I’ll do it myself: self-leadership, proactivity, and socialization

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore newcomers as active participants within their own socialization, through the influence of self-leadership on proactivity and subsequently organizational socialization and organizational commitment. Design/methodology/approach Data collected from 193 organizational newcomers (i.e. individuals within their first year at an organization) working in a variety of industries were examined within three serial mediation models in PROCESS. Findings The results of these analyses suggest that self-leadership influences organizational newcomers’ adjustment and subsequent commitment by assisting them in seeking organizational resources. Research limitations/implications This study answers calls to explore both the mediating mechanisms through which self-leadership processes influence organizational outcomes and the complex relationships between human workplace interactions and the proximal and distal outcomes of socialization. Practical implications The findings indicate that organizational stakeholders should enhance the self-leadership abilities of newcomer, thereby easing the socialization burden on organizations. Originality/value This paper offers a novel framework (i.e. self-leadership) for understanding newcomer socialization and provides an encompassing model that recognizes individual capacities, communicative behaviors, adjustment and subsequent organizational attitudes.

Making Things Happen: Self- Leadership and Newcomers Socialisation

“…The selfleadership strategies may help newcomers to understand their task and role, co-workers and culture of the organisation. According to Cranmer, Goldman, and Houghton (2019), newcomers those practice behavioural focused strategies are actively engaging in seeking information and feedback that are related to the desired outcomes. While constructive thought strategies, for example, mental imagery and optimistic self-talk enable individuals to see the situation positively, natural reward strategies motivate newcomers to engage in social events of the organisation.…”

“…The transition into a new workstation is a problematic experience for newcomers (Cranmer, Goldman, & Houghton, 2019;Saks & Gruman, 2012). The transition is a more stressful experience, and this experience continues until they successfully socialise to the new organisational context.…”

“…Also, organisational socialisation transmits organisational culture to newcomers and influences employee's attitudes and behaviours (Ashforth et al, 2007). Newcomers' successful socialisation leads to their well-being, work engagement and retention (James, 2020), and thus, enable organisations to get expected outcomes from the newcomers (Cranmer et al, 2019;James & Azungah, 2019). Successful socialisation allows newcomers to understand the organisation and positively influences the expectation of both the organisation and the newcomers.…”

“…However, organisations were unable to provide all the resources that newcomers needed to their successful socialisation (Saks & Ashforth, 1997;James & Azungah, 2020;Kowsikka & James, 2019). Consequently, recent studies on organisational socialisation have focused on individuals' active role in the organisational socialisation process (Cranmer et al, 2019). Theories related to socialisation such as social cognitive theory (Bandura, 1986(Bandura, , 2001, uncertainty reduction theory (Berger & Calabrese, 1975) and socialisation resource theory (Saks & Gruman, 2012) suggests that individuals are self-organising and proactive organisms.…”

“…Newcomer Self-initiated activities such as feedback-seeking, information-seeking, and engagement in positive framing help their successful socialisation process (Ashforth et al, 2007;Kowsikka & James, 2019) and facilitate them to experience well-being and engage in their work (James, 2020). Individuals' self-initiated activities are more valuable than organisation's formal effort to socialise newcomers (Ashford & Black, 1996;Cranmer et al, 2019), and thus, researchers repeatedly focus on individuals self-initiated activities that facilitate successful socialisation. Recently, a few studies on newcomers' organisational socialisation investigate the impact of newcomers' proactive behaviour on the adjustment and socialisation process (Kowsikka & James, 2019).…”