Organizational career management practices and objective career success: A systematic review and framework

The theorization of the relationship between organizational investments in career development and individual success remains underdeveloped, and empirical tests of this relationship, which have been dispersed among several disciplinary areas, have produced inconsistent results. Addressing these issues, the purpose of this article is to propose a theoretical framework that illustrates why and how organizational career management practices translate into career success and under what circumstances the relationship is effective. Using a systematic review of empirical studies on career management practices and objective success, we identify three theoretical mechanisms - developmental, informational, and relational - and two groups of contingency factors that explain this relationship. Our framework advances the extant literature on organizational career management and provides suggestions to companies for designing effective career management systems.     

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.     

组织的社会化策略与员工离职倾向：一个组织进入过程的实证研究

组织社会化策略在新员工的组织进入过程中扮演重要的角色,对新入职员工的态度和行为有重要影响.本研究以一家家电企业上海总部的员工为对象,研究在中国环境下,组织社会化策略对新入职员工离职倾向的影响,发现制度化的组织社会化策略对新入职员工的离职倾向有显著的负面作用,而对老员工的离职倾向影响不显著.论文的结论对组织对新员工的组织进入过程的管理有借鉴意义.     

Predicting employee commitment and satisfaction: the relative effects of socialization and demographics

This study compared the relative influences of organizational socialization and demographic variables on job satisfaction and organizational commitment. Organizational variables were assessed by asking 193 Chinese employees in Hong Kong to evaluate socialization within their companies, namely: (1) training received; (2) understanding of the organization; (3) co-worker support; and (4) future prospects within their companies. Dependent variables were standard measures of (affective, continuance and normative) commitment and of satisfaction (with co-workers, pay, promotion, supervisors and the work). Results revealed higher correlations between the socialization measures and job satisfaction and commitment than between the demographic measures and the dependent variables. Although a few demographic measures had some predictive power, the regression analyses confirmed that the socialization variables were consistently stronger predictors of both satisfaction and commitment. Strategic implications for human resource management are discussed.     

Organizational success and success criteria: Conceptual issues and an empirical illustration

This paper deals with the concept of “organizational success” and success criteria. The discussion reveals that success may be conceptualized and measured in several ways. A variety of criteria for describing, explaining and predicting organizational success dealt with in the literature are explored in a small-scale study conducted in the newspaper industry. The findings show that commonly used success criteria, based on both unobtrusive and obtrusive data, are more or less unrelated, mapping different and only partly understood aspects of organizational success. Theoretical and management implications are highlighted.     

Contextualizing the career success of Arab women entrepreneurs

ABSTRACT

Drawing on institutional theory, this study gives voice to Arab women entrepreneurs. Through contextualization and in-depth, semi-structured interviews, I examine Lebanese women entrepreneurs’ conceptualizations of career success, the mechanisms they use to realize it and their overall awareness of it. According to the findings, the entrepreneurs experience career success as an act of disobedience against socially imposed cultural and gender mandates. Furthermore, career success evolves as a contextual, dynamic process that is culturally dependent but individually negotiated, interpreted and constructed using external and internal conceptualizations. In turn, these conceptualizations are intertwined with agency and unfold as a process at the intersection of gender, patriarchy and cultural values. Accordingly, I argue against reducing career success to static, objective and subjective criteria. Doing so undermines the complexity and processual nature of the construct and neglects the importance of cultural values in shaping the understanding and experience of career success in different societies. I also stress the importance of contextualizing women’s entrepreneurial experiences and demonstrate that Lebanese women entrepreneurs’ conceptualizations of career success reflect both Arab social-cognitive and normative institutions and their own agency.     

Narrative construction of expatriate experience and career cycle: discursive patterns in Finnish stories of international

Expatriate experience is not only a disconnected occasion for cross-cultural anxiety and adjustment but also an important event in the process of self-development and learning. Following this view and arguing for a discursive approach, the paper focuses on ways in which expatriates themselves tell and interpret their development and movement across expatriate career cycle. Meaning systems connecting expatriate job with previous and following work experiences in career stories of Finnish engineers and managers were identified using a combination of narrative and discourse analysis. No evidence was found of an autonomous expatriate discourse but, in contrast, expatriate career cycle was narrated using available organizational repertoires of development and career. Describing and discussing the meaning-making properties of three identified discourses - bureaucratic, occupational and enterprising - the paper emphasizes the organizational environment of expatriate experience while acknowledging the limits of these contemporary career vocabularies in addressing individual learning and change in cross-cultural settings.     

Variability in the Organizational Climate of Government Offices and Affective Organizational Commitment

Abstract

This study examined the shared perceptions of 739 professional and technical employees regarding organizational climate and the strength of affective commitment in fifty-one geographically dispersed offices of an agency of state government. The results indicated that the level of affective commitment in these offices could be predicted reliably (adjusted R 2 2James and colleagues (James et al., 1978 James, L. R., Hater, J. J., Gent, M. J. and Bruni, J. R. 1978. Psychological Climate: Implications fromCognitive Social Learning Theory and Interactional Psychology. Personnel Psychology, 31: 783–813. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]; Jones and James, 1979 Jones, A. P. and James, L. R. 1979. Psychological Climate: Dimensions and Relationships of Individual andAggregated Work Environment Perceptions. Organization Behavior and Human Performance, 23: 201–50. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) initially identified five domains of climate, but in subsequent work they included only four domains. Aspects of the fifth domain, organizational and subsystem attributes, were included in the first (i.e. role stress and lack of harmony) and fourth domains (i.e. social environment characteristics) of their model.  = .75) from three of the eight dimensions of organizational climate included in the study: goal ambiguity, social cohesion and fairness and equity. Implications of these results with respect to developing effective human resource management strategies in public sector organizations are discussed in detail.     

Executive career advancement in career moves across employers: the role of organization-level predictors

This paper examines the career moves of executives between different organizations and looks at the characteristics of executives employing organizations as a predictor of the outcome of the moves. The paper uses a retained executive search firm's proprietary data set that contains information on the career paths of executives in the financial services industry. The results show that the perceived operational excellence of executives employing organization has a significant signalling power for other employers and strongly impacts the success of executives' moves across different organizations. The data also reveal that executives may use their employment spell at large-sized organizations that are perceived as excellent as a conscious career-building mechanism and accept smaller promotions to join such organizations.     

Organizational types and leadership roles

Certain managerial functions are necessary or of greater importance in certain organizations. The following relations between organization types and leadership roles are hypothesized: expert organizations and producers, bureaucratic organizations and administrators, group organizations and integrators, and task organizations and entrepreneurs. The analysis shows that striving for results and achieving goals (i.e. producer role) is a role requirement that appears in all types of organization, whereas integrating behavior was required as a secondary requirement, again in all four types of organization. It was also found that the union stewards overestimated their leaders’ efficacy as administrators and entrepreneurs, whereas the leaders themselves overestimated their own efficacy as producers and integrators. The leader’s length of service with the organization reduces the inclination towards the producer role, but is conducive to the role of administrator.     

The emergence of career boundaries in unbounded industries: career odysseys in the Italian New Economy

The main objective of this research1 was to study boundaries to the ‘boundaryless career’ in a novel context. Our empirical study focused on career paths leading top managers to enter emergent firms. We collected data on professional histories of a sample of top managers who operated in firms listed at the ‘Nuovo Mercato’ (New Market), the Italian equivalent of the NASDAQ. We demonstrate the existence of two major kinds of boundaries: competence-based (in the form of industry boundaries) and relation-based (in the form of professional network boundaries). A second objective of our research was to identify dominant individual career logics and to connect different career logics to the boundaryless career concept. Our data reveal the dominance of the evolutionary career logic.     

The impact of on-site mentoring on expatriate socialization: a structural equation modelling approach

While the literature on expatriate adjustment has focused on the importance of back-home mentors and their instrumentality for future career advancement, this research explores the importance of on-site mentors for the effective socialization of expatriates into their current overseas assignments. Using a sample of 179 expatriates located in nineteen countries, this paper presents a structural equation model illustrating the relationships among mentoring received, expatriate socialization and socialization outcomes. Amount of mentoring received positively impacts on expatriate socialization, which in turn positively influences job attitudes, intention to finish the expatriate assignment and expatriate understanding of global business issues. Using Hofstede's typology of national cultures, this research also suggests that the international context of the overseas assignment affects how much on-site mentoring expatriates receive. Specifically, expatriates are more likely to receive mentoring in small power distance, weak uncertainty avoidance and individualistic cultures.     

The career reality of global managers: an examination of career triggers

This study investigates whether the conceptualization of contemporary careers corresponds with the career realities of global managers, a new type of international work in organizations. Based on in-depth interviews with 45 global managers, or managers having worldwide coordination responsibility, we examine whether their different career moves are triggered by factors that reflect a short-term perspective, a non-hierarchical course, self-management, and internal values. The findings have implications for both the career and international human resource (HR) literature. They highlight that a balanced approach better captures the career realities of global managers and suggest an altered meaning of midcareer experience. They further point to the continuing importance of headquarters, question the necessity of an international career anchor, and indicate the opportunities of flexible global work to achieve a stable family life.     

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.     

The career competencies of self-initiated and assigned expatriates: assessing the development of career capital over time

Abstract

Building on a modern careers approach, we assess the effects of working abroad on individuals’ career capital. Given the dearth of longitudinal studies, we return to a sample of economics graduates in Finland eight years later. We measure changes in three dimensions of career capital; ‘knowing how’, ‘knowing whom’, ‘knowing why’ and find that company assigned expatriates learn more than self-initiated expatriates. All three career capital areas benefit from international experience and all are increasingly valued over time. Based on our findings, we conclude that a dynamic notion of career capital acquisition and use is needed. Managerial implications include the need for a wider view of talent management for international businesses.     

Creating supply chain relational capital: The impact of formal and informal socialization processes

Establishing closer social ties between buying and supplying organizations is increasingly cited as a critical differentiator of high and low performers in global supply chains. While the creation of relational capital within an organization is a relatively well identified concept in organizational research, comparatively little research exists on the inter-organizational socialization processes that create relational value in supply chains. In our research, we extend theoretical models of group social conduits into this context, and develop a model that posits the impact of formal and informal socialization processes on the creation of relational capital between buyers and suppliers. Results from our study of 111 manufacturing organizations in the United Kingdom suggest that informal socialization processes are important in the creation of relational capital, which in turn can lead to improved supplier relationship outcomes. Formal bridging socialization conduits appear to play a lesser role in deriving these benefits.     

Organizational interfaces and innovation: The challenge of integrating supplier knowledge in LEGO systems

Suppliers have become increasingly important as partners in firms' innovation efforts. Reaping potential collaboration benefits is complex due to challenges in combining internal and external knowledge. The paper explores how various types of organizational interfaces between buyer and supplier create both opportunities and problems for their joint actions. The paper is based on a longitudinal case study of attempts to develop an innovative packaging solution for the toy manufacturer LEGO systems. The study shows that buying firms need to carefully analyse what form of organizational interface access to prioritize since each type offers its specific possibilities and drawbacks. Furthermore, the feasibility of organizational interfaces may change over time due to mutual organizational learning.     

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.     

Corporate restructuring and career advancement in Hong Kong

This paper examines the factors that contribute to career advancement in a sample of forty-four Hong Kong managers working in three local companies that had undergone restructuring. The findings indicate that they were acutely aware of shifts in the nature of their career paths but generally were reactive to changes rather than proactive. Their concerns about changes were mostly instrumental and pragmatic judgements about how things might affect their job security and career prospects. To increase their chances of getting promoted, they focused on human-capital investment by upgrading and widening their work skills. While they felt obligated to work overtime and enhance their performance by taking on extra duties and responsibilities, they sought to develop a harmonious relationship with the environment rather than dominate it. They disliked challenging their superiors, preferring instead to imitate their superiors' behavioural patterns. In their efforts to increase opportunities for career advancement, they employed business networking and visibility as ‘wooing’ strategies. Furthermore, the desire to avoid losing face and humiliation were effective motivators.