A Good Walk Foiled: Monopoly Power and Barriers to Entry into the PGA Tour

In order to explore whether the PGA Tour's 2013 qualifications amendments represent a meritocratic evolution or simply a monopolistic barrier to entry, this study compares the results of the 2014 PGA Tour to those of the Web.com Tour. Upon empirical examination of each tour's earnings, scoring characteristics, and course characteristics, we are able to predict the marginal skill differences between players on the two tours. In doing so, we illustrate that sufficiently talented Web.com Tour golfers are being excluded from participation in the PGA Tour. As such, the changes made by the PGA Tour regarding qualification perhaps run counter to welfare maximization in terms of tour participants and fans of professional golf. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The burden of glory: Competing for nonmonetary incentives in rank‐order tournaments

In an environment in which elite, highly paid professionals compete for nonmonetary rewards, we find evidence of underperformance. Our analysis suggests that choking under pressure from high‐stakes nonmonetary rewards is behind the underperformance. This implies that high stakes nonmonetary rewards can create meaningful pressure on individuals and lead to worse performance, a distinct issue that has yet to be adequately examined. These findings come from an examination of the behavior of top U.S. golfers competing to earn a place on the U.S. Ryder Cup team via their performance in PGA Tour tournaments with differing allocations of Ryder Cup qualifying points.     

Career success after stigmatizing organizational events

This article examines the effect of six types of stigmatizing organizational events on employees' career moves to another employer: criticism of the organization in the media; resignation of key individuals from the organization; downsizing; a drop in net income; lawsuits launched by the Securities and Exchange Commission, competitors, or customers; and lawsuits launched by employees. Stigmatizing events that signal the decline of corporate performance are the most devastating for professional career success. Outsiders, on the other hand, are less sensitive to an organization's involvement in lawsuits launched by public authorities or employees. Stigmatizing events affect the career success of every professional in the organization, irrespective of his or her hierarchical level. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

The impact of age on the ability to perform under pressure: golfers on the PGA tour

This paper is about aging and the ability to perform under pressure on the PGA tour. Performance increases with golfing skill, but may first increase and then decrease with age as experience interacts with changes in physical condition. Similarly, mental fortitude or the ability of a golfer to perform under pressure may first increase and then decrease with age as experience interacts with changes in the ability to concentrate. Net performance on the tour is the result of both physical golfing skill and the ability to perform under pressure. We control for changes in physical skill and focus on the mental side of the game. The role of experience suggests an inverted U shaped relationship between age and mental performance that could vary significantly across golfers. We use Order-m FDH to calculate a measure of performance under pressure, and we confirm an inverted U-shaped curve with age. Along the way, we examine the ability to perform under pressure at the level of the individual golfer.     

Predicting Malaysian managers' objective and subjective career success

Compared with the extensive research on managerial career in the west, little has emerged from Asia. This study reports an investigation of the determinants of objective and subjective career success of managers working in the Malaysian public sector. Surveys were received from 288 managers of various managerial grades. The findings revealed that managers' objective and subjective career success were predicted by different variables. Objective career success was predicted by human capital and demographic variables. Subjective career success was predicted by structural variables, individual variables, and demographic variables. The implications for research and practice are highlighted.     

Mentoring and expressive network resources: their relationship with career success and emotional exhaustion among Hellenes employees involved in emotion work

Although mentoring has been identified as an important career resource for protégés in the Anglo-Saxon cultural cluster, pertinent research in other cultures is still scarce. The relationship of mentoring and expressive network resources with protégés' career success and emotional exhaustion was investigated in a sample of 104 Hellenes (Greek) bank employees performing frontline service jobs. The number of mentors that respondents reported they have had was related to their extrinsic career success. However, currently having a mentor was not related to intrinsic career success and was marginally related to emotional exhaustion. In contrast, the amount of expressive network resources was strongly related to both intrinsic career success and emotional exhaustion. The results are discussed with respect to extant research, the national cultural context of the study and the cross-cultural transferability of human resource systems. The general tentative conclusion is that relationships with mentors and expressive network resources appear to be important resources for employees across cultures, but the relative potency of their benefits is influenced by the national cultural characteristics.     

Are freelancers a breed apart? The role of protean and boundaryless career attitudes in employability and career success

Recent economic and organisational changes have fostered an increasing diversification of the workforce, among whom freelancers are an under‐represented population in the literature. This study aimed at examining the role of protean and boundaryless career, professional commitment, and employability activities in fostering freelancers' subjective career success. Data were collected via an online survey among a sample of 425 Italian freelancers and analysed through structural equation modelling. Results partially confirmed several hypotheses: higher self‐directed career management and boundaryless mindset predicted higher employability activities and professional commitment; moreover, employability and professional commitment acted as mediators between career attitudes and subjective career success. The study provides support for the importance of such variables to freelancers' career success, as well as for the significance of protean and boundaryless careers among nontraditional occupational groups. Interventions aimed at fostering such attitudes could support freelancers in improving their attainment of professional progress and perception of career success.     

Chinese managers' career success networks: the impact of key tie characteristics on structure and interaction practices

Structured personal interviews were conducted with 105 senior and mid-level Chinese male and female managers, in which each respondent provided information about their career success network (CSN) ties. Using this data, we tested hypotheses on: (1) the age composition of Chinese managers' CSNs; (2) the face-to-face interaction practices within Chinese managers' CSNs; and (3) the roles of tie sex composition and tie content (position-centred versus person-centred ties) in influencing the age composition of and interaction practices within Chinese managers' CSNs. The results demonstrated that both Chinese male and female managers, while generally preferring to form CSN ties with individuals who are older than themselves, are relatively more reluctant to include middle-aged or elder women in their CSN. The age of those included in the respondents' CSN was also influenced by tie content and whether the tie spans the organizational boundary. With respect to interaction practices within the CSN, tie content moderated the relationship between tie sex composition and interaction practice. Female managers' person-centred ties with men had significantly lower levels of interaction outside the workplace than person-centred ties composed of members of the same-sex. However, this difference was not exhibited in the case of position-centred ties. Interestingly, the reluctance to socialize with the opposite-sex exhibited by female managers did not appear to be shared by their male counterparts. The implications of these results for career success in China are discussed.     

Advancement along a career path: the influence of human capital and performance

Following the path metaphor of careers along with signalling and human capital theories, we examine important factors that predict individuals' advancement in a career. With a unique sample of American football players, we tested the influence of individuals' human capital on their performance, value and advancement along a career path. Our findings indicate that individuals' human capital assessed in the first stage of the career path is positively related to individuals' performance in the second stage of the career path and the value placed on individuals in the third stage of the career path. We also found that performance in the second stage mediated the relationship between human capital assessed in the first stage and the value placed on individuals in the third stage of the career path.     

Non-native accents and stigma: How self-fulfilling prophesies can affect career outcomes

This article proposes a framework examining the impact of non-native accents on speakers' work and career outcomes, namely, career advancement and career satisfaction. Drawing on stigma theory, we present a conceptual model to assess cognitive, affective, and behavioral reactions towards non-native accents. We contend that speaking with a non-native accent is linked with (i) managers' perceptions of speakers' fluency, (ii) expectations concerning non-native speakers' performance abilities, (iii) positive regard in social interactions and (iv) supervision style towards speakers with non-native accents. Moreover, we suggest that speaking with a non-native accent may lead speakers to (i) feel excluded and devalued at work, and (ii) assume an avoidance approach at work. Together, these effects can create a self-fulfilling prophecy that negatively affects non-native speakers' work and career outcomes. We also suggest that the strength of accents' consequences depend on the presence of particular person-related (accent prestige, exposure to the non-native accent, and non-native speakers' goal orientation) and job-related factors (nature of the job and company ethnocentrism). Implications for theory and practice are discussed.     

Developing and Utilizing Network Resources: Roles of Political Skill

This study examines the role of political skill in the development and utilization of network resources at the individual level. Drawing on the behavioural and network perspectives as well as political skill literature, we propose that political skill increases one's network resources (developing network), which will benefit his/her performance and career success. Moreover, political skill is hypothesized to strengthen the relationships between network resources and performance and career outcomes (utilizing network). A two‐wave study on a sample of 281 supervisor–subordinate dyads from six electronic firms in China confirms our hypotheses. Our examination of the dual role of political skill facilitates a better understanding of the networking process from the perspective of individual skill/behaviour, thus enriching the behavioural theory and network literature. Implications are discussed and directions for future research are suggested.     

The interplay between learning strategy and organizational structure in predicting career success

The institutionalization of management development and the money spent on it is in sharp contrast to the importance attached to what we know about how managers learn and whether it helps them to get promotion, given the specific organizational context in which they work. We therefore examined career success as a complex positive or negative function of the individual's learning strategy and the organization's structure. One hundred and twenty-seven managers from three government-related organizations completed a questionnaire. A deep learning strategy, characterized by a focus on meaning and relations, fosters career success, especially in a lowly specialized context. In contrast, a surface learning strategy, characterized by a focus on instructions and facts, hampers career success, especially in a highly integrated context. The findings strongly suggest that management development programmes need to be made to measure, taking into account both how the manager learns and how the organization is structured.     

Goal congruence: fitting international assignment into employee careers

This research investigates how the quality of the relationship between sending supervisors and expatriates is related to turnover and performance. Utilizing goal congruence and leader–member exchange (LMX) theories, it is hypothesized that the quality of the relationship between sending supervisors and expatriates mediates goal congruence and the two outcome variables: performance and turnover intentions. The goal examined is the degree to which the expatriation fits into expatriates' career paths at the firm. Regression analysis is used to test the hypotheses with a sample of 44 matched sending supervisor–expatriate dyads. Findings indicate that LMX mediates the relationship between goal congruence and performance. Furthermore, goal congruence has a direct negative relationship with turnover intentions. These results suggest that sending supervisors significantly influence the success of expatriate assignments.     

Sex Differences in Responsiveness to Organizational Career Management

This is a study of differences between women and men in their responsiveness to formal organizational career management. Questionnaire data from 272 men and 101 women were analyzed. It was found that women's individual career variables were mostly similar to men's, but their responsiveness to organizational career management was higher than men's. Women's career effectiveness (performance, attitudes, identity, and adaptability) and career planning increased when the level of perceived organizational career management was high. The sex difference remained even when the effects of two other responsiveness-reducing factors, managerial position and tenure, were controlled. The results are interpreted in terms of women's cognitive construction of organizational reality. It is suggested that human resource managers have to distinguish between two different objectives: enhancing women's effectiveness vs. enhancing their career progress. To attain the first objective, formal career management systems should be developed. To attain the second, it is argued that women need to relate differently to the informal organizational system.     

The impact of international experience on objective and subjective career success in early careers

There is an ongoing debate in the literature on the long-term impact of international work experience on future career success. In this longitudinal study based on university graduates, we compare expatriates (n = 159), repatriates (n = 395) and domestic employees (n = 2697) with regard to their objective and subjective career success during the first five years of their careers. Results from propensity score matching and ordinary least-squares regressions show that expatriates and repatriates have a higher objective career success in terms of monthly wages. We further find a higher subjective career success for expatriates and male repatriates.     

An investigation of ingratiation as a career management strategy: evidence from Singapore

In spite of the recognition that career politics, and therefore ingratiation, is widely used to manage careers, there is a dearth of empirical studies on ingratiation as a career management strategy. Consistent with Ferris and Kacmar's (1988) suggestion, the study reported here investigated the conditions (defined by situational variables, career concerns and personality variables) under which ingratiation is used as a career management strategy. Data were obtained through a structured questionnaire from professional employees (N = 214) in public and private sector organizations in Singapore.

Factor analysis of the 21-item career concerns scale revealed four solutions representing internal and external career concerns. The results of the hierarchical regression revealed that situational variables explained most of the variance in ingratiation, followed by career concerns and personality variables. Among the individual variables, task ambiguity, supervisor reward power, managerial responsibility and need for achievement were significant while personal success approached significance. Internal career concern of autonomy development was unrelated to ingratiation. Of the interaction terms, only supervisor reward power and Machiavellianism approached significance. Directions for future studies are suggested.     

The role of performance appraisals in motivating employees

Workers' rewards and career perspectives often depend on how their supervisors perceive their performance. However, evaluating a worker's performance is often difficult. We develop a model in which a worker is uncertain about his own performance and about his supervisor's ability to assess him. The supervisor gives the worker a performance appraisal aiming to affect both the worker's self‐perception and his own credibility in assessing the performance. We examine how performance appraisals affect the worker's future performance. Our model's predictions are consistent with empirical findings. Supervisors give, on average, “too” positive appraisals, and both positive and negative feedback can (de)motivate workers.     

Cultural values and definitions of career success

This paper examines how national culture relates to the ways that individuals define career success. Data are drawn from interviews with 269 professional services employees in 15 countries. Interviews are content coded and linked with country‐level Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior Effectiveness measures of cultural values. We test our hypotheses using a multilevel multinomial logit model. The results demonstrate that the ways in which employees define career success vary across countries, due in part to differences in cultural values after controlling for gender, occupation, job level, and national economic development. We find that employees from countries high in future orientation, uncertainty avoidance, and performance orientation are more likely to define career success in terms of interpersonal outcomes, and those from countries high in collectivism (institutional and in‐group), humane orientation, and gender egalitarianism are more likely to prefer intrapersonal outcomes. We find that employees from countries that are high in assertiveness, uncertainty avoidance, and performance orientation are more likely to define career success in terms of achievement‐oriented outcomes. Finally, we find that employees from countries high in power distance report career success definitions in terms of safety and security outcomes. We discuss the implications of these findings for theories of cultural differences in careers across countries.