Creativity is becoming a topic with increasing interest to organization to gain competitive advantages in the global market. Thus there is a need for greater understanding of the dynamics between the personal and contextual factors responsible for creative performance in work settings.
This study examined the possibility of inverted U-shape relation between the employees’ experienced time pressure and their creativity at work and also examined whether this curvilinear relation varied as a function of employees’ self-efficacy,positive affectivity, job autonomy and challenging work. This study obtained data from 198 employees and 34 supervisors from Taiwan, covering mainly the manufacturing industry.
Contrary to the expectations, results from this study showed positive linear relationship between time pressure and creativity instead of curvilinear relationship.
An inverted U-shaped time pressure-creativity relation only emerged for employees who scored high on either self-efficacy, positive affectivity, job autonomy or challenging work while simultaneously experiencing intermediate time pressure.
We discussed the implications of these test results for future research and practice.

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