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We develop and test a motivational framework to explain the intensity with which individuals sell entrepreneurial initiatives within their organizations. Initiative selling efforts may be driven by several factors that hitherto have not been given full consideration: initiative characteristics, individuals' anticipation of rewards, and their level of dissatisfaction. On the basis of a survey in a mail service firm of 192 managers who proposed an entrepreneurial initiative, we find that individuals' reported intensity of their selling efforts with respect to that initiative is greater when they (1) believe that the organizational benefits of the initiative are high, (2) perceive that the initiative is consistent with current organizational practices (although this effect is weak), (3) believe that their immediate organizational environment provides extrinsic rewards for initiatives, and (4) are satisfied with the current organizational situation. These findings extend previous expectancy theory-based explanations of initiative selling (by considering the roles of initiative characteristics and that of initiative valence for the proponent) and show the role of satisfaction as an important motivational driver for initiative selling.

This study investigates how employees' perceptions of adverse work conditions might discourage innovative behavior and the possible buffering roles of relational resources. Data from a Mexican-based organization reveal that perceptions of work overload negatively affect innovative behavior, but this effect gets attenuated with greater knowledge sharing and interpersonal harmony. Further, although perceived organizational politics lead to lower innovative behavior when relational resources are low, they increase this behavior when resources are high. Organizations which seek to adopt innovative ideas in the presence of adverse work conditions thus should create relational conduits that can mitigate the associated stress.

Organizational politics and OCB 2Mitigating the negative effect of perceived organizational politics on organizational citizenship behavior: Moderating roles of contextual and personal resources (7,352 words) AbstractBased on the job demands-resources model, this study considers how employees' perceptions of organizational politics (POP) might reduce their engagement in organizational citizenship behavior (OCB). It also considers the moderating role of two contextual resources and one personal resource (i.e., supervisor transformational leadership, knowledge sharing with peers, and resilience) and argues that they buffer the negative relationship between POP and OCB. Data from a Mexican-based manufacturing organization reveal that POP reduces OCB, but the effect is weaker with higher levels of transformational leadership, knowledge sharing, and resilience.The buffering role of resilience is particularly strong when transformational leadership is low, thus suggesting a three-way interaction among POP, resilience, and transformational leadership.These findings indicate that organizations marked by strongly politicized internal environments can counter the resulting stress by developing adequate contextual and personal resources within their ranks.

We add to human resource literature by investigating how the contribution of task conflict to employee creativity depends on employees’ learning orientation and their goal congruence with organizational peers. We postulate a positive relationship between task conflict and employee creativity and predict that this relationship is augmented by learning orientation but attenuated by goal congruence. We also argue that the mitigating effect of goal congruence is more salient among employees who exhibit a low learning orientation. Our results, captured from employees and their supervisors in a large, Mexican‐based organization, confirm these hypotheses. The findings have important implications for human resource managers who seek to foster creativity among employees. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.