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Summarizes previous studies concerning the influence of attractiveness of job applicants on the outcome of job interviews. Outlines the halo, contrast and order effects. Presents a model for guiding the intereviewer together with a method for investigating the issues. Includes a hypotheses, research design, sample selection, instrumentation, data collection and analysis. Provides some expectations and conclusions this model of investigation may produce.

“Which advertisement fits reality?” asked Pamela Butler, researcher into gender communication. The top ad represents selected adjectives used to describe feminine characteristics in the Bern Sex Role Inventory (BSRI), a psychometric testing instrument, while the bottom ad represents so‐called masculine personality characteristics. The ads were adapted from Butler's advertisements for “Insurance Executives” in Self‐Assertion for Women.

Wanted: Manager Affectionate, childlike person who does not use harsh language, to head our administrative division. We want someone who is cheerful and eager to sooth hurt feelings. The position requires gullibility. This is the perfect job for the tender, yielding individual. Wanted: Manager Competitive, ambitious person with leadership ability to head our administrative division. We want someone who is dominant and self‐sufficient. The position requires strong analytical ability. This is the perfect job for a self‐reliant, independent person.

The ever‐increasing cost of seeing a graduate training contract through to its successful completion has made the selection decision, and indeed the choice of selection techniques used, increasingly vital. This paper identifies the selection methods currently used by the Scottish accountancy profession to recruit graduate trainees, compares these against best practice and highlights a number of areas where improvements to current practice would be recommended. Analysis of the selection literature revealed the range of selection techniques on offer, and from a consideration of the validity and reliability of each technique, it was possible to identify best practice in graduate selection. Data was collected by sending a questionnaire to 79 firms of Scottish Chartered Accountants. The targeted firms constituted the entire population of Scottish firms seeking to recruit a graduate trainee to commence in Autumn 2002 (as detailed within the annual ICAS Directory of Training Vacancies). Using the results of the primary and secondary data, the skills currently being sought by firms of Chartered Accountants in their graduate trainees were identified. The methods used by firms to identify these skills were then examined with each method being examined in terms of its current use as well as its value and effectiveness in practice. It was found that there have been significant changes to the skill‐set sought by firms in the early 21st Century as compared with a decade ago, with less emphasis on numeracy and more interest in softer skills such as communication and problem‐solving. As regards the techniques currently employed by firms to identify these skills, it was found that there has been some progress made over the last decade. However, the majority of firms are still reluctant to let go of what is now considered to be the more traditional interview‐based approach to selection, favouring this above what might be considered the more innovative techniques on offer. Further, it was found that few firms have designed their selection process specifically to identify the skill‐set that they have delineated. Thus, a consequent lack of consistency throughout the selection decisions was evidenced.

This paper aims to analyze cognitive-based trust development during the beginning phase of virtual teams (VT) before any trustor’s firsthand, knowledge-based trust of a trustee can develop. At this phase, early cognitive trust development is largely an individual construct that can help set the tone for subsequent phases and may also influence final VT effectiveness and performance.

This study begins with an analysis of cognitive-based trust and trust in VT and then focuses on the models and antecedents of early trust development in VT.

The conclusion offers a precise visualization of the research on early trust development in VT that identifies new research opportunities, particularly valuable for new field research.

This literature review could be useful to both researchers of early trust formation in VTs and to organizations that use VTs as a part of their workforce. The figures and tables produced in this literature could be useful to researchers of early trust development in VTs in two areas. First, researchers can use this information to quickly identify the academic literature associated with each component of early trust models, the type of research conducted for each component. Second, new research opportunities based on this sample for each component of the early trust model is clearly identified.

Organizations need to ensure that members of VTs can form quickly and operate effectively within a short period. Identifying factors that may influence early trust formation could give managers and VT members an understanding of the importance of trust development in the early stages of VTs and how this may ultimately influence a VTs performance, effective teamwork and productivity.

The conclusion offers a precise visualization of the research on early trust development in VT that identifies new research opportunities, particularly valuable for new field research.

I begin by examining some ways in which organisations have attempted to improve their recruitment and selection procedures to minimise bias and unfair discrimination, and focus on the assessment centre as a potentially useful technique in this respect, especially for managerial selection. I go on to examine the assessment centre in more detail, including its origins, construction and uses, before discussing the strong evidence for its validity as a selection and assessment procedure. I then describe some recent British innovations in assessment centre design and practice, especially in its use for management and organisation development purposes, before discussing some of my own recent research, in collaboration with Ivan Robertson and Usha Rout, on participants' attitudes towards the use of assessment centres for selection and development purposes, including gender differences in attitudes.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of cultural intelligence (CQ), idiocentrism-allocentrism and organizational culture on work engagement in a multinational organization from the perspective of conservation of resources theory.

The sample consisted of 219 employees of a multinational company (MNC). Partial least squares–structural equation modeling was used to test the research model.

The results suggest that CQ is positively related to work engagement and that this relationship is moderated by employees’ idiocentrism-allocentrism, as well as by the adaptability dimension of organizational culture.

Greater generalizability of the findings could be achieved with a more geographically dispersed sample. Other cultural dimensions, as well as personal and organizational characteristics, should be considered in order to more clearly ascertain the relationships between these variables.

The findings suggest that CQ is a powerful tool for developing employee engagement within MNCs. Furthermore, a highly adaptive organizational culture and consideration of employees’ cultural values are important in order to enhance the effect of CQ on engagement.

This study identifies relevant resources that can aid in managing a diverse workforce and increasing employee engagement in companies that operate across national borders.

The aim of this study is to systematically review the scholarly literature on the self-fulfilling prophecy and identify the theoretical and methodological gaps in the literature as a foundation to encourage future research.

To develop a theoretical framework for self-fulfilling prophecy research, each empirical article published in a peer-reviewed journal from January 2001 to October 2022 was retrieved using EBSCO’s Business Source Premier database. The keywords “self-fulfilling prophecy,” “Galatea effect,” “Golem effect” and “Pygmalion effect” were used in the Abstract of articles to conduct this literature review.

The authors developed a 2 × 2 framework that distinguishes self-fulfilling prophecies based on whether they are initiated internally or externally and whether positive or negative outcomes result. The authors then introduce what we label the Eyeore effect. The resulting framework helps identify the need for more research on the golem, Galatea and Eyeore effect.

This review is limited because the authors only reviewed peer-reviewed empirical articles in the English language.

This work provides a meaningful framework to synthesize the types of self-fulfilling prophecies and systematically reviews the state of the literature, as a springboard to identify and encourage fruitful areas of future research.

The aim of this article is to investigate how managers see, interpret and make sense of their performance management system experiences and recommend the way forward for both policy and practice, in what makes effective appraisal systems.

The study applied the repertory grid to elicit the personal constructs of how managers make sense of their appraisal experiences. The cognitive mapping methodology allows the researcher to go deep into the respondents' “theories in use” to provide new insights on how they “think”. This, in turn, allows a better understanding of the language managers use to make sense of the experiences.

Core conceptual dimensions, cognitive maps and cluster diagrams were generated, providing implications for research, practice and new directions for future research.

Although the application of the grid technique was time‐consuming, the finer grain level of analysis provided a deeper appreciation of managers' “theories in use”. The study provides a cross‐sectional view of the current state of managerial cognitions. Findings open up new ways of thinking and new way of doing in appraisal research and practice.

The findings provided very meaningful insights on what managers look for in appraisal system effectiveness, along with the documentation of how they make connections between their own elicited personal constructs on system effectiveness.

The paper makes a modest contribution to both theory and practice from the perspective of managerial cognitions about the entire appraisal systems using a method originating from clinical psychology.

Although the measurement of self‐leadership (RSLQ) has been developed and validated with samples from the USA with promising reliability and construct validity, its generalizability to the Chinese context is problematic. The purpose of this study is to modify the existing self‐leadership scale (RSLQ) in order to make the application of self‐leadership theory and measurement more relevant to the Chinese culture. This modification includes: enhancing the generalization of self‐leadership measurement to the Chinese context by refining the items of four existing dimensions (self‐observation, evaluations of beliefs and assumptions, natural rewards, and self‐punishment) found to have low‐reliabilities in one previous validation study; and extending the breadth of some self‐leadership components based on the cross‐cultural theory about self‐concept differences between individualism and collectivism. Three self‐leadership subscales are newly developed through extending three self‐leadership components (natural rewards, self‐observation, and evaluating beliefs and assumptions) with the incorporation of social/relation‐based features associated with collectivism.

The modified RSLQ was administered to 569 Chinese students. The reliability and construct validity of this modified self‐leadership scale was explored using exploratory (EFA) and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). Test of association with self‐efficacy was also examined.

Results from the EFA demonstrated good reliability and stable factor structure for the modified scale and CFA demonstrated acceptable model fit for 11 factors of the modified self‐leadership scale. Most notably, the refinement of four existing dimensions (self‐observation, evaluations of beliefs and assumptions, natural rewards, and self‐punishment), which had failed to reach acceptable levels of reliability in Neubert and Wu's Chinese sample, showed increases above the commonly recommended level of 0.7. Two new extended dimensions, relation‐based natural rewards and social‐oriented evaluation of beliefs and assumptions, consistently emerged in two independent student samples. More interestingly, the items of another extended dimensions, relation‐based self‐observation consistently merged with the task‐based self‐observation (the original subscale) to form one factor, suggesting that, in Chinese culture, task‐based self‐observation cannot be separated from relation‐based self‐observation. The modified RSLQ was also positively and strongly associated with self‐efficacy.

Further validation work is required to examine whether the refined RSLQ could be generalized to another collectivistic country such as Korea or Japan.

Managers will benefit from understanding how culture shapes an individual's use of self‐leadership strategies.

The study makes a significant contribution to the universal application and generalizability of self‐leadership measurement to the Chinese population. The validation works to support the belief that the modified 38‐item RSLQ is a superior measure with higher internal consistency and more stable factor structure than that of the existing instrument, which could be generalized to a Chinese context.