When Project Commitment Leads to Learning from Failure: The Roles of Perceived Shame and Personal Control

Abstract

Facing a remarkably changing world, researchers have gradually shifted emphasis from successful experiences to failures. In the current study, we build a model to explore the relationship between project commitment and learning from failure, and test how emotion (i.e., perceived shame after failure) and cognition (i.e., attribution for failure) affect this process. After randomly selecting 400 firms from the list of high-tech firms reported by the Beijing Municipal Science and Technology Commission, we use a two-wave investigation of the employees, and the final sample consists of 140 teams from 58 companies in the technology industry in mainland China. The results provide evidence for the positive role of personal control attribution in the relationship between project commitment and learning from failure. However, in contrast to previous studies, perceived shame, as the negative emotion after failed events, could bring desirable outcomes during this process. Based on the results, we further expand a model to explain the behavioral responses after failure, and the implications of our findings for research and practice are discussed.The failures and reverses which await men - and one after another sadden the brow of youth - add a dignity to the prospect of human life, which no Arcadian success would do.—Henry David Thoreau

Shame on You! When and Why Failure-Induced Shame Impedes Employees’ Learning From Failure in the Chinese Context

“…As the emotional bond between organizational employees and projects and organizational goals, project commitment has received attention from organizational management scholars as a personality trait. Most previous studies on project commitment by scholars took it as an antecedent variable and studied its possible positive results, such as improving project performance (Gulzar et al, 2012) and promoting learning from failure (Wang et al, 2018). However, whether project commitment plays a positive role in the relationship between emotion and behavior, especially in the context of failure, has not been explored by scholars.…”

“…In addition, employees with a high sense of project commitment often have a stronger incentive to reflect on the problems they face in advancing projects in order to achieve better performance and cut losses by adjusting their behavior in time (Wang et al, 2018). While failure can have negative consequences, it can also have many benefits, such as providing valuable information such as our weaknesses in how to handle problems (Corbett et al, 2007).…”

“…From the perspective of Chinese culture and the impact of shame on individual cognition and behavior, this paper explains why shamed employees find it difficult to learn from failure. In fact, there are many different opinions on the effect of shame, and many scholars have proposed its positive effect on individuals (Wang et al, 2018). Based on the failure situation in Chinese culture, unlike Western culture, "face" and other factors will affect the performance of individuals in multiple aspects, including cognition, emotion, and behavior, after failure events (Wang et al, 2019).…”

“…In addition, the cognition of the goal and value of a project will also affect the emotional and behavioral results after failure. Project commitment, which is an individual's recognition of the value of a project and their desire to realize the project, affects individuals' enthusiasm and initiative in work and learning (Wang et al, 2018). Individuals with a high level of project commitment take various measures to achieve project objectives, which enables them to regard failure experiences as an important source of feedback on behavior and learning (Hoegl et al, 2004;Wang et al, 2018).…”

“…Project commitment, which is an individual's recognition of the value of a project and their desire to realize the project, affects individuals' enthusiasm and initiative in work and learning (Wang et al, 2018). Individuals with a high level of project commitment take various measures to achieve project objectives, which enables them to regard failure experiences as an important source of feedback on behavior and learning (Hoegl et al, 2004;Wang et al, 2018). As a result, they can change their perception of failure and learn from it through positive actions and cognitive adjustment, even if they experience shame after failure.…”