The authors propose that broad aspects of lateral relationships, conceptualized as coworker support and coworker antagonism, are linked to important individual employee outcomes (role perceptions, work attitudes, withdrawal, and effectiveness) in a framework that synthesizes several theoretical predictions. From meta-analytic tests based on 161 independent samples and 77,954 employees, the authors find support for most of the proposed linkages. Alternative explanations are ruled out, as results hold when controlling for leader influences and mediation processes. The authors also observe differential strengths of coworker influence based on its valence, content, and severity, and on the social intensity of the task environment. The authors conclude with a call for more comprehensive, complex theory and investigation of coworker influences as part of the social environment at work.
This research advances understanding of the psychological mechanisms that encourage or dissuade upward, improvement-oriented voice. The authors describe how the loyalty and exit concepts from A. O. Hirschman's (1970) seminal framework reflect an employee's psychological attachment to or detachment from the organization, respectively, and they argue that psychological attachment and detachment should not be considered as separate, alternative options to voice but rather as influences on voice behavior. Findings from 499 managers in the restaurant industry show that psychological detachment (measured as intention to leave) is significantly related to voice and mediates relationships between perceptions of leadership (leader-member exchange and abusive supervision) and voice, whereas psychological attachment (measured as affective commitment) is neither a direct predictor of voice nor a mediator of leadership-voice relationships.
Using meta-analytic tests based on 87 statistically independent samples, we investigated the relationships between the five-factor model (FFM) of personality traits and organizational citizenship behaviors in both the aggregate and specific forms, including individual-directed, organization-directed, and change-oriented citizenship. We found that Emotional Stability, Extraversion, and Openness/Intellect have incremental validity for citizenship over and above Conscientiousness and Agreeableness, 2 well-established FFM predictors of citizenship. In addition, FFM personality traits predict citizenship over and above job satisfaction. Finally, we compared the effect sizes obtained in the current meta-analysis with the comparable effect sizes predicting task performance from previous meta-analyses. As a result, we found that Conscientiousness, Emotional Stability, and Extraversion have similar magnitudes of relationships with citizenship and task performance, whereas Openness and Agreeableness have stronger relationships with citizenship than with task performance. This lends some support to the idea that personality traits are (slightly) more important determinants of citizenship than of task performance. We conclude with proposed directions for future research on the relationships between FFM personality traits and specific forms of citizenship, based on the current findings.
Results from a study examining the predictors of skill transfer from an instructional to a work environment are presented. Prior research indicates that skill transfer is a function of both individual and contextual factors. A total of 186 employees from a work organization were surveyed on individual dimensions (goal orientation, training self-efficacy) and contextual factors (supervisor and peer support). Pre-training motivation was proposed as proximal training outcome and further connected to the distal outcome, skill transfer. Analyses with structural equation modeling using EQS indicate that individual dimensions, such as mastery-approach goal orientation and training self-efficacy, are related to pre-training motivation. Also, contextual factors, such as peer support, predicted both pre-training motivation and skill transfer, while supervisor support was unrelated to either pre-training motivation or skill transfer. Pre-training motivation, in turn, was related to skill transfer. Implications for theory and practice are discussed.
Training transfer is crucial for workplace effectiveness, yet some of its social support antecedents are not well investigated. We examine the extent to which two forms of social support (from the organization and the supervisor) predict training transfer and propose several related processes explaining these influences. First, social support enhances training self-efficacy, increases trainees' mastery (learning) goal orientation, and their motivation to transfer. In turn, we propose that these individual factors are positively related to trainingrelated cognitions. We test and confirm our model in a longitudinal study based on a sample of 111 employees. The results contribute to a better understanding of organization-and supervisor-based social support as predictors of transfer, and clarify several important related mechanisms.
Using a cross-level design and relying on a contingency approach to understanding empowering leadership, we investigate the mediating role of individual-level psychological empowerment in the cross-level relationship between team-directed empowering leadership and two complementary forms of individual-level citizenship: affiliative organizational citizenship behavior and taking charge. We also investigate the moderating role of organizational support climate in the relationship between empowering leader behavior and these two forms of citizenship. Using data collected from 98 work teams in one large organization in China, in addition to support for the mediating role of psychological empowerment, we found a "double-edged" moderating effect for organizational support climate. For affiliative organizational citizenship behavior, and consistent with reciprocation perspectives posited by social exchange theory, results showed that the highest levels occurred when both empowering leadership behavior and organizational support climate were high. In contrast, for taking charge, and consistent with control theory, results showed that the highest levels occurred when empowering leadership behavior was high but when organizational support climate was low. Our findings highlight the counterintuitive notion that organizational support climate may not always have uniformly Acknowledgments: We would like to thank Zinta Byrne, Mike Crant, and Jerald Greenberg for helpful suggestions on a previous draft. The study was supported by a research grant from Mays Business School, Texas A&M University, to the second author.
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