1. Introduction Workplaces constantly face change (Herscovitch & Meyer, 2002) and the pace at which organizations go through change has increased tremendously (Piderit, 2000). Hence, managing change has emerged as an important competence (Paton & McCalman, 2008). However, about half of change initiatives fail (Fay & Lhrmann, 2004). Thus, the need for a better understanding of organizational change processes is evident (Stensaker & Langley, 2010; van Knippeuberg, Martin, & Tyler, 2006). The success of change initiatives depends largely on employees' willingness to change their behaviours, attitudes, goals, and values (Ashforth & Mael, 1998; George & Jones, 2001; WhelanBerry, Gordon, & Hinings, 2003) as change processes typically raise several concerns leading to resistance among employees. Fostering commitment to change among employees is therefore a fertile avenue for successfully managing change. Globalization as a force pushing companies towards expanding their activities globally, opening up subsidiaries in different countries leads to a growing number of transnational companies. The transnational nature of companies might yield further complexities for change management initiatives. Thus, in order to plan and implement change effectively in transnational organizations, cultural aspects need to be taken into account, as leadership perception and effectiveness as well as communication effectiveness are determined by cultural differences (House, Javidan, Hanges, & Dorhan, 2002; Merkin, Taras, & Steel, 2014). Managing change in a transnational organization is a particular challenge, as the headquarters has to rely on the foreign subsidiaries in implementing change. Change management literature has shown that two factors strongly inuence the willingness of employees to change: Top management communication and leadership behaviour (Hill, Seo, Kang, & Taylor, 2012). What however complicates change management projects in transnational organizations is cultural differences. In this paper, we develop a conceptual model that links top management communication and direct manager's transformational leadership behaviour to employees' commitment to change in a transnational organization. The theoretical model and the empirical study yield two important insights: First, the greater the cultural distance between employees and headquarters, the more important is the leadership behaviour of the direct supervisor. In other words: the direct managers' role as change agents increases with cultural distance. Second, top management (i.e. headquarters) communication is less effective the greater the cultural distance between the foreign subsidiary and the headquarters is. These are substantial additions to extant literature on change management, as we show that change management initiatives in transnational organizations follow their own rules. These ndings have important theoretical and managerial implications. The following section develops a research model, which is tested with a sample of 939 employees involved in a change initiative of a transnational technology company with its headquarters in Germany and manufacturing sites and sales ofces in 35 countries. The aim of this change process was to implement a global operational excellence initiative. The nal section of the paper will discuss the ndings and derive conclusions, limitations and an outlook for future research initiatives. 2. Theoretical Framework In this section, we develop the conceptual model for our study. We review literature on change management to conclude that the success of change initiatives strongly hinges on employee acceptance and support for organizational change. Therefore, during change implementation much effort is focused on shaping employees' beliefs, attitudes, and intentions (Armenakis, Harris, & Mossholder, 1993; Herold, Fedor, & Caldwell, 2007) in general and Schwarz, & Minbashian, 2015 or Jaros, 2010). Herscovitch and Meyer (2002) argued (later commitment to change in particular. We also conclude that top management communication and empirically confirmed by Meyer, Srinivas, Lal, and Topolnytsky (2007)) that, while all three the direct leader's behaviour (transformational leadership) are of central importance for creating dimensions would relate positively to compliance with the requirements of change, only affective commitment to change. Cultural distance however is an important, so far neglected, variable in and normative commitment would lead to higher levels of support. Building on Hill et al. (2012) such a change management model, as it increases the role of direct managers as change agents and empirical studies that in fact showed that continuance commitment to change either had no or and diminishes the effect of top management communication. only a very weak impact on attitudinal and performance outcomes (Bouckenooghe, et al., 2015; Turner Parish, Cadwallader, & Busch, 2008), we focus on affective and normative commitment to change in this study. Affective commitment to change is defined as the "desire to provide 2.1. Commitment to change support for the change based on a belief in its inherent benefits" and normative commitment to Of all the literature discussing individual-level constructs reported to increase individual change as "a sense of obligation to provide support for the change" (Herscovitch & Meyer, 2002, readiness to change (i.e. self-efficacy, commitment to change, perceived personal competence, p. 475). and job satisfaction), commitment to change has received the most attention (Choi, 2011). Various researchers highlighted the overall importance of actions taken by leaders during Herscovitch and Meyer (2002, p. 475) define commitment to change as "a force (mind-set) that change (Balogun & Johnson, 2004a; Huy, 2002). Hill et al. (2012) identify two top management- binds an individual to a course of action deemed necessary for the successful implementation of a related variables that strongly influence employees' commitment to change: transformational change initiative." Thus, commitment to change usually reflects an employee's approval of new leadership and top management communication. Transformational leadership includes regulations, policies, programs and so forth and constitutes a dynamic process (Jaros, 2010). articulating and presenting a clear vision, displaying charisma, motivating employees through Commitment to change includes not only positive attitudes toward the change, i.e. the inspiration and intellectual stimulation derived from exposing them to new and complex ways of employees' intentions to support it, but also their willingness to work on behalf of its successful thinking, and being considerate of their individual needs and desires (Podsakoff, Mackenzie, implementation (Herold, et al., 2007). Moorman, & Fetter, 1990). Thus, transformational leadership is "important during times of Herscovitch and Meyer (2002), drawing on their general theory of workplace commitment change because of the ability of transformational leaders to engage followers and motivate them (Herscovitch & Meyer, 2002), propose a three-dimensional model of commitment to change, to support the leader's chosen direction" (Herold, Fedor, Caldwell, & Liu, 2008, p. 353). consisting of normative commitment to change (obligation-based), continuance commitment to Furthermore, transformational leadership fosters absorptive capacity, organizational learning and change (cost-based), and affective commitment to change (feelings-based). Numerous studies on innovation (Garcia-Morales, Llorens-Montes, & Verdu-Jover, 2008). change have used this conceptualization (for a review see for example Bouckenooghe, M.Cultural Distance and Change Management Cultural Distance and Change Management Regarding communication during change initiatives, employees expect the top their workgroup (Bommer, Rich, & Rubin, 2005; Podsakoff, et al., 1990). Such leaders articulate management team to deliver credible information about the type and consequences of change, as a clear vision of the future that is understood by followers, and motivate followers to accept it it is the top management team which usually determines the direction and scope of change (Burns, 1978). Employees are more likely to accept change and to view it as legitimate when they initiatives (Gersick, 1991; Romanelli & Tushman, 1994). The top management team shapes the perceive a climate of trust, feel loyal and attached to the employer, and other members of their organization's general communication style and credibility (Hill, et al., 2012; Pincus, Rayfield, & workgroup accept the change (Rousseau & Tijoriwala, 1999). Furthermore, a climate of trust Cozzens, 1991). reduces the belief in dysfunctional reasons for change (e.g. self-serving reasons on the part of However, the role of leaders in developing high levels of affective and normative leadership) and promotes beliefs in functional reasons (e.g. business-related reasons) (Rousseau commitment to change, as well as the specific mechanisms through which employee attitudes and & Tijoriwala, 1999). Hence, it should follow that transformational leadership is strongly related behaviours are affected during change, have been rarely examined (for an exception see Herold, to managerial effectiveness during organizational change (Bass & Riggio, 2006; Pawar & et al., 2008 or Hill, et al., 2012). Culture distinguishes leadership practices and values in different Eastman, 1997). countries (House, Hanges, Javidan, Dorfman, & Gupta, 2004). Transnational companies therefore While there is abundant literature on the positive consequences of transformational need to consider cultural influences when managing change. Thus, this study focuses on the leadership (for meta-analytic studies see for example Judge & Piccolo, 2004 or Wang, Oh, influence of cultural differences on transformational leadership and top management Courtright, & Colbert, 2011), and some work that studies its influence on employees' communication in fostering commitment to change. commitment to an organization (e.g. Avolio, Zhu, Koh, & Bhatia, 2004; Bass & Riggio, 2006; Pillai & Williams, 2004), there is surprisingly little research focusing on the effects of transformational leadership on employees' commitment to change (Herold, et al., 2008). 2.2. Transformational Leadership and Commitment to Change Discussing the role of leadership during organizational change, Burke (2013, p. 279) concludes Transformational leadership refers to the way leaders achieve a desired behaviour among that "what has not been as clear from the literature is the impact of leadership on organization their followers; it "includes individualized consideration, intellectual stimulation, idealized change ... there has been little evidence that scientifically demonstrates the leader's impact. It is influence (charisma), and inspirational motivation" (Yukl, 1999, p. 286). Thus, a goal of reasonable to assume, nevertheless, that because there is mounting evidence that leaders affect transformational leaders is to transform "followers' attitudes, beliefs, and values" (Rafferty & organizational performance in general, surely they have an impact on organizational change in Griffin, 2004, p. 330) so that "followers feel trust, admiration, loyalty, and respect toward the particular." Only very limited empirical research explicitly addresses the relationship between leader, and they are motivated to do more than they originally expected to do" (Yukl, 1999, p. transformational leadership and employees' commitment to change (Carter, Armenakis, Feild, & 286). Through their support and inspiration, transformational leaders promote trust and loyalty in Mossholder, 2013; Herold, et al., 2008; Hill, et al., 2012; van der Voet, 2014). This is surprising, 9as the effects of transformational leadership on commitment to change are evident (see Herold, et Hypothesis 1: Direct managers' transformational leadership behaviours are positively al., 2008; Hill, et al., 2012). Transformational leadership behaviours create conditions in which related to employees' (a) affective commitment to change and (b) normative commitment to followers are more likely to commit to a change by designing a positive vision for the future change. (beyond the vision for the specific change), inspiring followers, attending to their needs in a way that helps them in coping with concerns regarding change, and building trust (Herold, et al., 2.3. Top Management Communication and Commitment to Change 2008; Hill, et al., 2012). Affective and normative commitment to change drive employees' supporting behaviour with respect to change initiatives (Herscovitch & Meyer, 2002). Affective Top management communication is an important driver of organizational change (Hill, et al., 2012; Portoghese, et al., 2012), especially when change initiatives encompass the whole commitment to change builds on employee devotion to support change because immanent company (Pincus, et al., 1991; Young & Post, 1993). Communication helps employees benefits are expected. Normative commitment to change has its foundation in an employee's understand the consequences of change, and their new roles (van Dam, Oreg, & Schyns, 2008). sense of duty (Herscovitch & Meyer, 2002). Based on the capability of transformational leaders Poor communication of change processes triggers uncertainty and facilitates the emergence of to promote loyalty and trust (Yukl, 1999), communicate vision (Burns, 1978), and to create a rumours (DiFonzo & Bordia, 1998), cynicism and resistance to change (Stanley, Meyer, & sense of moral duty so that meeting a company's requirements is valuable to employees (Meyer Topolnytsky, 2005). Schweiger and Denisi (1991) show that extensive top management & Parfyonova, 2010), we expect transformational leadership to positively influence affective and communication yields higher levels of job satisfaction and trust in company management. normative commitment to change. This assumption is also backed by empirical findings showing transformational leadership is positively related to affective (Herold, et al., 2008; Hill, et al., Furthermore, uncertainty from an employee's perspective is reduced (Schweiger & Denisi, 1991). Top management communication encompasses, on the one hand, information provided to 2012) and normative commitment to change (Hill, et al., 2012). employees through top management (top-down communication), and, on the other hand, the In this study, we investigate the transformational leadership of direct managers (in the extraction and incorporation of information from organizational stakeholders (bottom-up local subsidiary of the transnational organization) of employees involved in a change process. communication) (Hill, et al., 2012; Lewis, 2007). Top-down communication needs to deliver a Transnational companies need to implement change promoted by their headquarters in consistent picture about the goals and consequences of change initiatives. Thus, top-down subsidiaries dispersed in different countries. Thus, direct mangers located in the subsidiary have change-management communication should focus on revealing all necessary information in order an unique opportunity to trigger commitment to change because of "their physical and to reduce uncertainty among employees (DiFonzo & Bordia, 1998; Richardson & Denton, 1996). psychological proximity to the members of their workgroup" (Hill, et al., 2012, p. 761). Bottom-up top management communication can enhance employees' perceptions of justice, Therefore, we put the following hypotheses forward: because employee concerns are perceived to be considered. Furthermore, bottom-upcommunication also provides the possibility for top management to mitigate negative emotional responses from employees (Richardson & Denton, 1996) and to reduce uncertainty through collective planning (DiFonzo & Bordia, 1998). We therefore expect top management communication (comprised of top-down and bottom-up communication behaviour) to strengthen belief in the benets of the change initiative, because stakeholder opinions have been incorporated and goals and consequences of change, and thus a vision of the future, have been communicated. Furthermore, top management communication triggers trust among employees in top management (Schweiger & Denisi, 1991) and, as a consequence, affective responses of employees to change initiatives are also promoted. We therefore put the following further hypothesis forward: Hypothesis 2: Perceived top management communication is positively related to employees' (a) affective commitment to change and (b) normative commitment to change. 2.4. The Moderating Role of Cultural Distance Culture as a contextual variable ames behaviours and beliefs of human beings, and as a consequence, also the way organizations operate (Hofstede, 1980, 1991; House, et al., 2004). House and colleagues (2004) extensively investigated cultural inuences in terms of leadership practices and values in the course of the GLOBE (Global Leadership and Organizational Behaviour Effectiveness Research) project. The authors follow the proposition that \"the amount of inuence, prestige, and privilege given to leaders varies widely by culture\" (House, et al., 2004, p. 10). Taking this consideration into account, we can expect that globally dispersed companies will need to cope with the fact that their leadership efforts, when not adapted to cultural differences for different subsidiaries, might not achieve the same effect in subsidiaries 12 from distinct cultural settings. Culture exposes inuence on leadership behaviour on nine different dimensions denominated the nine GLOBE cultural competencies (House, et al., 2004): power distance, uncertainty avoidance, human orientation, collectivism I and H, assertiveness, gender egalitarianism, future orientation and performance orientation. Power distance refers to the expectation that power is distributed equally. Uncertainty avoidance describes how strongly societies rely on norms and rules to avoid unpredictable outcomes. Human orientation encompasses societal values assigned to fairness and altruism. Collectivism I refers to institutional practices triggering a collective distribution of resources and collective action, while collectivism II refers to what extent individuals express pride, loyalty and cohesiveness in organizations and families. Assertiveness describes the individual tendency to be confrontational and aggressive in relationships. Gender egalitarianism refers to the degree to which a collective minimizes gender inequality. Future orientation refers to the degree to which individuals pursue future-oriented actions. Finally, performance orientation describes the degree to which a society rewards the performance and excellence of their members (cp. House, et al., 2004). In transnational organizations, leadership perception and effectiveness is determined by cultural differences (House, et al., 2002; Javidan, Dorfman, Sully de Luque, & House, 2006; Yan & Hunt, 2005). The construct cultural distance as \"the degree to which the cultural norms in one country are different from those in another country\" (Morosini, et al., 1998, p. 139) gained wide acceptance in literature to explain phenomena like strategies and organizational characteristics (e.g. entry modes or international diversication (e.g. Barkema, Bell, & Pennings, 1996; Grosse & Trevino, 1996)), subsidiary management (e.g. Roth & O'Donnell, 1996), and multinational enterprise performance (e.g. Morosini, et al., 1998). Cultural distance also inuences headquarters-subsidiary relationships (Drogendijk & Holm, 2012). It has been argued that cultural differences make the transfer of organizational innovations among units and technology 13 implementations more difficult, and impede efcient coordination of resources and accurate information ows, as well as hinder organizational control systems (Gomez-Mejia & Palich, 1997). In the context of mergers and acquisitions, Vaara et a1. (2012) argued that cultural differences between acquirer and target lead to social conict and less browledge transfer. All these studies investigated constructs that are related to change (e.g. transfer of innovations across units, technology implementation, coordination of resources, social conict, knowledge transfer) and therefore support the assumption that cultural distance inuences change initiatives. To summarize, it is quite clear that cultural distance inuences headquarters-subsidiary relationships. However, to the best of our knowledge, there are no studies that investigate the role of cultural distance for organizational commitment to change. Scholars even note that literature on commitment to change in general pays very little attention to cross-cultural di'erences (Bouckenooghe, et al., 2015). Hence, we include cultural distance and develop arguments for its moderating role in our model. Leadership acceptance depends upon the interaction between culturally induced leadership theories and leader attributes and behaviours (House, et al., 2002). Following this argumentation, we expect cultural distance to moderate leadership behaviour and top management communication in change initiatives in transnational companies. The distance between leaders and followers explains leadership perceptions and leadership outcomes (Antonakis & Atwater, 2002), whereby distance can be seen as social or psychological distance, physical distance, frequency of contacts, or hierarchical or cross- furrctional distance (Antonakis & Atwater, 2002). Avolio et al. (2004), building on previous literature, develop a number of arguments as to why physical or structural distance moderates the relationship between transformational leadership and organizational commitment: Proximity 14 facilitates communication between leaders and followers, while distance decreases the direct inuence and effectiveness (Chen & Bliese, 2002; Liden, Sparrowe, & Wayne, 1997), and close leaders have more opportunities to show individualized consideration, to be sensitive to followers' needs, and to support employees' development (Shamir, 1995). Distance also hampers trust and relationship building (Howell & Hall-Merenda, 1999). All these arguments support our assumption that cultural distance moderates the relationship between transformational leadership and employees' commitment to change. Similar to physical distance, cultural distance inuences communication and the opportunities for leaders to act, react and intervene, and to create trust and build relationships. The more distant a subsidiary is from its headquarters, the smaller the congruence is between the culturally induced leadership concepts of the followers compared to those of the headquarters. More specically, we argue that the more culturally distant a subsidiary is from its headquarters, the more important transformational leadership from direct managers is, when implementing change initiatives 'Transfomrational leaders help followers to see the importance of transcending their own self-interest for the sake of the mission and vision of their group and/or organization" (Jung & Avolio, 1999, p. 209). We expect that in transnational change initiatives, direct managers in the subsidiaries are better able to understand culturally induced leadership expectations. Furthermore, as transformational leaders create an environment characterized by trust and loyalty (Y ukl, 1999), we expect employees to turn even more to their direct managers for guidance, as change initiatives bring along uncertainty (DiFonzo & Bordia, 1998; Richardson & Denton, 1996). Direct leaders will achieve a better fit regarding these leadership expectations. \"Being uther from home usually means being less well connected to local networks, less able to understand local norms, and less able to be sure how much to trust what people may say\" (Helliwell, 2002, p. 21). 15 As concerns top management communication, we expect a negative moderating effect of cultural distance. The more culturally distant the headquarters are from a subsidiary, the higher the likelihood that top management will not achieve a t between expectations regarding leadership and leadership behaviour. Especially when change initiatives are of a companywide scope, achieving this t will be difficult because top management communication needs to address culturally dispersed stakeholders involved in the change initiative simultaneously. Research in this respect indicates, for instance, that while Japanese employees expect very precise answers from their leaders, for U.S. employees preciseness is not as important (Javidan, et al., 2006). Thus, it will be very difcult to design communication in a way that it is effective in different cultural settings Cultural distance impedes comprehensibility of culture, and practices in culturally distant markets make it more difcult to explain how knowledge can be used, increasing ambiguity about knowledge to be transferred and impeding communication in general (Reus & Lamont, 2009). Reus and Lamont (2009) summarize the effects of cultural distance as follows: \"it makes it more difficult for workforces to come together, interact, and share ideas, and, as a result, impedes communication\" (p 1302). Even when language differences are overcome, employees would prefer to communicate with individuals of similar cultures rather than with individuals from distant cultures (Lane, Greenberg, & Berdrow, 2004). To summarize, cultural differences can lead to misunderstandings in communication and suspiciousness among employees (Merkin, et al., 2014); \"cultural differences oen lead to miscommunication, which can and does cause conict\" (Triandis, 2012, p. 34). Hence, we expect that cultural distance impedes the impact of top management communication on employees' commitment to change Hypothesis 3: The positive relationship between a direct manager's transformational leadership and (a) affech've and (b) normative commitment will be stronger when the cultural distance between an employee and the organization's headquarters is higher Hypothesis 4: The positive relationship between top management communication and (a) affective and (b) normative commitment will be weaker when the cultural distance between an employee and the organization's headquarters is higher. Figure 1 summarizes the proposed relationships which will be tested empirically in the following sections 1w whim!" ammuniuu'nn Figure 1: Study model