Search results

This study aims to test the propositions of socialization resources theory, specifically focusing on social capital resources and their prediction of proximal (relational learning) and distal (job satisfaction and intent to quit) outcomes. The authors include the job design characteristic of job autonomy as a moderator of these associations.

Cheung et al.’s (2021) four-step SEM procedure was used to test our mediation, moderation and moderated mediation hypotheses. The sample consisted of newcomers (N = 175) measured at two time points.

The results support the proposed model. Relational learning mediates the associations between social capital resources and outcomes; the utility of these social capital resources is stronger when job autonomy is lower.

Organizations can use social capital resources to reduce newcomers' uncertainty during socialization, facilitating learning and positive outcomes. Organizations should also carefully consider the amount of job autonomy they grant to newcomers, as too much can be detrimental.

Despite the acknowledged importance of workplace resources and relationships, few studies have focused on social resources provided during socialization. Moreover, job design is rarely included in socialization research, despite its influence on workplace processes. Thus, this study provides information about two novel areas of investigation: socially-oriented socialization resources and the impact of job autonomy.

Being different from others can be stressful, and this may be especially salient for newcomers during organizational socialization when they may be expected to fit in. Thus, drawing on conservation of resources theory, the authors examine the effects of newcomers' individual differentiation on their subsequent emotional exhaustion.

The authors test a multiple mediation model with data from 161 UK graduates collected at three times using structural equation modeling.

The results largely support the hypotheses, identifying individual differentiation as a motivational resource associated with the proactive behavior of changing work procedures. In turn, changing work procedures links with the personal resource of positive affect, which facilitates the relational resource of social acceptance and predicts lower emotional exhaustion. Individual differentiation predicts lower social acceptance also, but not via monitoring as anticipated.

The results provide novel insights into the effects of individual differentiation on emotional exhaustion in the context of organizational socialization. The study highlights that, while newcomers high in individual differentiation face depletion of the relational resource of social acceptance, they can still adjust well and avoid emotional exhaustion through changing work procedures to foster positive affect.

With organizations hiring from increasingly diverse labor markets, this study aims to examine the implications of newcomers’ individual differentiation for their group identification. The paper proposes and tests a self-verification process in which individual differentiation predicts group identification through role innovation under positive social feedback on innovation (moderated mediation). Simultaneously, a self-categorization pathway is examined of the indirect negative influence of individual differentiation on group identification through role modeling (mediation).

Survey data were collected at three time points from 161 UK university alumni.

The analyses support a self-verification pathway: newcomers with high individual differentiation report higher group identification via role innovation only when they receive positive feedback on their innovative actions. However, there was no support for a self-categorization pathway, with no indirect relationship found between individual differentiation and group identification via role modeling.

HR practitioners and managers who are responsible for helping newcomers adjust should consider newcomers’ individual differentiation. Specifically, newcomers with high individual differentiation may more successfully navigate their transition and identify with their workgroup when given appropriate support, such as positive social feedback on their innovative actions.

The study extends organizational socialization research by focusing on when newcomers with high individual differentiation may experience group identification. The findings highlight the important role of positive social feedback on group identification; this suggests a potential means by which newcomers with high individual differentiation can settle successfully.

The growing instability of the labor market will almost certainly result in more employees whose values misfit with their organization’s. This paper draws from the exit-neglect-voice-loyalty model to examine a broader range of responses to misfit; explores sociopolitical resources as the mechanisms through which misfit transmits its effects and investigates job mobility as a boundary condition enhancing or constraining responses to misfit.

A novel model (N = 152 New Zealand employees) examined links from misfit to two sociopolitical resources (perceived influence and organizational responsiveness) and from these to exit-neglect-voice-loyalty moderated by job mobility. Supplemental analyses examine moderated-mediation.

Misfit negatively predicted both sociopolitical resources, perceived influence and organizational responsiveness. Moderated-mediation analyses showed that the constructive reactions to misfit (voice and loyalty) were predicted conditionally at low levels of job mobility and indirectly via the respective sociopolitical resources. In contrast, destructive reactions to misfit (exit and neglect) were predicted directly, with neglect predicted at high levels of job mobility.

Implications for human resource practitioners highlight the deleterious repercussions of misfit but also include the conditions under which misfit employees may attempt to constructively salvage their employment relationship.

This study integrates a broader set of concurrent responses to misfit using the exit-neglect-voice-loyalty typology, as well as introducing sociopolitical perspectives to the literature on misfit.

To provide evidence-based recommendations on the types of leader behaviors organizations should target for a better return on leader training investment the authors draw on the destructive and constructive leadership behavior model and the bad is stronger than good proposition to examine the following question: Compared to constructive leader behavior, does destructive leader behavior have a greater effect on follower outcomes or is something more nuanced occurring?

The authors used Qualtrics online panels to collect data (N = 211 and N = 342) from full-time office-based participants. They used multivariate latent regression and dominance weights analyses to examine the relative strength of destructive versus constructive leader behaviors on followers' satisfaction with leader, and task performance.

Across both samples, leader hypocrisy and leader social undermining had relatively stronger effects on follower satisfaction with leader. Leader knowledge hiding had a relatively strong effect on follower task performance. Leader ethical conduct had the strongest association with follower satisfaction with leader in both samples. Hence, the authors' results were aligned with the bad is stronger than good proposition.

The authors' show that white-collar organizations can benefit from improved follower attitudes and performance by reducing leader hypocrisy and social undermining (destructive behavior) while simultaneously promoting leader ethical conduct (constructive behavior).

This study aims to examine two individual dispositions, propensity to trust and reciprocation wariness, as antecedents of team–member exchange (TMX) and how shared leadership moderates these relationships. It also investigates work engagement as a consequence of TMX.

Data were collected from 175 employees in 42 teams; a multilevel random slope model was used to test the moderating effect of shared leadership at the team level and across levels.

Shared leadership provides a boundary condition for the relationships from propensity to trust and reciprocation wariness to work engagement through TMX. At the individual level, the positive effects of propensity to trust and negative effects of reciprocation wariness on TMX, and their indirect effects on work engagement through TMX, were weaker at higher shared leadership. At the team level, the positive relationship between propensity to trust and TMX was unconditional on shared leadership, whereas the relationship between reciprocation wariness and TMX was moderated by shared leadership. At the team level, shared leadership had positive effects on TMX and work engagement.

Managers can adopt shared leadership to encourage social exchanges among team members to enhance TMX and work engagement.

The study extends the TMX research by investigating dispositions as antecedents and work engagement as a consequence at both individual and team levels. It also identifies the moderating role played by team-level shared leadership, which provides a strong situation supporting reciprocal interactions.

Workplace bullying involves a power imbalance, and despite laws in New Zealand which prohibit discrimination on the grounds of gender, women remain under-represented in top-level roles. The aim of the study was to examine whether gender and role (managerial/non-managerial) were related to the bullying experienced by women and men.

An online survey collected data from 991 (41%) men and 1,421 (59%) women. The survey provided a definition of bullying and asked participants whether they had been bullied at work. If they replied yes, then follow-up questions asked for the gender and role of the perpetrator.

Women were more likely than men to self-identify as having been bullied. Male employers, senior managers, middle managers, supervisor and peers bullied men and women about equally, whereas women bullied women far more than they bullied men. The largest group of bullies of women were female peers, who rarely bullied male peers, while male peers bullied both genders about equally. Female clients bullied female staff but almost never male staff; male clients bullied both men and women but the numbers were small.

These data relied on self-report, and people may be reluctant to identify themselves as targets or may not recognize that the negative behaviours they have been facing amount to bullying. Qualitative data can help explore these issues from societal, organizational and policy perspectives.

While men and women may differ in how often they recognize or admit to having been bullied, the gendered nature of power in the workplace is well established and reinforced in the findings here. It is clear that organizational leaders, both male and female, need to understand gender and power imbalance and act as role models. Currently, the authors’ findings show that the behaviour of at least some of those at the top of New Zealand organizations needs to improve.

The problem of bullying at work will not be easy to solve. The solutions lie, not with “fixing” individuals via training, stress management and well-being programmes but with effective systems, procedures, policies and leadership that recognize the power dynamics at work.

Little is known at present about the relationships between gender and bullying behaviour. The paper focusses on who bullies whom in the workplace and finds that men tend to bully both men and women while women tend to bully women. Importantly, the authors’ works suggest that instead of structural and organizational measures to manage bullying, greater initiatives to manage bullying need to consider how gender and power dynamics interact at work.

The current healthcare environment provides several challenges to the existing roles of healthcare professionals. The value of the professional expert is also under scrutiny. The purpose of this paper is to generate a construction of professional expertise amongst practitioners in the current healthcare environment. It used the speech-language therapy community in New Zealand (NZ) as an example.

Speech-language therapists currently practicing in NZ completed an online survey including qualitative and quantitative components. The range of experience and work settings of participants (n=119) was representative of the workforce.

Participants clearly identified being “highly experienced” and “having in-depth knowledge” as essential elements of professional expertise. Thematic analysis generated two interconnected themes of a professional expert being a personal leader and teacher, and a highly experienced, knowledgeable and skilful practitioner. Additionally, practitioners needed to be seen to contribute to the community in order to be known as experts. Clinical practice was valued differently from research generation.

This study is novel in exploring a construction of professional expertise amongst practitioners in a current healthcare community. Within that community, experts could be viewed as highly effective practitioners that visibly contribute to the professional community. The study draws attention to the role of reputation and the impacts of being a clinical teacher or leader compared with pursuing a research role. This could be particularly relevant in the promotion of evidence-based practice.

Highly-experienced allied health professionals have the opportunity to perform at the expert-level by sharing knowledge and skills with more junior staff, with the aim of upskilling the workforce. The study explored the current motivators, aspirations and the role of work in the life of highly-experienced practitioners, revealing factors that hinder or support them to further develop their own expertise and be inspiring role-models and mentors for less experienced staff.

Taking a grounded theoretical research design, we report on interviews with 45 allied health practitioners with at least seven years of professional experience from different professions and across organisational sectors. Transcripts were coded iteratively in conjunction with reviewing the literature, and cases were categorised to form a conceptual typology of work orientation.

Four work orientations are characterised capturing the diversity of the allied health workforce, particularly in relation to two dimensions of personal fulfilment and future ambition. The relationship between the types and expert-level performance is discussed, leading to recommendations for support that can be implemented to develop and sustain expert-level performance within a community.

A new view of work orientation is introduced that relates expert-level performance with meaningful work. The findings highlight a diversity of work orientation for highly-experienced allied health professionals, that all require managerial awareness. Once recognised, the four types would benefit from different supports that could develop and maintain expert-level performance in those that seek it. Alternatives are also available for those that do not. Implications for workforce policy are discussed.

The purpose of this paper is to address assumptions about the prevalence of change in human resource management (HRM) and organizational change literature, providing evidence from employee perceptions across three countries. The results indicate change was commonplace even before the pandemic disruptions of 2020.

Given this study's exploratory, employee perspective, a cross-sectional self-report survey was used. Three survey panel samples were collected in 2017: US (n = 718), Australia (n = 501) and New Zealand (n = 516). Analysis of variance was used to test whether the prevalence of change differed significantly between countries or specific groups of employees. An analysis of comments on change types and emotional response provides further insights.

The paper provides evidence of the ubiquity of change: 73% of employees are experiencing change at work and 42% perceived it as moderate to massive, with little variation between countries. Employees commonly experience more than one change, with those experiencing large amounts of change reporting predominantly negative emotional impacts.

The research provides a snapshot across three countries during a prosperous and relatively stable period, providing a point of comparison for the turbulent times we have faced in 2020. Since change can be arduous, the authors recommend that HRM researchers consider change prevalence as a contextual factor, and practitioners heed employee reactions to change, particularly during periods of significant change.

In providing foundational evidence of change ubiquity in contemporary workplaces, this paper enables more accurate discussions regarding change.