A Study On The Influence Of Middle Level Managers' Competence On The Climate And Results Of Creativity In Teams Of Knowledge Enterprises

In the time of knowledge economy, creativity has been viewed as the key success factor to organizations from both academic and practical perspectives. The stimulation of employees'creativity, the improvement of organizations'creative capabilities and the establishment of knowledge enterprises have been scheduled as development strategies by more and more companies. While working on the material capital investment, companies must attach importance to organizational environment to ensure the sustainable and systematic creativity. Specific cultural characteristics in China determine that leadership is a major force among many factors that influence organizational environment. So we must emphasize on the influence of middle level managers'deep-seated competences on creativity and further development of companies.This paper utilized concepts of competence and climate for creativity, and focused on middle level managers in knowledge enterprises as the research objective. It discussed that in China which dimensions of competence will have influence on the generation and development of creativity. The present effort firstly identified four dimensions of competence by Exploratory Factor Analysis and put forth the competence model for middle level managers of knowledge enterprises. Then based on the dimensions and scales of climate for creativity developed by foreign studies, this study identified five dimensions of climate for creativity using samples from China's knowledge enterprises. Finally, the influences of competences on climate and results of creativity were found by Path Analysis. The results demonstrated that management qualifications, cognitive traits and organizational commitment have positive influences on climate and results of creativity, while indices under the dimension of management skills have complicated influences on climate and results of creativity, which should be used cautiously by managers.Those findings will help enterprises in selecting and training middle level managers, in order to build climate for creativity and improve internal creative capabilities. This empirical research on dimensions of climate in China background will also enrich studies on climate for creativity.