How work meaningfulness promotes green innovation behavior through dual proactive motivation pathways

In response to escalating sustainability pressures, organizations increasingly rely on green innovation, which often depends on employees’ self-initiated efforts. Although prior research has linked work meaningfulness to innovation and proactivity, it offers limited insight into the motivational processes through which meaningful work is associated with green innovation behavior. Drawing on the proactive motivation model, we develop and test a dual-pathway model in which work meaningfulness is related to green innovation behavior through two parallel mechanisms—an energized-to pathway via work passion and a reason-to pathway via intrinsic motivation—while also examining spiritual leadership as a boundary condition. Using three-wave matched survey data from 406 employee-leader dyads in China, we find that work meaningfulness is positively related to employees’ green innovation behavior. Work passion and intrinsic motivation each mediate this relationship, and spiritual leadership strengthens the corresponding conditional indirect associations. By empirically operationalizing proactive motivation theory in a sustainability context with parallel mediators, this study clarifies the motivational pathways linking work meaningfulness to green innovation behavior and offers actionable guidance for sustainability-oriented organizations, HR leaders, and managers engaged in green transformation initiatives.