The impact of job embeddedness on innovation‐related behaviors

It has often been argued that low turnover leads to less innovation in organizations, not only because fewer job vacancies are available for outsiders with new ideas, but also because longer‐tenured employees might be more resistant to change. In this study, we propose that job embeddedness may actually strengthen employees' motivation to generate, spread, and implement innovative ideas in organizations. In a longitudinal study with a diverse sample, we found that job embeddedness was positively and significantly related to innovation‐related behaviors, even after controlling for demographic variables, the job attitudes, and the job perceptions that are frequently associated with job embeddedness. In addition, we found some support for the proposed moderating effects of career stage; that is, the relationship between job embeddedness and implementing innovative ideas was stronger for individuals in the mid‐ and late stages of their careers than for those in the early stage of their careers. This article concludes with directions for developing future theory. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

How do industrial relations climate and union instrumentality enhance employee performance? The mediating effects of perceived job security and trust in management

In this study, we examine the effects of two key variables associated with union effectiveness on the job performance of employees, and the mechanisms that explain such effects. More specifically, we investigate whether employees' perceptions that their union has a constructive relationship with management (industrial relations climate) and is able to act as an agent for their concerns (union instrumentality) promotes their job performance by enhancing their perceived job security and trust in management. Drawing on three waves of data from 303 employees and their immediate supervisors within 17 private enterprises in China, we find employees' perceptions of union effectiveness influence their job performance by enhancing both their perceived job security and trust in management. These findings are consistent with social exchange theory and conservation of resources theory. This article contributes to the literature by improving our understanding of how unions influence employees' work performance and by explaining how employees' perceptions of the industrial relations climate and union instrumentality influence their job performance. It also sheds light on the important issue of the effectiveness of unions in China, a country where the centrality of the Chinese Communist Party is often considered to have reduced the instrumentality of unions.     

Individual and contextual antecedents of older managerial employees' willingness to accept intra-organizational job changes

This study examines the respective influence of individual characteristics and contextual factors on employees' willingness to accept major internal job changes – i.e. domestic relocation, international assignment and change of discipline – in their late careers. Data were obtained from a two-wave longitudinal survey of 584 management-level employees from different private-sector organizations located in France. Three separate hierarchical regression equations were run to test the relationships of interest in this study, one for each of the three internal mobility opportunities. The set of attitudinal variables was found to explain a significant proportion of the variance in the willingness to change discipline, but its influence was weak or null respectively in explaining willingness to accept an international posting or domestic relocation. Off-the-job embeddedness and spouse's unwillingness to move were confirmed as strong deterrents to relocation. As for the individual characteristics, openness to experience was identified as a major determinant of all the types of mobility included in this study. The results suggest that a much more dynamic role could be envisaged for late-career managers, at least for respondents corresponding to certain individual and contextual variables.     

The Role of Perceived Organizational Performance in Organizational Identification,Adjustment and Job Performance*

abstract Favourable organizational status and prestige has a substantial role in shaping constituents' attitudes and actions. The status and prestige of an organization is often a reflection of its achievements or performance. In the present study, we investigate the role of organizational performance or achievement (as assessed by organizational members) in evoking employees' identification, adjustment, and job performance. The results of this study indicate that two forms of organizational performance (labelled as perceived social responsibility and development and perceived market and financial performance) are associated with organizational identification. However, when compared to perceived market and financial performance, perceived social responsibility and development had a larger effect on organizational identification, which in turn resulted in enhanced employees' work outcomes – adjustment and job performance.     

The impact of the employee-organization relationship on temporary employees' performance and attitude: testing a Singaporean sample

Following the framework proposed by Tsui et al . (1997), this research paper examines the impact of the employee-organization relationship on temporary employees' job performance, turnover intention, overall job satisfaction, affective commitment, perception of fairness and perception of work options. Data were collected from 191 temporary employees from seven employment agencies in Singapore. Analyses conducted revealed that employee responses do vary under the four types of relationship (quasi-spot contract, under-investment, mutual investment and over-investment). In general, both mutual investment and over-investment relationships were associated with higher levels of performance and more favourable attitudes than either the under-investment or quasi-spot contract. Specifically, temporary employees under the mutual investment and over-investment relationships have better job performance, a higher level of affective commitment to the agency, improved overall job satisfaction, higher perception of fairness, higher perception of work options and lower turnover intentions. Furthermore, these finding were obtained even after controlling for the effects of company tenure and job level on employee performance and attitudes. The results highlight the importance of employee-organization relationships in eliciting the desired temporary employee outcomes. Practical implications were drawn for human resource practitioners and employment agencies on how best to manage temporary employees. Some limitations and suggestions for future research were discussed.     

Intercultural competence and expatriates

This study examines the simultaneous effects of employees' fit with their organization, job and supervisor on their job satisfaction, organizational commitment and turnover intention in Turkish banks by paying special attention to the moderating role of perceived organizational support (POS) in these relationships. Survey data collected from 213 employees who work in five different banks operating in Istanbul, Turkey, show that employees' value fit with their organization increases their job satisfaction and organizational commitment significantly while having no direct effect on their turnover intention. The results also suggest a positive association between employees' fit with their job (needs–supplies fit) and their job satisfaction along with the negative, direct impact of job fit on turnover intention. The hypothesized relationships between employees' value fit with their supervisor and selected employee outcomes are not supported. With respect to the moderating role of POS, the overall findings indicate that a high level of organizational support suppresses the effects of employees' value fit with their organization on their job satisfaction and organizational commitment as well as reducing the relationship between their job fit and job satisfaction and turnover intention.     

Exploring the factors associated with employees' perceived appraisal accuracy: a study of Chinese state-owned enterprises

Western employment practices have increasingly been used in emerging markets, but little is known about the factors influencing non-Western employees' views regarding Western employment practices. This paper presents a study that investigates the factors associated with Chinese employees' perceived appraisal accuracy. Based on the extant literature, the study tests six aspects of a performance appraisal (PA) system: employees' perceptions of distributive justice, procedural justice, interactional justice, administrative purpose, developmental purpose and the use of multiple raters. A mixed methods approach was used to collect the data; quantitative data collected from a survey were used to test the hypothesized relationships and qualitative data collected from interviews were used to help explain the underlying logic behind the relationships. The results of the hypotheses testing show that employees' perceived accuracy of PA is positively associated with the three types of justice and the two purposes of PA. The findings from the interviews indicate that employees' perceptions of appraisal accuracy are influenced by certain Chinese cultural characteristics and management traditions. The implications of the findings for research and practice are discussed.     

The impact of corporate entrepreneurship and high-performance work systems on employees' job attitudes: empirical evidence from Greece during the economic downturn

In turbulent times, corporate entrepreneurship (CE) and high-performance work systems (HPWSs) are expected to expand and flourish. However, research on the influences of both CE and HPWSs on employees' job attitudes has generally been neglected. The aim of this study is twofold. First is to investigate the effects of CE and HPWSs on facets of job satisfaction and the three components of organisational commitment. Second is, consistent with the social exchange theory, to examine whether psychological contract act as an important mediator for the CE, HPWSs and employees' job attitudes relationships. Empirical evidence was obtained from 424 employees in the Greek manufacturing industry. Results indicate that both CE and HPWSs positively impact employees' level of job satisfaction and organisational commitment. In addition, we find evidence that psychological contract theory provides a coherent theoretical framework for understanding these relationships. Theoretical and practical implications for HR managers conclude the article.     

Risky Businesses? Young People in Informal Self‐Employment in Sofia

This article studies how perceptions of the risks associated with informal self‐employment depend on the interplay between the institutional, structural (network) and cultural embeddedness of economic action. Informal self‐employment should create at least three types of risk. The first concerns the possible legal and social sanctions that stem from the illegal character of the entrepreneurial action. The second is related to the complete lack of social security protection among those for whom informal self‐employment is their sole employment. The third is connected with the lack of guarantees concerning contract enforcement, which may increase the probability of opportunistic behaviour by business partners and clients. On the basis of a qualitative study of young, highly educated, informally self‐employed workers in Bulgaria's capital Sofia, I argue that these risks are compensated by the specific network and cultural embeddedness of the economic action. This compensation takes the form of various types of insurance against risks. Its core is the replacement of the vacuum of institutional‐system trust with interpersonal trust. Thus, the specific constellation of institutional, network and cultural embeddedness is able to solve the problem of opportunism, as well as to create the perception that the informally self‐employed are faced with not much greater risks than registered self‐employed workers.     

The influence of collectivist human resource management practices on team-level identification

In this study, we investigate how a culturally specific human resource management (HRM) approach influences employees' relational identification at the team level, which may in turn influence the behavior of team members. Given the boundary condition of a collectivistic societal culture, collectivist HRM helps improve employees' team-level identification and their performance. Collecting empirical data from firms in different regions of China, we found that the collectivism-oriented HRM approach has a positive effect on employees' team-level relational identification. This team-level identification, in turn, can significantly improve the job satisfaction of team members and reduce their turnover intention. We conclude with a discussion of the implications of our findings for academic researchers and practitioners.     

Job Design in the Presence of Career Concerns

We reconsider the job design theory of Holmstrom and Milgrom to include career concerns. When agents are motivated by their reputation, the discretion to pursue outside activities plays an integral part in the incentive scheme. Discretion can be a useful instrument to enhance incentives and prevent the adverse selection of low‐ability agents. We argue that these synergies are useful in explaining, among other examples, the employment of US faculty members and of physicians in dual health care systems.     

Hiring for retention and performance

This study evaluated the usefulness of several pre‐hire variables to predict voluntary turnover and job performance. Analyses showed that applicants who knew current employees, had longer tenure with previous employers, were conscientious and emotionally stable, were motivated to obtain the job, and were confident in themselves and their decision making were less likely to quit, and had higher performance within six months after hire. Results also indicated that pre‐hire attitudes (employment motivation and personal confidence) did not predict turnover and performance beyond biodata (pre‐hire embeddedness in the organization and habitual commitment) and the personality traits (conscientiousness and emotional stability). For all predictors but personality, the strength of the relationships weakened over time up to two years after hire. Nonetheless, organizations can avoid voluntary turnover and increase performance by basing hiring decisions on the set of predictors analyzed in this study. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Forms of cross‐border mobility and social capital in multinational enterprises

This paper discusses how different forms of cross‐border employee mobility all contribute to establishing social ties across different units of multinational enterprises (MNEs). Despite the growing recognition of the significance of employees' cross‐unit social ties in MNEs for both individuals and the organisation, the mechanisms for creating such ties remain underspecified. We contribute to closing this gap by identifying the role that an array of forms of international mobility can play in promoting employees' (cross‐unit) social ties inside MNEs. We draw upon empirical accounts of the job‐related international mobility experiences of 72 high‐skilled employees in three leading MNEs in the mobile telecommunications sector. Guided by a framework that utilizes some of the key concepts of the debate on social ties and social capital, we discuss traditional expatriation, short‐term assignments, localised transfers and business travel in terms of the structure and strength of the cross‐unit ties they engender, as well as their accessibility. We find (1) that it is not only traditional long‐term assignments in the form of expatriation that enable individuals to create cross‐unit social ties; and, (2) that different forms of international mobility promote cross‐unit social ties in variable ways and to different extents.     

Social expectations,gender and job satisfaction: Front‐line employees in China's retail sector

This study aims to enhance our understanding of gender and employment in China. Analysing data collected from over 1,800 employees at 22 foreign‐invested and locally owned retail stores in eight Chinese cities, it firstly explores whether, like their counterparts in Western countries, female employees have higher levels of job satisfaction than their male colleagues. Secondly, it distinguishes the key differential predictors of female and male employees' job satisfaction levels. This article extends gender role theory on job satisfaction by showing how traditional values, the structure of work and a nation's dominant gender ideology combine to shape women and men's job satisfaction and work experiences in a transitional context.     

Job security and employee well-being: Evidence from matched survey and register data

We examine the effects of establishment- and industry-level labor market turnover on employees' well-being. The linked employer-employee panel data contain both survey information on employees' subjective well-being and comprehensive register-based information on job and worker flows. We test for the existence of compensating wage differentials by explaining wages and job satisfaction with average uncertainties, measured by an indicator for a high excessive turnover (churning) rate. The results are consistent with the theory of compensating wage differentials, since high uncertainty increases real wages, but high uncertainty has no effect on job satisfaction while not controlling for wages.     

Examining the impacts of community and organization embeddedness on self-initiated expatriates: the moderating role of expatriate-dominated private sector

With a newly developed dimension of the job embeddedness construct and the aim to better understand turnover, this study investigates the relationships of job embeddedness with shocks and turnover intention for an important emerging group in the worldwide workforce – self-initiated expatriates (SEs). We consider three embedding factors: individuals' community embeddedness towards their home country (home country community embeddedness – HomeCCE – newly developed), embeddedness towards the organization in which they are employed in the host country (host country organization embeddedness – HostCOE) and embeddedness towards the host country community (host country community embeddedness – HostCCE). Structural equation modelling is applied to a sample of SEs from 10 three-star to five-star hotels in the Macau SAR of China. This research shows that HostCOE plays a mediating role between a SEs' HomeCCE and turnover intention and willingness to accept unsolicited job offers; and these mediated relationships are moderated by the variables: expatriate-dominated private sector and the SEs' HostCCE. These findings shed light on factors that affect the retention of SEs and have implications for management and future research.     

Work–life policies and female faculty representation in US doctoral‐granting economics departments

This article examines the relationships between work–life policies and female faculty representation and promotion at US doctoral‐granting economics departments. The data were collected in 2012 on tenure‐track and tenured full‐time faculty from 125 departments and updated in 2018 to include promotion status. Variables include individuals and their educational backgrounds, professional experience and publications. Only publications and experience are statistically significant for predicting academic rank for the female subsample, and the impact of publications is much larger for women compared with men. Work–life policies differ in explaining the representation of women across academic ranks. Dual‐career policies have a positive effect on female representation at the assistant and associate levels but do not have a statistically significant impact at the full professor level. National Science Foundation ADVANCE grantee universities have increased female representation across all ranks, but the effect is the smallest at the full professor level. Work–life policies are insignificant in predicting promotion.     

Trust in management: the role of employee voice arrangements and perceived managerial opposition to unions

This study examines the relationship between employee voice arrangements and employees' trust in management using data from the 2007 Australian Worker Representation and Participation Survey of 1,022 employees. Drawing on social exchange theory and employee relations literature, we test hypotheses concerning the relationships between direct and union voice arrangements, perceived managerial opposition to unions and employees' trust in management. Consistent with our predictions, after controlling for a range of personal, job and workplace characteristics, regression analyses indicated that direct voice arrangements were positively related to employees' trust in management. Union voice arrangements and perceived managerial opposition to unions were negatively related to trust in management. The article concludes by highlighting the study's implications for management practice and avenues for further research.     

Embeddedness across contexts: A two‐country study on the additive and buffering effects of job embeddedness on employee turnover

Despite the growing body of literature on the effects of job embeddedness on turnover, there are few studies on how job embeddedness operates in different countries. This study, based on the Conservation of Resources theory, addresses this research gap by investigating both the additive and the buffering effects of on‐the‐job and off‐the‐job embeddedness using employee data from China (n = 373) and Switzerland (n = 268). Results showed that on‐the‐job embeddedness reduced the likelihood of turnover more strongly in Switzerland than in China (additive effect). Additionally, in China, the unsolicited job offer–turnover relationship was stronger when employees had lower levels of off‐the‐job embeddedness (buffering effect). This research contributes to the understanding of the relative role of on‐the‐job and off‐the‐job embeddedness for turnover in different countries.     

Organization‐Based Self‐Esteem,Psychological Contract Fulfillment,and Perceived Employment Opportunities: A Test of Self‐Regulatory Theory

This study addresses organization‐based self‐esteem (OBSE) development by examining the role of perceptions of employer psychological contract fulfillment, and the self‐regulatory processes by which OBSE evolves and produces its effects. Self‐regulatory theory helps reveal why psychological contract fulfillment relates to OBSE, how OBSE mediates its effects, and the ways in which OBSE might interact with perceived employment opportunities to affect job satisfaction, performance, and turnover intentions. The results show that OBSE is related to and mediates the relationships between relational contract fulfillment and employee job satisfaction and performance, but OBSE is not related to transactional contract fulfillment. Nor does OBSE mediate the relationships between transactional contract fulfillment and the dependent variables. Perceived employment opportunities moderate the relationships of OBSE with job satisfaction and turnover intentions. This study concludes with recommendations of ways managers can increase their sensitivity to the types of messages they communicate to employees. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.