Trust,individualism and job characteristics as predictors of employee preference for teamwork

Employee resistance has long been recognized as a key constraint on the success of organizational change initiatives. However, it is only recently that employee attitudes towards working in teams has been specifically investigated as a factor influencing team effectiveness. Using data from 218 employees in 40 self-managing work teams, we examined the relationship between trust, individualism, job characteristics and team members' attitudes towards teamwork. Providing a partial test of Mayer et al.'s (1995) relational model of trust, the results indicate that the two situational forms of trust (trust in co-workers and trust in management) were stronger predictors of an employee's preference for teamwork than propensity to trust. Trust in co-workers was found to partially mediate the relationship between a person's propensity to trust strangers and their preference for working in a team. The importance of considering the dispositional variables of propensity to trust and individualism as factors that influence an employee's preference for teamwork, as well as their trust in management, trust in co-workers and their opportunity for skill utilization are discussed.     

The effect of job impact,job interdependence,and employee characteristics on the acceptability of a drug-testing policy

Increasingly employers are testing employees for illicit drug use. Employees vary in their degree of acceptance of drug-testing policies. Both job and individual characteristics are hypothesized to affect individuals’ reactions to drug-testing policies. The first study reported here investigated the effect of job impact, job interdependence, sex, and age on four aspects of the acceptability of a drug-testing policy. While there was no effect for the job characteristics, both age and sex had significant effects. A follow-up study which focused solely on employee characteristics replicated the age effect. Implications are discussed.     

Housing, taxation and retirement provision

This paper considers the tax treatment of housing and the issue of savings for retirement in the context of a simplified model that still allows key aspects of the household context to be realistically represented. A model is developed in which both housing and financial assets can be used as vehicles for household saving. Individuals face perfect capital markets and choose between owner-occupied and rented accommodations. For the model developed, it is shown that the tax advantage of owner-occupied housing is not fully removed even if imputed rents are subject to income taxation. However, deferred income taxation for both housing and savings in the form of financial assets would result in an equal treatment of tenants and owner-occupiers.     

Workplace Performance,Worker Commitment,and Loyalty

Using matched employer–employee level data drawn from the 2004 UK Workplace and Employee Relations Survey, we explore the determinants of a measure of worker commitment and loyalty (CLI) and whether CLI influences workplace performance. Factors influencing employee commitment and loyalty include age and gender, whilst workplace level characteristics of importance include human resource (HR) practices. With respect to the effects of employee commitment and loyalty upon the workplace, higher CLI is associated with enhanced workplace performance. Our findings that workplace HRs influence CLI suggest that employers may be able to exert some influence over the commitment and loyalty of its workforce, which, in turn, may affect workplace performance.     

The effect of autonomy,training opportunities,age and salaries on job satisfaction in the South East Asian retail petroleum industry

South East Asian petroleum retailers are under considerable pressure to improve service quality by reducing turnover. An empirical methodology from this industry determined the extent to which job characteristics, training opportunities, age and salary influenced the level of job satisfaction, an indicator of turnover. Responses are reported on a random sample of 165 site employees (a 68% response rate) of a Singaporean retail petroleum firm. A restricted multivariate regression model of autonomy and training opportunities explained the majority (35.4%) of the variability of job satisfaction. Age did not moderate these relationships, except for employees >21 years of age, who reported enhanced job satisfaction with additional salary. Human Capital theory, Life Cycle theory and Job Enrichment theory are invoked and explored in the context of these findings in the South East Asian retail petroleum industry. In the South East Asian retail petroleum industry, jobs providing employees with the opportunity to undertake a variety of tasks that enhanced the experienced meaningfulness of work are likely to promote job satisfaction, reduce turnover and increase the quality of service.     

Public sector expatriate managers: psychological adjustment,personal characteristics and job factors1

Although public sector expatriates are becoming increasingly common, research on them is very limited. There is reason to believe that the situation for expatriates from the public sector may be different than for those from the private sector. This study investigated US Department of Defense administrators assigned to US embassies worldwide. Results showed that self-efficacy, role clarity and role discretion had a positive association with the psychological adjustment of the respondents while role conflict and role overload only had a marginal negative relationship with the criterion variable. On the other hand, neither international experience nor the effectiveness of preparatory training had any association with the psychological adjustment of respondents. Surprisingly, these findings suggest a similar picture for the expatriates from the public and private sector. Implications of these findings are discussed in detail.     

Taxes,time diversification,and asset choice at retirement

This study extends existing research by examining the effect of personal income taxes on the expected relative performance of asset classes as viewed from the retirement date. Results suggest that tax status does not affect the basic conclusions of previous time diversification studies. However, the fund's tax status affects the size of withdrawals that can be sustained, the performance of stocks relative to bonds, and the risk of the retirement fund. In general, for a given size fund and after-tax withdrawal proportion, tax-deferred funds have not only a greater expected return, but also greater risk than non-tax-deferred retirement funds. *** DIRECT SUPPORT *** A00DH017 00009     

Effects of job stress on self-esteem,job satisfaction,and turnover intention

ABSTRACT

This study is focused on female inbound call center counselors who are easily exposed to emotional labor when customers express anger and hostility and use swear words toward invisible targets on the phone. Our study is based on 244 responses from female inbound call center counselors. Job stress has a significantly negative effect on job satisfaction and self-esteem. It was shown that self-esteem has a partially mediating effect, and turnover experience had a moderating effect. It is important to shed new light on the roles of self-esteem among determinants of job satisfaction.     

Planning knowledge for phased rollout projects

This paper explores how projects that can be considered as repeatable and replicable in a sequence of deliverables over a period of time can be planned and executed (rolled out) in a way that maximizes knowledge transfer and production from one execution to the next. A variety of management disciplines were reviewed to understand the way that project and program rollouts are treated in IT, product development, organizational learning, and manufacturing literature. These reviews enabled the development of a conceptual model to describe how planning and implementing the rollout of a product or service can be more knowledge‐focused and an accompanying capability maturity model. Several examples from real life, including one experienced by one of the authors, were used to illustrate and test the conceptual model. The model integrates knowledge management, change control, and planning in a way that can develop organizational learning and the authors assert that this can improve productivity and both tangible and intangible returns to those that follow the model. An accompanying capability maturity model is also presented. The conceptual model, while initially tested against several real‐life cases, needs to be tested against a new set of projects as an action learning research project in order to more fully develop knowledge of the dynamics of learning and improvement in rollout projects. The implication is that when project managers undervalue important learning aspects of phased rollouts, they may miss important organizational learning opportunities.     

调动各方力量创造就业岗位

市政协主席蒋以任在上海企联调研报告上作重要批示: 我觉得这个调查报告很好,请社法委研究,必要时可以设立和参与新增岗位减少下岗的课题研究,或与三方协调机制各方联合举行研讨会,会有一定作用的。在就业、再就业和社会保障上,建议多加强与企业联合会和企业家协会(二块牌子、一个班子)的合作。     

The Worker, the Union and the Democratic Workplace

Abstract . Much attention has been devoted to the potential gains in work satisfaction and productivity that can result from more democratic work organization. In the U.S. the willingness of management to share power is a key factor in the transfer from authoritarianism, as is widely recognized. Less widely recognized are the worker and the union as impediments to change. Various characteristics and interests of both, many related to the long history of the authoritarian workplace, make transition difficult. A particular set of conditions, not generally prevailing in the U.S., would be necessary for a pervasive joint union, management, worker thrust toward more participatory work organization.     

Pensions,wage profiles,and retirement rules specific human capital approach

This paper clarifies how the loss of profits by quit-related work force disturbances and the endogeneity of the length of contracts play a critical role in determination of the compensation structure. Such a loss of profits is demonstrated to be a necessary and sufficient condition which induces (non-vested) pensions and mandatory retirement synchronously. Mandatory (or pensioned) retirement, however, does not always entail upward-tilted wage profiles except in the firms in which workers' quitting creates a serious work force disturbance. The optimal length of contract is determined as a function of market opportunities and firm-specific characteristics. Finally, based on our analysis, policy implications in Japan's contemporary industrial relations are derived.     

Returning to the workforce after retiring: a job demands,job control,social support perspective on job satisfaction

Despite growing interest in the aging of the workforce, few investigations have explored a key aspect of diversity among older workers: whether or not they consider themselves retired. Using a sample of workers ages 50 and older from the National Study of the Changing Workforce (2008), we apply career development theory and the job demand–control(–support) framework to investigate potential differences between working retirees (i.e. employed older adults 50+ who consider themselves retired) and working non-retirees (i.e. employed older adults 50+ who do not consider themselves retired) in terms of their job characteristics (i.e. demands, control, support) and how these job characteristics are related to job satisfaction. We find that working retirees report lower job demands and higher social support, and that there is limited evidence for the buffering hypothesis. Implications for researchers and employers are discussed.     

知识型员工工作设计的思路探讨

本文在现代工作设计内涵及其模型的基础上 ,从工作设计思路的角度 ,结合知识型员工的特点 ,提出基于激励思路的以能为本的知识型员工工作设计理念。     

Well-being,job satisfaction and labour mobility

I investigate whether two indicators of job-related well-being predict subsequent quitting. I find that both the Depression–Enthusiasm scale and the Anxiety–Comfort scale predict quitting, the former more strongly, and this contributes an element of criterion validity to their use as welfare measures. However, overall job satisfaction, which implicitly captures well-being relative to outside job opportunities, predicts job mobility better than either the Depression–Enthusiasm or the Anxiety–Comfort scale. I also find asymmetric effects: relative to intermediate levels, low well-being or job satisfaction are associated with greater quitting, yet high well-being or job satisfaction are not significantly associated with reduced quitting.     

A reassessment of the relationship between job specialization,job rotation and job burnout: example of Taiwan's high-technology industry

This study applies the concept of job specialization and job rotation based on early principles of job design in solving employees' perception of job burnout, using employees of Taiwan's high-technology industry as targets for re-examination. In past management systems of traditional industries, job rotation was adopted to address employees' feelings of monotony, boredom and fatigue as a result of job simplification and specialization. However, with the advancement of technology, shortening of technical life cycles and changes in job characteristics, the relationship between job rotation, job specialization and job burnout is now different from in the past. The results from 304 valid samples collected from employees of Taiwan's high-technology industry reveal that the adoption of job specialization in high-tech industry in fact raises professional efficacy and reduces employees' feeling of job burnout, which is opposed to the benefits of job design purported in past management systems. Therefore, this paper seeks to re-examine the relationship between the three variables. By implementing job rotation or job specialization systems as means to address issues related to employees' job burnout, organizations should not only consider the benefits to job management, but also adjust according to technology and environmental changes. Only by doing so could organizations release the maximum potential from human resources management systems.     

Worker directors and collective bargaining

Elizabeth Chell and Derek Cox report on some of their findings of a study into worker directors and collective bargaining which was carried out between 1976 and 1979 and funded by the Department of Employment. The research involved seven private sector companies which have some form of worker director system.     

Digital transformation: a review,synthesis and opportunities for future research

Management Review Quarterly - In the last years, scholarly attention was on a steady rise leading to a significant increase in the number of papers addressing different technological and...     

Worker mobility,employer-provided general training,and the choice of graduate education

This paper links inherent mobility to observed schooling choices. A job search model with graduate education predicts that more mobile workers are more likely to enroll in full-time MBA programs. Adding to the literature on employer-sponsored general training, the model predicts that employers are likely to provide tuition assistance to workers who find quits costly. I use a panel survey of GMAT registrants to test some of the empirical implications of the model. I show that observable measures of job attachment are correlated with the probability of attending part-time and, conditional on part-time attendance, with the likelihood of receiving tuition reimbursement.