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Transformational leaders spark the intrinsic motivation of employees, thereby stimulating their extra-role performance. However, not all employees are lucky enough to have a transformational leader. The purpose of this paper is to investigate to what extent mindfulness can function as a substitute for transformational leadership. By being attentive to and aware of what is taking place in the present, mindfulness provides employees with a source of intrinsic motivation that lies within the person, thereby possibly making employees less dependent on transformational leadership.

An online survey was used to collect data of 382 employees working in diverse sectors in the Netherlands.

Moderated mediation analyses indicated that mindfulness partly compensates for a low levels of transformational leadership in fostering intrinsic motivation and in turn extra-role performance, thereby providing evidence for the substitutes for leadership theory. Moreover, the findings extend previous research on the contribution of mindfulness to in-role performance by showing its additional value for intrinsic motivation and extra-role performance.

Despite the use of validated measures and the presence of an interaction effect, common-source bias cannot be out ruled completely.

Since mindfulness can be developed, the results suggest a training intervention to make employees less dependent on their leaders for their motivation.

This paper is the first to show that mindful people are more resilient against the absence of transformational leadership. Given the frequent changes in management layers in organizations, knowledge about resources for individual resilience and self-management is sorely needed.

The purpose of this paper is to operationalise critical reflection. Although critical reflection is widely recognised as a crucial element in individual and organisational learning, not many instruments exist to measure critical reflection in the context of work organisations.

Critical reflection was operationalised by using a combination of a literature review and a survey.

Critically reflective work behaviour was defined as a set of connected activities carried out individually or in interaction with others, aimed at optimising individual or collective practices, or critically analysing and trying to change organizational or individual values. Based on the survey, an instrument was developed for measuring six dimensions of critically reflective work behaviour, namely, critical opinion‐sharing, asking for feedback, challenging group‐think, openness about mistakes, experimentation and career awareness.

Future research should focus on the predictive validity of the instrument by relating it to performance appraisals from supervisors or to ratings of innovative behaviour. Further research could also focus on inter‐rater reliability by contrasting self‐ratings with ratings from colleagues and supervisors.

In combination with an instrument measuring organisational climate, the instrument may play a role in relating the work behaviour of employees to job characteristics and perceptions of organisational climate.

The concept of critically reflective work behaviour focuses on the role of the behaviour of all employees in the organisation in becoming a learning company.

The relationship between managerial coaching and team performance may be mediated by team reflection because coaching is often thought to lead to reflection, which has been found to lead to improved performance. In contrast, this relationship might be moderated by team reflection, because poorly reflective teams are more likely to depend on coaching than highly reflective teams. The purpose of this paper is to test these rival hypotheses.

The authors employed a longitudinal survey method at two points in time in two long-term care organizations. Team members were asked to rate the level of managerial coaching and team reflection. Team managers were asked to evaluate team performance.

Team reflection turned out to be a moderator and not a mediator in the relationship between managerial coaching and team performance. Only the performance of poorly reflective teams benefits from managerial coaching.

Excessive coaching of highly reflective teams may be a waste of the energy and time of both managers and teams and may even harm team efficiency. Therefore, team managers would be wise to estimate the team’s level of reflection in order to adjust their coaching interventions accordingly. Future research should explore how managers can be supported in making a valid assessment of the team’s reflective capabilities and in adjusting their coaching interventions accordingly.

This paper sheds light on the relationship between managerial coaching and team performance by testing contradicting explanations regarding the role of team reflection.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate how different team learning activities relate to different types of team performance as rated by team members and managers.

The 624 respondents, working in 88 teams in seven different organizations indicate their perceptions of team learning and their performance ratings of the team. Moreover, managers in the organization are asked to evaluate the team performance.

Team member ratings of effectiveness are positively related to the boundedness and stability of the team and information processing and negatively related to information acquisition. Manager ratings of effectiveness are positively related to boundedness and stability, information processing and information storage and retrieval. Team member ratings of efficiency are positively related to information processing and negatively related to information acquisition. Manager ratings of efficiency are positively related to boundedness and stability and information storage and retrieval. Team member ratings of innovativeness are positively related to information processing, while no predictors are found for manager ratings of innovativeness.

Since the data are cross‐sectional, the authors cannot draw conclusion about the causality between the variables. Longitudinal designs that study the sequence of team learning and team performance are called for. Furthermore, future studies might include more objective performance measures.

As team learning proved to have predictive value for diverse team performance indicators, rated by team members and managers, team should carefully organise their learning process in order to enhance their performance.

Although some studies have proven the significance of team learning for team performance, none have investigated which team learning activities are related to which types of performance ratings.

In this paper critical reflective working behaviour will be operationalized. Second, the question will be raised which factors have impact on critical reflective working behaviour. The following dimensions of critical reflective working emerge: reflection, vision sharing, challenging group‐think, asking for feedback, experimentation and awareness of employability. In a survey amongst 742 respondents these dimensions are validated. Important influencing factors seem to be self‐efficacy and participation.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between supervisors' conflict strategies and subordinates' affective commitment and absenteeism.

To test the hypotheses, the authors conducted a survey of 173 higher educated employees in consulting and staff functions. They measured supervisory conflict management by asking subordinates to rate the conflict strategy of their superior. For the measurement of absenteeism the officially recorded sick leave figures of days per year were used.

The results show a pure mediating effect of commitment in the relationship between supervisory integration strategy and absenteeism. The non‐confrontation strategy is negatively related to commitment, but neither directly nor indirectly related to absenteeism. There is no direct or indirect (through commitment) relationship between the supervisory controlling strategy and absenteeism.

Suggestions for absence management and management development are offered.

The work advances the thinking on supervisory cooperative and competitive behavior and the operating mechanisms between this behavior and employee work attitudes and behavior.

Competent clinical teachers are essential for clinical teaching. According to the literature, coaching can contribute to improved levels of reflection and better performance of clinical teachers. By engaging in a dialogue about coachee's teaching behaviour, coaches can stimulate reflection of novice teachers. This study aims to gain insights into the effectiveness of coaching processes in which experienced clinical teachers act as coaches for less experienced teachers.

A case study was conducted in a Dentistry Faculty of a University Medical Centre in The Netherlands. Semi‐structured interviews with nine coaching couples were conducted.

The findings indicate that only one coaching couple succeeded in using coaching as an effective tool for stimulating reflection and the performance of the beginning clinical teacher. Instead of discussing and analysing coachees' teaching behaviour, the other couples merely discussed the knowledge and experience of the coach.

This study provides insight into the pitfalls of collegial coaching, and discusses various factors that might affect coaching such as a hierarchical relationship between coach and coachee, the academic climate, the personality of coach and coachee, and finally the importance of using the right coaching model.

The paper aims to introduce the papers in this special issue which highlight the importance of cooperation in organizations, and outline future research directions.

Conceptual approaches to cooperation in organizations are described and a brief outline is given to each paper in the special issue.

This special issue brings together studies that enhance our theoretical understanding of cooperation, addressing core issues related to the role of cultural differences, virtual communication, team processes, leader behavior, and the impact of norms on cooperation.

Factors that facilitate or hinder cooperation in organizations are highlighted, and suggestions on how to deal with those issues in practice are provided. The papers facilitate understanding of the role of cultural differences, communication, team processes, and leader behavior on cooperation in organizations.

The paper provides an introduction to the special issue.