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1 – 10 of over 158000Work-based learning is critical for enhancing employees’ skills and contributing to the firm’s performance. This paper aims to establish the effects of needs assessment on the…
Abstract
Purpose
Work-based learning is critical for enhancing employees’ skills and contributing to the firm’s performance. This paper aims to establish the effects of needs assessment on the relationship between training intensity as part of learning and how employees’ skills are reflected in firm performance.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper used the World Bank Tanzania Employees Skills Survey (TESS) dataset, which contains 424 firms. This paper estimated the moderated mediation model through partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) and employed the index of moderated mediation to determine if the model was correctly specified.
Findings
The results show that among three skills, i.e. technical, interpersonal/communication and work ethic skills, only the level of technical skills mediated the relationship between training and the firm’s performance. The index of moderated mediation suggests a threshold point for the firm’s training needs, above which the indirect effect of training on performance through technical skills starts to decrease. The negative correlation between the firm’s training needs and the indirect effect suggests that employees’ essential human capital qualities, viewed from the angle of their training needs, are among the key factors for executing effective training.
Research limitations/implications
This paper’s conceptual model is limited because it does not incorporate an education variable for the trained employees. In addition, it only conceptualized the perceived most important skills of interpersonal communication, technical skills and work ethic, despite there being other skills that could have been considered. Moreover, the data only measured the present skill level at three on the Likert scale, providing limited room for skill level variance.
Practical implications
Those who decide which training programme deserves priority given limited resources and the firm’s goals need to understand that training is an addition to what their employees already have and, thus, should make extra efforts to equip them with more knowledge relating to their assignments. Moreover, this understanding should extend to the employees themselves.
Originality/value
The paper introduced and showed the necessity of training needs assessment to increase the value of training in enhancing the firm’s performance. We propose a model for assessing training intensity through process analysis. The respective model depicts a threshold point for the firm’s training needs, below which the training will work.
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Yuan Sun, Zhu Mengyi and Anand Jeyaraj
This paper aims to investigate whether and how enterprise social media (ESM) affordances affect employee agility.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to investigate whether and how enterprise social media (ESM) affordances affect employee agility.
Design/methodology/approach
Adopting self-determination theory (SDT), this study examines a model in which the four ESM affordances (i.e. visibility, association, editability and persistence) impact employee agility through the three basic psychological needs satisfaction (i.e. perceived autonomy, perceived relatedness and perceived competence) of employees. Mplus 7.4 was used to analyze survey data gathered from 304 employees who used ESM in the workplace.
Findings
The authors’ findings show that all four ESM affordances contribute to perceived relatedness and perceived competence; visibility and association affordances also have positive impacts on perceived autonomy; and all three psychological needs satisfaction positively impact employee agility.
Originality/value
First, this study adapted SDT to explore how ESM influences employee agility. Second, this study enriches the relevant research on the antecedents of employee agility and also provides new evidence and theoretical support for employee agility. Third, this study effectively expands the antecedents and outcomes of employee basic psychological needs satisfaction in the domain of ESM and agility.
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Sobia Nasir, Nadia Nasir, Shabnam Khan, Waqas Khan and Server Sevil Akyürek
The study aims to describe the impact of supervisor’s and co-worker’s ostracism on the employee's responses (emotional, psychological and behavioral) through the mediation of…
Abstract
Purpose
The study aims to describe the impact of supervisor’s and co-worker’s ostracism on the employee's responses (emotional, psychological and behavioral) through the mediation of employees' efficacy needs and relational needs. Moreover, psychological capital is treated as a moderator to handle the adverse responses of ostracized employees.
Design/methodology/approach
The study employed a three-wave quantitative research design to gather data from employees and their respective supervisors who belonged to various healthcare units (N = 510) using self-administered close-ended questionnaires. After that, SmartPLS software was used to analyze the data through a structured equation modeling (SEM) technique.
Findings
The empirical results of the study endorsed that ostracism adversely (negatively) affects employees' responses (comprised of emotional, behavioral and psychological). Moreover, the results revealed that employees' needs (efficacy and relational) mediate the relationship between ostracism experienced by employees (supervisor’ and co-workers’ ostracism) and their emotional, behavioral and psychological responses. In addition, it is also evidenced that employees' psychological capital improves the negative association between employees' needs and responses.
Originality/value
The literature in this domain is scarce, and the theoretical stance is weak due to the traditional approaches that are more concerned with the outcomes rather than analyzing the employee's conditional what they are going through. The present study enhances the knowledge of the transactional mode of coping and its application to ostracism in the workplace. The results of the current study may also support the practitioners in formulating interventions to foster a favorable workplace environment.
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Laura E. Hurtienne and Matthew Hurtienne
As human resource development (HRD) seeks to develop organizations and unleash human expertise (Swanson and Holton, 2009), leaders should be encouraged to consider every employee…
Abstract
Purpose
As human resource development (HRD) seeks to develop organizations and unleash human expertise (Swanson and Holton, 2009), leaders should be encouraged to consider every employee as a complex individual with unique needs and aspirations. The purpose of this paper is to introduce the concept of equity leadership (EL), which identifies individual employees’ personal and professional resource, relationship and opportunity needs in an effort to support employees in reaching their fullest potential in the workforce, therefore increasing positive organizational outcomes.
Design/methodology/approach
The theoretical foundations of EL are social exchange theory (SET; Saks and Rotman, 2006) and the ERG theory of motivation (Alderfer, 1969). SET recognizes the give-and-take relationship between leaders and employees, while ERG theory of motivation considers an individual’s personal and professional existence, relatedness and growth needs. The theories provide a foundation for EL’s definition.
Findings
EL posits that leaders’ attention to employees’ resource, relationship and opportunity needs in the workplace could result in a positive effect on the social exchange between leaders and employees. EL provides a framework for these exchanges to occur and for employee needs to be considered, thus resulting in increased employee engagement, productivity and retention.
Research limitations/implications
EL can take a significant amount of time, especially when starting with new employees; however, the relationships and positive organizational outcomes provide justification for engaging in the leadership style.
Practical implications
This paper seeks to advance the field of HRD by defining EL, exploring the theoretical underpinnings of EL and providing actionable steps for leaders to put EL into action.
Social implications
The nuanced theory of EL encourages organizations to evolve from the factory model of expectations to a model that considers the unique needs of individuals in organizations. Grounded partly in SET, EL promotes positive relationships between leaders and employees.
Originality/value
There are many leadership theories; however, EL, unlike any other leadership theory, uniquely considers the individual needs of each employee through consistent one-on-one conversations between the leader and individual employees to discover employee needs and also strives for positive organizational outcomes as a result of the social exchanges.
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Huseyin Arasli, Levent Altinay and Hasan Evrim Arici
The purpose of this paper is to examine the model of seasonal employee leadership (SEL) in a service management process and to create a multi-dimensional scale to gauge this…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the model of seasonal employee leadership (SEL) in a service management process and to create a multi-dimensional scale to gauge this construct. This is because very recent qualitative research by Arasli and Arici (2019), which is the first stage of this scale, recommended a multi-dimensional SEL model for the hospitality industry.
Design/methodology/approach
Making use of data gathered from 1,343 seasonal hotel employees, the authors established a new scale to examine the SEL model. Two separate data sets were collected; the first set was used to perform an exploratory factor analysis, while the second set was processed to confirm the initial factor results using a confirmatory factor analysis.
Findings
The results show that the measurement scale developed in this research provides considerable reliability, as well as convergent and discriminant validities. In particular, the findings confirmed a four-dimensional measurement scale of the SEL: seasonal leader’s qualities, core influence, operational influence and terminal influence.
Originality/value
The paper is the first attempt to develop a new scale which measures the SEL approach in the hospitality literature. Therefore, this study contributes to the current literature through developing and testing the four-dimensional SEL scale and shedding light on the importance of an industry-specific leadership in managing seasonal hotel employees effectively.
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Jin-Soo Lee, Ki-Joon Back and Eric S.W. Chan
The purpose of this paper is to achieve three objectives: to investigate perceived quality of work life (QWL) need attributes among frontline employees in the lodging industry, to…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to achieve three objectives: to investigate perceived quality of work life (QWL) need attributes among frontline employees in the lodging industry, to assess the asymmetric relationships between QWL attributes and job satisfaction (JS) and to prioritize QWL attributes for the effective management of JS.
Design/methodology/approach
Data were analyzed using exploratory factor analysis, impact range-performance analysis and impact-asymmetry analysis.
Findings
Each QWL attribute showed significant and various asymmetric or linear impacts on JS or job dissatisfaction (JDS).
Practical implications
Study results provided critical information for hotel managers to prioritize several attributes, such as safe work place, fair pay, empowerment and effective training, to enhance JS and reduce JDS for frontline personnel.
Originality/value
This study sheds light for identifying the underlying structure of QWL and further investigate the asymmetric relationship between QWL attributes and JS/JDS using need satisfaction, self-determination and three-factor theory in the lodging industry.
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Hui Chen, Qiaozhuan Liang, Chao Feng and Yue Zhang
Drawing on self-determination theory, this study explored how leader humility affected employees' proactive behavior through satisfying their psychological needs for autonomy…
Abstract
Purpose
Drawing on self-determination theory, this study explored how leader humility affected employees' proactive behavior through satisfying their psychological needs for autonomy, competence and relatedness. Furthermore, based on a contingency view, this paper suggested Chinese traditionality as a significant boundary condition for the effects of leader humility.
Design/methodology/approach
Data were collected from 465 employees and 111 direct supervisors in China using a three-wave, two-source design. Hierarchical regression analyses and Hayes' PROCESS macro were applied to test the hypotheses.
Findings
The results indicated that leader humility positively affected employee proactive behavior through the mediating mechanisms of psychological need satisfaction (i.e. autonomy, competence and relatedness). Furthermore, these positive effects were stronger among employees with lower Chinese traditionality beliefs.
Originality/value
Although prior research has examined the relationship between leadership and proactive behavior, most extant studies have focused on “top-down” leadership approaches, ignoring the effect of leader humility. Drawing on self-determination theory, the present study makes contributions to both the leader humility research and proactivity literature by identifying psychological need satisfaction as the mechanism and Chinese traditionality as the moderator.
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Kimberley Breevaart, Sergio Lopez Bohle, Jan Luca Pletzer and Felipe Muñoz Medina
The purpose of this paper is to examine the weekly effects of job insecurity on employee voice and silence. Specifically, the authors argue that because employment fulfils…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the weekly effects of job insecurity on employee voice and silence. Specifically, the authors argue that because employment fulfils important needs, employees’ needs are less fulfilled when they feel that their job is at risk (i.e. high job insecurity). Consequently, the authors argue that employees engage in less voice and more silence because when employees’ needs are not fulfilled, they are less committed to the organization and/or protect their personal resources.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors tested their hypotheses in a five-week long diary study among 97 employees.
Findings
The authors found that employees reported lower need fulfilment in those weeks and the week after job insecurity was higher, which, in turn, decreased employee voice and increased employee silence in those weeks and the week after.
Research limitations/implications
The study shows that feelings about one’s job insecurity fluctuate from week to week and that the weekly negative effects associated with increased job insecurity can be explained from a needs fulfilment perspective. The study also highlights the importance of studying voice and silence simultaneously.
Practical implications
Managers could indirectly increase employees’ voice and decrease employees’ silence by reducing feelings of job insecurity to increase employees’ feelings of predictability of and control over their future.
Originality/value
The authors studied short-term effects of job insecurity on both employee voice and silence, and examined need fulfilment as an underlying mechanism to explain the effects of job insecurity.
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Jillian Webb Day, Courtney L. Holladay, Stefanie K. Johnson and Laura G. Barron
The purpose of this study is to investigate how employee need relates to rewards and employee perceptions of fairness within an organization in the USA using a pay-for-performance…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to investigate how employee need relates to rewards and employee perceptions of fairness within an organization in the USA using a pay-for-performance system.
Design/methodology/approach
To evaluate the presence of a relationship between employee need and reward allocation in a pay-for-performance system, a questionnaire was administered to a sample of 292 employees from two departments at an academic medical center.
Findings
The findings highlight the positive relationship between employee need and reward allocation that remains when controlling for employee performance evaluation ratings. Findings further show that employee communication with the manager about need explains this relationship.
Research limitations/implications
The findings make two important contributions to research on reward allocation and performance management. First, the results show employee need is related to the allocation of rewards in organizational settings outside of collectivistic cultures or developing countries. Second, by demonstrating the role of employee communication with managers about need within the relationship between employee need and reward allocation, the paper provides a more detailed understanding of additional factors related to compensation decisions in a pay-for-performance system.
Originality/value
Little research has explored the relationship between employee need and reward decisions at an individual level in organizational settings within individualistic cultures. The findings from this study address this gap by establishing the presence of this relationship in a pay-for-performance reward-based organization with service-based values. This finding is timely due to the current economic downturn experienced by organizations, and thereby the level of employee need observed in Western individualistic cultures.
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One MNC′s attempts to develop empowerment strategies are reviewed.These strategies are based on a cross‐cultural study of employee needsin the company′s Australian, German and…
Abstract
One MNC′s attempts to develop empowerment strategies are reviewed. These strategies are based on a cross‐cultural study of employee needs in the company′s Australian, German and Japanese subsidiaries. Although the need to control stands out in each of the three countries, employee needs patterns are different. The needs for economic security, belongingness, recognition, self‐worth, and control relate with each in different configurations and patterns. Because of significant differences in employee needs patterns, empowerment strategies enabling employees to fulfil their need to control cannot be transferred from one culture to another without major adjustments. In some instances very little is needed to empower an employee while in others almost nothing works. Some light is shed on why, within an MNC, a similar amount of control over their work and work environments empowers Japanese workers much more than their Australian and German counterparts.
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