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Interest in generational research has garnered a lot of attention, as the workplace is seeing multiple generations (i.e., the Silent Generation, Baby Boomers, Gen Xers, and Millennials) working side-by-side for the first time. However, it is unclear how multiple generations of workers interact with each other and affect the workplace. Although there is extant literature on generational differences, some scholars have argued that the effect sizes are small and the differences are not meaningful. The focal aim of this chapter is to present the current state of literature on generational research. We present the relevant conceptualizations and theoretical frameworks that establish generational research. We then review evidence from existing research studies to establish the areas of differences that may exist among the different generations. In our review, we identify the issues arising from generational differences that are relevant to human resource management (HRM) practices, including new workforce entrants, aging workers, the changing nature of work and organizations, and leadership development. We conclude with several directions for future research on modernizing workplace policies and practices, ensuring sustainability in current employment models, facilitating future empirical research, and integrating the effects of globalization in generational research.

“Academic values” is one of the most popular terms used in the higher education literature. But how do we study academic values? Besides autonomy, freedom, and collegiality, the “values” in “academic values” often remains implicit, leaving a conceptual gap in the literature. Moreover, autonomy, freedom, and collegiality may reflect the shared normative expectations as part of the value system of a profession, rather than the value orientation at the individual level. To examine the latter, this chapter proposes a conceptual framework adapted from the studies of work values in applied psychology. As a heuristic device, the academic work value framework consists of six ideal-typical value orientations belonging to three dimensions: work autonomy, social orientation, and value of knowledge. The framework's relevance and usefulness are evaluated by revisiting relevant literature on academic orientations. The result shows a spectrum of value positions in academic work, from the “old school” values to the “entrepreneurial” ones to the hybrid orientations. Overall, this framework provides a potential approach to operationalize the concept of academic values for empirical research. At the same time, as a heuristic device, it is open for reflection, critique, and further development.

This study identified differences of work values between two types of hospitality workforce members: hospitality industry practitioners and hospitality student/practitioners. A total of 398 nonstudent practitioners were randomly selected from various hospitality organizations to participate in this study. There were 828 student practitioners included in the data collected from a hospitality management college. Fifteen values were identified along with their hierarchical order. Three-dimensional work value structure shared by hospitality-major student/practitioners and industry practitioners were revealed. They are: General Work Values, Management Work Values, and Hospitality Work Values. The differences of the three dimensions among the four categories of student practitioners and industry practitioners were identified. Furthermore, work values were found to differ by gender. Implications are drawn for industry managers as well as educators.

This study examines the interactive effects of work values and organisational commitment on localisation.

This study draws on human capital theory, and reports on a survey of 200 expatriate managers working in Qatar.

We find that localisation is negatively associated with work values and positively associated with organisational commitment. Furthermore, work values appear to influence organisational commitment.

Despite a surfeit of literature on localisation of human resources, few studies previously have explored its relationship with work values and organisational commitment. This chapter presents empirical research on the issue from Qatar, a country in a region which remains under-researched in the literature.

This chapter aims to provide nuance into the issue of generational cohort differences at work by focusing on the role of contextual moderator variables. Theory and hypotheses derived from the research on generational differences, psychological contracts, and work values are contrasted to a countervailing set of hypotheses derived from theory and research on the confluence of age and Person-Environment (P-E) fit. Complex patterns of interactive effects are posited for both alternatives. The results favored a generational hypothesis regarding the positively valenced construct of job satisfaction but an age-based hypothesis for the negatively valenced construct of turnover intentions. Results are tested using a subset from a large and nationally representative sample of adults from the US workforce (n = 476). Results offer mixed support for both age and generational cohorts, qualified by the specific type of outcome at hand.

Epidemics and pandemics tend to jolt people out of their ordinary living to a special state of crisis and suffering. The COVID-19 pandemic has not proven different, and this chapter and indeed the whole volume is a call to reflect on an ongoing state of volatility, uncertainty, complexities and ambiguity (VUCA). Where it is difficult to project an end to a pandemic as occurs presently, VUCA is even more significant, and the outcomes of these reflections can only augur well for present and future confrontations of a crisis. In this chapter, we have described our premises for understanding work values in a normative sense. Understanding the principles behind the stability and sustainability of these values will serve as a guide for the responsible management of changing workforce dynamics. While respecting the personal choices involved in work values, we outline some social and organisational factors that influence said dynamics.

Ethical principles play a key role in the attendant changes in the workforce ranging from rapid digitisation to remote working, to flexible work hours, and changing workspaces. New problems have arisen relating to the rising costs of working virtually, unequal opportunities in different economies, genders, and fields, and the rapid changes that are still ongoing. Some issues we have tackled include the challenge with employer–employee trust when supervision and workspaces are rapidly shifting, and the responsibility for well-ness and flourishing when the lines between work and the rest of life become blurred. We have recommended some attitudes that will promote integrity in all the stakeholders of a given workforce so that there is effective collaboration and individual growth.

Introduction: Human values serve as the foundation for human society. To establish and safeguard our family and community, we practice values such as friendship, love, wisdom, self-control, responsibility, forgiveness and so on. The philosophies of society and life are guided by values. They are necessary for the establishment of social bonds and norms for acceptable behaviour. Values are drawn from socio-cultural and prophetic ideologies. However, the meaning of values varies from person to person, whereas institutional values are more strict and less malleable in nature. Person’s values are shaped by their experiences in a variety of fields, and those values change through time and from different perspectives. Children are growing up in a world that is used to frivolous spending and impulsive purchases as the result of consumerism. Parents in a nuclear family are preoccupied with their jobs and often do not spend quality time with their children. As a result, they try to make up for it by giving their children expensive gifts; children are receiving abundant luxury before asking for it, so they begin to place value on material things and develop little or no emotional bonds. On top of that, these young minds are becoming exposed and addicted to the cell phones and other technological devices. The young children are becoming numb to their surroundings and relationships, and as a result, they are being immersed in a fantasy world of their own makings. The upshot is that these young people build their own universe that is nonrealistic and disconnected from the rest of the world. When these children grow up, they continue to live in their own make-belief world. They become egotistical, with little emotional attachment, loyalty, respect, sensitivity or devotion to other people or things. They are becoming increasingly distant, anxious, troubled and unstable in their personal life due to their high ambitions, thirst for more, attachment to luxury, lack of commitment to relationships, contempt for standards and conventions and separation from other connections. This impacts their personal and professional lives. Research says that the majority of professionals and teachers in Management Schools feel stressed due to target pressure, fear of failure, managing their work-life balance, etc. and often succumb to depression as well as death due to this. The goal of modern management education is to help students develop holistically. However, the challenge is do the teachers themselves believe in the Life Values that they are supposed to inculcate among students. Many good B-Schools are developing programs to teach their students these ‘life-skills’. Are they, however, truly fruitful? Is it possible to create a sustainable young generation that is psychologically robust and capable of overcoming life’s challenges?

Purpose of the Study: The chapter follows the Rokeach Values (instrumental and terminal values) system as a framework for study. The study has examined the (i) pattern of the locus of control (LOC) of professionals and teachers and (ii) relation between LOC and work value and its’ importance in two occupational groups, viz. teachers and professionals of a company and tries to understand their importance to build a sustainable career. The purpose of the study is to realise the perspectives of different stakeholders in society, such as corporate and academicians, about the life values needed to be developed among young budding managers, which will result in a sustainable business.

Research Methodology: A mixed method approach of research methodology will be followed to understand the role of the value system in creating a sustainable young generation. This chapter will administer a questionnaire to gauge professionals and teachers who have grown up in the modern environment of getting ‘anything, anywhere, anytime’, and through some in-depth interviews, it will try to understand their perspectives about the importance of values in their life.

Scope of the Study: This chapter will focus on the young professionals and young teachers and the influencers in their life, as they will be molding the business decisions and decision makers, respectively, of the future.

Originality and Values: The chapter is original in nature, and it will attempt to define ‘life skills’ differently through the lens of sustainable values that must be acquired in order to produce a sustainable future.

Outcome: Work values are culture-specific. The chapter suggests that by changing the importance of path values and terminal values of their human resources towards more internal control can help the organisation to solve some human resource problems as well as improve the organisational performance to achieve sustainable behaviour. This research will help to provide an insight into the difference between skills and values. The aim is to highlight that skills pursued without values can never attain the sustainable world which is the urgent need of the hour. It will also serve as a guide for the management of colleges in terms of which values and skills should be instilled in their teachers to build a sustainable future so that they can disseminate the same to the students and how this might be accomplished.

A work orientation represents a person’s beliefs about the meaning of work – the function work plays in the person’s life and the constellation of values and assumptions the person holds about the work domain. Research has suggested that adults tend to favor one of three primary work orientations: job, career, or calling. Empirical studies have shown that adults with different primary work orientations tend to experience different work and career outcomes; however, scholars have not analyzed how or why an individual first develops a work orientation. In this study, we take a first step toward investigating the origins of adults’ work orientations.

We propose hypotheses drawing on extant literature on the development of work values and occupational inheritance. We test hypotheses using a retrospective research design and survey methodology, with a sample of working adults.

Work orientations are developed through socialization processes with parents during adolescence. There are different patterns of development across the three work orientation categories: stronger calling orientations are developed when both parents possess strong calling orientations; stronger career orientations develop in accordance with fathers’ career orientations; and job orientations are related more to the nature of the adolescent’s relationship with parents than with parents’ own work orientations.

This research provides the first empirical study of the origin and development of work orientations.

This research offers insight into ways generations are connected through the perceived meaning of their work, even as the nature of work changes. We encourage future scholars to use this as a starting point for research on the development of work orientations, and to continue exploring these questions using additional methods, particularly longitudinal study designs.