管理工程学报2026，Vol.40Issue(3)：30-43,14.DOI:10.13587/j.cnki.jieem.2026.03.003
谦以制胜:中国情境下谦逊领导的元分析
Humility leads to success:A meta-analysis of the humble leadership in the Chinese context
摘要
Abstract
In the era of volatility,uncertainty,complexity,and ambiguity,increasingly complex and dynamic work situations place higher demands on leaders' knowledge and problem-solving abilities.Relying on leaders to use their personal wisdom from top to bottom to solve all problems is becoming increasingly difficult.However,as China's cultural context is influenced by Confucianism,Taoism,and other cultures that highlight the quality of humility and the importance of maintaining it in interpersonal relationships,humble leadership,a typical"bottom-up"leadership style,has attracted considerable attention and respect.Humble leaders are self-aware,recognize and appreciate employees' contributions and advantages,and maintain open and humble learning attitudes.However,the meaning and self-awareness dimension of humble leadership in China differs from that in Western culture.Chinese scholars have conducted in-depth empirical research on humble leadership and achieved productive results,which is necessary and important to explore the impact of humble leadership in the Chinese context. To further explore the impact of humble leadership in the Chinese context,this study conducted a meta-analysis on the humble leadership in the Chinese context.First,Chinese and English keywords were searched in Chinese databases,such as the China National Knowledge Infrastructure and Chinese Social Sciences Citation Index,and English databases,such as Web of Science,EBSCO,and Wiley.According to inclusion and exclusion criteria,studies meeting the requirements were selected and included in a meta-analysis of 185 empirical studies on humble leadership in China.Next,the Psychmeta package in R language and the Hunter-Schmidt meta-analysis method,commonly used in organizational management,were used for analysis.To ensure the study's reliability,heterogeneity and publication bias tests were conducted.The effects of humble leadership at different levels(individuals,teams,organizations,and leaders themselves)in the Chinese context were analyzed,and phased conclusions were obtained.Then,using subgroup analysis,this study examined the influences of different organizational categories,measurement time points,and use of Owens's scale and other tools developed by Chinese researcher.Finally,based on the meta-analysis,the study's shortcomings and directions for future research were proposed. The meta-analysis showed the following:First,publication bias test indicates no significant publication bias problem for humble leadership in China.The heterogeneity results all exceeded the high heterogeneity standard of 75％,indicating that the random-effects model could be used for testing.Second,humble leadership had a significant positive effect at different levels.It promoted employees' affective commitment,psychological safety,work engagement,leader-member exchange,performance,innovation,and voice;strengthened team learning;enhanced team performance and creativity;and helped improve organizational performance and leadership effectiveness.The potential moderating effect also showed that humble leadership's positive effect is influenced by context(different organization categories)and measurement factors(measuring time points and tools).Specifically,humble leadership's influence is stronger in nonprofit institutions,and its positive effect is more significant when measuring time points across cross-sectional design and using scales such as Owens's scale. This study is the first to summarize empirical research on humble leadership in the Chinese context and conduct a meta-analysis,reaching the phased conclusion that humble leadership in China has positive effects at various levels(employees,teams,organizations,and leaders themselves).It also identified the potential moderating effects.This study contributes to the literature on humble leadership in China in several ways.First,it integrated several empirical studies based on the Chinese context and reported the precise impact of humble leadership on employees,teams,organizations,and leaders themselves.Thus,it promoted research on and summarized the mechanisms of humble leadership in the Chinese context.Second,it tested the moderating effects of situational factors and assessed the impact of humble leadership across organizational categories.Finally,it evaluated the effects of different measurement time points and tools as potential influencing factors.In sum,it integrated the literature on humble leadership and its impact on outcomes in the Chinese context and different moderating effects.关键词
谦逊领导/绩效/中国情境/元分析Key words
Humble leadership/Performance/Chinese context/Meta-analysis分类
管理科学引用本文复制引用
李超平,蓝媛美,刘豆豆..谦以制胜:中国情境下谦逊领导的元分析[J].管理工程学报,2026,40(3):30-43,14.基金项目
国家自然科学基金项目(71772171) The National Natural Science Foundation of China(71772171) （71772171）
