Head nurses' scientific research and innovation leadership and nurses' innovative work behavior: the mediating role of intra-team competition perception and the moderating role of harmonious work passion.

BACKGROUND: Nurses' innovative work behavior represents an important form of proactive workplace behavior in healthcare organizations. Although head nurses' scientific research and innovation leadership may create conditions that support innovation, how such leadership is translated into nurses' innovative work behavior through team-level cognitive processes and under what motivational conditions this association is strengthened or weakened remain insufficiently understood. METHODS: A cross-sectional survey was conducted among 400 clinical nurses in China. Participants completed validated measures of head nurses' scientific research and innovation leadership, intra-team competition perception, harmonious work passion, and nurses' innovative work behavior. Pearson correlation analyses, hierarchical regression analysis, mediation analysis, and moderated mediation analysis were performed. RESULTS: Head nurses' scientific research and innovation leadership was positively associated with nurses' innovative work behavior. Intra-team competition perception partially mediated this association. Harmonious work passion moderated the association between intra-team competition perception and nurses' innovative work behavior: the association was stronger among nurses with lower harmonious work passion and weaker among those with higher harmonious work passion. The conditional indirect association between head nurses' scientific research and innovation leadership and nurses' innovative work behavior through intra-team competition perception was also stronger when harmonious work passion was lower. CONCLUSION: By integrating transformational leadership theory and self-determination theory, this study extends existing research on nurses' innovative work behavior by identifying intra-team competition perception as a team-level cognitive pathway and harmonious work passion as a motivational boundary condition linking leadership context with innovation behavior. Nursing managers should not rely solely on competitive cues to stimulate innovation, but should also cultivate nurses' internalized work passion and provide supportive leadership for sustainable innovation.