The impact of three kinds of identity on research and development employees’ incremental and radical creativity

• Team identity and expertise identity positively affected radical and incremental creativity.
• Family identity did not affect radical and incremental creativity.
• For the employees whose family identity was the highest among the three identities (including team identity and expertise identity), none of the identities had an effect on creativity.

Employee creativity is thought to be a source of organizational innovation which in turn is a source of competitive advantage for organizations. Little research has examined what employees’ identities are correlated with their creativity. In a sample of 383 research and design (R&D) employees and their supervisors from aerospace research and design organizations in China, we found that 241 employees’ highest identification scores were team identity, 11 employees’ highest identification scores were expertise identity, and 120 employees’ highest identification scores were family identity. Findings demonstrated that team identity and expertise identity positively affected radical and incremental creativity. Family identity did not exhibit an effect. But for the 120 employees whose family identity was the highest among the three identities, none of the identities had an effect on creativity. Implications of the findings to the employee identity and creativity management areas are discussed.