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Because of the changing psychological contract between employers and employees over time, the primary responsibility for career development has shifted from organizations to employees. As the role of individuals in career development has become important, personal growth initiative (PGI), individuals' positive and proactive stance toward change and continuous self-improvement, can be a pivotal construct in the fields of human resources (HR), organizational behavior (OB) and career management. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effects of person–organization fit (POF), authentic leadership and work empowerment on PGI.

Data were collected from 235 employees of a leading telecommunication company in South Korea. Most respondents were highly educated male managers in their 30s and 40s. With an overall confirmatory factor analysis, the four-factor measurement model indicated a good fit to the data. The relationships between variables and the relative importance of each independent variables were tested using hierarchical multiple regression analysis, along with a bootstrapping to examine the mediation effect of work empowerment.

Based on a moderated mediation model, this study examined the integrative effects of POF, authentic leadership and work empowerment on PGI. The authors found that employees demonstrated a high level of PGI when they perceived themselves fit with the organization and when they were empowered in their work. While the direct effect of authentic leadership was non-significant, supportive, transparent and ethical leadership behavior significantly moderated the relationship between POF and PGI. Lastly, based on a bootstrap analysis, this study found that work empowerment partially mediated the relationship between POF and PGI.

This empirical study contributes to the body of knowledge in the field of HR, OB and career management. This study introduced a relatively less explored construct, PGI, using data from knowledge workers in South Korea. The authors integrated diverse research streams such as person–environment fit, leadership and engagement research. Lastly, this was the first study that investigated the effects of contextual factors on PGI in the workplace.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of learning organization culture (LOC), learning goal orientation (LGO) and psychological empowerment (PsyEmp) on employee engagement, focusing on the mediating role of each dimension of PsyEmp (meaning, competence, self-determination and impact).

Individual perceptions of 329 employees in 9 South Korean for-profit companies were obtained by a cross-sectional survey. Construct validity of each measurement model was examined using confirmatory factor analysis, and the hypothesized structural model was tested by structural equation modeling. Bootstrap analyses were used for testing mediation effects of PsyEmp.

The authors found that PsyEmp had a significant effect on job engagement, and that LOC and LGO significantly predicted the level of PsyEmp and engagement. The four dimensions of PsyEmp partially mediated the relationship between the two predictors (i.e. LOC and LGO) and job engagement. LGO had a stronger effect than LOC on both PsyEmp and job engagement.

Employees who are high in LGO and perceive that an organization provides opportunities for continuous learning with supportive leadership are more likely to experience improved meaning in their work, competence in their knowledge and skills, and foster self-determination with respect to their personal impact on their work and organization. These important facets of PsyEmp that promote employee engagement should be considered by human resource and OD professionals when recommending workplace changes to improve organizational effectiveness and sustainability.

This study complements the trend to use employee engagement as a proxy for understanding both individual and organizational performance by investigating the relationships among LOC, goal orientation, empowerment and engagement.

In a knowledge-based economy, employees’ perception of psychological safety in their wok unit is critical for group conflict. The purpose of this study is to investigate the mediating role of psychological safety between the predictors (i.e. organizational trust and empowering leadership) and the outcome variable, group conflict.

Data was drawn from 633 employees from a global automobile company headquartered in South Korea. Construct validity of the measurement model was examined using a confirmatory factor analysis. The hypothesized model was tested by a structural equation modeling and the bootstrap analysis.

Organizational trust and empowering leadership accounted for 68% of the variance in employees’ psychological safety. The three antecedents (i.e. organizational trust, empowering leadership and psychological safety) explained 20% of the variance in group conflicts. Psychological safety significantly and fully mediated the relationship between organizational trust and group conflict and the relationship between empowering leadership and group conflict.

Human resources and organization development professionals can help employees feel more psychologically safe in an organization by developing empowering leaders and making more trustworthy organizational culture. When employees perceive a high level of psychological safety, they are likely to feel less conflict in their team.

This study examined the antecedents and consequences of psychological safety of knowledge workers in a non-Western cultural context. Psychological safety played a pivotal role as a mediator. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study that empirically found the direct link between organizational trust and psychological safety and the relationship between empowerment leadership and psychological safety.

The purposes of the study are to examine the relationships between team emergent states (TES) (i.e. compelling direction, team identity and psychological safety) and team effectiveness outcomes (i.e. team performance, team satisfaction and growth experience), and investigate the mediating role of knowledge sharing and the moderating role of inclusive leadership in those relationships.

This study employed hierarchical multiple regression analysis and bootstrap analyses to test the hypotheses by using data from 73 teams in eight South Korean firms.

Psychological safety was found to be a significant TES for team effectiveness outcomes. Knowledge sharing mediated the relationship between TES and team effectiveness. Lastly, inclusive leadership positively moderated (1) team identity-knowledge sharing; (2) psychological safety-knowledge sharing; and (3) team identity-team performance relationships.

The authors’ findings suggest that managers cultivate a psychologically safe team climate and show inclusiveness to build successful teams. This study also emphasizes the importance of knowledge sharing to turn positive TES into team effectiveness.

From a comprehensive perspective, the findings show the detailed mechanism in which TES relate to team effectiveness mediated by knowledge sharing. In particular, the authors' endeavor further determines the different roles of inclusive leadership, as a boundary condition, in the mechanism.

Employee well-being has been an under-researched area in the field of human resources (HR) and organizational behavior. The purpose of this paper is to investigate personal (learning goal orientation (LGO)), contextual (empowering leadership), and job-related (psychological empowerment) antecedents of psychological well-being (PWB).

Individual perceptions of knowledge workers in nine Korean consulting firms in South Korea were obtained using a cross-sectional survey. HR managers distributed paper versions of a survey questionnaire to 400 employees, and 334 usable questionnaires were collected, giving the authors a final response rate of 83.5 percent.

As a result of structural equation modeling analysis, the level of employees’ psychological empowerment turned out to partially mediate the relationship between LGO and PWB, while fully mediating the relationship between empowering leadership and PWB. LGO and perceived empowering leadership accounted for 54 percent of the variance in psychological empowerment and the three antecedents explained 47 percent of the variance in PWB.

This study relied on a cross-sectional survey method with potential common method bias. As a result of the single-factor test, however, it is unlikely to confound the interpretations of the results. Another limitation of this study is that the sample of this study was restricted to knowledge workers with relatively high cognitive ability since they were mostly junior male managers with four-year college or graduate degrees.

To enhance perceived empowerment and PWB, HR, and OD practitioners can support employees and their managers by providing relevant HR practices and services including developing supportive empowering leaders with effective coaching skills, hiring, and developing employees with higher LGO, and redesigning jobs for employees so they feel more empowered.

This study linked four emerging subjects in management and positive psychology: goal orientation, empowering leadership, psychological empowerment, and well-being research. The theoretical contribution of this study lies in that it is one of the first attempts to investigate the relationships among LGO, psychological empowerment, and PWB specifically for knowledge workers in South Korea.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of personal characteristics (proactive personality and performance goal orientation) and contextual characteristics (organizational learning culture and leader‐member exchange quality) on employees' career satisfaction.

Data were drawn from 232 employees in a Fortune Global 500 company in Korea. A confirmatory factor analysis was conducted for measurement model assessment. Descriptive statistics and hierarchical multiple regression analyses were used to explain the variance in career satisfaction.

As a result of correlation analysis, all the constructs were found to be significant predictors of career satisfaction. Accounting for 22 percent of the variance in career satisfaction, employees exhibited the highest career satisfaction, when they had higher performance goal orientation, and when they perceived higher learning culture and better relationship with supervisor. LMX turned out to moderate the relationship between performance goal orientation and career satisfaction.

The contributions of this study to theory lie in the fact that it: took an integrative approach encompassing both personal and contextual factors; examined little researched constructs in career development, organizational learning culture and goal orientation; and was an international study, based on the Korean cultural context.

To support employees' career satisfaction in the Korean cultural context, the contextual factors (i.e. organizational learning culture and LMX quality) are more important than the personality factors. HR/OD practitioners can play a pivotal role in improving career satisfaction by adopting such practices as cultural change and leadership development using coaching/mentoring.

This paper is original in that it takes an integrative approach encompassing both personal and contextual factors, examines organizational learning culture and goal orientation, which have previously been the subject of little research, and has an international dimension, being based on the Korean cultural context.

The purpose of this study is to examine the joint effects of employees’ core self‐evaluations and perceived transformational leadership of their supervisors on employees’ affective commitment to the organization.

Subjects were drawn from a Fortune Global 500 company in Korea. Descriptive statistics and hierarchical multiple regression analyses were used to explain the variance in organizational commitment.

Core self‐evaluations and transformational leadership positively influenced employees’ organizational commitment. In terms of effect size, organizational commitment was more related to transformational leadership than core self‐evaluations. As for transformational leadership, employees exhibited the highest organizational commitment when their leaders articulated the vision, promoted group goals, and provided intellectual stimulation.

The sample of this study is likely restricted to a certain group with similar demographic characteristics (e.g. male junior managers with relatively high education levels). This study, like most organizational commitment studies, relied on self‐reported and cross‐sectional survey method.

Since core self‐evaluations tend to be stable over time, HR professionals need to recruit and select those with higher core self‐evaluations. HR/OD professionals can help managers change their leadership in a transformative fashion (vision articulation, group goal promotion, and intellectual stimulation) by providing relevant training programs and developmental relationships such as coaching and mentoring.

This study took an integrative approach that encompasses personal and contextual factors in a study. It found not only a significant relationship between core self‐evaluations and organizational commitment, but also the interaction effects of core self‐evaluations and one of the dimensions of transformational leadership.

The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between transformational leadership (TL) and authentic leadership (AL) using a canonical correlation analysis (CCA).

The sample was 427 knowledge workers from a Fortune Global 100 company in Korea. Descriptive statistics and CCA were used to test the relationship between the two perceived leadership constructs.

A canonical correlation indicated that the composite of TL (i.e. idealized influence, inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation and individualized consideration) was strongly and significantly related to the composite of AL (i.e. transparency, moral/ethical, balanced processing and self-awareness), accounting for 82.3 per cent of the shared variance between the two variable sets.

This empirical study was based on employees’ perceptions on the two leadership behaviors of their supervisors, using a cross-sectional survey method. In addition, this study is confined to the employees in a for-profit organization in Korean cultural setting, leaving room for speculation with regard to cultural issues.

It is noted the two leadership behaviors are not substitutable, but complementary. Therefore, human resources development (HRD) practitioners are suggested to design leadership development programs focusing both on AL and TL in a concerted way. In this way, HRD professionals can help their managers enhance their AL and TL capability, and thus let their followers emulate their leader’s behaviors, which ultimately will lead to higher level of organizational commitment, employee/job engagement and in-role and extra-role performance.

This is the first study that empirically confirmed Burns’ (1978) initial intuitive conceptualization of the authentic transformational leaders. We found that an authentic leader appears to be a transformational leader or vice versa. Another contribution lies in that to identify the common denominator between the two leadership behaviors this study used a relatively rare CCA in the field of HRD.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of personal characteristics (goal orientation) and contextual characteristics (organizational learning culture and developmental feedback) on employees' career satisfaction, organizational commitment, and turnover intention.

Subjects were drawn from four Fortune Global 500 companies in Korea. Descriptive statistics and hierarchical multiple regression analyses were used to explain the variance in outcome variables.

The results indicate that career satisfaction is predicted by organizational learning culture and performance goal orientation. Organizational learning culture, developmental feedback, and learning goal orientation are the significant predictors of organizational commitment. Finally, organizational learning culture, career satisfaction, and organizational commitment turn out to be the predictors of turnover intention.

By enhancing organizational learning culture and by considering goal orientation, human resource development/organization development practitioners could play important roles in improving organizational commitment, in career satisfaction, and in decreasing turnover.

The theoretical contribution of this paper lies in its inclusive approach encompassing both the personal and contextual factors (such as organizational learning, leadership, and personality) on career and organizational commitment research. It is an interesting finding that while performance goal is associated with career satisfaction, learning goal orientation is related with organizational commitment.