
when employees help others sort out a problem by sharing
adequate knowledge, it enhances their work performance for
innovation. High task dependency in this aspect can promote
employees’ resource acquisition process. Therefore, people
who feel psychologically comfortable in a group setting with
high task interdependence are likelier to attempt to share
practical innovation ideas inside an organization.
Moreover, task interdependence permits the employees to
use each other's skills without adding to their cognitive load.
Previous studies relate task interdependence with organi-
zational citizenship behavior (Goo etal., 2022). Still, our
research emphasizes that individuals with a high level of
psychological safety in a team when there is a lot of task
interdependence are likely to invest more effort in sharing
efficient company innovation strategies. Thus, considering
the above debate, it is suggested that.
H4: Task Interdependency moderates the association
between psychological safety and innovative behavior.
Methodology
Participants anddata collection
“A sample is a subset of the population” according to
(Creswell & Creswell, 2017; Das etal., 2023). Participants
were those employees performing the role of a leader (super-
visor) and at the same time, working as employees under
the supervision of team lead in I.T companies in Lahore,
Pakistan as a population of the survey. IT companies were
chosen because they were a reliable cause of competitive
gain for Pakistan. Such companies are drawing vast amounts
of private investment, significantly contributing to Pakistan's
GDP. “GDP is the sum of the total market value of all fin-
ished goods and services produced inside a nation's borders
within a certain period” (Süygün, 2021). Though, we only
chose those companies where doing extra work is common-
place. Supervisors may act interdependently toward their
staff to reach the established goals due to the added work-
load. The appropriate data was gathered using the conveni-
ence sampling method. No consensus was reached regard-
ing the ideal sample size for structural equation modeling
studies, with people serving as the unit of analysis (Hoyle,
1999; Nguyen etal., 2019). Therefore, 230 is thought to be
a sufficient sample size for results.
This research used preliminary information obtained
directly from the participants. Just because of the causal
nature of the study, survey questionnaires were utilized for
the purpose of gathering information after the approval
from the ethics committee for being carried out with
human participants. All participants were initially told
about how the survey data will be used for this study, and
complete confidentiality of their answers was guaranteed
to get open responses.

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The language for questionnaires was English and
almost 250 questionnaires were delivered to IT companies
in Lahore city for prompt responses; 240 were received
back, and 10 questionnaires were not filled. Therefore,
they were removed, and finally, 230 questionnaires were
considered for results. Employees supplied information on
all the variables, including emotional intelligence, servant
leadership, psychological safety, innovative behavior, and
task interdependence during their working hours without
any remuneration. (Table1)
The results of Table2 reveal that out of all participants,
69.1% (159) were male and 30.9% (72) were female. Most
of the workforce ranged in age from 25 to 34years. This
survey represented that 27.4% (63) of respondents were in
that age group. 18.3% (42) of them were up to the age of
24, 23.5% (54) were between the ages of 35 and 44years,
14.8% (34) were between the ages of 45 and 55years, and
16.1% (37) belonged to the age group of people who were
above 55. According to their educational backgrounds,
73.5% (169) participants had bachelor's degrees, 7.0% (16)
had master's degrees, 1.3% (3) had M.Phil. degrees, 17.8%
(41) qualified for other categories, and the remaining 0.4%
(1) had a degree of Ph.D. Concerning the findings related
to their work experience, 45.7% (105) of participants had
up to one year of experience, 52.2% (120) had two to five
years of experience, 1.7% (04) had five to ten years of expe-
rience, and the remaining 0.4% (1) had ten or more years of
experience in their perspective companies. Meanwhile, only
24.3% (56) of respondents held permanent jobs, and the
remainder 75.7% (174) were employed on a contract basis.
Operational measures
The study model's variables as shown in Fig.1, were
evaluated using previously developed and validated items
which were in-depth explored with three IT industry
experts. After careful consideration and evaluation, the
experts recommended a few alterations to the original
questions. Thechanges regarding the sequence and word-
ing of the questions were made to finalize the question-
naire as displayed in Table1. A "five-point Likert scale
(1-Strongly Disagree; 5-Strongly Agree)" was employed
to assess each item.
Emotional intelligence
To evaluate emotional Intelligence, we adopted a scale
developed by (Cooper & Petrides, 2010) which contained
10-item. A sample item is “Expressing my emotions with
words is not a problem for me”. (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.873).
Servant leadership
To evaluate servant leadership, we employed a seven-item
scale created by (Lin, 2008). The scale is more valuable and
applicable in the context of Pakistan. A sample question is "
My supervisor is always interested in helping people in our
community." (Cronbach's alpha = 0.936).
Psychological safety
Our study used a seven-item scale based on (Edmondson, 1999)
for psychological safety. The scale has been verified to have a
high level of of reliability and validity which, was developed from
previous research. A sample item is “Members of this team can
bring up problems and tough issues.” (Cronbach's alpha = 0.938).
Innovative behavior
To assess innovative behavior, we employed an 8-item scale
created by (Janssen, 2005). The scale was created in the
context of Pakistan and is better suited to our sample. An
example question is "I explore new working methods, tech-
niques, or instruments." (Cronbach's alpha = 0.947).
Task interdependence
We adopted an 8-item scale for task interdependence devel-
oped by (Grabner etal., 2022; Liu, 2022; Wang, 2022; Wong
& Van Gils, 2022). A sample item is “Generating the outcome
or product of this team requires a great deal of communication
and coordination among members.” (Cronbach's alpha = 0.831).
Control variables
We considered demographic factors as control variables that
were previously developed and validated including gender, age,
education, work experience, and nature of employment because
they may have the potential to significantly affect personnel’s
innovative behavior (Shalley & Gilson, 2004). When it comes to
gender, males are coded as 1 and females as 2, while age groups,
BS education, master's education, M.Phil. degree, doctorate, and
above are all coded as 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 respectively. When it
comes to years of work experience, up to one year is coded as 1,
2–5years is coded as 2, 5–10years is coded as 3, and more than
10years is coded as 4, and for nature of employment, permanent
was coded 1 and contractual was coded as 2.
All scales have positive items except the second items of
emotional intelligence (- 0.489) and task interdependence
(- 0.394). Both are recorded but their values are less than
the standardized value of factor loading (0.07), therefore
removed from the Table1 and 3, respectively.

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Table 1 Constructs, Items, and Factor Loadings
Construct/Source/Dimensions Items Loading
Emotional Intelligence (Cooper & Petrides, 2010) Expressing my emotions with words is not a problem for me 0.788
I often find it difficult to see things from another person’s viewpoint -0.489
I usually find it difficult to regulate my emotions 0.809
Normally, I get it difficult to know exactly what emotion I’m feeling 0.767
Overall, I’m comfortable with the way I look 0.718
I often find it hard to stand up for my rights 0.859
I often find it difficult to adjust my life
according to the circumstances 0.775
I’m normally able to “get into someone’s shoes” and experience their emotions 0.845
Generally, I’m able to adapt to new environments 0.839
I would describe myself as a good negotiator 0.811
Servant Leadership (Lin, 2008) My supervisor cares about my well-being 0.775
My supervisor is always interested in helping people in our community 0.854
My supervisor can solve work problems with new or creative ideas 0.844
My supervisor gives me the freedom to handle difficult situations in the way that
I feel is best 0.87
My supervisor provides me with work experiences that enable me to develop new
skills 0.847
My supervisor does what she/he can to make my job easier 0.854
My supervisor would not compromise ethical principles to achieve success 0.896
Psychological Safety (Edmondson, 1999) If you make a mistake on this team, it is often held against you 0.856
Members of this team can bring up problems and tough issues 0.805
People on this team sometimes reject others for being different 0.891
It is safe to take a risk on this team 0.812
It is difficult to ask other members of this team for help 0.869
No one on this team would deliberately act in a way that undermines my efforts 0.87
Working with members of this team, my unique skills and talents are valued and
utilized 0.869
Innovative Behavior (Janssen, 2005) I explore new working methods, techniques, or instruments 0.829
I convert innovative ideas into useful applications 0.87
I systematically introduce innovative ideas 0.903
I make important organizational members enthusiastic about innovative ideas 0.831
I generate original solutions to problems 0.906
I create new ideas for improvements 0.834
I mobilize support for innovative ideas 0.88
I thoroughly evaluate the application of innovative ideas 0.774
Task Interdependence (Grabner etal., 2022; Liu,
2022; Wang, 2022; Wong & Van Gils, 2022)
Generating the outcome or product of this team requires a great deal of communi-
cation and coordination among members 0.804
Members of this team must depend heavily on one another to get the team's work
done -0.394
Members of this team have their jobs to do, with little need for them to work
together 0.826
Others depend directly on my job 0.803
My job cannot be done unless others do their work 0.767
My work directly determines the progress of others 0.867
Team members must make efforts together 0.73
Team members work independently 0.825

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Common method bias
Data were acquired from only one industry because of the
nature of the research strategy for this study i.e. IT workers,
and common method bias (CMB) may accompany our findings.
Previous studies suggested that when employing the structural
equation modeling (SEM) in partial least squares (PLS-SEM)
technique, the full collinearity test may be used to identify
whether the data was damaged by the problem of common
method bias (Wong, 2016). The current research used variance
inflation factors (VIF) by a comprehensive collinearity test to
evaluate common method bias. The test model may not have the
CMB problem if the test model's scores are less than the cutoff
value of 3.3, and vice versa if the test model's scores are greater
than the cutoff value of 3.3. The findings demonstrated that the
CMB inaccuracy did not taint the data in the existing research
because all of the VIF scores for the analyzed latent variables
are lower than the indicated cutoff value. Thus, we came to the
conclusion that CMV was not an issue, allowing us to continue
our investigation for additional empirical research.
Data analysis andresults
Smart PLS 3 was used in the current study to investigate the
purported hypothesis since it is accepted as a cutting-edge
assessment method for entire areas. This recent empirical
study aimed to forecast and explain the studied latent con-
structs using the current theory. PLS-SEM has emerged as
a revolutionary technique (Hair etal., 2021) when a topic
needs to be examined to use structural modeling, clarifica-
tion, and construct estimation. It is also considered a ver-
satile tool for model evaluation (Bøe, 2016). The second
reason for using PLS-SEM is that it has less strict require-
ments for sample size than data normality and Amos. (Hair
etal., 2021) this study used PLS-SEM to avoid sample size
and data normality problems. As well as factor loadings for
evaluating construct validity and internal consistency reli-
ability, the PLS technique and bootstrapping strategy are
utilized to find path coefficients and the appropriate consid-
erable level to investigate the hypotheses (Mia etal., 2022).
After the measurement model was computed, estimates were
found by evaluating the structural model.
Measurement model assessment
In the measurement model, convergent validity was measured
through loadings, Cronbach’s alpha, average variance extract,
and competitive reliability. Referring to Tables2 & 3 and Fig.2,
factor loadings often exceeded the suggested value of 0.60, with
a few exceptions. Similarly, all Cronbach's alpha and composite
dependability (C.R.) scores were higher than the recommended
0.70 (Hair etal., 2017). For every construct under research, the
average variance extract (AVE) values were higher than the sug-
gested levels of 0.50. (Hair etal., 2021). The questions with the
lowest factor loadings (0.50) were excluded.
To evaluate the accuracy and reliability of the data, a new
criterion called the heterotrait-monotrait (HTMT) ratio was
proposed in discriminant validity (see Table4). In particular
situations, the Fornell-Larker criterion is one of the best and
most efficient assessment methods; however, it cannot iden-
tify the absence of discriminant validity. Consequently, all
values are below the established cutoff of 0.90, demonstrat-
ing discriminant validity (Hair etal., 2017).
Table 2 Profile of Respondents
Demographic Variables Categories Frequency Percentage
Gender Male 159 69.1
Female 72 30.9
Age Group 18 to 24 42 18.3
25 to 34 63 27.4
35 to 44 54 23.5
45 to 55 34 14.8
55 + 37 16.1
Education BS 169 73.5
Master 16 7.0
M.Phil 3 1.3
PhD 1 .4
Other 41 17.8
Work Experience Up to 1 Year 105 45.7
2—5 Years 120 52.2
5—10 Years 4 1.7
10 + Years 1 .4
Nature of Employment Permanent 56 24.3
Contractual 174 75.7
Fig. 1 Theoretical Framework
Model

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Structural model assessment
After ensuring that the model is valid and reliable through
the assessment of the measurement model, structural mode-
ling was done to evaluate hypotheses from the perspective of
IT companies. Path coefficients, t-values, and standard errors
are generated to assess the model's and the relations' appli-
cability to the data. In Smart PLS, bootstrapping determines
whether or not the values of the path coefficients support
the hypotheses. According to Table5 and Fig.3, Emotional
Intelligence is strongly and favorably associated with servant
leadership (β = 0.841, t = 14.898, LL = 0.692, UL = 0.922);
thus, H1 is supportive.
The results also showed a statistically significant link
between psychological safety and servant leadership
(β = 0.871, t = 18.766, L.L. = 0.754, U.L. = 0.936), thus sup-
porting H2. Moreover, it was also concluded that psycho-
logical safety is significantly linked with innovative behav-
ior (β = 0.382, t = 2.727, LL = 0.094, UL = 0.643); thus H3
is supporting. Lastly, task Interdependence considerably
and positively moderates the connection among psycho-
logical safety and innovative behavior (β = 0.375, t = 2.947,
LL = 0.110, UL = 0.606), thus supporting H4.
Smart PLS was also employed for a straightforward slope
analysis to assess the results of the moderating (interaction)
impact and to visualize its strength and emphasis. Slope plots
are usually employed to comprehend the moderating effect
clearly and visualize the interaction terms (Memon etal.,
2020). A high degree of task interdependence strengthened
the beneficial connections between psychological safety and
innovative behavior, as depicted in Fig.4.
Discussion
The study looked at how emotional intelligence, servant
leadership, and psychological safety can influence innova-
tive conduct in the I.T sector of Lahore, Pakistan. At the
same time, task interdependency moderates the association
among psychological safety and innovative behavior. The
social learning theory served as a frame of reference for
this investigation. Emotional intelligence was found to be
a strong analyst of servant leadership in the first hypothesis
(H). A wealth of research indicates a considerable connec-
tion among servant leadership and emotional intelligence
(Barbuto etal., 2014; Kumari etal., 2022). Similarly, it was
examined that emotional intelligence and servant leadership
have a beneficial link in the IT environment (Lee, 2019;
Miao etal., 2021; Razvi etal., 2015). Our research supports
the strong correlation among these two concepts and implies
that mentors with high emotional intelligence demonstrate
additional servant leadership practices.
According to the findings, servant leadership impacts
psychological safety, which indicates that it may directly or
indirectly influence the psychological safety of a company's
employees (H2). This result confirmed the fundamental
assumptions of the social learning theory, which holds that
servant leadership behavior, an encouraging and follower-
centred style of leadership, can inspire, heal, and love oth-
ers, lead to high psychological safety results, and ultimately
affects follower outcomes (Dutta & Khatri, 2017). Numerous
Table 3 Convergent Validity
CR: Composite Reliability and AVE: Average Variance Extracted
Constructs Items Loadings Alpha CR AVE
Emotional Intelligence El1 0.788 0.873 0.919 0.603
El3 0.809
El4 0.767
El5 0.718
El6 0.859
El7 0.775
El8 0.845
El9 0.839
El10 0.811
Servant Leadership SL1 0.775 0.936 0.948 0.722
SL2 0.854
SL3 0.844
SL4 0.87
SL5 0.847
SL6 0.854
SL7 0.896
Psychological Safety PS1 0.856 0.938 0.95 0.729
PS2 0.805
PS3 0.891
PS4 0.812
PS5 0.869
PS6 0.87
PS7 0.869
Innovative Behavior IB1 0.829 0.947 0.956 0.73
IB2 0.87
IB3 0.903
IB4 0.831
IB5 0.906
IB6 0.834
IB7 0.88
IB8 0.774
Task Interdependence TI1 0.804 0.831 0.892 0.585
TI3 0.826
TI4 0.803
TI5 0.767
TI6 0.867
TI7 0.73
TI8 0.825

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empirical studies in organizational research have proved that
various antecedents at the corporate and individual levels
improve employees' psychological safety (Frazier etal., 2017;
Joo etal., 2022). This study thus contributes significantly to
our knowledge of the functions of servant leadership and psy-
chological safety from the perspective of IT organizations.
Notably, the social learning theory highlights a reciprocal
association among leader and follower, owner and worker;
for instance, followers positively respond to their leaders' sup-
portive and positive behavior by demonstrating more confi-
dence at the workplace and commitment to their jobs, which
can enhance their innovative performance.
An earlier study demonstrates that psychological safety
affects the association between harsh supervision and origi-
nal or creative behavior (Liu etal., 2016; Zhu & Zhang, 2020)
but a recent study's unexpected finding shows a connection
between psychological safety and innovative behavior (H3)
as both are essential for achieving long-term organizational
objectives for creating a profitable and sustainable IT firm.
At the same time, the outcome is ultimately advantageous
Fig.2 Smart PLS Model—Measurement Model Assessment
Table 4 Discriminant Validity (HTMT Ratio)
EI: Emotional Intelligence, IB: Innovative Behavior, PS: Psychologi-
cal Safety, SL: Servant Leadership, and TI: Task Interdependence
EI IB PS SL TI
EI
IB 0.797
PS 0.756 0.779
SL 0.78 0.78 0.78
TI 0.764 0.797 0.797 0.716
Table 5 Path Analysis
p < 0.05 and T > 1.645
Hypothesis Relationships Beta SD T-Value P Value LL UL Decision
H1 EI- > SL 0.841 0.056 14.898 0 0.692 0.922 Supported
H2 SL—> PS 0.871 0.046 18.766 0 0.754 0.936 Supported
H3 PS—> IB 0.382 0.140 2.727 0 0.094 0.643 Supported
H4 TI—> IB 0.375 0.127 2.947 0.003 0.110 0.606 Supported

Current Psychology
1 3
to people. Accordingly, psychological safety reduces the
effects of employees' physical and mental stress, enhancing
their motivation to learn new knowledge for innovation (Shen
etal., 2020; Tepper, 2007). Innovative conduct is essential
for both people and firms. With innovation, a business can
expand, establish a competitive advantage, or reap long-term
benefits. Motivation to perform tasks confidently, indepen-
dently, and cooperatively generated an environment for the
business's development, sustainability, and accomplishment.
We draw this conclusion because task interdependency sup-
ports the hypothesis that psychological safety and employees'
innovative behavior are positively correlated (H4).
Theoretical implications
This study makes many significant theoretical advances to
the body of literature and existing social learning theory
Fig.3 Smart PLS Model—Structural Model Assessment
Fig.4 Simple Slope Effect for Moderation Effect

Current Psychology
1 3
through the collective impact of emotional intelligence,
servant leadership, psychological safety, task interdepend-
ency, and creative workplace conduct by employees. Firstly,
our research outcomes demonstrate a linkage between
emotional intelligence and servant leadership based on
the principle of social learning. A study indicated that the
servant leader trait of emotional intelligence aids in higher
employee productivity (Moroń & Biolik-Moroń, 2021). A
high degree of emotional intelligence was also said to help
create a high level of job enthusiasm and to boost employ-
ees' dedication and creative performance. Our study sup-
ports the strong correlation among the two variables and
implies that leaders with greater emotional intelligence
demonstrate additional servant leadership practices.
Secondly, using social learning theory, we have estab-
lished that this study proposes that servant leadership
facilitates psychological safety in employees. Our results
support the outcomes of prior literature by stating that
servant leadership and psychological safety are positively
correlated. The current study revealed servant leader-
ship's beneficial effects on psychological safety, which
further affects the innovative behavior of IT personnel.
As an illustration, it was suggested that additional research
needs to be done on the antecedents and consequences
of psychological safety. The findings show that servant
leadership was both an antecedent and an outcome of
psychological safety, adding value to the literature body.
Thirdly, recent research presents that psychological safety
is correlated with employees' innovative behaviour. This
research is unique as it scrutinized innovative behavior,
critical employee performance factors, and task interde-
pendence. Lastly, this study confirmed that team members
could have helped the other members to produce more
innovative solutions, strategies, and ideas for the success
of IT companies. Moreover, regarding social learning
theory, helpful behaviors encouraged team ingenuity by
enabling workers to use cooperative difficulties, such as
the diversity of ideas, as sources for innovation. The teams
may have had an opportunity to generate ideas and creative
solutions through spontaneous dialogue and work together
to settle problems to free up space for innovation.
Practical implications
We can provide practical advice for management practices
generally and in the context of the IT sector in Lahore, Paki-
stan, based on the findings of this research. The conclusions
of our study indicate that emotionally intelligent leaders
are far more successful in workplace situations than non-
intelligent leaders (Littrell, 2022). In I.T. businesses, serv-
ant leaders who exhibit emotional intelligence favourably
impact their followers' innovative behavior. As a result, this
study identified servant leadership as a leadership style that
can effectively and efficiently improve employee behavior,
hence enhancing organizational innovative performance.
Additionally, servant leaders encourage their staff to feel
psychologically comfortable in the workplace by offering
insightful suggestions for change which ultimately lessens
employee’s anxieties about work-related issues.
In the case when servant leaders provide sufficient sup-
port to their workforces then employees will feel more
psychologically safe in speaking up, presenting ideas, shar-
ing knowledge with colleagues, and most importantly, the
employees will obtain the encouragement of disclosing
mistakes and liabilities, believing that they are enabled to
access additional resources like feedback, recommenda-
tions, advice, and moral support from others without feel-
ing denigrated or condemned. This setting makes it easier
to accomplish tasks at work, encourages teamwork at all
levels, both individually and collectively, and boosts innova-
tive behavior. Moreover, task interdependence is a beneficial
working mode to lessen information concealment through
frequent, close engagement, communication, and depend-
ency between workers. As a result, leaders can enhance the
interdependence and relevance of team activities and raise
task visibility between team participants under the criteria of
the networked knowledge system. Furthermore, this encour-
ages team members to develop a sense of shared interests,
strengthening their sense of safety and loyalty and ultimately
enhancing motivation for innovation.
Limitations andfuture directions
Several restrictions exist in recent research, even though
it has succeeded in achieving its goals. First, data from IT
organizations in Lahore, Pakistan, were only collected using
a purposive sampling technique. Therefore, future research
could gather information from individuals in various loca-
tions of Pakistan who demonstrate emotional intelligence
and adhere to servant leadership principles to provide
insightful findings about psychological safety concerning the
contribution of task interdependence for innovative behav-
ior. Secondly, the study design was cross-sectional. Since a
cross-sectional study design can only partially satisfy some
of the conditions for causal inference between constructs,
the current research falls short in convincing validation of
the causal link between constructs. The variance inflation
factor test was used in recent research to address this prob-
lem. Still, because it was a cross-sectional study, it was vul-
nerable to the difficult-to-eliminate common method bias
issue. Data on the five variables of emotional intelligence,
servant leadership, psychological safety, innovative behav-
ior, and task interdependence were taken from employees'
self-reports at a time. Future research should employ a lon-
gitudinal approach to lessen the detrimental effects of both

Current Psychology
1 3
difficulties further, gathering information from numerous
periods and sources.
Thirdly, results should be interpreted carefully because
the study was done only in the high-stress IT industry,
where servant leadership is likely to occur. Future research
must consider other sectors too, by using the same study
approach, which may yield different results after evaluation.
Fourth, the sample size used in the current study was ade-
quate. Still, there is always the possibility of using a bigger
sample size in future studies to increase the generalizability
of the findings. Fifthly, this research collected data from I.T
employees having education of BS, Master, M.Phil, Ph.D.,
and other types of degrees; thus, future studies should ana-
lyze every section individually. Lastly, the current research
used a questionnaire for data collection, but future research
can use a qualitative approach (interviews) for the respond-
ents' opinions.
Conclusion
Current research assumes that emotional intelligence and
servant leadership pivots as an essential ancestor of psycho-
logical safety and task interdependence in the perspective
of IT companies to augment innovative behavior which was
previously unexplored. The study examined how emotional
intelligence is closely related to servant leadership practices.
The analytical findings revealed that servant leadership ade-
quately explains the company's psychological safety environ-
ment, subsequently stimulating the employees' innovative
behaviour.
The analytical findings revealed that servant leadership
adequately explains the company's environment of psycho-
logical safety which subsequently stimulates the innovative
behavior of the employees. Moreover, high task interdepend-
ence moderated the association among psychological safety
and innovative behavior. This research contributes to the
corpus of literature on the behavior of workers, by explor-
ing new areas for scholars as well as benefits for companies
in providing task interdependence from the leaders for the
innovative progress of their employees.
Supplementary Information The online version contains supplemen-
tary material available at https:// doi. org/ 10. 1007/ s12144- 023- 04990-7.
Data Availability Data will be available on request.
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