The ‘if-then’ rules matter more? The roles of regulatory focus and leader–member exchange

•In hospitality organizations, enhancing positive work behavior and minimizing negative ones should always be on the top agenda of managers.•Study results confirm that frontline employees will exhibit stronger positive effort behavior when their promotion focus and prevention focus are stronger.•Managers should pay closer attention to developing and communicating the linkage (if-then rules) between a given task and an expected gain.•Study results indicate that prevention-focused employees are significantly and negatively correlated to social loafing.•Employees’ orientation to regulatory focus is not a static personality trait but a choice based on their cognitive understanding of the causation.