Determinants of employee training: impact on organizational legitimacy and organizational performance

Employee training is one of the most studied human resource practices, as it is considered critical for organizational success. However, employee training and its impact on organizational performance have usually been studied from an economic-rational perspective, in terms of the economic and competitive advantages that companies can achieve by training employees. This study goes beyond the economic-rational approach and draws on institutional theory. We introduce contextual factors in the analysis of the determinants of employee training to complement the variables of competitive advantage and explain the relationship between employee training and organizational outcomes. Data were collected from 374 organizations using a questionnaire administered in Spain. The findings support the idea that both economic-rational and institutional determinants influence employee training. There are also two different kinds of outcome from training employees: organizational legitimacy improves at the same time as organizational performance.     

Authentic leadership and intrapreneurial behavior: cross-level analysis of the mediator effect of organizational identification and empowerment

Intrapreneurial activity is positively associated with the organizational growth, and the factors that stimulate such behaviors need to be identified. The general goal of this work is to explore the relationship of authentic leadership with employees’ intrapreneurial behavior and the intervening processes. A correlational study was carried out with 212 employees of Spanish companies, in which two cross-level mediation hypotheses were tested. The results obtained indicate that employees’ organizational identification and organizational empowerment both mediate the relationship between authentic leadership and employees’ intrapreneurial behaviors. In this work, we note the importance of including authentic leadership as an antecedent of intrapreneurship.     

Does supervisor-perceived authentic leadership influence employee work engagement through employee-perceived authentic leadership and employee trust?

The issue of authentic leadership has been generating increased interest in both practical and academic domains. This study examines the influence of authentic leadership on employee trust and employee work engagement from the dyadic supervisor–employee viewpoint. The sample data consists of responses from 77 team supervisors and 345 employees in 36 companies. We utilize hierarchical linear modeling to test the hypotheses. The cross-level results show that employee trust fully mediates supervisor-perceived authentic leadership and employee work engagement, and that employee-perceived authentic leadership fully mediates the relationship between supervisor-perceived authentic leadership and employee trust, as well as the relationship between supervisor-perceived authentic leadership and employee work engagement. On the individual level, employee trust has a partial mediating effect on the relationship between employee-perceived authentic leadership and employee work engagement.     

Employee positive moods as a mediator linking transformational leadership and employee work outcomes

Past leadership research has demonstrated that transformational leadership has a positive effect on employee task performance and helping coworker behavior. However, among the research on the mediating mechanisms linking transformational leadership and employee work outcomes, little has been done empirically to examine the mediating effect of employee positive moods. This study extends previous research by examining the mediating role played by employee positive moods. Data were collected longitudinally from 282 employees and their immediate supervisors in 10 insurance companies in Taiwan. Results showed that transformational leadership both directly influenced employee task performance and helping coworker behavior and had an indirect effect through employee positive moods.     

An empirical study of other‐oriented and rational self‐interest leadership approaches

Other orientation is defined as “the extent to which individuals are concerned with the welfare of others” (Meglino & Korsgaard, 2007, p. 59). Other‐oriented leaders focus their attention on organizational objectives coupled with a human resource emphasis, whereas rational self‐interested leaders concern themselves with organizational objectives coupled with self‐emphasis. This quantitative study examines philanthropian and servant leadership, which are other‐oriented leadership approaches, and transactional leadership, which is a rational self‐interested leadership approach, to determine the effectiveness of the approaches in the 21st century. This study further examines the results of a hermeneutic phenomenological study of philanthropian leadership that introduced a new other‐oriented leadership model. This study focuses on leadership preferences of leaders, employees, and third‐year undergraduate business students to determine if there is a significant difference between preferences among groups for other‐oriented and rational self‐interest‐oriented leadership approaches.     

Identity Orientation,Organizational Identification,and Leadership Involvement

The present study relies on theories of authentic and relational leadership, as well as the identity orientation model, to study leadership involvement in volunteer organizations. We propose that self‐expression and social cohesion—the opportunity organizational membership provides people to express who they are and to develop social relationships—are related to organizational identification and leadership involvement. We posit that self‐expression and social cohesion satisfy personal and relational identification motives and increase organizational identification—a form of identification with a collective—which in turn affect leadership involvement. The hypotheses are tested using structural equations modeling using a sample of 210 professional association members, a nonwork sample that reduces the influence of extrinsic rewards on leadership involvement.     

Organizational Surveillance of Computer-Mediated Workplace Communication: Employee Privacy Concerns and Responses

Email, social media, and other types of computer-mediated workplace communication tools can enhance flexibility in how employees perform their jobs, expand networking opportunities, increase profits, cut costs, and enable collaboration among diverse groups across the globe. Despite their advantages, these technology tools can also cause security breaches, financial loss, employee distraction, and lawsuits. To prevent such damaging consequences, many companies monitor their employees’ computer-mediated workplace communication. However, this surveillance is often met with resistance from employees as it taps into concerns over workers’ privacy rights, due process, and fairness. We examine these employee concerns through an empirical study of full-time working adults’ beliefs about their computer-mediated workplace communication privacy and their evaluations of organizational justice, trust in upper management, and commitment to the organization. Our results suggest that employees who perceive less computer-mediated workplace communication privacy tend to view their organization’s policies as less fair, trust upper management less, and demonstrate less commitment to their organizations. Furthermore, results indicate that procedural justice mediated the relationship between privacy and organizational commitment and moderated the relationship between privacy and organizational trust.     

The Costs of Exhibiting Organizational Citizenship Behavior

Organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) has been associated with positive organizational outcomes and with higher managerial ratings of employee performance. However, concerns have been raised about the possible personal costs of performing such activities. This paper examines the relationship between OCB and emotional exhaustion and work‐family conflict and explores the moderating role of job performance in shaping those relationships. In a time‐lagged field study of customer‐contact center employees the research found that one particular dimension of OCB—conscientiousness—was associated with higher emotional exhaustion and with work‐family conflict. The study also revealed that conscientious employees who performed their in‐role job responsibilities at a high level experienced greater emotional exhaustion and work‐family conflict than conscientious employees who performed their in‐role job responsibilities at a low level. Our findings suggest that organizational pressures to increase the level at which both discretionary and formal role obligations are performed can carry negative consequences for employees. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

The Social‐Cognitive Underpinnings of Employees’ Ambidextrous Behaviour and the Supportive Role of Group Managers’ Leadership

Although research on organizational ambidexterity has exploded in the past several years, the determinants of individual‐level ambidexterity have received little scholarly attention. This is surprising given that management scholars increasingly highlight the benefits of combining explorative and exploitative activities in individual employees’ work roles. Using data collected by a two‐wave survey of 638 employees nested in 173 groups across 34 organizations, our research demonstrates that both psychological factors and leadership predict employees’ ambidextrous behaviour. Our results demonstrate that general self‐efficacy positively predicts ambidextrous behaviour through learning orientation. In addition, we show that employees exhibit higher ambidexterity when their group managers demonstrate paradoxical leadership; that is, a leadership style that couples strong managerial support with high performance expectations. Paradoxical leadership also moderates the relationship between learning orientation and individual ambidexterity such that employees’ ambidextrous behaviour is highest when paradoxical leadership and employee learning orientation are simultaneously at high levels.     

Improving corporate biodiversity management through employee involvement

This paper presents an empirical examination of the role of employee involvement in the internalization of corporate biodiversity management. A qualitative study in natural resource companies was conducted, based on semi‐directive interviews with managers, consultants, and experts in this area. The findings show that employee involvement is essential to improve biodiversity practices in natural resource companies, which largely rely on organizational citizenship behaviors for the environment. The role of tacit knowledge, voluntary initiatives, and prevention of harmful behaviors in the workplace are highlighted. The main obstacles to the internalization of biodiversity issues include their complexity, the lack of corporate commitment, the externalization of initiatives, and the lack of training for employees. The contributions to the literature on corporate environmental management, internalization of new practices, and organizational citizenship behaviors for the environment are explained. Managerial implications and avenues for future research are also provided.     

The influence of authentic leadership behaviors on trust and work outcomes of health care staff

A key element of a healthy work environment is trust: trust between staff and their leaders. Authentic leadership is proposed as the core of effective leadership needed to build trust because of its clear focus on the positive role modeling of honesty, integrity, and high ethical standards in the development of leader‐follower relationships. A model linking authentic leadership behaviors with trust in management, perceptions of supportive groups and work outcomes (including voice or speaking‐up behavior, self‐rated job performance, and burnout) using secondary analysis procedures was examined. The hypothesized model was tested using structural equation modeling in two samples of health care employees from a western Canadian cancer care agency: clinical care providers including nurses, pharmacists, physicians, and other professionals (N = 147) and nonclinical employees including administrative, support, and research staff (N = 188). Findings suggest that supportive leader behavior and trust in management are necessary for staff to be willing to voice concerns and offer suggestions to improve the workplace and patient care.     

The influence of transformational leadership and organizational identification on intrapreneurship

Managers play a vital role in encouraging and supporting the initiatives of individual employees to explore new opportunities, to develop new products or to improve work procedures for the benefit of the organization. This study examines the influence of manager leadership styles on employee intrapreneurial behavior and the mediating role of organizational identification. Partial Least Squares modeling was used to analyze the data from 186 employees belonging to several Spanish public and private organizations. The results show that transformational leadership has a positive impact on employee intrapreneurial behavior, whereas transactional leadership negatively influences it. Furthermore, these effects are found to be partially mediated by organizational identification.     

The Comparative Influences of Transformational Leadership and Leader–Member Exchange on Follower Engagement

Scholars of transformational leadership and leader–member exchange (LMX) have argued that leaders are able to positively influence the job attitudes and behaviors of followers by different means. Whereas transformational leadership focuses on the leaders’ ability to transform followers through a global inspiring vision that encourages positive change among all employees, LMX highlights the importance of the leaders’ unique relationships with followers as the driver of positive attitudes and behaviors. Using field data gathered from 280 full‐time employees, the current research compared the influence of these two leadership styles on follower engagement. The results suggested that rather than the influence derived from inspirational leadership behaviors, it is employees’ unique relationship with their leader that creates follower engagement. Additionally, the results indicated that follower engagement mediates the relationship between leadership and key employee outcomes (i.e., organizational citizenship behavior [OCB] and employee turnover intentions). Implications to theory and practice are discussed.     

Feeling lonely at work: investigating the consequences of unsatisfactory workplace relationships

Although prior literature reveals that loneliness is a pervasive problem among adults, little research has evaluated the impact of loneliness in the workplace. Given that workplace relationships underlie many important organizational phenomena, it is important to understand whether and how workplace loneliness affects employee behavior. Based on the social exchange model, we hypothesize that in comparison with their non-lonely counterparts, lonely employees will experience lower quality leader‐member and organization‐member exchanges at work such that they will tend to be worse at in-role and extra-role workplace functions. Drawing on the results of our survey of schoolteachers, we present findings to support our hypotheses.     

Work motivation and organizational citizenship behaviors

This study tested the relationship between employees' sources of work motivation and their display of organizational citizenship behaviors. Two hundred thirty‐nine employees from 38 locations of four companies in the agricultural industry completed the Motivation Sources Inventory and were rated by their leaders in organizational citizenship behaviors. Results showed significant positive relationships between individuals' self‐concept internal motivations and organizational citizenship behaviors. Results also showed significant negative relationships between instrumental and self‐concept external motivations and organizational citizenship behaviors. A hierarchical regression with each of the significant covariates accounted for 12% of the total variance in organizational citizenship behavior. These results indicate that employees' sources of motivation offer some explanation of their organizational citizenship behaviors. Implications for future research and practice are discussed.     

Entitlement to Work‐Life Balance Support: Employee/Manager Perceptual Discrepancies and Their Effect on Outcomes

We broaden contemporary understandings of the relationship between HR practices that support work‐life balance and organizational as well as individual outcomes, through a focus on perceptual discrepancies of entitlement. To theorize this notion, we adopt the self‐perception accuracy model and extend it by investigating whether any employee/management discrepancies in perceptions of entitlement mediate the relationship between HR practices supporting work‐life balance and outcomes. We use data from 20 European countries and apply a multilevel statistical methodology. Our results did not reveal significant mediation effects, but the perceptions of managers, not of employees, are related to HR practices that support work‐life balance. Furthermore, employees tend to have higher expectations of entitlement than does management. Finally, the more aligned management and employee perceptions of entitlement, the higher the positive organizational and individual outcomes over and above contextual idiosyncrasies. Findings denote that, in achieving positive outcomes for employees and organizations, managing perceptions regarding organizational support for work‐life balance is more important than actual support practices. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

All for one and one for all: A mechanism through which broad‐based employee stock ownership and employee‐perceived involvement practice create a productive workforce

Drawing on social identity theory, this research frames a multimediational model that delineates how broad‐based employee stock ownership (BESO) and employee‐perceived involvement practice in tandem yield a productive workforce at the organization level. In our theoretical model, we propose that social cohesion and voluntary turnover are collective attitudinal and behavioral outcomes resulting from the shared perception of we‐ness that employees experience through both participatory practices. Our path analysis of a multisource, time‐lagged dataset from 176 large U.S. companies revealed the sequential mediating roles of social cohesion and voluntary turnover between these organizational practices and labor productivity. Our theoretical claims and empirical evidence will contribute to a systematic understanding of how and why BESO and employee involvement leverage greater organizational productivity from employees.     

The Olympic Effect: Employee Reactions to Their Employer's Sponsorship of a High‐Profile Global Sporting Event

With companies investing vast sums of money on sponsoring high‐profile sports events, it is surprising that very little research exists to examine the possible impact that this has on the sponsors’ employees. This two‐wave panel study explores the indirect role that Olympic sponsorship and employee support for this sponsorship has on increases in organizational identification and discretionary effort—via, that is, pride and employee assessments of their employer's corporate social responsibility (CSR) credentials. The current study surveyed 241 employees (from three countries) in two phases across a 12‐month period in the run‐up to the 2012 London Olympics. Olympic sponsorship support was found to be positively associated with organizational pride and CSR perceptions, which both predict increases in organizational identification and discretionary effort (controlling for earlier baseline levels of these outcomes). In addition, there is also evidence of an indirect positive effect (through CSR perceptions and pride) of Olympic sponsorship support on increases in organizational identification and discretionary effort. The implications of these findings for decision makers considering sponsoring major sporting events are discussed; the findings provide interesting insights that can help HR functions to understand the consequences of sports sponsorship and processes involved that explain positive employee responses. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

企业教练型领导与员工创新行为的实证研究

企业领导的行为对员工的工作状态和工作效率,甚至个人发展都有着重要的关联作用,而员工的自身发展对企业的发展又有着重要的影响。企业员工个人对企业的影响作用可以通过其创新能力,创新行为的实施表现出来。然而在企业员工的日常工作当中,员工的心理资本是影响其创新行为实施的重要因素。由此看来,企业领导的教练行为、企业员工的心理资本、企业员工的创新行为的实施,这三者之间有着密不可分的关系,对企业的发展也存在着深远影响。     

Perceptions of On- The-Job Discrimination and Employees With Disabilities

This study examines factors that predict perceptions of workplace discrimination by employees with disabilities. Individual level variables are combined with organizational level variables in a single model of perceived inequality. Data came from surveys administered to employees with disabilities and their respective employers. Individual and organizational variables together provide a better understanding of perceived discrimination than either set alone. Despite the predominance of studies that demonstrate inequality in compensation, this study shows that employees experience discrimination over most terms/conditions of employment.