The Journal of applied psychology
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Drawing on self-determination theory, this research investigates whether the motivation behind employees' helping behaviors is associated with their positive affect and their subsequent help provision, and whether citizenship pressure moderates these relationships. A recall-based experiment and an experience-sampling study capturing helping episodes among fulltime employees found that when employees helped coworkers because of higher autonomous (controlled) motivation in a helping episode, they experienced higher (lower) positive affect, and they had stronger (weaker) helping intentions and helped coworkers more (less) subsequently. We further found that citizenship pressure enhanced the positive relationship between episodic autonomous motivation and positive affect. Overall, the results challenge the universality of the "doing good-feeling good" effect and explicate the joint roles of citizenship pressure and helpers' episodic motivation in influencing employees' positive affect and their subsequent helping behaviors. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).
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To gain endorsement from their managers, should employees be direct with explicit change suggestions, or should they be indirect with questions and hints? We draw on psychological threat and communication clarity theories to offer competing hypotheses with respect to the association between voice directness and managerial endorsement. We then further draw from social judgment research to theorize whether the relationship between voice directness and managerial endorsement might be modified by voicer politeness and voicer credibility. The results of an experimental study and two field studies show that being direct about change-oriented suggestions is associated with more frequent managerial endorsement when voicers are credible (Studies 1 and 2 in the United States) or polite (Study 3 in China). We discuss implications of these findings, limitations, and directions for future research. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).
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We utilize the social intuitionist approach to moral judgment and moral disengagement theory to understand why and when employees sabotage customers. We contend that when customers mistreat employees (i.e., customer mistreatment), employees experience intuitive emotional reactions in the form of hostility, which automatically activates devaluation of targets, a specific facet of moral disengagement. In turn, employees become unencumbered by moral self-regulation and sabotage customers who mistreat them (i.e., customer-directed sabotage). ⋯ We test our theoretical model using a field sample of customer service employees and an experimental study to establish causality. Our results provide general support for our hypotheses. We discuss theoretical and practical implications and opportunities for future research. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).
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Reports an error in "Why and when hierarchy impacts team effectiveness: A meta-analytic integration" by Lindred L. Greer, Bart A. de Jong, Maartje E. Schouten and Jennifer E. ⋯ Additionally, we show that the negative relationship between hierarchy and team performance is exacerbated by aspects of the team structure (i.e., membership instability, skill differentiation) and the hierarchy itself (i.e., mutability), which make hierarchical teams prone to conflict. The predictions regarding the positive effect of hierarchy on team performance as mediated by coordination-enabling processes, and the moderating roles of several aspects of team tasks (i.e., interdependence, complexity) and the hierarchy (i.e., form) were not supported, with the exception that task ambiguity enhanced the positive effects of hierarchy. Given that our findings largely support dysfunctional views on hierarchy, future research is needed to understand when and why hierarchy may be more likely to live up to its purported functional benefits. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).
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In today's organizations, employees are often assigned as members of multiple teams simultaneously (i.e., multiple team membership), and yet we know little about important leadership and employee phenomena in such settings. Using a scenario-based experiment and 2 field studies of leaders and their employees in the People's Republic of China and the United States, we examined how empowering leadership exhibited by 2 different team leaders toward a single employee working on 2 different teams can spillover to affect that employee's psychological empowerment and subsequent proactivity across teams. ⋯ Finally, across studies, we found that empowering leadership exhibited on one team can substitute for lower levels of empowering leadership experienced in a different team led by a distinct leader. We discuss our contributions to the motivation, teams, and leadership literatures and provide practical guidance for leaders charged with managing employees that have multiple team memberships. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).