Boundaryless careers, social capital, and knowledge management: Implications for organizational performance

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to critically assess the utilization of boundaryless careers in organizations through the lens of how they impact the formation and deployment of organizational social capital. We build a model of the positive and negative effects of boundaryless careers on social capital formation by proposing a more nuanced picture of boundaryless careers. We divide boundaryless careers into four types: internal psychological, internal enacted, external psychological and external enacted. Our model delineates the conditions under which different types of boundaryless careers affect the formation and deployment of organizational structural, relational and cognitive social capital and offer propositions based on our analysis. In addition we examine type of knowledge (exploratory or exploitative) pursued by the firm as a key moderator for the relationships we propose.

Employee development and voluntary turnover: testing the employability paradox

“…ecause organisations increasingly need employees with up-to-date knowledge and skills (Lazarova and Taylor, 2009), employee development is one of the most significant human resource initiatives in today's organisations (Lee and Bruvold, 2003). Employee development allows organisations to enhance labour flexibility, boost performance and create a sustained competitive advantage (e.g.…”

Servant Leadership and Work Engagement: The Contingency Effects of Leader–Follower Social Capital

“…Social interaction instead relates to the process and captures the extent to which the two parties know each other on a personal level, through informal interactions that go beyond established formal channels (Carmeli, Ben‐Hador, Waldman, & Rupp, ; Nahapiet & Ghoshal, ). Extant research emphasizes the importance of strong leader–follower relationships for effective organizational functioning (Lazarova & Taylor, ; Leana & van Buren, ), but without specifying how the social capital embedded in such relationships may contribute to the effective implementation of servant leadership (Payne et al, ).…”

Career Advising in a VUCA Environment

“…As firms worked to become more agilebeing able to compete in the marketplace by adding new, profitable lines of products and services and eliminating older, less profitable ones-they began minimizing permanent workers with core, firm-specific knowledge and skills and replacing them with contingent workers-such as temporary or contract workers-and by outsourcing many jobs (Cooper, 2002;Fierman & Hadjian, 1994;Nash, 1994). As a result, many companies began consciously and purposefully dismantling career ladders and divesting themselves of employees with obsolete skills (Arthur & Rousseau, 1996;Bernstein, 2003;Bridgstock, 2009;Lautsch, 2002;Lazarova & Taylor, 2009;Royal & Althauser, 2003;Waterman, Waterman, & Collard, 1994). Careers-as workers had come to know themwere coming to an end.…”

“…Figuratively speaking, employers cancelled the old contract and began negotiating from a new template, the new contract. The new terms include portfolio careers (Cooper, 2002;Handy, 1996;Nash, 1994), protean careers (Hall, 1996a;Hall & Mirvis, 1998;Sullivan, 1999), or boundaryless careers (Arthur & Rousseau, 1996;Lazarova & Taylor, 2009;Mirvis & Hall, 1994). The term portfolio careers emphasizes the need for workers to build and document their skills and special knowledge as a basis for continued employability.…”