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Guided by Hobfoll’s (1989) conservation of resources theory, we examined how psychological entitlement moderates the negative relationship between work-family conflict (WFC) and job satisfaction.

Using a sample of 119 accountants from the Midwestern United States, we tested our hypotheses with hierarchical regression analysis.

Results indicate a strong, negative relationship between WFC and job satisfaction for employees low in psychological entitlement, but an insignificant relationship for entitled employees.

The results suggest that some entitlement may be beneficial to employees when coping with WFC. However, organizations should limit WFC in order to foster their least entitled employees’ job satisfaction.

This is the first study that investigates how psychological entitlement affects employees' reactions to WFC. Not only does it contribute to the growing body of research that examines how this individual difference affects workplace functioning, but it suggests there may be some benefits to entitlement, which largely has been disparaged.

The current, established scale used to measure personal reputation treats the construct as a unidimensional measure. For example, the scale fails to distinguish between individuals who are known for being socially popular versus those who are known for being experts in their field. This study aims to address this issue by developing a multidimensional personal reputation scale.

Based on existing theory, a scale is developed and validated against existing, similar constructs. First, a panel of three academic experts who have done research on personal reputation, and also two professional experts who have rich experience in the management field, evaluated the items for face validity. Then 112 working adults were asked to rate the reputation of a co-worker. Each dimension of personal reputation was validated against an existing, similar scale (e.g. social reputation was validated against an existing “popularity” scale).

A multi-dimensional, personal reputation scale is presented. This measure purports that personal reputation has three dimensions: task, social and integrity.

The presented scale allows researchers to distinguish different types of reputations in the workplace. This is significant because both anecdotal evidence and empirical findings suggest that to simply assume that reputation based upon being a person of high integrity and upon being an expert at a specific task will present the same outcomes is a fallacy. To further the knowledge of personal reputation, a need exists to be able to measure the different dimensions of reputation.

Given the entitlement and job mobility associated with Generation Y, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the moderating effects of psychological entitlement and tenure on the felt accountability-job satisfaction relationship.

Survey data from a sample of resident assistants were examined using hierarchical moderated regression analysis.

Entitled employees responded to accountability favorably, demonstrating lower job satisfaction than non-entitled employees when accountability was low, but nearly equal levels when accountability was high. All participants reported higher job satisfaction when job tenure was lower, but entitlement-driven satisfaction differences were observed only when accountability was low.

Cross-sectional data warrants longitudinal replication to establish causation and to give insight into how much time must pass before accountability begins to reduce the negative effects of entitlement.

Findings suggest that managerial tactics that increase employees’ felt accountability could reduce the negative impact of psychological entitlement on job attitudes and related outcomes.

Using a unique sample of Generation Y employees, the results provide an indication of how supervisors from earlier generations can improve the workplace attitudes of younger workers.

Reputation has many positive outcomes, but little is known about how individuals manage their personal reputation at work. This study aims to investigate the relationships between job performance and political skill on personal reputation.

Ninety‐eight triads from a Midwestern manufacturer provided data. Employees rated their political skill, supervisors rated the employees' job performance, and coworkers rated the employees' personal reputation. The white‐collar respondents were mostly Caucasian, female, middle aged, and moderately tenured in their position. The data were analyzed with regression analysis.

The results illustrated positive political skill‐personal reputation and job performance ‐personal reputation relationships. Job performance was positively associated with personal reputation for politically skilled employees, but not for individuals low in political skill.

Job performance was evaluated by employees' supervisors, but less subjective, quantitative measures of job performance would be helpful.

Political skill training and/or mentoring relationships may help individuals manage their personal reputation at work.

This study focused on personal reputation in a work environment. However, the results also may be useful to individuals in a variety of organizations (e.g. schools, clubs, churches).

This is one of the first studies to investigate how individuals manage their personal reputation in a work setting. Unlike previous research that used self‐evaluations of personal reputation, this study uses peer evaluations, which is more appropriate for the construct.

Although reputation is important to career success, little is known about how individuals develop their personal reputation at work. This study seeks to investigate the role of work relationship quality and citizenship behavior as partial mediators of the political skill‐personal reputation relationship.

In total, 145 triads from a manufacturer in the Midwestern USA provided data for the study. Employees rated their political skill and citizenship behavior, supervisors rated their relationship quality, and coworkers rated the employees' personal reputation. Based on the complementary theories of signaling and social exchange, the relationships between the constructs were analyzed with structural equation modeling.

Political skill demonstrated both direct and indirect effects on the development of personal reputation. In particular, work relationship quality and citizenship behavior partially mediated the relationship between political skill and personal reputation.

Personal reputation was evaluated by a randomly selected coworker, but a collection of perceptions would be helpful.

Political skill training and/or mentoring relationships may help individuals manage their personal reputation at work, thus benefiting their careers.

This study focused on personal reputation in a work environment. However, the results also may be useful to individuals in different types of organizations.

This is one of the first studies to investigate how individuals develop their personal reputation at work. Unlike previous research that used self‐evaluations of personal reputation, this study used peer evaluations, which is more appropriate for the construct.

In everyday life, as well as in work organizations, we engage in frequent and quite comfortable discourse about the nature of reputations, and wealso see personal reputation used as a basis for important human resources decisions (e.g., promotions, terminations, etc.). Unfortunately, despite its recognized importance, there has been very little theory and research on personal reputation in organizations published in the organizational sciences. The present paper attempts to address this need by proposing a conceptualization of personal reputation in organizations. In this conceptualization, reputation is presented as an agreed upon, collective perception by others, and involves behavior calibration derived from social comparisons with referent others that results in a deviation from the behavioral norms in one's environment, as observed and evaluated by others. Implications of this conceptualization are discussed, as are directions for future research.

Fred R. Blass is an Assistant in Management at Florida State University. He received a Ph.D. in Management from Florida State University, and before joining the faculty at Florida State, served on the Department of Management faculty at the United States Air Force Academy. Blass has research interests in power and influence in organizations and organizational socialization. He has published his research in such journals as Human Resource Management and The Leadership Quarterly. Also, he has presented his research at both national and regional professional conferences.