Navigating The Bind of Necessary Evils: Psychological Engagement and The Production of Interpersonally Sensitive Behavior

Margolis, Joshua D.; Molinsky, Andrew

doi:10.5465/amj.2008.34789639

Cited by 146 publications

(136 citation statements)

References 56 publications

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“…Leader to follower compassion represents a dyadic process where leader notices the suffering of the follower, feels empathic concern, and responds compassionately (Kahn, 1993;Lilius et al, 2008;Margolis & Molinsky, 2008;Miller, 2007). There is significant research evidence demonstrating a reliable association of empathic concern with actual helping behaviour (Archer et al, 1981;Coke, Batson, & McDavis, 1978).…”

Section: Felt/experienced Compassion and Empathic Concernmentioning

confidence: 99%

Healing a Broken Spirit: Role of Servant Leadership

Jit¹,

Sharma

Kawatra³

2017

Vikalpa

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Executive SummaryA number of empirical studies have suggested that servant leadership can enhance the well-being/emotional health of its followers by creating a positive work climate ( Black, 2010 ; Jaramillo et al., 2009 a; Neubert et al., 2008 ). The followers’ sense of well-being, in turn, has been found to be related to greater organizational commitment ( Cerit, 2010 ; Hale & Fields, 2007 ; Hamilton & Bean, 2005 ; Han, Kakabadse, & Kakabadse, 2010; Pekerti & Sendjaya, 2010 ). Greater the organizational commitment, higher is the employee job satisfaction ( Cerit, 2009 ; Chung, Jung, Kyle, & Petrick, 2010 ; Jenkins & Stewart, 2010 ; Mayer, Bardes, & Piccolo, 2008 ) and lower is the employee turnover ( Babakus, Yavas, & Ashill, 2011 ; Jaramillo, Grisaffe, Chonko, & Roberts, 2009 b).A servant leader—with reported behaviour characteristics such as empathy, compassion, and altruistic calling and healing—builds not only a mentally and emotionally healthy workforce but also inculcates a sense of cohesiveness, collaboration, and sustainable relationships among the followers by understanding and addressing their feelings and emotions. It has been reported that cohesiveness and collaboration in a servant-led organization increases pro-social and altruistic behaviour among followers that improves organizational performance ( Ebener & O’Connell, 2010 ; Ehrhart, 2004 ; Hu & Liden, 2011 ; Walumbwa, Hartnell, & Oke, 2010 ) and overall team effectiveness ( Mayer et al., 2008 ; McCuddy & Cavin, 2008 ; Taylor et al., 2007 ).The significance of understanding and addressing the feelings and emotions of followers and ensuring their well-being becomes evident from the above findings. The aim of this qualitative study is to comprehend how servant leaders understand, empathize with, and address the emotional turmoil of their employees.Orientation for emotional healing is reported to be a unique characteristic of servant leaders. But there is negligible empirical research to understand the way servant leaders alleviate the suffering of their employees. The present study fills this gap.Qualitative methods and techniques from different qualitative methodologies were used for data collection and analysis. We conducted 15 semi-structured interviews with leaders in corporate, education, and government sectors to capture personal accounts about their experiences, reflections, and analysis of their approach to emotional healing.Our results suggest that servant leaders—with their orientation for empathy, compassion, healing, altruistic calling, and listening—adopt a compassionate approach to manage employees’ emotional turmoil. All three parts of the process of compassion, described by Clark (1997) and Kanov et al. (2004) are clearly visible in the narratives of our respondents. The servant leaders, with characteristics of empathy and compassion, are oriented towards the followers’ suffering. This leads to empathic concern and compassion that trigger in them an urge to take action to relieve the followers’ suffering. This action, also termed as compassionate responding, manifests itself in a three-step behaviour: (1) patient listening and discussion; (2) empathetic handling that includes comforting and calming as well as guiding and counselling the suffering employee; and (3) taking personal responsibility and providing support (emotional, social, financial, and administrative).Insight from this study will guide the working managers to understand and practice the process of alleviating the emotional turmoil of employees such that a culture of compassion and benevolence will emerge and sustain for the long-term health and growth of the organization.

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Section: Felt/experienced Compassion and Empathic Concernmentioning

confidence: 99%

Healing a Broken Spirit: Role of Servant Leadership

Jit¹,

Sharma

Kawatra³

2017

Vikalpa

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“…For example, Margolis and Molinsky (2008) found that when organization members were required to harm others in the service of a greater good (for society, their organization, or the individuals themselves), the care and concern with which they implemented the harm influenced the targets experience of the organizational representative's benevolence and the target's experience of harm.…”

Section: Perspective Taking and Trust Repair By Transgressorsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Building and Rebuilding TrustWhy Perspective Taking Matters

Williams¹

2012

Restoring Trust in Organizations and LeadersEnduring Challenges and Emerging Answers

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Abstract[Excerpt] There is growing interest surrounding the function of perspective taking in social interactions and organizational life. In this chapter, I examine the role of perspective taking in trust building and trust repair. Whereas some researchers focus on the ability of perspective taking to elicit sympathy, concern, and cooperative behavior (Batson, Turk, Shaw, & Klein, 1995; Parker, Atkins, & Axtell, 2008; Parker & Axtell, 2001), others focus on the strategic impact of perspective taking (Epley, Caruso, & Bazerman, 2006;Galinsky, Maddux, Gilin & White, 2008;Galinsky & Mussweiler, 2001). I build on both streams of research by examining work that connects perspective taking to trustworthy, cooperative behavior and by delineating how the proactive (or more strategic) aspects of perspective taking can generate and repair trust. Williams, M. (2012) Suggested Citation Building and Rebuilding Trust Why Perspective Taking Matters M I C H E L E W I L L I A M S C o r n e l l U n i v e r s i t y I N T R O D U C T I O NThere is growing interest surrounding the function of perspective taking in social interactions and organizational life. In this chapter, I examine the role of perspective taking in trust building and trust repair. Whereas some researchers focus on the ability of perspective taking to elicit sympathy, concern, and cooperative behavior (Batson, Turk, Shaw, & Klein, 1995; Parker, Atkins, & Axtell, 2008; Parker & Axtell, 2001;), others focus on the strategic impact of perspective taking (Epley, Caruso, & Bazerman, 2006;Galinsky, Maddux, Gilin & White, 2008;Galinsky & Mussweiler, 2001). I build on both streams of research by examining work that connects perspective taking to trustworthy, cooperative behavior and by delineating how the proactive (or more strategic) aspects of perspective taking can generate and repair trust.Perspective taking refers to the process of "imagining another person's thoughts or feeling from that persons point of view" (Davis, 1996;Mead, 1934). Perspective taking not only fosters understanding and caring actions that build social bonds, but also is likely to play a central role in active trust building (Williams, 2007) and trust repair. Although trust building and trust repair involve many of the same processes, I use the term "trust building" to refer to processes that increase trust, from a neutral or positive initial state-one that has not been damaged. In contrast, I use "trust repair" to refer to processes used to increase trust once a preexisting level of trust has been decreased by the actions of one party, the transgressor. Rebuilding trust is more complicated than initial trust building because the victim, who has been harmed, is likely to be concerned about additional harm and predisposed to believe that greater trust in the transgressor is not warranted (Kim, Dirks, 8c Cooper, 2009).Perspective taking may help transgressors and victims take proactive steps to repair trust violations, especially asymmetric trust violations (i.e., violations that are initially e...

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“…Providers of negative, unwanted services have fewer opportunities to show employees the prosocial impact of the organization, if there is one, since they tend to perform tasks that are to an extent 'impossible' and a 'necessary evil' because they harm users for 'the greater good', because the users are unwilling, and with their goals under constant dispute (Hargrove & Glidewell 1990;Moynihan 2005;Margolis & Molinsky 2008, Molinsky & Margolis 2005. Such organizations do not focus on identifying with the users because they will never do a good job in their eyes.…”

Section: Service Logic: Negative Versus Positive Servicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The role of public service motivation in performance. Examining the potentials and pitfalls through an institutional approach

2017

Bestuurskunde

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Cover designEsther Ris, www.proefschriftomslag.nl Internal designMadelief Brandsma grafisch ontwerp, Arnhem English editingGiles Stacey, Englishworks PrefaceBeing a public service motivation (PSM) scholar is great. People seem to always think about your research topic -the motivational drive to contribute to society unselfishly, even being willing to sacrifice yourself for society -and have an opinion about it. For instance, whenever colleagues needed help they would immediately assume (and express) that I would help them because I am very public service motivated (just as someone studying consumerism in sports is a sports consumer and someone focusing on transparency is fully transparent… the force of logic is strong in science). Getting coffee is something I would of course sacrifice myself for -would it not contribute to society because coffee was essential for others to finish their PhD? Actually, on this last point I have to agree as the coffee trips to IJs& Zopie were crucial in finishing this book. Moreover, at parties when I would tell about my dissertation (yes, I go to very exciting parties!) and state that I study the motivation of public servants, the reaction was usually: "Then you must be finished quickly" followed by a rant on lazy and unresponsive public servants… Luckily, I found that these public servants were motivated enough that it remained interesting for me to study for four years (full-time!).A common question asked to any PhD is why? Why spend four years on one topic? And why this topic? As a student I wrote every paper on the European Union. I wrote my high school final project on the potential success and failure of the expansion of the European Union and my bachelor thesis on the (lack of) Europeanisation in Dutch municipalities. Then why switch to public service motivation? I guess the main reason is that I have always felt a fascination for those people in our society that try to make it a better place to live, sacrificing their time and energy often above what is asked of them, and even putting their lives on the line. I have heard them being described as self-interested, lazy bureaucrats but that was not my impression and I therefore wanted to know more about their drive to work for society. I have not been disappointed in that regard, as I have had the fortune to meet many inspiring public employees that do their work with incredible passion. What wondered me was the general proposition in the literature that highly public service motivated employees will perform better in their job than those with lower levels of PSM. Did it not matter what situation you are in? What would happen if a public servant that really wants to contribute to society does not feel able to do so through his or her work? We have all encountered situations in which we were motivated but were thwarted in reaching our goals.When finishing a PhD for instance, you encounter difficulties such as organizations that do not respond, time constraints and losing sight of the goal. The title of my research process co...

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Navigating The Bind of Necessary Evils: Psychological Engagement and The Production of Interpersonally Sensitive Behavior

Cited by 146 publications

References 56 publications

Healing a Broken Spirit: Role of Servant Leadership

Healing a Broken Spirit: Role of Servant Leadership

Building and Rebuilding TrustWhy Perspective Taking Matters

The role of public service motivation in performance. Examining the potentials and pitfalls through an institutional approach

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