On sabotage in collective tournaments

In this paper a tournament between teams (a collective tournament) is considered, where each contestant may spend productive effort in order to increase his team’s performance or sabotage the members of the opponent team. It is shown that each team directs all its sabotage activities at exactly one of the opponent team’s least able members. This is due to two effects, a decreasing-returns effect and a complementarity effect. The result is of particular interest, as findings on individual tournaments indicate that very able players should usually be sabotaged most strongly.     

Job demands,control and support: Meta-analyzing moderator effects of gender,nationality, and occupation

The job demands-control (-support) model (JDC(S)) remains one of the most influential to HR-related issues of work stress, organizational behavior, and job design. However, despite over 37 years of research, the first meta-analysis of the model was conducted only recently. It examined interrelationships between the model's three workplace characteristics: demand, control and support in order to better understand how employees view relationships between these prominent work dimensions. A rather surprising result was the near-zero demand-control relationship, which was found to be moderated by gender. The current analysis extends our understanding of DCS interrelationships to include examination of nationality and occupation as additional moderating variables. We also build on the initial review by extending moderator analysis to relationships between demand-control-support dimensions and job satisfaction and emotional exhaustion — the two most examined psychological outcomes in primary studies. The present meta-analysis narrows the field of studies to 141 studies (N_{(Individuals)} = 145,424) of Karasek's model which include these outcomes. Our findings show additional patterns of gender moderation, including moderation of the demands-job satisfaction relationship. Additionally, both nationality and occupation moderate every DCS interrelationship, and relationship with job satisfaction and emotional exhaustion in some way. Our results offer new understanding as to the boundaries of these relationships, and the JDC(S) model; and invite further theory building and meta-analytic investigation.     

An axiomatization of the core of cooperative games without side payments

Let M be a set of m players, m≧3, and let Γ be the set of all (finite) games (without side payments) that have a non-empty core. When M is finite, the following four (independent) axioms fully characterize the core on Γ: (i) non-emptiness, (ii) individual rationality, (iii) the reduced game property, and (iv) the converse reduced game property. If M is infinite, then the converse reduced game property is redundant.     

Optimizing team conflict dynamics for high performance teamwork

In the current review we consider theory and research involving task, relationship, and process conflict. We examine relationships with team performance and innovation with an eye toward recent meta-analytic findings. We then review recent research investigating the interplay of team conflict types in the form of team conflict profiles. We advance the Team Conflict Dynamics Model to connect conflict profiles with key variables in the nomological net: psychological safety, conflict management, and team performance. This model considers dynamics by examining conflict transformations over time, reciprocal effects of conflict management processes, and negative feedback loops. Moreover, the model incorporates contextual features involving team design and the organizational environment. This review is needed in order to integrate recent meta-analytic findings, conflict profiles, conflict dynamics, and contextual factors into a parsimonious model useful for guiding future research and practice.     

Task and person-focused leadership behaviors and team performance: A meta-analysis

This paper reports the results of a meta-analytic review of the relationship between person and task-focused leader behaviors, on the one hand, and team performance, on the other hand. The results, based on 89 independent samples, show a moderate positive (ρ = 0.33) association between both types of leadership behaviors and subjective team performance. For objective team performance, the effect sizes are smaller, yet positive (ρ = 0.19 for task-focused leadership behaviors and ρ = 0.18 for person-focused leadership behaviors). Furthermore, with respect to the methodological moderators, the analyses show that the relationships were stronger when leadership behaviors were rated by the leaders themselves, rather than by others, and the association was stronger when the correlations were estimated at the individual level, as opposed to the team level of analysis. Concerning conceptual moderators, team type was identified as a significant moderator, and correlations between a person-focused leadership behavior and team performance were stronger for service and project teams than for action/performing teams. Task interdependence was another moderator tested in our meta-analysis, yet our results show no clear moderating effect of task interdependence on the relationship between leadership behavior and team performance.     

New Employee Orientation Programs

The conceptual domain of new employee orientation programs is defined. Following this, orientation programs are distinguished from socialization, psychological contracts, training, and realistic job previews (RJPs). Three somewhat diverse areas of academic research are used to develop a framework for the design and study of new employee orientation programs: (a) stress theory/coping methods, (b) attitude theory/change methods, (c) RJP theory/methods. The framework for designing new employee orientation is called “ROPES,” an acronym for Realistic Orientation Programs for new Employee Stress. Five field experiments that best represent ROPES are reviewed. Future research on newcomer orientation should be guided by a clear definition of the conceptual domain, borrow liberally from related areas of inquiry, be conducted in field settings, and use experimental designs.     

拒绝“内卷”:团队人际关系、工作需求创新对和谐型激情的作用机制

职场内卷现象受到多方关注,如何让员工持续热爱工作成为现实的命题。本文以自我决定理论及工作特征理论为依据,考察团队人际关系、员工团队心理安全感及工作需求创新对员工和谐型激情的作用机制。研究发现:高质量领导成员交换关系和团队成员交换关系能使员工产生团队心理安全感,团队心理安全感分别在领导成员交换关系及团队成员交换关系与和谐型激情之间起中介作用,工作需求创新调节了中介效应。因此,组织若欲令员工热爱工作,团队的“安全感”和工作的“新鲜感”同样重要,应着力在团队人际关系建设和工作设计方面提升员工的积极感知体验。研究结论对组织员工管理实践具有一定指导意义。     

Effects of school team embeddedness on team trust and potency

This research surveyed a total of 323 local and foreign university students in Taiwan to examine the relationships of on- and off-the-team embeddedness with team behaviors by using the job embeddedness scale (JES) developed and validated by Lee et al. (Acad Manag J 47(5):711–722, 2004) and Mitchell et al. (Acad Manag J 44(6):1102–1121, 2001). The two composites of team embeddedness were measured with a total of 28 items, which asked students the extent to which they valued the attachment to their class team and school. For both local and foreign students, this research found that on-the-team embeddedness would affect team trust and team potency significantly while team trust would cause a positive direct effect on team potency. For foreign students, however, off-the-team embeddedness would not affect team potency significantly until team trust was introduced as a mediator. Moreover, significant differences were found in the relationships of nationality and years in university with off-the-team embeddedness. This study provides original evidence for the application of JES to school team relationships, and the link between school embeddedness and team effectiveness.     

Taking the emergent in team emergent states seriously: A review and preview

Team emergent states are properties that develop during team interactions and describe team members' attitudes and feelings (e.g., cohesion). However, these states' emergent nature has largely been neglected, as most studies do not examine the temporality of team phenomena. We review longitudinal studies on team emergent states and demonstrate that a majority of papers reveal their temporal dynamics but offer no universal patterns as to how such states emerge. The review reveals common variables related to temporal dynamics and highlights the importance of studying the development of team emergent states to enhance our knowledge of their causal directions, antecedents, and outcomes. We suggest that future research should clarify the concept of team emergent states, connect theories to research on temporal dynamics, adopt more qualitative approaches to answer “how” and “why” questions, and improve research designs to study meaningful forms of change. Lastly, we present practical implications for the HR field.     

Learning and relationship orientation: an empirical examination in European museums

• The purpose of this paper is to assess the interrelations between learning orientation, innovation strategy, relationship orientation and economic and social performance in the management of cultural organizations such as museums. We first provide a review of the literature addressing the main constructs involved in the research: learning orientation, innovation, relationship orientation and performance, and we detail the model's hypotheses reflecting the interrelations amongst the proposed variables. Building on extensive literature, a model is developed and empirically tested using survey data collected from 491 European museums in Spain, France, Italy and the UK. Data are analysed through structural equation modelling. In the present study, evidence is found to support the positive and significant link between learning orientation and internal (organizational innovation) as well as external (relationship orientation) changes in museums. Further, we find that organizational innovation and relationship orientation aid the introduction of greater technological developments in these organizations. We also find evidence to support the idea that learning orientation, innovation strategy and relationship orientation impact the economic and social performance of museums. Findings clearly show that achieving organizational objectives through learning processes necessarily entails the introduction of internal changes—innovation—and external relationships—relationship orientation.

Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Ideological currency in psychological contracts: the role of team relationships in a reciprocity perspective

This study focused on the role of ideology in psychological contracts, which has been a neglected theme in psychological contract research. A study among Dutch middle managers in education revealed that ideological psychological contract fulfillment explained additional variance in relation to employee obligations toward the organization. Moreover, it was found that team relationships moderated the relations between some aspects of employer contract fulfillment and employee obligations, but no significant interactions were found between employer ideological fulfillment and team relationships in relation to employee obligations.     

First‐year donation behavior and risk of supporter lapse

• In this research, we explore supporter lapse behavior after making first‐year donations to a nonprofit organization. We argue that two observable variables — the monetary amount of first gift at sign‐up and the number of gifts given in the first year of the support relationship — can be used to approximate the level of commitment to supporting the organization and to predict likelihood of lapse in subsequent years. The reasoning is that the two variables are indications of the psychological resources as well as the financial resources expended in reaching donation decisions. The research hypotheses were tested using fundraising data extracted from the databases of two leading US‐based nonprofit organizations. Results indicate that both variables had significant effects. Interestingly, the number of gifts given in the first year of the support relationship had a much bigger effect than the dollar amount of the gift at sign‐up: In one organization, supporters who donated more than one gift in the first year were 39% less likely to lapse in subsequent years compared with their one‐gift counterparts, while a tenfold increase in the dollar amount of the first gift at sign‐up (e.g., from $10 to $100) predicted only 4% decrease in the lapse likelihood in subsequent years. Insights from this research may help to build better practices of supporter base management in “low‐touch” fundraising programs for attracting, building relationships with, and sending appeals to supporters.

Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

How do lean management organizations behave regarding training and development?

This paper analyses the role of training and development in lean management organizations. The hypothesis is that organizations characterized by lean management have a distinctive profile in terms of training and development. Specifically, it is hypothesized that lean organizations have the following features to a higher extent than non-lean organizations:

? employee involvement in training and development

? use of work groups for quality, product development and task flexibility

? attribution of importance to training in quality, customer orientation and people management

? line management responsibility for training and development of the employees

? use of job enlargement

? information of employees about management decisions

? use of team briefings and quality circles.

The analysis shows that it is possible to identify a relationship between lean management and training and development, although the statistical results could have been more significant. It is also discussed in the paper to what extent country-specific variables dominate (or are dominated by) company-specific characteristics. The general finding is that company-specific impact seems to be stronger than country-specific variables.

In general, it can be said that the lean management pattern as a company-specific variable is characteristic for most countries analysed (although to a varying degree). It is, however, sometimes confounded by country-specific variables. For instance, Turkey does not follow the general pattern, and the hypothesis can be supported only in selected minor areas. Hence, in this case country-specific variables outweigh company-specific variables. In most other countries, this is not the case.     

The impact of team characteristics on the supervisor’s attitude towards telework: a mixed-method study

Abstract

This study examines the impact of team characteristics on the supervisor’s attitude towards telework through a mixed-method approach. First, in the quantitative part, we test hypotheses drawing on disruption and dependency theory, using data of 205 supervisors from four Belgian organizations. The data confirm the hypothesized negative correlation between task interdependence and supervisors’ supportive attitude towards telework, as well as the moderating role of supervisor’s dependency on his or her team on this relation. We found no impact of team heterogeneity and lack of team effort and low performance. Second, we use qualitative data collected through 39 semi-structured face-to-face interviews with supervisors to gain a better understanding of supervisors’ reasoning behind their attitude towards telework. These data provide insight into how task interdependence, team heterogeneity and lack of team effort and low performance affect it. Our team-centred conceptualization of the antecedents of supervisors’ attitude towards telework enables to highlight the key role of structural aspects in shaping supervisors’ attitudes towards telework. This is particularly important for policy, as organizations are better placed to remediate aspects at the team level that contribute to supervisors’ negative attitude towards telework, rather than those at the inter-individual one.     

The women of Cairo: Equilibria in large anonymous games

In this article, I characterize Nash equilibria of large anonymous games by providing the following neccessary and sufficient condition for an equilibrium distribution: for no subset K of actions more players play actions in K than have a best response in K to the given distribution. While neccessity is trivial the proof for sufficiency relies on a theorem by [Math. Proc. Camb. Philos. Soc. 78 (1974) 323] which is an extension of Hall’s theorem or the marriage lemma well known from graph theory. The veiling problem for the women of Cairo serves as an illustrating heuristic example explaining the nature of the result.     

External cooperation and entrepreneurial orientation in industrial clusters

ABSTRACT

The aim of this paper is to examine the relationship between external cooperation and entrepreneurial orientation (EO). This relationship is explored in cluster environment, wherein entrepreneurial organizations compete and cooperate simultaneously to pursue opportunities. The following hypothesis is tested: External cooperation is positively correlated with entrepreneurial orientation. The hypothesis is tested with a correlation analysis on a sample of 77 small-sized enterprises operating in the Malopolska region in Poland, wherein several clusters are active. Additionally, the regression analysis is conducted to examine the associations between inter-organizational cooperation and EO dimensions. The findings confirm that external cooperation is positively correlated with EO. This observation is confronted with a pro-competitive approach that is a constitutional element of the entrepreneurship concept. Moreover, the findings show that the correlation between external cooperation and a firm’s performance is stronger than between some other EO dimensions and performance. Additionally, the findings show the important role of relationships between organizations and their clients. In the paper, several remarks for development of the theory are discussed, including the need for incorporating inter-organizational cooperation into a set of entrepreneurial traits and reflecting it in entrepreneurial orientation scales. The findings confirm the importance of that direction of theory development that focuses on inter-organizational collaboration in the context of entrepreneurship.     

Causality in social theory via linguistic fuzzy logic

I present a new approach to the study of causality in social theory using linguistic fuzzy logic as a framework. This approach differs from conventional analysis of causality on two fronts. First, all variables are considered to possess two degrees of freedom (or variation): a linguistic nuance value, which corresponds to what we conventionally refer to as interval or categorical value, and a linguistic truth value, which measures our confidence level in this nuance value. Second, combining this double fuzzification of variables with linguistic fuzzy logic I propose new tools for studying fuzzy causality. The linguistic fuzzy logic approach is illustrated through a re-examination of Skocpol’s (1979, States and social revolutions: a comparative analysis of France, Russia, and China. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge) theory of social revolution.     

Spatial pillage game

A pillage game is a coalitional game as a model of Hobbesian anarchy. The spatial pillage game introduces a spatial feature into the pillage game. Players are located in regions and can travel from one region to another. The players can form a coalition and combine their power only within their destination regions, which limits the exertion of the power of each coalition. Under this spatial restriction, a coalition can pillage less powerful coalitions without any cost. The feasibility of pillages between coalitions determines the dominance relation that defines stable states in which powers among the players are endogenously balanced. With the spatial restriction, the set of stable states changes. However, if the players have forecasting ability, then the set of stable states does not change with the spatial restriction. Core, stable set, and farsighted core are adopted as alternative solution concepts.     

Stimulating teachers’ team performance through team-oriented HR practices: the roles of affective team commitment and information processing

Abstract

Teams of teachers are increasingly held accountable for the quality of education and educational reforms in vocational education and training institutions. However, historically teachers have not been required to engage in deep-level collaboration, thus team-oriented HR practices are being used to promote teamworking in the sector. This paper examines the relationship between team-oriented HR practices and team performance in terms of innovation and efficiency via teachers’ affective team commitment and engagement in information processing. To examine these associations, a team-oriented HRM research instrument was developed and validated based on the ability-motivation-opportunity model (N = 970, 130 teams) and hypothesised associations were examined using multilevel structural equation modelling (N = 704, 70 teams). The results show positive relationships between the team-oriented HR practices of recruitment, team development, team evaluation and teamwork facilitation, and team innovation. Additionally, all practices except team development were positively related to team efficiency. The relationships between team-oriented HR practices and these team performance indicators were often partially or fully mediated by affective team commitment and information processing. Because affective team commitment and information processing sometimes only partially mediated the links between team-oriented HR practices and team performance, other underlying mechanisms await identification.     

Renaissance of case research as a scientific method

Since the seminal article by Eisenhardt (1989), scholarly interest in case research has mushroomed in operations management and organization sciences. Volumes of methodological texts are matched with a massive amount of empirical research that seeks to apply and further develop case research as a scientific method. What is missing from this literature is a treatment of the methodological diversity of case research. In this paper, we seek to unveil this heterogeneity by describing three distinct methodological accounts of case study: theory generation, theory testing, and theory elaboration. Each approach has its own idiosyncrasies, in particular when it comes to the interplay between theory and empirics. A typical case research incorporates both existing theories and empirical data to varying degrees. In light of this heterogeneity, we re-interpret key aspects of extant contributions and discuss guidelines for future case research. We propose that ultimately, case research rigor is determined by attention to idiosyncrasy and transparency of reasoning. We conclude by arguing that we have witnessed in the past 25 years in organization research what amounts to the Renaissance of case research.