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Relying on information processing and attribution theories, which relate to the formation of leadership perceptions and attributes, the current study seeks to examine the relationship between demographic variables and principals' systems thinking (PST) in an integrated model. The present study purpose was threefold: first, the study seeks to examine whether attributions middle leaders make about PST may show substantial and systematic variance in a management team. Second, the study seeks to investigate the influence of principal–middle leaders’ relational demography variables (gender, education and tenure) (dis)similarity on middle leaders’ PST attribute. Finally, the study seeks to explore the moderating role of duration of principal- principal–middle leader acquaintance in the relationship of demographic (dis)similarity to PST.

Data were collected from 305 dyads (middle leaders and their principals) from 101 schools. MANOVA analysis and hierarchical regression analyses were used to test the hypothesis.

Findings showed that it is both appropriate and important to examine group-level effects when studying PST effects. Also, PST levels were higher in gender-similar relationships than in gender-dissimilar ones. Finally, duration of acquaintance was found to moderate the relationship between principal–middle leaders’ gender (dis)similarity and PST appraisal.

Focusing on principal–middle leader relationships, which are explicitly relational, with a consideration for level relationships may potentially highlight the need to consider multiple levels of analysis in order to understand how PST attribution occurs. This focus can help us to capture the core of PST social dynamics among the dyad, as well as highlighting the distinction, if any, between in-groups and out-groups. Acknowledging that school faculty are motivated by their interpersonal relationships with their principals and how such relationships are contingent upon demography (dis)similarity and the duration of acquaintance between dyads may help to broaden the understanding regarding potential antecedents of middle leaders' PST attribution and its implication for school organizations.

Drawing on the relational demography literature and a social identity perspective, several research propositions in which the authors postulate that demographic characteristics (e.g. gender and race) of senior leaders will influence the implementation and effectiveness of diversity management practices were presented. Specifically, the authors focus on the Chief Executive Officer/Chief Diversity Officer (CEO/CDO) dyad and explore independent and joint effects of CEO and CDO majority–minority group status on workplace diversity outcomes, outlining key identity-based and relational moderators (e.g. value threat, relational identity and leader–member exchange) of these relationships.

The literature on relational demography and leader–member exchange to develop propositions for future research was integrated.

This is a conceptual paper. There is no empirical data reported testing the propositions.

The authors extended theory and research on relational demography by focusing on senior leaders in the organization and proposing that the influence of CEO and CDO demographic characteristics on the enactment of diversity practices may be contingent on key identity-based and relational processes.

The authors are not aware of any studies investigating how personal characteristics and relational processes relating to the CEO and CDO may influence the implementation and effectiveness of workplace diversity management practices. In a similar vein, the authors contribute to the research literatures on relational demography and social identity by extending the application of these theories to senior leaders in organizations and in relation to the work of CEOs and CDOs.

The study aims to present an in-depth review of previous research on relational demography (individual–team dissimilarity) over the past 30 years. In doing so, the authors highlighted the main theoretical underpinnings, teased out the common methodological approaches and identified the major mediating processes and contingency factors that influence relational demography's effect on individual outcomes in teams.

The authors searched and examined eight databases (ABI/INFORM Complete, ProQuest, EBSCO, Web of Science, JSTOR, PsycARTICLES, PsycINFO and Science Direct) and distilled 106 studies from 34 journals. The authors synthesized and analyzed this body of work to identify extant patterns and themes in relational demography.

The findings reveal that the majority of theories used are categorized into three segments. The antecedents used are mainly surface- and deep-level variables, while the outcomes are classified into personal- and work-related constructs. For research testing, Euclidean distance and Blau's index are primarily utilized as heterogeneity measures, while various forms of regression are used as the analytical tool for hypotheses testing.

Extant literature reviews on relational demography are scant. This study provides an extensive synthesis and analysis of the studies in the area over the past 30 years and offers an agenda that can motivate future research.

In management research, little is known about how ethno-racial minority leaders interact with similar employees in supervisor–subordinate relationships. This study aims to examine and provide a deeper understanding of individuals’ negative reactions to similar others, thus highlighting the double-edged nature of demographic similarity which has historically predicted positive affective reactions.

Using a survey design, the authors collected data from supervisor-subordinate dyads from multiple companies from the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex in Texas, USA. They used ordinary least squares regression and conditional process analysis to test the hypotheses, including a two-stage moderation and moderated mediation.

Incorporating social context, i.e. minority status, as a moderator, the results show that ethno-racial minority leaders supervising ethno-racially similar subordinates were more vulnerable to relationship conflict than non-minority dyads. This, in turn, is linked to a reduction in the leaders’ feelings of trust toward their ethno-racially similar subordinate.

This study draws on social identity theory and status characteristics theory to explain the contradictory processes and outcomes associated with dyadic ethno-racial similarity and suggests the conditions under which dyad racial similarity is connected with unfavorable outcomes. This framework helps to broaden the boundary conditions of relational demography to provide a more nuanced explanation of when and why minority leaders in demographically similar hierarchical dyads experience more relationship conflict, which ultimately diminishes trust.

This study's purpose is to investigate the antecedents of an employee's remedy‐seeking behavioral intentions in response to wrongful dismissal.

Hypotheses generated by two paradigms are tested, the similarity‐attraction and the similarity‐betrayal paradigms, using Tobit regression and data from a scenario‐based survey of employees.

Consistent with the similarity‐attraction paradigm, the management team's racial and deep‐level similarity to the employee both were negatively related to the employee's propensity to consult a lawyer. Consistent with the similarity‐betrayal paradigm, the employee's propensity to consult a lawyer increased with the supervisor's deep‐level similarity to the employee; among men, the propensity to complain to regulatory agencies increased with the management team's gender similarity and the propensity to not seek a remedy declined with the supervisor's gender similarity.

Limitations of the study include the use a single‐source, cross‐sectional, convenience sample; the small size and heterogeneity of the non‐white sub‐sample; and the limited number of control variables. Future research should explore whether the findings are robust when tested using alternative types of data; alternative wrongful dismissal scenarios; a more extensive set of controls for organizational, job, and personal characteristics; and larger, more diverse sub‐samples of non‐whites.

Organizations should manage dismissals in a manner that encourages employees to favor internal remedy‐seeking over external remedy‐seeking options.

This study is the first to investigate the antecedents of a wrongfully dismissed employee's propensity to engage in internal as well as external remedy‐seeking and to explore the effects of management's similarity to the employee on the employee's remedy‐seeking actions.

The purpose of this paper is to explore whether surface-level actual similarity interacts with leader-member dyadic communication agreement in predicting group member performance ratings at earlier time periods in a work group’s development. Additionally, this research examines whether deep-level perceived similarity interacts with leader-member dyadic communication agreement in predicting group member performance ratings at later time periods in a work group’s development. The relationship between shared cultural context and perceived and actual similarity is also investigated.

This research analyzes longitudinal data from the study questionnaires at five occasions in a Malaysian organization.

Results based on a sample of 28 group projects and 141 matching dyad who completed the study questionnaires at 5 occasions reveal that there is no interaction between workgroup relational ethnicity and workgroup relational gender with leader-member dyadic agreement at early time periods in a workgroup’s development. Therefore, H1 is not supported. H2 posited that deep-level perceived similarity will interact with leader-member dyadic communication agreement in predicting group member performance ratings at later time periods in a workgroup’s development. H2 is supported. Results reveal that the interaction between leader-member dyadic communication agreement and perceived similarity explains 36 percent of the variance of perceived group members’ performance ratings. This is after accounting for the control variable and the independent variables. From a cultural standpoint, the findings in this study underscore that conversations based on the Malaysian cultural norm of “budi” reflect not only a cultural basis of communication, but also that this shared cultural context leads to perceived similarity between ethnic Malay, Chinese, and Indians, and also both genders in the Malaysian workplace.

Leader-member dyadic communication agreement reflects the social appropriateness and relationship quality between individuals, as well as the context of the leader-member workgroup interactions. The findings of this study underscore the premise that conversations reflect not only a cultural basis of communication, but also that shared cultural context leads to perceived similarity. This study specifically examines the role of ethnicity in Malaysia organizational workgroup (e.g. ethnic Malay, Chinese Malay, and Indian Malay) as well as gender.

This study systematically examines the influence of actual and perceived similarity in leader-member dyadic communication from a longitudinal and multilevel standpoint.

Using a within-subject vignette experiment, this study aims to disentangle the differential effect of task and relationship conflict on team effectiveness and interpersonal outcomes. In addition, the authors aimed to test the moderating role of the conflict inducing person’s gender on task and relationship conflict outcomes.

Data were collected using four vignettes administered to 151 participants from an Air Force military organization.

Relationship conflict was more damaging than task conflict for team effectiveness, the harmonious interpersonal relations and the expected positive affective team climate. Task conflict triggers more positive emotions than relationship conflict and, in consequence, team effectiveness is higher in scenarios with the task rather than relationship conflict. The groups in which conflict is induced by a woman are not expected to perform better than groups in which the conflict is induced by a man. The similarity between participant’s gender and the gender of the person that generated the conflict accentuates rather than attenuates the effectiveness decline associated with relationship conflict. Task conflict triggers cooperative, while relationship conflict triggers assertive conflict management strategies.

This study provided only a snapshot on how task and relationship conflict are perceived to relate to the various team and individual-level outcomes, particularly in military settings.

The findings evidence the differential effect of task and relationship conflict not only on team effectiveness but also on attitudinal and emotional team and individual-level outcomes.

Venture capital is a critical source of funding and development of new ventures. The investment decision of venture capitalists (VCs) is a multi-stage assessment process where the entrepreneurs’ characteristics are the most important criteria to determine the decision to accept or to reject the proposal at the screening stage. At this stage, the decision-making of VCs is influenced by their subjective characteristics and their interactions with the entrepreneurs who share the same characteristics as theirs. How do the entrepreneurial experiences of both VCs and entrepreneurs interact and bias the evaluation? Several studies have tried to provide an answer to this still pending question. Research concurs in that entrepreneurial experience drives primarily the screening decisions of VCs. Yet, if many studies have shown that VCs are prone to cognitive biases in their evaluations, research focusing on the relationship between of those biases and entrepreneurial experience in the context of investment decision is scarce. VCs’ cognitive biases have been linked to the subjective characteristics of VCs. Most precisely, many studies have shown that a common bias among investors is the similarity-attraction bias such that VCs’ evaluations improve when VCs and entrepreneurs share the same characteristics. As a result, it is likely that entrepreneurial experience plays a significant role in explaining biases in investment decisions. Overall, research points out the importance of entrepreneurial experience of both VCs and entrepreneurs, their interactions and the cognitive biases shaped by their respective experiences in explaining the investment decisions of VCs at the screening stage.

This paper aims to understand the relationships of complementary specialization, cognitive trust, affective trust, tie strength and similarity with group formation intention.

The data have been collected from 30 management students from a batch of 110 students of a premiere Indian business school. To assess the proposed relationship, multiple hierarchical regression was performed on collected data by using SPSS© 20.

The obtained results exhibited cognitive trust, affective trust and tie strength as significant predictors of dyadic group formation intention, whereas similarity and complementary specialization were not found.

The research on group formation is limited, and more particularly the functions of the above-mentioned factors on the group formation intentions of management graduates are yet to generalize. Therefore, present research is an early approach which tries to address the mentioned gap from a social network perspective and considers the group formation and social network literature.