When self‐love is threatened: Adopting a dual‐type view to understand leader narcissism and its impacts on LMX and newcomer work outcomes

Abstract The extant literature has revealed that leader narcissism has paradoxical impacts on follower outcomes. In this research, we argue that its paradoxical effects can be disentangled by the presence of two distinct types of leader narcissism—narcissistic admiration and narcissistic rivalry—which can shape leaders’ initial relationship‐building with new followers (i.e., newcomers) differently. Integrating a dual‐type view of narcissism with leader–member exchange (LMX) theory and conducting a multi‐wave, multi‐source field study with 151 leader‐newcomer dyads, we found that leader narcissistic admiration is negatively related to leader perceived threat of a newcomer whereas leader narcissistic rivalry is positively related to it. Leader perceived threat of a newcomer, in turn, reduces the newcomer's LMX perceptions and ultimately hinders the newcomer's job satisfaction and task performance. Moreover, leader perceived similarity with a newcomer was found to strengthen the negative (positive) effect of leader narcissistic admiration (rivalry) on leader perceived threat of a newcomer. We did not find support for the moderation effect of newcomer acceptance seeking from the leader. This research sheds light on the value of adopting a content‐specific and multidimensional approach in studying leader narcissism.