Abstract: In the VUCA era, it has become an important strategic choice for enterprises to timely respond to market changes by inducing improvisational behaviors in front-line innovators to creatively solve various emergent problems and technical challenges. However, current improvisation researches largely focuses on the above-team level, and there is a lack of systematic exploration on how to induce improvisational innovation in innovation team members in real time. By integrating regulatory focus theory and substitutes for leadership theory, this study aims to elucidate the process by which a team leader's promotion-focused behavioral modeling affects subordinates' improvisational innovation, specifically in four intervention contexts consisting of two substitute factors: formalization and identification with the leader. The analysis of data from 211 leader-member pairs of innovation teams reveals that (1) leader's promotion-focused behavioral modeling induces subordinates' improvisational innovation through their situational promotion focus; (2) subordinates' identification with the leader enhances the positive effect of leader's promotion-focused behavioral modeling, while formalization reverses this positive effect; (3) subordinates' identification with the leader could effectively mitigate the counter effect of formalization. Based on the analysis of the four intervention contexts, this paper systematically explains whether leader's promotion-focused behavioral modeling can induce improvisational innovation in subordinates and uncovers a variety of effect differences. The findings have implications for organizations to stimulate improvisational innovation in employees according to local conditions.

Key words: improvisational innovation, leader's promotion-focused behavioral modeling, situational promotion focus, formalization, identification with the leader