The moderating effect of climate for inclusion on supervisor-subordinate dissimilarity outcomes

Growing workforce diversity increases the likelihood that managers and subordinates will differ along demographic lines, a situation that has important implications for relationship quality and organizational outcomes. In a sample of 1,253 employees from 54 work-units, we investigate the effects of differences in disability status on individual performance and find that dissimilarity exhibits negative indirect relationships via leader-member-exchange (LMX) quality. Furthermore, we investigate the role of unit-level climate for inclusion in this relationship. In addition to a positive main effect of climate for inclusion on LMX relationships, we also find support for a buffering effect of unit-level climate for inclusion on the negative dissimilarity-LMX relationship for situations in which the supervisor, but not the subordinate, has a disability. This study contributes to the growing literature on diversity by investigating supervisor-subordinate differences in disability, an often neglected dimension of diversity, and by taking into account the specific constellation of differences, a fact that is overlooked in current literature. In addition, we focus on climate for inclusion as a potential tool for organizations to better leverage diversity in their firms, and are among the first to empirically examine this new construct.