10.5465/AMBPP.2013.6 THE COMBINED ROLES OF MASTERY AND PERFORMANCE CLIMATES IN IMPLEMENTING CREATIVE IDEAS MIHA ŠKERLAVAJ Faculty of Economics University of Ljubljana The Centre of Excellence for Biosensors, Instrumentation, and Process control - COBIK BI Norwegian Business School MATEJ ČERNE The Centre of Excellence for Biosensors, Instrumentation and Process control - COBIK ANDERS DYSVIK BI Norwegian Business School CHRISTINA G. L. NERSTAD BI Norwegian Business School CHUNKE SU University of Texas at Arlington ABSTRACT Not all creative ideas get implemented. Two field studies, in China (117 employees nested within 21 groups) and Slovenia (240 employees nested into 34 groups), revealed a three- way interaction of idea generation × performance climate × mastery climate in predicting idea implementation. INTRODUCTION We set out to make three contributions to the fields of creativity and innovation research. First, we focus on the context of implementing creative ideas at work within two highly diverse cultures (China and Slovenia). The goal is to search for any universal, as well as contingent, patterns across cultures that unfold when people at work strive to implement their creative ideas. This aim is in line with a recent review of the role of national cultures in creativity and innovation research (Zhou & Su, 2010) that calls for empirical research on creativity in Chinese work settings. Our second choice of country (Slovenia) also adds to the debate over whether creativity and innovation at work are universal or culture specific (Erez & Nouri, 2010). By intentionally selecting two non-Western countries, we add to the generalizability of the research findings on the context of the link between the generation and implementation of creative ideas. Second, we explore the contextual influences on the successful implementation of creative ideas by individuals at work, specifically, the form of the perceived motivational climate (i.e., mastery and performance climates), which is defined as the extant criteria of success and failure in the work environment (Ames, 1992a; Ames, 1992b; Nicholls, 1989). The motivational climate likely influences whether individuals are ultimately successful at implementing their creative ideas (cf., Hirst, Van Knippenberg, & Zhou, 2009). In the present study, we investigate how the interplay of the two basic types of motivational climates at work enhances or inhibits the