I/O Psychology Research Briefing

Your 90-day snapshot of what's new in the field
📊 368 articles 🕐 Updated: October 22, 2026
Showing 368 articles
This Week
Meta-Analysis of the Dark Triad and Counterproductive Work Behavior: The Role of Cultural and Measure Boundary Conditions
Human Performance Jisoo Ock, Fengge Li October 21, 2026
Organizational Culture Research Methods Measurement & Psychometrics Individual Differences Networks
Previous meta-analyses have provided valuable insights into the relationships between Dark Triad (DT) personality traits and counterproductive work behavior (CWB). However, the effect of key moderators of these relationships remains less explored. The current meta-analysis addresses this gap by examining the moderating effects of country-level individualism-collectivism and measure type in studies examining the DT-CWB relationships. For measure type, we compared two widely used composite measures of DT (Short Dark Triad, Dirty Dozen) with standalone measures of DT traits. A systematic review identified 499 correlations (ks) based on a total sample of 45,087 individuals from 135 sources obtained from 25 countries. These correlations were synthesized using a mixed meta-analysis that corrected for small sample bias and unreliability in the criterion measure scores. Results showed that narcissism, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy positively predicted CWB at both the composite (ρ = .20, .33, and .43, respectively) and specific (CWB-I and CWB-O) levels. Country-level collectivism showed minimal moderating effects, whereas DT traits measured with the Short Dark Triad or Dirty Dozen showed stronger correlations with CWB than standalone measures. These findings indicate that measure choice may meaningfully affect estimated DT-CWB relationships, whereas broad country-level cultural differences may play a limited role.
Show more Read full article →
Leaving on a High or Low Note? An Achievement Goal Perspective on Executive Retirement
🔓
Personnel Psychology Zhefan Huang, Kaidi Wang, Bingjie Lu, Mo Wang, Aaron Hill, et al. October 20, 2026
Motivation Turnover & Retention Selection & Assessment Performance Networks
ABSTRACT Executive retirement represents a pivotal career transition with significant implications. However, our understanding of the antecedents of executive retirement remains limited. We contend that, different from the retirement of general employees, it is important to position executive retirement within an achievement context and consider factors such as firm performance and achievement goal orientations. Drawing on late adulthood developmental psychology, we propose an achievement goal framework to theorize the relationship between firm performance and executive retirement, and the moderating roles of goal orientations. We theorize that firm performance is associated with two distinct mechanisms: the legacy fulfillment mechanism (salient for executives with high performance) and the selective prioritization mechanism (salient for executives with low performance), which together result in a U‐shaped relationship between firm performance and the likelihood of executive retirement. We further consider executives’ goal orientations as boundary conditions to probe the underlying mechanisms. We found general support for our theory using an archival dataset of 1840 chief executive officers from S&P 1500 firms (Study 1) and a two‐wave survey of 363 executives (Study 2). By integrating developmental psychology theories into the executive retirement literature, our research sheds light on executive retirement decisions through a developmental psychology lens.
Show more Read full article →
The Paternity Leave Ripple Effect in the Finance Industry: Shaping Norms and Social Cohesion
🔓
Human Resource Management Almudena Cañibano, Marion Festing, Stefanie Titze October 20, 2026
Organizational Culture Training & Development Turnover & Retention Performance Job Attitudes
ABSTRACT Paternity leave shifts work‐life policy from accommodating women's caregiving to legitimizing men's involvement in care. We examine how this is experienced in male‐dominated workplaces and interpreted by those around leave‐takers through interviews with fathers who took extended paternity leave in French finance organizations, and other stakeholders at work (colleagues, HR representatives, top managers) and at home (life partners). Following an interpretivist, context‐dependent approach, we find that participants associated paternity leave with changes in social relations, connectedness, and concern for collective well‐being. We theorize that, under certain conditions, these changes may coalesce into relational and collective experiences aligned with social cohesion beyond the workplace. We further theorize two pathways. In a transformative cycle, paternity leave may disrupt descriptive and injunctive gender norms, and experiences aligned with social cohesion occur. In a maintenance cycle, established norms persist, and such experiences largely do not arise. These divergent pathways depend on the favorability of nested contextual conditions: meso‐ (policy design, top management engagement, organizational climate) and micro‐ (manager, peer support), within the macro‐context of a male‐dominated industry. The study extends work‐life policy research beyond individual and organizational outcomes and identifies conditions under which paternity leave may challenge gendered divisions of labor within and beyond organizations.
Show more Read full article →
Taking a Note from Music: Conceptual Sampling and the Creative Logic of Theory Development
Academy of Management Review Quinetta M. Roberson, Phillip Steven Thompson October 20, 2026
Training & Development Research Methods Performance Organizational Change
How do scholars develop new theoretical explanations from existing ideas? Although management research has established clear criteria for evaluating theoretical contributions, it has devoted comparatively less attention to the creative processes through which those contributions are generated. In cumulative knowledge systems, theorists rarely develop ideas from entirely new conceptual materials. Instead, they build on existing concepts, mechanisms, and explanations to generate new theoretical insights. This review essay introduces conceptual sampling as a process framework for understanding creative theorizing in management. Drawing on scholarship on music sampling in jazz, electronic music, and hip-hop, we argue that theorizing often proceeds through three distinct processes of conceptual transformation: (1) rearticulation, (2) recombination, and (3) recontextualization. These processes respectively deepen existing theoretical frameworks, build new explanations by integrating ideas across literatures, and extend concepts into new contexts. By integrating scholarship on music sampling with work on theory development, this essay illuminates how scholars transform established conceptual resources into new theoretical explanations, thereby advancing insights on theory development in management.
Show more Read full article →
Action-oriented Narratives. How Innovation Emerges from Crowd Discussions
Organization Science Claudio Biscaro, Arvind Malhotra, Ann Majchrzak October 19, 2026
Individual Differences Social Responsibility Performance Motivation Leadership
Crowds are increasingly invited to tackle complex innovation problems. However, our understanding of how crowds solve these problems has limited our ability to utilize them effectively. In this article, we examine how a crowd tasked with finding ways to preserve New Zealand’s native flora and fauna achieves solutions to this complex innovation problem through discussion. Our analysis reveals that discussions leading to innovative solutions differ from those leading to non-innovative solutions: innovation-yielding discussions (1) mobilize more Resources than Constraints, (2) converge on a single Goal, and (3) specify few (often one) responsible Subject(s); vis-à-vis, discussions leading to non-innovative solutions often surfaced multiple goals—thereby sustaining multiple problem framings—while subjects remained vague, implicit, or multiplied, and constraints frequently outnumbered resources. Moreover, we show how the specific weavings of these discursive elements support the crowd’s navigation of the complex innovation problem. Three discursive maneuvers – subject-goal anchoring, repurposing distant knowledge, and layering resources – are fundamental navigational tools used by the crowd to form what we call ‘action-oriented narratives:’ simple, dynamic, and evolving linguistic structures that enable collective problem exploration while giving room for localized improvisation. We contribute to the literature on problem solving by showing how specific linguistic activities alter individuals’ capacity to contribute to and solve complex problems. We also contribute to the literature on linguistic structures supporting innovation by showing that the types of discussions that support innovation depend on the openness of the setting.
Show more Read full article →
Building on Shaky Foundations: A Critical Review of Criterion Validity Evidence in Personnel Selection
🔓
International Journal of Selection and Assessment A. Susan M. Niessen, Felix Kerscher, Juan Camilo Arboleda Cardona, Jacob J. Matić, Ilse P Peringa, et al. October 19, 2026
Measurement & Psychometrics Selection & Assessment Performance Individual Differences Leadership
ABSTRACT We reviewed the most recent meta‐analytic literature on the criterion validity of predictors of job performance used in personnel selection. The overreliance on concurrent incumbent studies leads to meta‐analytic estimates based on data collected in conditions with non‐representative stakes and an inability to estimate and correct for range restriction based on credible information, obstructing the estimation of operational validity in actual selection contexts. Therefore, we argue that we do not need more meta‐analyses. First, we need primary studies that actually provide estimates of operational criterion validity. On a positive note, we observed increasing attention in meta‐analyses to heterogeneity of results, publication bias and open science. There is room for improvement in terms of attention to the quality and operationalization of predictor and performance measures, and reflection on the quality of the evidence. Given these issues, our stance is that the current body of research does not allow drawing firm conclusions about the criterion validity of predictors of job performance in actual, operational selection settings. To move forward, we provide recommendations for reviewers, editors, and authors of primary studies and meta‐analyses on predictors used in personnel selection.
Show more Read full article →
Ethnographic Theorizing in Human Resource Management: From Theory‐as‐Design to Theory‐in‐Use
🔓
Human Resource Management Jaejin Lee, Nina Jörden October 18, 2026
HR Systems & Talent Management Selection & Assessment Training & Development Networks Social Responsibility
ABSTRACT Research on human resource management (HRM) has generated influential frameworks for explaining the relationships between HR practices and organizational outcomes. Existing accounts offer less insight into how the frameworks informing those practices acquire meaning, authority, and practical traction in organizational settings. We conceptualize this as a gap between theory‐as‐design and theory‐in‐use and develop ethnographic theorizing as a mode of examining the use‐life of selected design‐oriented HRM frameworks. Our contribution is twofold. First, we specify how sustained immersion, temporal depth, embodied co‐presence, and relational obligation enable researchers to follow frameworks as they are enacted and negotiated. Second, we develop three recursively related analytic moves for theory development— Complement, Complicate, and Reframe —through which ethnographic evidence can elaborate, qualify, or revise existing theoretical accounts. We demonstrate this approach through two ethnographic studies of HR analytics in different organizations. The comparison shows how legitimacy work, identity negotiation, and meaning‐making shaped the enactment of data‐driven HRM in these settings. The paper thus offers a structured approach for studying how established HRM frameworks operate in use and for assessing when situated evidence warrants changes to their constructs, relationships, or boundary conditions. In addition, we discuss implications for HRM theory, research design, and practice.
Show more Read full article →
Last 90 Days
Inclusive Leadership as a Site of Struggle: Resistance and Mitigation Strategies for Sustaining Inclusion for Historically Marginalized Employees
Personnel Psychology Katina B. Sawyer, Judith A. Clair, Christian Noble Thoroughgood, Kelly P. Gabriel, Jacob A. Brown October 15, 2026
Diversity & Inclusion Social Responsibility Leadership Training & Development Research Methods
ABSTRACT Scholars emphasize inclusive leadership's benefits for leaders and employees, yet existing theory largely overlooks the challenges leaders face when addressing disparities experienced by historically marginalized employees. Drawing on an inductive study of 47 historically marginalized STEM employees and 14 leaders they identified as inclusive, we model inclusive leadership as a three‐part process: (1) leaders’ inclusion efforts (attentive learning, talent amplification, and structural debiasing); (2) resistance to these efforts (skepticism, gatekeeping, fit critiques, and non‐compliance); and (3) leader strategies to mitigate resistance and protect inclusion (explaining value, co‐crafting strategies, evaluating fit critiques, and managing change momentum). We triangulate findings and test our theory's boundary conditions using qualitative data from three additional STEM samples: racial minority men, lower‐ranking women, and White males. The first two samples replicate our model; the third reveals that White men may perceive inclusive leadership differently than historically marginalized employees. By centering the perspectives of those most affected by bias, our study extends inclusive leadership theory. We offer a processual view that moves beyond detailing inclusive behaviors to highlight the challenges leaders face enacting them.
Show more Read full article →
Putting others first: testing a model of prosociality and performance
🔓
Journal of Business and Psychology Anna Viragos, M. Davis, D. Leach October 15, 2026
Performance Selection & Assessment Measurement & Psychometrics Motivation Training & Development
Abstract Employees reshape their roles to help others; yet existing theories explain either proactive self-directed job redesign or prosocial behavior within existing role boundaries. We introduce Prosocial Job Crafting (PSJC), a distinct form of role-based job crafting through which individuals proactively modify their jobs’ task, relational, and cognitive boundaries to create opportunities to benefit others. PSJC draws on the three dimensions of prosociality, linking perceived prosocial impact, prosocial motivation, and prosocial behavior. The paper presents two empirical studies: in Study 1, we develop and validate a new scale measuring PSJC with data collected from employees in the USA ( N = 500), and in Study 2, we test our theoretical model with matched data collected from Hungarian academic library employees ( N = 262) and performance rating from their direct supervisors ( N = 8). Perceived prosocial impact predicted all three forms of PSJC; however, only task PSJC positively predicted performance. Findings suggest that the dimensions of PSJC have distinct behavioral implications and PSJC is not a uniform phenomenon. We establish Job Crafting as not exclusively pro-self, and that prosociality can be enacted through proactive job redesign.
Show more Read full article →
Crafting and recrafting the self: Cycles of identity struggle in job crafting
🔓
Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology Danielle A. Tucker, Jane Hendy October 14, 2026
Job Design Social Responsibility Health & Well-Being Conflict Organizational Culture
Abstract Job crafting is widely regarded as a proactive approach for enhancing meaning and well‐being at work. This study challenges this view by examining the experiences of 24 change managers across six public‐sector organizations. Conceptualizing job crafting as identity work, we show that it unfolds as a cyclical process of identity management, through which individuals repeatedly respond to identity ambiguity, conflict and unvalidated self‐worth as roles evolve under conditions of change. We identify three recurring identity tensions and three corresponding cycles of identity‐driven job crafting that reflect an emotionally charged process of self‐preservation in response to misalignment and shifting expectations. Across cycles, both approach‐ and avoidance‐oriented crafting strategies generate unintended identity consequences that shape subsequent responses and redirect crafting over time. We further identify alternative value definitions as a novel, symbolic form of job crafting through which individuals sustain authenticity when behavioural adjustment proves insufficient. By reconceptualizing aspects of job crafting as a cyclical identity process marked by emotional strain, this study advances understanding of the darker side of job crafting beyond behaviour‐centred accounts that portray it as uniformly empowering.
Show more Read full article →
Event System Theory: A Decade of Progress and a Future of Potential
Academy of Management Review Frederick P. Morgeson, Terence R. Mitchell, Dong Liu October 14, 2026
Training & Development
Published 10 years ago, event system theory (EST; Morgeson, Mitchell & Liu, 2015) has become a highly influential organizational theory. EST consists of a complex of three interacting event components: event strength, event space, and event time. It has been used by scholars across domains in a variety of different ways and serves as a key catalyst for event-oriented research and theory. In this article, we reflect upon the development of EST and discuss the impact it has had on the field. We then identify the different ways EST has been used, offer suggestions for studying events, and discuss all the work that still needs to be done.
Show more Read full article →
Is leniency always divine? Nonlinear consequences of leader leniency for follower psychological safety and job performance
Journal of Managerial Psychology Jiang Xu, Jingzhen Cao October 14, 2026
Performance Leadership Health & Well-Being Research Methods Networks
Purpose Drawing on fairness theory and the “too-much-of-a-good-thing” perspective, this study examines the curvilinear relationship between leader leniency and follower psychological safety and its downstream association with follower job performance. It further examines whether third-party wrongdoing severity moderates this relationship. Design/methodology/approach Data were collected through a time-lagged and multi-source field survey. Multilevel path modeling was used to test the proposed hypotheses. Findings The results show an inverted U-shaped relationship between leader leniency and follower psychological safety, which is positively associated with job performance. This relationship varies with third-party wrongdoing severity: it is nonlinear at higher levels of severity but approximately positive and linear at lower levels. Practical implications Moderate leniency is associated with higher psychological safety and performance, whereas excessive leniency may weaken these benefits. Leaders may therefore benefit from aligning leniency with wrongdoing severity when responding to misconduct. Originality/value By conceptualizing leader leniency as a double-edged phenomenon, this study provides a more nuanced account of when and why leniency is beneficial or detrimental. It extends research on leadership and misconduct management by identifying both the underlying mechanism and the contextual condition shaping the effects of leader leniency.
Show more Read full article →
The “double-edged sword” effect of leader humor on employee's workplace cyberloafing
Journal of Managerial Psychology Zhisong Cui, Chilombo Namwinga Nanyangwe, Liu Bolong, Weirong Sun October 13, 2026
Performance Leadership Networks Research Methods Selection & Assessment
Purpose Drawing upon social information processing (SIP) theory, this study examines the “double-edged sword” effect of leader humor on workplace cyberloafing. Design/methodology/approach Two complementary studies were conducted. Study 1 used a two-wave field survey to test the full model, while Study 2 employed an experimental design to replicate key findings, focusing on the interactive effects of leader humor and employees' sense of humor on perceived cyberloafing tolerance and workplace loneliness. A post hoc analysis further examined competing hypotheses and discrepancies between the studies. Findings Leader humor may increase workplace cyberloafing by enhancing perceived cyberloafing tolerance; conversely, leader humor may reduce workplace cyberloafing by alleviating workplace loneliness; employees' sense of humor can weaken the positive relationship between leader humor and perceived cyberloafing tolerance; employees' sense of humor can also weaken the negative relationship between leader humor and workplace loneliness. Originality/value This pioneering study reveals that leader humor can both increase and decrease workplace cyberloafing by shaping perceived cyberloafing tolerance and workplace loneliness. It also shows that employees with a stronger sense of humor are less likely to interpret leader humor as leniency or rely on it for social connection, weakening both effects. By combining field and experimental methods, the study offers rigorous evidence and meaningful theoretical and practical implications.
Show more Read full article →
Are you envious of me? employees’ envy attribution and behavioural responses to coworkers’ incivility
European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology Fangzhou Lin, Long W. Lam, Haoying Xu October 13, 2026
Job Attitudes Turnover & Retention Leadership Networks
In recent years, research on workplace envy has expanded beyond its traditional focus on the envious to also study the experiences of the envied. However, as most studies have focused on the consequences of perceiving oneself as envied, empirical insights into why individuals form this perception remain limited. Guided by relational attribution theory and envy attribution model, we examine why the perception of being envied at work can result from experienced incivility, and why this relationship is strengthened by employee proactivity standing. Furthermore, we propose that envied employees are likely to respond by engaging in political behaviour and withdrawing from interpersonal helping. In Study 1, a two-wave survey of full-time employees, experienced incivility was positively associated with the perception of being envied. In Study 2, a three-wave survey of employees and their supervisors, experienced incivility was positively associated with the perception of being envied, particularly when employee proactivity standing was high, which in turn was positively related to political behaviour and negatively related to interpersonal helping. Our findings contribute to the envy literature, and we discuss their theoretical and practical implications.
Show more Read full article →
With whom you elaborate matters: how learning orientation impacts cross-culture and same-culture information elaboration in culturally diverse teams
🔓
Journal of Business and Psychology Yongkang Yang, Daan van Knippenberg, Anne Nederveen Pieterse, Jia Li October 12, 2026
Training & Development Teams Organizational Culture Diversity & Inclusion Performance
Abstract Work teams are increasingly characterized by diverse cultural backgrounds. Although research has established that cultural diversity holds the potential to enhance team performance through information elaboration—the exchange, discussion, and integration of task-relevant information—prior work has treated elaboration as an undifferentiated process, leaving unspecified whether it occurs across or within cultural boundaries. We develop a differentiated elaboration perspective that distinguishes cross-culture information elaboration between culturally dissimilar members from same-culture information elaboration between culturally similar members. Using a multi-source, multi-wave study of 104 culturally diverse teams comprising 587 members, we found that, as expected, cross-culture elaboration was more strongly related to team performance than same-culture elaboration. Moreover, team learning orientation predicted both forms of elaboration, and its indirect association with team performance was stronger through cross-culture elaboration. These findings advance a differentiated elaboration perspective to demonstrate that elaboration that crosses cultural boundaries is more important for diverse teams than same-culture elaboration. This points to opportunities for future research on reaping the benefits of diverse teams.
Show more Read full article →
Decoding fairness: Unveiling the cognitive processes that determine pay rises and promotions
🔓
Journal of Vocational Behavior Gabriele Boccoli, Benedetta Colaiacovo, Francesco Candia, Luca Gastaldi, Mariano Corso A October 10, 2026
Diversity & Inclusion Job Attitudes HR Systems & Talent Management Selection & Assessment Research Methods
Drawing on attribution theory, this study explores how employees explain organizational decisions concerning pay rises and promotions, conceptualizing these attributional processes as an interpretive layer that precedes fairness evaluations, and how distinct configurations of causal explanations are associated with work-related attitudes. The research was conducted in an Italian bank, leveraging on a two-wave design and a two-study structure. The full sample ( N = 3193) was randomly split into two equivalent subsamples. Study 1 ( n = 1540) used latent profile analysis to identify three attribution profiles: meritocratic attributors profile , the institutional attributors profile, and the relational-structural attributors profile. Study 2 ( n = 1599) replicated the profile structure, assessed their longitudinal stability and tested associations with demographic and work-related predictors as well as key work outcomes. Study 2 shows that the meritocratic attributors profile and the relational-structural attributors profile are both stable over time, while the institutional attributors profile is more fluid. Demographic and work-related factors were associated with profile membership. Older employees and those in higher positions were more likely to belong to profiles emphasizing competence-based or institutionalized explanations, whereas younger employees and women were more often associated with profiles emphasizing relational and structural explanations, such as networks and gender dynamics. Our findings also reveal that attribution profiles are associated with different attitudes toward work. Employees in the meritocratic attributors profile reported the highest levels of work engagement, affective organizational commitment, distributive justice, and trust in management. These levels were lowest among employees in the relational-structural attributors profile, consistent with the idea that explanations centered on relational dynamics and structural constraints are associated with less favourable evaluations of organizational decisions.
Show more Read full article →
Reconceptualizing Network Change: Robustness and Resilience of Interorganizational Networks
Organization Science Maxim Sytch, Sukanya Roy, Pavel Ivanov Zhelyazkov October 09, 2026
Networks Organizational Change Training & Development Individual Differences Research Methods
Existing research on interorganizational network dynamics has largely treated network change as gradual, local, and primarily oriented toward private organizational advantage. Yet contemporary cooperative interorganizational systems are highly interconnected across industrial sectors and geographies and are routinely exposed to shocks that simultaneously disable multiple organizations or relationships among them. These shocks stem from pandemics, natural disasters, wars, sanctions, and cascading partner failures, and can rapidly reconfigure whole‑network architectures and undermine collective outcomes. In light of this new reality, we reconceptualize interorganizational networks as loci of frequent, punctuated change at the whole network level, with primary implications for collective outcomes. We develop this reconceptualization through a robustness–resilience lens, defining network robustness as an interorganizational network’s capacity to maintain its collective outcomes in the immediate aftermath of a shock, and network resilience as its capacity to recover and potentially surpass pre‑shock collective outcomes over the longer term. We then outline the theoretical and methodological opportunities that this robustness–resilience perspective opens for the study of network change.
Show more Read full article →
Legal Chameleons: Political Ideology, Institutional Histories, and Firms’ Management of Identity Cues
Organization Science Yong Hyuck Kim, Jose N. Uribe, Maxim Sytch October 09, 2026
Measurement & Psychometrics Selection & Assessment Teams Diversity & Inclusion Performance
This study examines how foreign firms strategically manage the salience of foreignness when facing unfavorable domestic evaluators. Foreign firms do so by altering the ethnic composition of the agents representing them before the evaluators. We examine this question in the context of Asian firms’ selection of legal counsel in U.S. federal courts. Prior research suggests that foreign firms may anticipate less favorable evaluations in courts that have historically favored domestic over foreign firms and in those with conservative judges. We argue that, in such evaluative settings, Asian firms adjust the ethnic composition of their external legal teams to manage the salience of foreignness, and that such adjustments are especially likely in courts that combine judge conservatism with pro-domestic ruling histories. We test these arguments using data on U.S. patent litigation from 2000 to 2016 and validated measures of courts’ political ideology and pro-domestic ruling histories. We find that Asian firms reduce the proportion of Asian-origin lawyers and increase the proportion of White lawyers when litigating in conservative courts, particularly when these courts also have pro-domestic ruling histories. By contrast, the ethnic composition of lawyers representing domestic firms remains stable across courts. Evidence of implicit bias against Asians among legal professionals provides additional support consistent with the theorized mechanism. Post-hoc analyses reveal that adjusting the ethnic composition of external legal teams attenuates the likelihood of unfavorable outcomes in conservative courts. These findings contribute to research on liability of foreignness by identifying agent selection as a specific mitigation mechanism in evaluative arenas.
Show more Read full article →
Colleagues that work together move together: How co-moving among newcomers affects individual and team performance.
Organization Science Emma Y. Zhao, Catherine Theresa Shea, Siyuan Li October 09, 2026
Teams Performance Selection & Assessment Training & Development Research Methods
As teams and team membership become more dynamic, colleagues from the same prior team increasingly transition together to a new team as a cohort: a phenomenon known as co-moving. Drawing on theories of shared team experience and team receptivity, we develop a multilevel, multi-theory, and multi-period model to examine how co-moving affects individual and team performance. We theorize that co-movers carry forward proximal shared team experience which they can leverage immediately to support their own performance relative to solo movers, who must build new working relationships. However, we also theorize that co-movers’ proximal shared team experience hinders team performance, though these detrimental effects attenuate over time. We test our theory using archival data from the National Basketball Association, supplemented by qualitative interviews with individuals involved in professional basketball. Our findings reveal that co-movers exhibit better individual performance than solo movers on their new teams and in our robustness checks we find that greater shared tenure on the prior team further enhances this advantage. At the team level, teams with co-movers perform worse than teams with solo movers, and we find partial support that this disadvantage attenuates over time. Additional analyses show that co-movers’ individual performance advantage persists over time in the new team. The findings from our interviews illuminate how these processes unfold both on and off the court. Our research contributes to the literature on shared team experience and newcomer integration by highlighting a multilevel tradeoff: while co-moving benefits individuals, it can initially undermine collective performance.
Show more Read full article →
The Inclusion Hangover: A Daily Diary Study of the Reflective Mechanisms for Employee Well‐Being
🔓
Personnel Psychology Niamh Dawson, Stacey L. Parker, C. P. Keenan, Sabine Sonnentag, Andrew F. Neal, et al. October 08, 2026
Diversity & Inclusion Research Methods Performance
ABSTRACT How included employees feel at work fluctuates meaningfully from day to day. Emerging research demonstrates that these fluctuations have important implications for employee well‐being. Yet little is known about the cognitive processes through which these effects extend beyond the workday. Drawing on Ilies and colleagues' (2024) model of work‐derived well‐being, we propose that evening work reflection constitutes a key mechanism linking daily perceptions of workgroup inclusion to next‐morning well‐being. We further argue that daily fluctuations in perceived workgroup inclusion carry greater psychological significance for employees who perceive themselves as underrepresented or non‐prototypical within their immediate work environment (i.e., contextual minorities), thereby exerting a stronger influence on subsequent work reflection and well‐being. Using a daily diary design with morning, afternoon, and evening surveys ( n = 3480 days; N = 389 employees), multilevel path analyses supported the proposed model, demonstrating that positive and negative evening work reflection explain how daily workgroup inclusion carries over to next‐morning well‐being. By identifying positive and negative work reflection as distinct pathways linking daily workgroup inclusion to employee well‐being, and establishing contextual minority status as a boundary condition of these processes, we advance understanding of how , and for whom , the effects of daily workgroup inclusion extend beyond the workday. Together, these findings underscore the importance of fostering day to day workgroup inclusion to support employee well‐being in increasingly diverse workplaces.
Show more Read full article →
The scientist–practitioner divide revisited: From bridging a gap to navigating the layers of a knowledge ecosystem
🔓
Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology Shaun Michael Pichler, Almuth McDowall October 08, 2026
Diversity & Inclusion Social Responsibility Motivation Networks
Abstract Discussions about the scientist–practitioner divide have shaped industrial, work and organizational psychology (IWOP), including landmark publications in this journal ( Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology 74 , 2001, 391–411; Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology 79 , 2006, 173–178). Yet, this dyadic metaphor may no longer reflect the complexity of the IWOP knowledge landscape. Drawing on the principles of the divide metaphor, we argue for reconceptualizing IWOP as a knowledge ecosystem, namely a dynamic, multilayered environment in which diverse actors create, translate, contest and apply scientific evidence. We highlight how end‐users extend beyond practitioners to include policymakers, regulators, courts, unions, educators and workers. We further distinguish between end‐users and end‐beneficiaries to illuminate how IWOP knowledge can generate uneven consequences for different recipients. We argue that an ecosystem metaphor enables a more complete and ethically grounded understanding of IWOP knowledge. Finally, we examine how structural forces, such as the prestige trap, can influence what knowledge is produced, rewarded and legitimized.
Show more Read full article →
Reaffirming the validity of unobtrusive personality measures: A comment on Harms et al. (2025) and guidance for the field
🔓
Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology Joseph S. Harrison, Steven Boivie October 08, 2026
Measurement & Psychometrics Individual Differences Selection & Assessment Performance Networks
Abstract As unobtrusive measures of CEO personality have become more common in organizational research, questions about their validity have grown. Harms et al., Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, (2025) 98, e70052 recently formalized some of these concerns in a meta‐analysis, citing higher average intercorrelations and weaker associations with firm performance relative to survey‐based measures as evidence of their lack of validity. We argue that these criticisms are overstated, reflecting both a misunderstanding of what unobtrusive measures capture and limitations in the authors' assumptions and meta‐analytic approach. Whereas self‐report surveys capture executives' self‐concepts, existing unobtrusive measures typically assess externally observed or expressed personality. We suggest that relatively higher average intercorrelations are theoretically expected when assessments reflect stylized expressions of CEOs' observed tendencies, and we provide evidence that unobtrusive measures can meaningfully distinguish between traits. We further argue that, given what they represent and their application in large firms, unobtrusive measures likely relate differently to outcomes shaped by external audiences as compared to aggregate financial outcomes. Consistent with this logic, we show substantive differences in the relationships between unobtrusive measures of CEO personality and market performance compared to accounting performance. Our study reaffirms the validity of unobtrusive personality measures and offers guidance for their appropriate evaluation, interpretation and continued refinement.
Show more Read full article →
The moralization paradox at work: How Supervisor's moral framing depletes subordinates' self‐regulatory resources and suppresses proactive problem prevention
🔓
Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology J.B. Ma, Shiyao Jiang, Zhou Xing October 08, 2026
Social Responsibility Research Methods Selection & Assessment Performance Networks
Abstract Integrating moral and ethical considerations into work is often presumed to yield a wide range of beneficial outcomes. Yet these benefits may not be unconditional, as prevailing scholarship has largely overlooked the potential costs associated with self‐regulatory resource depletion and diminished self‐initiated behaviours that are critical for averting future work disruptions. Drawing on ego depletion theory, we theorize that supervisor's work moralization can inadvertently hinder subordinates' proactive problem prevention by elevating their experiences of ego depletion. Furthermore, we posit that subordinates' reflective moral attentiveness intensifies this relationship, such that highly reflective individuals are more susceptible to the depleting effects of supervisor's work moralization, which in turn exacerbates the reduction in their proactive problem prevention. To test these propositions, we conducted two complementary empirical studies: Study 1, an experience sampling investigation, and Study 2, a vignette‐based laboratory experiment. Across both studies, the findings robustly supported our hypotheses. This research advances the literature by challenging the predominantly positive narrative of work moralization, illuminating its paradoxical potential to undermine subordinates' proactive behaviours, and providing novel theoretical insight into the boundary conditions and self‐regulatory mechanisms shaping the consequences of moral framing in the workplace.
Show more Read full article →
The Power of Identity Pause: Perimenopause and the Embodiment Process
Academy of Management Journal Madeline Toubiana, P. Devereaux Jennings October 08, 2026
Training & Development Networks Organizational Change
A growing volume of identity scholarship has started to challenge the Cartesian separation of body and mind, highlighting the importance of embodiment. While such research is enlightening, studies do not provide in-depth understanding of how some workers, but not others, are able to develop embodied identities (i.e., identities that are bonded with and bounded by their physical body). In particular, little is known about how this embodiment process occurs—or fails to do so—when changes within a worker’s body threaten their idealized identities (who they want and believe they should be). We examine this puzzle through an inductive study of perimenopause, which is a naturally occurring physiological transition experienced by most women. Unlike studies that have emphasized the importance of remedial identity or body work, our findings point to the criticality of an identity pause, which involves taking respite from striving to enact idealized identities. We illuminate how an identity pause gives workers the space to develop somatic attunement: the capacity to connect with, listen to, and respect their changing bodies. In so doing, our study calls attention to distinctive mechanisms that help develop embodied identities, advancing research on the body–identity nexus, embodiment, and women and work.
Show more Read full article →
When Data Scientists Meet Domain Experts: Artificial Intelligence, Epistemic Conflict, and Knowledge Transformation
Organization Science Mayur Prataprai Joshi, Ning Su, Mark Zbaracki October 08, 2026
Artificial Intelligence/Technology Training & Development Conflict Organizational Change Individual Differences
Predictive AI models developed by data scientists promise to transform organizational knowledge, yet in practice the predictions remain inscrutable to domain experts. Existing explanations situate the problems in the opacity of the AI tools, failed adoption, or jurisdictional conflict, but offer limited insight into how to make the knowledge accessible. Here we show how the problem emerges from the competing epistemic stances of data scientists and domain experts, which create conflict over how to produce and evaluate knowledge. We then ask how data scientists and domain experts address that conflict so that their work with AI satisfies each group’s standards for producing and evaluating knowledge. Drawing on an 18-month inductive study of three large Indian banks, we show that the data scientists produce new knowledge, but domain experts hold the power to decide whether it is deployed. Our findings distinguish between epistemic and jurisdictional conflict. We show that data scientists first try to address the epistemic conflict directly through assimilative practices that follow one epistemic stance or the other. When these practices fail to transform knowledge, data scientists learn to address the conflict indirectly through four bridging practices. These practices help the domain experts transform knowledge by embedding the data scientists’ predictions in the boundary objects and practices that the domain experts already use. Our findings reveal how power based on expertise rather than jurisdictional control can make possible the coproduction of knowledge.
Show more Read full article →
Angry leader with coercive power: Unpacking the effects on follower withdrawal through organizational dehumanization.
Journal of Occupational Health Psychology Hui Chen, Zihan Xiao, Yingsi Yang, Xiao-Hua Frank Wang October 08, 2026
Leadership Performance Turnover & Retention Research Methods Networks
= 288), we found that leader anger expression triggered followers' organizational dehumanization, which increased their withdrawal behavior. This mediated relationship was weakened when the leader's coercive power was low. Moreover, these effects were robust after controlling for abusive supervision and adding followers' affective reactions and inferences about leaders as alternative mediators. Theoretical contributions and practical implications of these findings are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
Servant leadership effects on service climate and employee engagement: a multi-level analysis
Journal of Managerial Psychology Pachsiry Chompukum, Vitara Pungpapong October 08, 2026
Leadership Job Attitudes Organizational Culture Social Responsibility Research Methods
Purpose This study examined the multi-level relationships between servant leadership, service climate, and employee engagement. It investigated how store manager servant leadership cultivated group trust at the store level, consequently affecting service climate and influenced employee engagement through perceived supervisor support. Design/methodology/approach This study employed a multi-level design to investigate the relationships. Data were collected in two waves from a total of 1,409 restaurant employees in Thailand, with usable responses obtained from 801 individuals across 120 restaurants who completed both waves of the survey in full. On average, teams had 6.68 members. A multi-level structural equation modeling approach was employed to account for the nested structure of employees within restaurant, enabling simultaneous testing of individual-level and store-level relationships. Findings Store manager servant leadership indirectly influenced employee engagement through perceived supervisor support. Additionally, servant leadership cultivated group trust at the store level, which, in turn, positively impacted service climate. Practical implications Organizations can significantly improve employee engagement by fostering leaders who value empathy, humility, and the well-being of their teams. Additionally, by prioritizing employee growth and creating a supportive environment built on trust, organizations can also build a positive work climate. Originality/value This study enhances our understanding of servant leadership by demonstrating its indirect influence on employee engagement. The multi-level approach provides a more refined view of how this leadership style shapes organizational dynamics. Specifically, it highlights the importance of servant leadership in building trust and fostering service climate.
Show more Read full article →
The nonwork-work spillover effects of leaders' spouse-directed surface acting: implications for self-alienation at work and the role of Machiavellianism
🔓
Journal of Managerial Psychology Ian M. Hughes, Jonathan P. Russell October 08, 2026
Research Methods Performance Health & Well-Being Leadership Networks
Purpose Guided by the work-home resources model while integrating basic needs theory, the present study examined how spouse-directed surface acting in the nonwork domain spills over into the work domain. Design/methodology/approach Three time-lagged waves of weekly data from 226 US leaders were analyzed using first-stage moderated mediation analysis with 5,000 bootstrapped resamples in R software. Findings Results from the bootstrapped moderated mediation model revealed that suppressing negative emotions with one's spouse at Time 1 was positively linked to self-alienation at work at Time 3 via the frustration of relatedness needs with one's spouse at Time 2. Moreover, this indirect effect (as well the direct effect between suppressing negative emotions and relatedness frustration) was, contravening our predictions, stronger for leaders higher in Machiavellianism. Originality/value This research is among the first to document the negative spillover effects of spouse-directed surface acting, revealing that suppressing negative emotions may be a catalyst for such spillover. Furthermore, our work builds upon extant knowledge of Machiavellianism in intimate partnerships, suggesting that while Machs may surface act with their partners more, they may particularly be vulnerable to the effects of negative emotion suppression.
Show more Read full article →
Leading the way to mental health: the role of mental health-specific leadership and stigmatizing attitudes for intra- and interpersonal mental health outcomes
🔓
Journal of Managerial Psychology Vince Pelzer, Machteld van den Heuvel, Roy B. L. Sijbom, Edwin A. J. van Hooft, Siw Tone Innstrand, et al. October 08, 2026
Health & Well-Being Leadership Job Attitudes Research Methods Performance
Purpose This study examines how mental health-specific leadership (MHSL) relates to employee mental health outcomes, including intrapersonal outcomes (burnout; work engagement) and interpersonal outcomes (team support; health-related extra-role performance), and the moderating role of stigmatizing attitudes toward mental health. Design/methodology/approach We surveyed 210 employees across 53 teams in a large public organization in the Netherlands and used multilevel path analyses to test our hypotheses. Findings At the individual level, MHSL was tentatively negatively associated with burnout, and positively associated with work engagement, team support and health-related extra-role performance. Stigmatizing attitudes moderated these relationships, tentatively weakening the MHSL–team support relationship and strengthening the MHSL–health-related extra-role performance relationship. At the team level, MHSL showed no significant associations. Practical implications Organizations may benefit from leadership development programs that promote mental health behaviors and foster supportive workplaces, particularly when combined with anti-stigma initiatives that reduce the impact of stigmatizing attitudes. Originality/value This study advances the concept of MHSL by linking it to intra- and interpersonal mental health outcomes, thereby extending health leadership frameworks. It provides novel insights into specific leadership behaviors that support employee mental health.
Show more Read full article →
Personnel Psychology's 40 Questions Series: Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Organizations
🔓
Personnel Psychology Derek R. Avery, T. L. Owens, Larissa R. Garcia October 07, 2026
Diversity & Inclusion Networks Performance Measurement & Psychometrics
ABSTRACT This article presents a curated set of 40 questions on diversity, equity, and inclusion in organizations (DEI) to address myths and misperceptions about its role in Industrial/Organizational (I/O) Psychology and Management research and practice. We crowdsourced questions from our professional networks and organized the responses into themes including foundations of DEI, the business case, DEI effectiveness, DEI resistance, legal interpretations, DEI pullback, measurement, and programs and vehicles. Though the review is not entirely comprehensive, the aim is to utilize the most up‐to‐date literature to answer many of the most pressing questions about DEI.
Show more Read full article →
Transaction Hazards Through Ideological Filters: How CEO Political Ideology Influences Vertical Integration Decisions
Journal of Management Holly Loncarich, Mirzokhidjon Abdurakhmonov, Madison Lee Schnacker October 07, 2026
Performance Training & Development Leadership Networks Artificial Intelligence/Technology
Why do firms facing similar transaction environments adopt different boundary structures? Transaction cost theory (TCT) predicts governance choices based on transaction hazards, but persistent heterogeneity in vertical integration suggests that such efficiency-based explanations are incomplete. We examine whether CEO political ideology is associated with systematic variation in firm boundary decisions. Drawing on research on political ideology and strategic leadership, we argue that ideological orientations shape how executives evaluate and prioritize governance trade-offs. Using a panel of 1,198 U.S. public firms from 2001 to 2020 and a firm fixed-effects design exploiting CEO successions, we find that firms led by more conservative CEOs exhibit higher levels of vertical integration. This relationship weakens when asset specificity is high and when industries are more concentrated but is not amplified by demand volatility. Our findings suggest that firm boundaries reflect not only transaction conditions but also systematic differences in executive decision-making.
Show more Read full article →
Exploring Leadership, Life Moments, and a Transforming Career Across Boundaries
Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior Bruce J. Avolio October 07, 2026
Leadership Organizational Change Training & Development Individual Differences
Here I describe the intersection of my life, career, and primary focus on linking together how one crosses boundaries of knowledge and understanding to make sense of how we theorize leadership, how we research it, and how it is practiced by the authors who write about it and the targets of their writing. I also write about how my lived experiences, some of which coincided with moments that impacted my generation, informed each important boundary I traversed in my field of leadership studies and practices. After an overview of the arc of the evolution of the leadership field focusing on the first 100 years of the modern era of leadership research and practice, I weave in stories of the personal and professional experiences that shaped my understanding and interpretations of what constitutes leadership and how it is developed. I focus primarily on positive forms of leadership, except when comparing bad and good leaders—the charismatic form of leadership deserves its own discussion category, given the awesome power these leaders hold for liberating or destroying followers, organizations, and institutions. In the end, I have been privileged to shake my own brain and many other brains on what constitute the best positive forms of leadership and its development.
Show more Read full article →
The Bamboo Ceiling in the UK: Ethnicity–Gender Intersectionality, Risk Tolerance, and Leadership Attainment
🔓
Personnel Psychology Jackson G. Lu, Qian Li, Shuang Liang, Wanqin Mu, Shiyang Gong October 06, 2026
Research Methods Leadership Performance Diversity & Inclusion Teams
ABSTRACT In the UK, Asians are often perceived as the “model minority” who face few hardships due to their strong educational performance and economic success. We question this perception by uncovering a “Bamboo Ceiling” in leadership attainment for certain Asian subgroups in the UK. Whereas many researchers and practitioners treat Asians as a monolith, we recognize heterogeneity among Asian subgroups and focus on comparing ethnic Chinese (the largest East Asian group) and ethnic Indians (the largest South Asian group). In Study 1, we analyzed CEOs and CFOs of the Financial Times Stock Exchange (FTSE) companies—the largest publicly listed companies in the UK—over a 14‐year period (2011–2024). There were virtually no ethnic Chinese CEOs or CFOs, whereas the representation of ethnic Indians in these positions did not differ significantly from that of Whites. In Study 2, we analyzed a large, nationwide dataset from the UK Biobank ( N = 322,734) to further investigate the moderating role of gender and the mediating role of risk tolerance. While ethnic Chinese overall experienced a Bamboo Ceiling (thus confirming Study 1's results), this main effect was moderated by gender: Ethnic Chinese men were significantly less likely than ethnic Indian and White men to attain leadership positions, a pattern partly mediated by ethnic differences in risk tolerance; by contrast, ethnic Chinese, Indian, and White women did not differ significantly and were each disadvantaged relative to their male counterparts. These effects were robust across survey‐based and polygenic measures of risk tolerance. Together, these findings underscore the importance of distinguishing among Asian subgroups and examining how ethnicity and gender intersect in leadership attainment.
Show more Read full article →
Human Resource Development in the Era of Artificial Intelligence: A Common Good Approach
Human Resource Development Quarterly Fang Lee Cooke, Zhou Jiang, Jun Xie October 06, 2026
Training & Development Artificial Intelligence/Technology Individual Differences HR Systems & Talent Management Social Responsibility
ABSTRACT Artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming how and under what conditions employees learn, work, and develop their careers. This has strong implications for human resource development (HRD), because AI goes beyond technology itself and presents social and ethical issues concerning whose capabilities are recognized, whose learning is supported, and whose career futures are protected. In this paper, we develop a perspective on HRD in the era of AI through a common good lens. A common good approach to HRD not only supports employees vulnerable to job displacement by providing them with skills and mindsets beneficial for their sustainable employment and careers, but also contributes to society by developing human capital and a sustainable labor force, as well as enhancing the wellbeing of the workers and their families. This approach requires organizations to balance both efficiency and human relationships and align organizational goals (economic and social) with common good outcomes for individuals and society. It transforms HRD from a traditional HRM function into a dynamic, justice‐based, relationship‐oriented, and sustainability‐driven system. We outline several new research avenues to advance the HRD field through a common‐good lens.
Show more Read full article →
A meta-analysis of the dynamism of emergent states and team processes.
🔓
Journal of Applied Psychology Andrew C. Loignon, Brent N. Reed, Andrew J. Knoblich, Karoline M. Summerville, Elizabeth Clayton, et al. October 05, 2026
Teams Research Methods Motivation Performance Leadership
Prevailing theories of teamwork propose that a team's cognitive, affective, and motivational states (i.e., emergent states) and its members' interdependent actions (i.e., team processes) are inherently dynamic. Nevertheless, much of the existing literature overlooks critical components of theories on system dynamics (e.g., inertia, coevolution, feedback) and has largely failed to consider how time operates, ultimately leading to a predominantly static view of teams. To extend our understanding of team dynamism, we synthesized over 3,000 correlation coefficients from longitudinal studies, representing more than 11,000 teams on average. Using cross-lagged, meta-analytic structural equation models, we found that (a) emergent states and team processes exhibit inertia over time, although this varies by construct (affect exhibits the least inertia, while conflict exhibits the most); (b) some constructs (team affect and team cognition) tend to coevolve with team processes over time, whereas others (team motivation and team conflict) are consistently predicted by earlier team processes; (c) team performance exhibits consistent feedback loops, predicting subsequent emergent states and processes, which, in turn, predict later performance; and (d) the length of time between observations moderates these dynamics. Drawing on these results, we outline several key theoretical considerations for understanding team dynamics, highlight important methodological considerations for conducting longitudinal causally identified teams research, and offer recommendations for advancing beyond the current static perspective to a more dynamic understanding of teams. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
Daily job crafting with generative artificial intelligence: Implications for work meaningfulness and engagement
🔓
Journal of Vocational Behavior Neris GÜVEN, Wendelien van Eerde, Almasa Sarabi, Corine T. Boon October 05, 2026
Job Attitudes Job Design Artificial Intelligence/Technology Individual Differences Training & Development
As Generative Artificial Intelligence (Gen-AI) becomes embedded in daily work, understanding how employees proactively engage with these tools to shape their work experiences is increasingly important. Building on self-determination theory and the job crafting literature, this study introduces the concept of daily Gen-AI-driven job crafting: employees' self-initiated use of Gen-AI to modify their daily job demands and resources. We examine whether Gen-AI-driven job crafting is associated with daily work engagement through psychological need satisfaction and work meaningfulness. We employed a daily diary design with 149 UK-based full-time employees (M age = 36.7, SD age = 10.4; 63.8% male) who used Gen-AI at work daily or multiple times per day over ten consecutive workdays, incorporating a brief open-ended question to examine whether employees experienced their Gen-AI use as intentional work modification. Quantitative results showed that the dimensions of Gen-AI-driven job crafting (augmenting instrumental resources, augmenting social resources, augmenting challenging demands, and automating hindering demands) were differentially associated with daily work engagement through need satisfaction (autonomy, competence, relatedness) and, in turn, work meaningfulness: the competence pathway received the most consistent support, while the relatedness pathway was the most limited. Open-ended responses were consistent with intentional work modification, for instance, automating hindering demands was framed as a strategic reallocation of cognitive resources toward more valued work rather than simple workload reduction. Together, these findings suggest that Gen-AI may function as a bottom-up work design tool associated with daily need satisfaction and engagement.
Show more Read full article →
Early Environmental Shocks and Organizational Reconfiguration in High-Growth Ventures
Organization Science Sunasir Dutta, Pyung Nahm, Luis Adrian Rios October 05, 2026
Social Responsibility Turnover & Retention Teams Networks
We study whether shocks from local natural disasters can leave durable organizational traces in young high-growth ventures. In principle, such firms may be relatively resilient to localized disruption because they are designed to scale beyond local markets and rely heavily on knowledge-based assets. We examine this possibility using a panel of 19,984 U.S. startups founded between 1985 and 2010 that subsequently received venture financing. We identify ventures whose founding counties experience natural disasters within 12 months of founding using FEMA Major Disaster Declarations. Ventures exposed to disasters at an early stage exhibit higher subsequent failure hazards and no general advantage in follow-on financing, yet show higher IPO hazards in favorable market windows, a pattern consistent with greater responsiveness to opportunities requiring substantial organizational reconfiguration. Descriptive employee-level evidence further documents differences in organizational structure and composition consistent with greater retained fluidity among exposed ventures. Drawing on organization design and imprinting theory, we interpret these patterns as consistent with the possibility that disasters function as forcing environments that entrench early-stage coordination features such as flatness, role fluidity, and broader expertise that would otherwise attenuate as ventures mature. These durable organizational traces may, in turn, shape ventures’ subsequent capacity for reconfiguration. We discuss implications for organizational adaptation, imprinting, entrepreneurial geography, and organizational responses to crises.
Show more Read full article →
Feeling proud but guilty? Unpacking the paradoxical nature of authoritarian leadership behavior on leaders themselves
Journal of Managerial Psychology é™łæŻ“ć©·, Xiao-Yun Xie, Wen Feng October 05, 2026
Leadership Job Attitudes Networks Research Methods Performance
Purpose Drawing on theory of self-conscious emotions, this research aims to advance the current understanding of authoritarian leadership by examining its effect on leaders' work engagement and emotional exhaustion through pride and guilt, and the boundary condition under which these effects occur. Design/methodology/approach This study employed an experience sampling method and analyzed 743 observations from 88 supervisors. Findings The results highlight the paradoxical nature of authoritarian leadership behavior for leaders themselves. Specifically, authoritarian leadership can simultaneously elicit feelings of pride and guilt in leaders, which subsequently lead to divergent outcomes: pride enhances leaders' work engagement, whereas guilt increases their emotional exhaustion. Moreover, the positive indirect relationship between authoritarian leadership and work engagement through pride is strengthened when leader Machiavellianism is high. Originality/value By examining authoritarian leadership as a daily behavior and diverging from the recipient-centric perspective, this study highlights its paradoxical effects on leaders themselves, thereby contributing to the authoritarian leadership and emotion literature.
Show more Read full article →
Executive Selection Has a Criterion Problem: A Perspective on Capability‐Centered Assessment Under Strategic Uncertainty
🔓
International Journal of Selection and Assessment Hannu Sehm October 05, 2026
Selection & Assessment Measurement & Psychometrics Organizational Culture Individual Differences Networks
ABSTRACT Executive selection often relies on distal proxies such as personality, career history, and reputation cues, despite their limited correspondence to future role demands  This perspective article argues that the central validity problem in executive selection is criterion specification rather than predictor optimization  It reframes assessment as a process of analyzing the organization's current strategic and cultural context, anticipating future role demands, and translating those demands into a weighted executive capability profile  Personality, career history, reputation cues, and interviews are therefore treated as potentially useful but criterion‐dependent evidence rather than substitutes for criterion definition  The article proposes a provisional framework for defining executive‐selection criteria and outlines implications for construct congruence, behavioral evidence, and future validation across strategic settings 
Show more Read full article →
Career Promises Without a Promisor: A Psychological Contract Perspective on Organizational Career Development Systems
Human Resource Development Quarterly Mohamed S. Mohiya October 05, 2026
Training & Development Job Attitudes Research Methods Selection & Assessment Turnover & Retention
ABSTRACT Organizations increasingly treat career development as central to employee retention and engagement, yet employees' lived experiences of these systems remain underexplored, particularly outside Western settings. This qualitative case study examines how employees perceive their organization's career development system within a large multinational hospitality and tourism company operating in Saudi Arabia. Two complementary sources are analyzed thematically: 123 firsthand employee comments drawn from an internal electronic system and 29 semi‐structured interviews with full‐time employees. Five themes emerged: career path ambiguity and invisibility (82%), structural barriers to advancement (68%), inadequate supervisor engagement (73%), differential treatment across employee categories (61%), and employee agency in career navigation (54%). Interpreted through Psychological Contract Theory, these findings support three theoretical extensions rather than a contextual application of the theory. First, career development contracts are structurally mediated: promissory content is distributed across human resource architecture, supervisory discretion, and formal policy, leaving employees unable to localize a promisor and rendering the reneging–incongruence distinction indeterminate from the employee standpoint. Second, breach is accretive rather than episodic, inferred cumulatively from informational opacity rather than triggered by an identifiable withholding event, thereby delaying recognition, attenuating momentary violation, and substituting chronic erosion of trust. Third, employee agency functions as compensatory absorption of unmet obligation, conserving the relationship outwardly while hollowing its content, such that behavioral quiescence cannot be read as contract fulfillment. The study specifies boundary conditions under which the dyadic, episodic, and reactive assumptions of Psychological Contract Theory require revision. It identifies contract legibility as a distinct target for human resource development practice in rapidly expanding, nationalizing labor markets.
Show more Read full article →
You are not alone: access to collective representation buffers the harmful impact of customer sexual harassment on gig workers
🔓
Journal of Business and Psychology Yijue Liang, Tianjun Sun, Renee McCauley, Ze Zhu October 03, 2026
Performance Networks Research Methods
Abstract Amid the rapid growth of the gig economy, gig workers can be particularly vulnerable to customer sexual harassment (CSH), facing unique challenges due to the “one-off” nature of their interactions with customers, insufficient protections, and the absence of bystanders who could potentially intervene. As one of the first attempts to connect the gig work and sexual harassment literatures, this research draws from conservation of resources theory to understand how CSH impacts gig workers’ subsequent behaviors and what protective factors can buffer such detrimental effects. With a five-day diary study (373 daily observations from 99 individuals) and a three-wave, time-separated survey study ( N = 377) on gig workers in the USA, we found that they experienced higher psychological distress and perceived greater self-threat after CSH exposure and, in turn, showed increased deviance in production and interpersonal interaction with customers. Importantly, the indirect detrimental effects of CSH on production deviance and interpersonal deviance, through psychological distress and self-threat, respectively, were weaker for gig workers who had access to collective representation than those who lacked such access. Theoretical and practical implications are further discussed in the paper.
Show more Read full article →
Stimulating gender-diverse teams’ creativity through team diversity training: A field experiment
🔓
Journal of Business and Psychology Christoph Reinert, Claudia Buengeler, Bart Voorn, Astrid Carlotta Homan October 03, 2026
Training & Development Diversity & Inclusion Teams Networks Selection & Assessment
Abstract Evidence of the gender diversity–team creativity relationship is inconsistent, highlighting the importance of managing the underlying processes. Building on the two predominant perspectives on team diversity processes, social categorization and information/decision-making, we propose that diversity training is most conducive to gender-diverse teams’ creativity when it stimulates information elaboration in addition to strengthening team identification. In a randomized field experiment with 446 individuals nested within 57 intact organizational teams, we examined the effectiveness of two team diversity training designs versus no training in enhancing the creativity of gender-diverse teams. One training focused solely on the social perspective (identification-focused), while the other addressed both the social and informational perspectives (identification-and-elaboration-focused). We tested the interactive effects of the two training conditions (vs. no training) and gender diversity on team creativity using pre- and post-measures. The findings provide partial support for our model. Identification-focused training did not stimulate the creativity of gender-diverse teams, and neither training condition affected team identification. Relative to no training, identification-and-elaboration-focused training was positively linked to team creativity via improved information elaboration among highly gender-diverse teams. The contrast between the two active training conditions was however not significant, and the evidence for the information-elaboration pathway should be interpreted cautiously. These findings provide initial field experimental evidence that team diversity training targeting information elaboration can help highly gender-diverse teams use their informational resources for creativity, contributing to the literature on managing (gender-)diverse teams. They further underscore the need for replication and testing the effectiveness of specific training components.
Show more Read full article →
When Recruiters Meet Algorithms: Advice Taking and Bias in AI‐Assisted Recruitment
🔓
International Journal of Selection and Assessment Alain Lacroux, Christelle Martin‐Lacroux October 03, 2026
Selection & Assessment Artificial Intelligence/Technology Diversity & Inclusion Performance Conflict
ABSTRACT This study examined whether professional recruiters revise their hiring decisions after receiving external advice under cognitive conflict, that is, when advice contradicts their initial evaluation. In a between‐subjects experiment, 1,208 recruitment professionals evaluated two candidates, made an initial hiring decision, and then received advice whose source (human expert vs. algorithmic recruitment system, ARS), accuracy (accurate vs. inaccurate), and number of advisors (one vs. two) were manipulated across eight conditions. Results revealed widespread egocentric advice discounting. Although trust predicted advice utilization, a trust–reliance paradox emerged: recruiters reported lower trust in the ARS yet were behaviorally more influenced by it. Convergent advice was most influential, and exploratory analyses suggested that inaccurate advice degraded decision quality more than accurate advice improved it. Findings underscore the need for calibrated reliance in AI‐assisted selection.
Show more Read full article →
Employee Activism, Then and Now
Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior Forrest S. Briscoe, Alexandra Rheinhardt Beer, Raquel Renee Kessinger October 02, 2026
Training & Development Motivation Networks Artificial Intelligence/Technology
We review research on employee activism, with particular attention to developments over the past decade, and identify avenues for future research that reflect the evolving nature of the phenomenon. We first define employee activism and distinguish it from related forms of employee behavior. We then identify three themes in the evolution of research on employee activism: an expansion from organizational-change goals to also include society-oriented goals, from persuasive tactics to also include disruptive tactics, and from in-person mobilization to also include activism through online digital platforms. We next synthesize research on five central features of employee activism—participants, goals, contexts, behaviors, and outcomes—drawing on scholarship across social movement sociology, organizational theory, organizational behavior, and strategic management. We conclude by identifying opportunities for research that better captures contemporary forms of employee activism and advances understanding of its consequences for employees, organizations, and society.
Show more Read full article →
Industrial-organizational science that matters: Social impact and policy implications in the Journal of Applied Psychology.
🔓
Journal of Applied Psychology Wendy J. Casper, Stephanie Brooke Escudero, Lillian Turner de Tormes Eby, Tianjun Sun, Talya N. Bauer, et al. October 01, 2026
Social Responsibility Diversity & Inclusion Training & Development Health & Well-Being Individual Differences
This introductory article to the special issue "Social Impact Research" examines the extent to which research published in the Journal of Applied Psychology has addressed pressing social issues related to work and employment.Using BERTopic modeling on 5,865 empirical articles published from the journal's inception in 1917 through June 2024, we identified 99 topics organized into 25 higher order themes, five of which directly reflect social impact: workplace stress, health, and well-being; workplace diversity, equity, and inclusion; organizational justice, ethics, and legal issues; work and employment transitions across the lifespan; and social justice and labor opinions.Trend analyses from 1980 to 2024 revealed growth in health and well-being research, relatively stable publication of diversity, equity, and inclusion scholarship, an inverted-U trajectory for justice and legal topics, and the disappearance of labor-related research.We then introduce the 19 special issue articles (appearing in the October and November 2026 issues) which address employment barriers facing marginalized and economically disadvantaged workers, medical benefits and leave policies, gender and women's employment, and macrolevel societal disruptions, each offering actionable implications related to work that can benefit the greater good.We conclude by proposing a future social impact research agenda that suggests industrial-organizational (I-O) psychologists conduct research that addresses key issues such as economic insecurity, immigrant and refugee workers, generative artificial intelligence, climate change, and political instability.
Show more Read full article →
Hostile Frame Takeover: Co-Opting the Security Frame in the Nuclear Energy Debate
Academy of Management Journal Stephan Bohn, Nora Lohmeyer, Harsh Kumar Jha, Juliane Reinecke October 01, 2026
Networks Research Methods
Frames not only shape societal debates but underpin the legitimacy of industries and institutions. Yet, even the most resonant frames can be turned on their head—weaponized against their initial intent. While framing research has studied competition between distinct frames, less is known about how a single frame’s meaning can be strategically inverted to serve opposing agendas. We conceptualize this process as “frame co-optation,” a potent but underexplored mechanism of discursive power that can alter institutional trajectories. The striking reversal of Germany’s nuclear energy phaseout provides a unique opportunity to examine frame co-optation. Using a multimethod machine-learning approach, we analyze three decades of the German nuclear energy debate to understand how the security frame, initially mobilized by antinuclear activists to justify a nuclear phaseout, was co-opted by pronuclear actors to advocate for its reversal. Our analysis shows how the pronuclear actors co-opted the security frame by perforating, camouflaging, infiltrating, and overwriting the frame’s meaning to invert its direction while preserving its resonance. We contribute to framing theory by introducing frame co-optation as a mechanism of strategic meaning inversion that can restore the legitimacy of controversial industries, and, more broadly, destabilize shared meaning and thereby amplify discursive polarization.
Show more Read full article →
In Pursuit of Ideal Data: Epistemic Enchantment and the Unintended Consequences of Datafying for Artificial Intelligence
🔓
Administrative Science Quarterly Elmira van den Broek, Natalia Levina October 01, 2026
Artificial Intelligence/Technology Individual Differences Selection & Assessment Training & Development HR Systems & Talent Management
The increasing datafication of work has become a pervasive theme within organizations, particularly with the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) technologies that rely on data and machine learning to generate insights and decisions. Prior research has shown that datafication practices aimed at administrative control and accountability can transform organizations in profound and often unintended ways. Our research moves beyond investigating datafication for administrative purposes to explore how it unfolds when actors intend to extract knowledge through AI predictive modeling. Drawing on a three-year ethnography of a human resources (HR) department introducing AI for candidate screening, we find that datafication expanded far beyond the technology’s initially envisioned scope. We explain this scope expansion by introducing the concept of epistemic enchantment : a collective process through which organizational members become captivated and mobilized by AI’s promise to generate predictive, objective, and continuously improving insights from data, while overlooking the costs and risks involved. Our study reveals how datafication practices can expand endlessly as organizational members, enchanted by AI’s epistemic promises, pursue the notion of ideal data as an ever-desired but never reachable goal.
Show more Read full article →
Multiple Regression: State of the Science
Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior Scott Tonidandel, Betsy H. Albritton, James M. LeBreton October 01, 2026
Research Methods Training & Development
The use of multiple regression was foundational to the advancement of organizational research, establishing itself as one of the most popular statistical frameworks of the field. Multiple regression techniques continue to innovate to meet evolving demands placed on organizational scientists such as the increased number of predictors, larger sample sizes, nonnormal distributions, increased access to data, and more. To provide researchers with an understanding of multiple regression innovations in the evolving landscape of organizational science, here we ( a ) review the literature to define the core themes of multiple regression, ( b ) summarize critical techniques and learnings of extant literature within each theme, and ( c ) highlight the emerging trends and innovations that possess the greatest potential impact to the field. Our review concludes by offering guidance to organizational scientists on how to identify a multiple regression approach from the plethora of available techniques that is best suited to their research question and context.
Show more Read full article →
I regulate my emotions; therefore, I am creative? Daily emotion regulation and workplace creativity
🔓
Journal of Managerial Psychology Lynn Schmodde, Marius Wehner October 01, 2026
Research Methods Individual Differences Networks Performance Measurement & Psychometrics
Purpose Evidence on the daily within-person relationship between emotion regulation strategies and creativity remains limited, particularly in non-service contexts. This study addresses this gap by examining the indirect relationship between day-level deep and surface acting and creativity via positive affect, and the moderating role of emotion regulation ability. Design/methodology/approach One-week diary study of 103 employees, analyzed using multilevel structural equation modeling. Findings Day-level deep acting was indirectly related to day-level creativity through positive affect, whereas surface acting showed the opposite pattern. Emotion regulation ability amplified the positive affective outcomes of day-level deep acting but did not buffer the negative effects of surface acting. Originality/value By examining how day-level deep and surface acting indirectly relate to creativity via positive affect in a non-service context, this study addresses a gap in research on day-level emotion regulation and creativity. Integrating broaden-and-build theory with emotion regulation research, it highlights emotion regulation ability as a personal resource amplifying the positive affective outcomes of deep acting.
Show more Read full article →
Being hazed out of silence for the newcomer: a victim-precipitation and protection model
Journal of Managerial Psychology Jinyun Duan, Fenghua Liang, Yue Qun Xu, Xiaoshuang Lin, Yue Zhu October 01, 2026
Selection & Assessment Performance Training & Development Leadership Research Methods
Purpose This study examines how newcomer silence shapes adverse socialization experiences. Drawing on victim precipitation theory, it investigates how newcomer silence may lead to coworker hazing through coworkers' perceptions of newcomer submissiveness and explores the contextual factor that buffers this effect. Design/methodology/approach We conducted a time-lagged survey involving 266 newcomer–coworker dyads in mainland China. Complex model-based path analysis was used to test the hypotheses. Findings Results showed that newcomer silence was positively associated with coworker hazing through perceived submissiveness; newcomer social status served as the protective factor that could protect silent newcomers who were perceived as submissive from being hazed. Originality/value This research extends victim precipitation theory to workplace hazing settings and contributes to understanding how newcomer silence can elicit negative responses from coworkers and what factor can be used to tweak this.
Show more Read full article →
Humorous leaders and narcissistic followers: linking leader humor to follower organizational citizenship behavior through follower workplace status
Journal of Managerial Psychology Kiho Jun, Joonghak Lee October 01, 2026
Research Methods Leadership Job Attitudes Networks Selection & Assessment
Purpose Drawing on the humor-as-social-information (HASI) framework, this study tests whether leader humor relates to follower organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) through follower workplace status, the framework’s inferential pathway, while modeling an affective pathway (follower affective commitment) in parallel as an alternative explanatory mechanism, and whether follower narcissism moderates the translation of workplace status into OCB. Design/methodology/approach Multi-wave survey data from 282 employees in South Korean organizations were analyzed using sequential regression and bootstrapped path analysis, including a formal moderated-mediation test. Findings Leader humor was positively associated with follower workplace status, which mediated the humor–OCB link even with affective commitment modeled in parallel. Follower narcissism weakened the relationship between workplace status and OCB. The indirect effect of leader humor on OCB through workplace status showed a directionally consistent pattern of attenuation at higher levels of narcissism, although the index of moderated mediation was not statistically significant. Originality/value The study isolates HASI’s inferential pathway by benchmarking it against the established affective pathway and specifies follower narcissism as a boundary condition at the stage where perceived status is translated into citizenship behavior.
Show more Read full article →
The emotional tax of financial insecurity: a dual-study examination of anger’s role in work behaviour
European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology I. M. “Jim” Jawahar, Bert H. J. Schreurs, Imke Dirkx October 01, 2026
Performance Selection & Assessment Health & Well-Being Networks
Financial insecurity, defined as a subjective appraisal that one’s financial resources are inadequate or unstable relative to current and anticipated demands, is an increasingly salient stressor with implications for work behaviour. Drawing on the stressor-emotion model, we argue that financial insecurity is associated with anger, which in turn relates to poorer workplace functioning. We tested this proposition in two multi-wave time-lagged studies. Study 1, a three-wave multi-source design with working university students in the United States (N = 190), showed that financial insecurity was indirectly associated with counterproductive work behaviour via anger, with weaker evidence for task performance. Study 2, a four-wave self-report design with full-time employees in Belgium (N = 189), replicated the indirect association between financial insecurity and counterproductive work behaviour through anger. These findings identify anger as an affective pathway linking financial insecurity to detrimental work outcomes, extend the stressor–emotion model to financial stressors, and highlight practical avenues through which organizations may mitigate the behavioural consequences of employees’ financial insecurity.
Show more Read full article →
Does Goal Orientation Make a Difference for Innovation Implementation? Moderating Roles of Implementation Autonomy and Perceived Ease of Use
Human Performance Se Yeon Choi, Xiao Qian, Jin Nam Choi, Hyun Sun Chung October 01, 2026
Research Methods Training & Development Motivation Job Design Job Attitudes
This study reconceptualizes innovation implementation as a continuum of behaviors, encompassing active, passive, and avoidant implementation, rather than a binary choice. These behaviors represent varying levels of employee engagement and are influenced by individual goal orientations and perceived contextual conditions. We tested our theoretical hypotheses by analyzing field data from 134 employees and their supervisors in a Chinese manufacturing firm. Our analysis shows that active implementation is strongly associated with learning goal orientation. By contrast, the effects of performance-prove goal orientation were contingent on perceived contextual factors: it was positively related to active implementation when implementation autonomy was high and positively related to passive implementation when perceived ease of use was high. Interestingly, performance-avoid goal orientation exhibited a negative relationship with passive implementation under the condition of high perceived ease of use. Notably, among the three implementation behaviors, only active implementation significantly enhanced innovation effectiveness. Overall, these findings underscore the pivotal roles of individual goal orientations and perceived contextual enablers in shaping innovation implementation behaviors and implementation outcomes.
Show more Read full article →
The revenue halo effect: How revenues and expenses asymmetrically affect perceptions of profitability
🔓
Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes Maria Giulia Trupia, Franklin Shaddy September 30, 2026
Performance Training & Development Research Methods Leadership Organizational Change
There are two primary ways to boost profits: increase revenues or decrease expenses. For example, whether a company increases revenues by $1 million or decreases expenses by $1 million, its profits will increase by $1 million (all else equal). But how do people subjectively evaluate such changes to revenues and expenses, and what inferences do they draw as a result? Across nine experiments ( N = 6045), an archival data analysis, and four supplemental studies, we document a robust “revenue halo” effect: increases in revenues, relative to equivalent decreases in expenses, lead to more positive perceptions of profitability, in both the short and long run, and result in more favorable overall impressions of financial strength, performance, potential, and trajectory. Consequently, managers who propose ideas for increasing revenues (vs. decreasing expenses) are viewed as more competent; consultants who develop such strategies are more likely to be rehired; and companies that report higher revenues are more attractive to investors. We furthermore propose that the revenue halo effect can be explained, in part, by the belief that strategies for increasing revenues are more innovative than strategies for decreasing expenses. Finally, to underscore the real-world relevance of our account, we analyze approximately 13 million financial news articles, finding that when firms reported increased revenues (vs. decreased expenses), they subsequently rose in Fortune 's “World's Most Admired Companies” rankings (the following year). This research identifies a novel asymmetry in judgments of organizational performance, with implications for managerial decision-making, corporate communication, and capital allocation.
Show more Read full article →
Phantom Networks: Window on Agency in Social Mechanisms
Organization Science Ronald S. Burt, Ray E. Reagans, Sonja Opper September 30, 2026
Networks Training & Development Performance Teams Motivation
Our goal is to offer proof of concept for the idea that behavioral networks emerging with and beyond assigned treatment networks in experiments can provide a valuable window on agency. We call these often unobserved behavioral structures phantom networks. Most evidence of agency is entangled with audience — what people recall, how others attribute, or who is seen to act. We strip that away to observe agency directly in the ties participants build within and beyond what they are assigned. Their deviation from assignment is not error but structure-in-action, a behavioral trace of agency. We offer three exhibits of that “behavioral deviation” revealing agency in gendered brokerage, rival brokerage, and structural reproduction. Across the three exhibits, behavioral deviation shows how a team works (sometimes in surprising ways), not how well the team works. Teams perform as expected in theory, but the behavior responsible for their performance is made more apparent by watching behavioral deviation. We close with a summary proof of concept and discussion of next steps for particularly promising future work
Show more Read full article →
To Settle or Not to Settle: Defending Firm Reputation in Litigation Response
Journal of Management Fei Li, He Gao, Qi Zhu, Matthew Semadeni September 30, 2026
Networks
Litigation can pose significant threats to a firm’s competitive advantage, requiring firms to respond strategically, particularly in deciding whether to settle. While prior research on litigation responses has primarily emphasized legal and economic drivers, it has paid limited attention to reputational considerations, offering an incomplete account of settlement decisions. Drawing on the theoretical mechanism of stakeholders’ situational expectations of the firm, we propose and show that a firm’s reputation for innovation is associated with a lower likelihood of settlement in patent litigation. We further find that this relationship is contingent on industry-level innovation intensity and plaintiff type. By examining how reputation shapes litigation responses, we make several important contributions to research on reputation and litigation.
Show more Read full article →
Improving employees’ job-stress mindset with an online micro-intervention: a randomized controlled study
🔓
European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology Anne Casper, Leon Toebben, Anja Isabel Morstatt, Alexander Pundt September 30, 2026
Health & Well-Being Research Methods Job Attitudes Selection & Assessment Performance
We tested the effectiveness of an online stress-mindset micro-intervention specific to job stress in a sample of 120 employees. We examined whether the intervention improves stress mindset, well-being, and cognitive appraisal. We randomly assigned participants to an intervention or control condition (i.e. alternative treatment or passive control group). Participants took part in the intervention at the beginning of the study and filled out another survey two weeks later. The intervention included a video about the benefits of stressful situations and a writing task. One half of the intervention group received a booster session after one week (intervention group with booster) and one half did not (intervention group without booster). Regression analyses showed that the intervention improved stress mindset right after intervention and two weeks later. We did not observe a fade-out effect. Both intervention groups reported reduced exhaustion and hindrance appraisal. Participants in the intervention group without booster reported a less pronounced decrease in work engagement and, contrary to expectations, a decrease in challenge appraisal compared to the passive control group. Our results imply that employees’ stress mindset can be improved with an online micro-intervention and that this intervention reduces employee exhaustion and hindrance appraisal.
Show more Read full article →
Tech Ready Yet Emotionally Drained: Unraveling the Multilevel Dynamics of Top Management Team Boundary Control and Formalization in Organizations
🔓
Group & Organization Management Aldijana Bunjak, Frederik Hesse, Matej Černe, Heike Bruch, Amadeja Lamovơek September 30, 2026
Teams Health & Well-Being Research Methods Training & Development Artificial Intelligence/Technology
Technological readiness (TR) is crucial in the contemporary digital work environment, although its relationship with employees’ well-being remains ambiguous. While TR is often assumed to benefit health by fostering both adaptability and competence, we question whether, and if so, under what conditions, it alleviates or exacerbates strain. Drawing on job demands–resources theory and upper echelons theory, we conceptualize TR as a personal resource and then develop and test a multilevel model in which its relationship with emotional exhaustion depends on unit-level formalization and organizational-level top management team boundary control (TMTBC). The findings of a large-scale, multi-source study of 2,267 employees nested in 1,547 units across 80 German small and medium-sized enterprises largely support our hypotheses, indicating that although TR is conceptualized as a personal resource, its association with emotional exhaustion depends on the interplay of unit-level structures and organizational-level norms. More specifically, TR is associated with higher levels of emotional exhaustion if it is not supported by formalization and TMTBC. From a practical perspective, we provide guidance for organizations on how to effectively leverage TR while remaining mindful that it may be associated with higher levels of emotional exhaustion among employees.
Show more Read full article →
Men as allies at work: Behaviours, motives and outcomes of workplace gender allyship
🔓
Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology Anca M. Miron, Nyla R. Branscombe, Cristinel Ababei, Adelia C. Ehrlich, Sylvia Peterson, et al. September 29, 2026
Motivation Training & Development Diversity & Inclusion Organizational Change HR Systems & Talent Management
Abstract Despite growing interest in workplace gender allyship, little is known about how allyship manifests in everyday organizational practice. Understanding workplace gender allyship requires identifying not only what men employees do during their everyday workplace interactions, but also why they do it and what outcomes those behaviours are perceived to have. Using qualitative survey data from open‐ended critical incident reports and descriptive frequency analyses, we examined the workplace allyship experiences of 85 working men (45 managers and 40 non‐managers). Our analyses revealed a typology of enacted and recommended allyship behaviours encompassing three overarching categories: support behaviours (providing instrumental, emotional and social support and mentoring), social change behaviours (advocacy, promoting organizational change, acting as a social change agent and confronting sexism), and self‐education . Although both managers and non‐managers were motivated by moral obligation and social justice concerns, managers were more strongly motivated by job‐related motives, whereas non‐managers more often emphasized empathic concern for women coworkers. Workplace allyship was associated with meaningful benefits for women, whereas participants reported relatively few negative consequences for themselves. These findings provide an empirically grounded framework linking allyship behaviours, motives and outcomes, with implications for employee training and organizational interventions.
Show more Read full article →
Linking Leader Overqualification to Employee Organizational Citizenship Behaviors Toward the Leader: A Personal Identification Process Model
🔓
Journal of Organizational Behavior Yuanyuan Gong, Fang Liu, Junbang Lan, Cao Zhang, Chun Hui, et al. September 29, 2026
Individual Differences Leadership Performance Networks
ABSTRACT Overqualification has important implications not only for the overqualified but also those who work under the overqualified. Leaders are an influential source of self‐identity for followers and employee‐perceived leader overqualification impacts how followers view themselves and behave to the overqualified leader. Perceived leader overqualification, however, has both positive and negative impacts on followers. Yet, research on effects of follower perceived leader overqualification is limited. From an identification construction perspective, and drawing on personal identification (PI) process model, we theorize that perceiving a leader as overqualified can strengthen followers' identification with that leader and, in turn, their organizational citizenship behavior directed toward the leader (OCBL). Because identification depends on how followers construe a leader's attributes in relation to their own self‐concept, we position follower narcissism as a boundary condition. We argue that narcissistic admiration strengthens the positive link between perceived leader overqualification and leader identification, whereas narcissistic rivalry weakens it, producing divergent indirect effects on OCBL. Results from one vignette‐based experiment in the United States and two multi‐wave, multi‐source surveys in China consistently support this moderated‐mediation model. The findings reposition overqualification as a relationally consequential leader attribute and clarify when, and for whom, it elicits rather than undermines supportive follower behavior.
Show more Read full article →
The shape of recovery activities: A person-centered study of evening recovery activity profiles, their work antecedents, and outcomes.
🔓
Journal of Applied Psychology Khalid M. Alameer, Ute Regina Hulsheger, M Wang, Sabine Sonnentag, Jan Schepers, et al. September 28, 2026
Health & Well-Being Selection & Assessment Networks Research Methods
= 321, 1,780 observations), we assessed to what extent these profiles replicated in an independent sample and extended the investigation by including work-related antecedents and next-day work outcomes. Results indicated that daily recovery activities cluster together into identifiable profiles that largely replicated across samples. The identified profiles exhibited unique relationships with recovery experiences, well-being, and work outcomes. Our findings add to the recovery literature by illustrating the merits of considering profiles of recovery activities and their characteristics rather than studying recovery activities in isolation. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
A meta-analytic examination of the criterion-related validity and cognitive loading associated with traditional and new situational judgment test paradigms.
🔓
Journal of Applied Psychology Filip Lievens, You Zhou, Jomel Wei Xuan Ng, Liyan Xi, Yixin Tian, et al. September 28, 2026
Measurement & Psychometrics Selection & Assessment Performance Training & Development Research Methods
Traditionally, situational judgment tests (SJTs) include text-based situations and ask candidates to pick the best and worst response option.Over the years, various new SJT paradigms have been developed to increase validity, reduce incidental cognitive load, and/or lower costs.Examples are multimedia SJTs, constructed response SJTs, and single-response SJTs.First, this study investigates how the traditional SJT paradigm performs in terms of criterion-related validity by updating prior meta-analyses.Second, this study provides initial, meta-analytic evidence on the criterion-related validity and cognitive load of several new SJT paradigms.On the basis of 457 independent samples from 302 studies (total N = 244,257), results showed that SJTs were not only predictive of job performance but also of academic performance, organizational citizenship behavior, and counterproductive work behavior.SJT validity was higher in operational (i.e., applicant) settings than in nonoperational settings and could also be expanded to new content (e.g., emotion and cross-cultural management).In terms of comparing traditional and new SJT paradigms, multimedia SJTs had validity equal to text-based ones but lower cognitive load.Importantly, the multiple-choice modality did not significantly outperform written constructed response modalities in terms of validity, and the cognitive loading of webcamconstructed responses was even lower than that of other response modalities.The implications of these findings are among others discussed in the context of the cost effectiveness of SJTs vis-Ă -vis other selection procedures.
Show more Read full article →
Incremental advantage of extraversion and neuroticism facets in predicting state work engagement
🔓
Journal of Business and Psychology Lida P. Ponce, Seth A. Kaplan, Reeshad Sam Dalal, JeongJin Kim, Nicholas A. Moon, et al. September 28, 2026
Individual Differences Job Attitudes Artificial Intelligence/Technology Organizational Culture
Abstract We extend the literature on personality dynamics and state work engagement by examining whether facets of state extraversion and neuroticism incrementally predict state work engagement beyond state domain personality (and other conceptually related covariates). This research contributes to the literature on state engagement and state personality by highlighting the dynamic and unique predictive potential of particular state facets for day-to-day engagement and its respective dimensions. Using a daily diary design, we collected data from 95 full-time employees over the course of 10 workdays (804 daily observations). Results indicated that state extraversion and neuroticism facets were related to overall state work engagement and that the facets predicted both broad and narrow (i.e., dimensions of) state work engagement beyond state domain personality. Specifically, state assertiveness predicted state work engagement beyond lagged engagement, state extraversion, and state positive affect. Similarly, state anxiety predicted state work engagement beyond lagged engagement, state neuroticism, and state negative affect. These findings further support the idea that state personality has predictive value for important dynamic workplace outcomes and extends this conclusion to state personality facets.
Show more Read full article →
Disruption, emotion, and self-management: a temporal framework for sustainable career outcomes – a systematic review
🔓
Work & Stress Ton Tol, Inge C. M. van Seggelen-Damen, Annet H. de Lange, Jol Stoffers September 28, 2026
Social Responsibility Training & Development Research Methods Motivation
This systematic review synthesised 128 peer-reviewed studies (2017 – early 2025) to examine how unplanned, disruptive events may relate to emotions, psychological and behavioural self-management processes, and sustainable career outcomes over time. Existing research insufficiently addressed how disruptive events affect careers and only a few studies considered the role of emotions. While deliberate thinking plays a key role in career shocks, psychological aspects are often overlooked since self-management is typically viewed as an aggregation of behaviours, which hinders research. Our synthesis differentiates psychological self-management (e.g. self-reflection and resilience) from behavioural self-management, including mobilising social support and goal setting. The synthesis indicates that workers’ appraisals of disruptive events may be associated with discrete emotional responses that appear to shape adaptation efforts and opportunity seeking. Initial disruption demands immediate attention, whereas subsequent stabilisation may create space to reflect on long-term career goals, pointing to career development as a gradual process. This review underscores the importance of supportive organisational resources in fostering resilience and adaptability. This study presents a framework detailing how emotions, self-management, and career outcomes reciprocally interact over time, providing insight into sustainable career development during periods of disruption. We related these findings to prior research and suggested directions for future research.
Show more Read full article →
“Clean” Meat? Regulatory Entrepreneurship and Jurisdictional Contestation in a Nascent Industry
🔓
Administrative Science Quarterly Cheng Gao, Alicia DeSantola, Nina Guilbeault September 28, 2026
Selection & Assessment Networks
In nascent industries, uncertainty about which regulatory agency has jurisdiction is often a major challenge for pioneering ventures. Yet, much of the literature on new ventures’ nonmarket strategy takes for granted the existence of a designated regulator. How do ventures manage regulatory jurisdictional uncertainty? We conduct an inductive, multi-case research study on how entrepreneurial organizations pioneering the nascent cell-cultivated-meat industry navigated such uncertainty in the United States between 2015 and 2019. Drawing on extensive semi-structured interviews and archival data, we uncover stratagems and processes that organizations employ across three phases of regulatory jurisdictional uncertainty: jurisdictional void, contestation, and convergence. Our resulting theoretical framework distinguishes two overarching strategies— complementary and oppositional —and unpacks their underlying mechanisms, theorizing how they enable organizations to influence jurisdictional uncertainty. Our study uniquely elucidates the rich dynamics among the disparate actors that compose nascent technology-enabled industries: new ventures, nonprofits, incumbents, investors, and regulators. More broadly, it provides a fresh perspective on how entrepreneurial organizations shape the regulatory architecture of the industries they are striving to create.
Show more Read full article →
Using Web-Scraped Microdata: Methodological Challenges Following a Change in Data Collection Procedures Using a Glassdoor Example
🔓
Group & Organization Management Alex Cardazzi, Sheila K. Keener, Nathapon Max Siangchokyoo, Andrew Bennett September 28, 2026
Organizational Change Research Methods Job Attitudes
Datasets created from microdata (i.e., publicly available individual-level data) can be incredibly beneficial for researchers investigating changes in group-level attributes and attitudes over time.One advantage of these datasets
Show more Read full article →
From Individual Advancement to Structural Conditions: Reframing Leadership Development
🔓
Human Resource Management Michele L. Heath, Jamila Maxie, Anwesha Choudhury September 27, 2026
Training & Development Leadership HR Systems & Talent Management Organizational Culture Diversity & Inclusion
ABSTRACT Low‐wage workers represent a significant segment of the organizational workforce, yet they remain largely absent from leadership development research and practice. These workers routinely face barriers such as limited access to development opportunities and occupational stigma. However, leadership development research has primarily emphasized individual readiness and human capital, paying too little attention to how leadership systems shape access to development. Drawing on Scarcity Theory and Pierre Bourdieu's Theory, we argue that leadership development operates as a classed system influenced by both material constraints and cultural expectations. These dynamics disadvantage low‐wage workers whose everyday leadership contributions often go unrecognized. We contribute to human resource management scholarship by integrating social class and scarcity into leadership development research by showing how economic precarity and class‐based norms jointly shape limited access to leadership development for the low‐wage worker. The proposed conceptual model reframes leadership development as a more inclusive talent management practice capable of leveraging a broader range of organizational expertise. We conclude by outlining future research directions on how HR systems can reduce structural barriers and expand leadership pathways for low‐wage workers.
Show more Read full article →
Formative and Reflective Measurement Models in Workplace Learning Research: A Critical Review and Guidelines
🔓
Human Resource Development Quarterly Josef Guggemos, Michael Göller September 27, 2026
Training & Development Measurement & Psychometrics Selection & Assessment Networks Research Methods
ABSTRACT Quantitative empirical research in workplace learning regularly makes use of measurement instruments that operationalize theoretical constructs. However, in domains related to workplace learning, high levels of measurement model misspecifications—up to 62% of all cases—have been identified. In most cases, formative measurement models, where indicators cause the construct, are erroneously specified as reflective, where the construct causes the indicators. This can significantly bias estimates, distort structural relationships, and, consequentially, compromise the validity of research findings. However, in workplace learning research there is currently no evidence available regarding the level of measurement model misspecification. To address this need for research, we systematically reassess 325 unique measurement instruments derived from 92 studies identified in a prior qualitative meta‐synthesis. Using two distinct coding strategies—a conservative coding and a majority coding—we evaluate the extent to which formative measurement models have been misspecified as reflective. Results indicate that between 34.8% and 50.2% of instruments are misspecified in this way, depending on the coding approach. Based on this, we provide guidelines to support researchers in selecting and evaluating measurement models. Our study advances the methodological rigor of workplace learning research and contributes to the broader discourse on improving construct validity in basic and applied research contexts.
Show more Read full article →
Closing the Gap, Carrying the Burden: How Gender and Prosocial Motivation Shape Workplace Recognition
🔓
Personnel Psychology Hanho Lee, Jia Jasmine Hu, Pengcheng Zhang September 25, 2026
Motivation Networks Diversity & Inclusion Performance Research Methods
ABSTRACT Despite progress toward gender equity, women remain disadvantaged in gaining workplace recognition. We theorize that prosocial motivation helps women achieve parity in workplace recognition by providing a role‐congruent path to becoming valued advice sources. Drawing on social role theory and role congruity theory, we propose that women are less likely than men to occupy central positions in advice networks, but that high prosocial motivation closes this gap. Advice centrality, in turn, functions as a peer‐conferred signal of workplace recognition that supports leadership emergence and performance ratings. Across a time‐lagged, multi‐source field study and two online experiments, we find support for this model. Study 1 ( n = 275) shows that women occupy less central positions in advice networks than men, but that high prosocial motivation closes this gap. Advice network centrality further mediates the interactive effects of gender and prosocial motivation on leadership emergence and performance ratings. Two online experiments (Study 2a, n = 247; Study 2b, n = 248) provide converging causal evidence for these effects. These findings show that prosocial motivation helps women achieve parity with men in workplace recognition, while raising the possibility that such parity may rest on demands that fall asymmetrically on women.
Show more Read full article →
Age-inclusive AI assessments: testing and refining open-ended prompts with human and LLM-simulated data
🔓
Journal of Business and Psychology Jingyi Li, Daphne Xin Hou, Louis Tay September 25, 2026
Selection & Assessment Artificial Intelligence/Technology Diversity & Inclusion Measurement & Psychometrics Performance
As workforces become increasingly age-diverse, organizations are increasingly adopting AI-based tools, such as automated video interviews (AVIs) and chatbots, to evaluate job applicants. Although prior research has documented age-related differences in communication styles, we know less about how these differences appear in AI-based assessments or whether the design of the assessment can reduce them. Across two studies, we examined age-related differences in how people responded to AVI prompts (i.e., interview questions) and whether changing the wording of prompts could make these assessments more age inclusive. In Study 1, we compared linguistic patterns in AVI responses among workers aged 18 to 66 + years or older. After controlling for education, gender, race, SES, and self-reported personality and vocational interest scores, the findings revealed significant age-related differences in semantic content (i.e., what people talked about) and language complexity (i.e., how complex their language was). In Study 2, we used ChatGPT to simulate AI personas representing workers of different ages and used these personas to test revised AVI prompts. Results demonstrated that prompt wording can meaningfully influence the magnitude and pattern of age-related linguistic differences, with some differences attenuated and others maintained. These findings suggest that prompt design may play an important role in making AI-based assessments more inclusive. We discuss the implications of the findings for understanding age-related differences in language and for designing fairer and more valid AI-based assessment tools.
Show more Read full article →
When and Why Do Leaders Endorse Radical Ideas? A Transactional Theory of Stress Perspective
🔓
Journal of Organizational Behavior Xuting Jiang, Chak Fu Lam, Yaping Gong, Wenxing Liu September 25, 2026
Health & Well-Being Leadership Networks Performance Individual Differences
ABSTRACT Extant research has focused on the strategies that employees use to obtain leaders' endorsement of creative ideas that vary in radicalness, overlooking the possibility that these employee‐centric factors may backfire by increasing leaders' sense of threat. Drawing on the transactional theory of stress, we offer a leader‐centric perspective by identifying leader creative personality as a resource that influences when creative ideas with varying radicalness levels are more or less likely to be endorsed. We predict that (1) idea radicalness will exhibit a negative indirect relationship with endorsement through increased leader threat appraisal when leader creative personality is low, and (2) idea radicalness will have a positive indirect relationship with endorsement through increased leader challenge appraisal when leader creative personality is high. Results from a three‐wave field study of 167 leader–employee dyads showed that the indirect relationship between idea radicalness and endorsement was negative via increased leader threat appraisal when leader creative personality was low, and the indirect relationship was positive via decreased leader threat appraisal when leader creative personality was high. A scenario‐based experiment with 300 leader participants replicated the negative indirect relationship between idea radicalness and endorsement via leader threat appraisal when leader creative personality was low. Our findings suggest the importance of addressing leaders' threat appraisals of radical ideas, and we provide insights into how organizations can effectively leverage employees' radical ideas by managing leaders' sense of threat.
Show more Read full article →
Book Review: Ilana Redstone. The Certainty Trap: Why We Need to Question Ourselves More—and How We Can Judge Others Less RedstoneI. (2024). The certainty trap: Why we need to question ourselves more—and how we can judge others less. Pitchstone Publishing. 248 pp. ISBN 9781634312561.
🔓
Administrative Science Quarterly Rellie Rachel Derfler-Rozin September 25, 2026
Training & Development Motivation Conflict Performance Job Attitudes
To state that we live in troubled and deeply polarized times in the United States and other countries has become almost a cliché.The underlying conditions that give rise to this observation remain pressing: Political and social discourse increasingly oscillates between extremes, hate crimes are on the rise (Farrell & Lockwood, 2023), and trust in institutions (Brady & Kent, 2022), including educational institutions, has eroded over time. 1 As a scholar who has researched and taught negotiation and conflict resolution for more than a decade, I found this book to be particularly timely.Research on dialogue and conflict resolution has largely emphasized the importance of civic discourse (e.g., Weaver et al., 2023), perspective-taking (e.g., Longmire & Harrison, 2018), and understanding the moral foundations underlying political disagreement (Graham et al., 2013).Several of these approaches, particularly Moral Foundations Theory and the emphasis on moral humility, intersect with arguments advanced in Redstone's book.At the same time, the book departs in important ways from dominant assumptions in the literature.Redstone contends that encouraging respectful discourse, while necessary, is insufficient for conflict resolution.Instead, she advocates engaging in deeper introspection, with particular emphasis on cultivating comfort with uncertainty.This emphasis on uncertainty represents a notable departure from scholarship on the motivation for resolving and reducing uncertainty (e.g., FeldmanHall & Shenhav, 2019).Redstone's argument is compelling: The contexts in which uncertainty feels most intolerable-discussions of highly charged social and political issues-are precisely those in which embracing uncertainty is most essential.A related departure from existing research is her claim that combating misinformation and disinformation, while important, should not be the primary focus of efforts to reduce polarization.Instead, she suggests that learning to live with uncertainty addresses the deeper source of the problem and may, as a secondary effect, enhance individuals' ability to evaluate and discern information.Redstone uses examples from both the political right and left, coupled with her insistence that no group holds moral superiority.She emphasizes the shared responsibility of recognizing the certainty trap and taking steps to avoid it.Redstone articulates the certainty trap through three interrelated fallacies: the settled question fallacy, the fallacy of equal knowledge, and the fallacy of known intent.The settled question fallacy refers to the tendency to treat complex issues as though they have already been conclusively resolved.Resisting this fallacy requires the ability to ask questions openly without being demonized (p.11).Importantly, Redstone emphasizes that rejecting the settled question fallacy does notBook Review 1488839A
Show more Read full article →
The Asymmetric Nature of Social Hierarchies: Unpacking the Dynamic Relationship Between Power and Status
Organization Science Rebecca L. Mitchell, James Garrett Matusik, Nicholas A. Hays September 25, 2026
Networks Training & Development Teams Research Methods Performance
Scholars and practitioners alike have long presumed that power and status, two foundational bases of social hierarchy, share a symmetric, mutually reinforcing relationship. However, support for this presumption has largely taken the form of theoretical accounts due to the prevalence of static research designs and a dearth of dynamic methodology in organizational research. Drawing on the Dual Perspective Model, we propose that one’s status is more likely to drive changes in one’s power than vice versa because status has a stronger connection to communion—an important component of interpersonal evaluations—than does power, and communality is an important predictor of both power and status. Using data from two studies involving project teams and a contemporary methodology from developmental psychology for modeling dynamic relationships (bivariate dual change score models), we illustrate that there is indeed a mutually reinforcing relationship between power and status over time, but this relationship is asymmetric. In three additional experiments, we find that perceptions of communality explain this asymmetry. We also find similar effects whether power is formal—attached to a position or role—or involves control over informal resources. Across all studies, we find that the path from status to changes in power is stronger than the path from power to changes in status.
Show more Read full article →
When the market moves: How stock market fluctuations shape risk-related behaviors at work.
Journal of Applied Psychology Joseph K. Kim, Joel Koopman, Kyoung Yong Kim, Ran Ahn, Youngduk Lee September 24, 2026
Research Methods Performance Motivation Job Attitudes Training & Development
How employees' personal stock holdings perform during the day has become increasingly visible and accessible, yet research has rarely examined how fluctuations in those holdings shape employees' experiences at work. Integrating cross-domain spillover and regulatory focus theories, we propose that morning fluctuation in personal stock holdings spills over into the workplace by influencing employees' risk propensity-their willingness to take or avoid risks-and, in turn, their risk-related workplace behaviors. Specifically, drawing from regulatory focus theory, we propose that a more positive (vs. negative) fluctuation in personal stock holdings than usual is associated with subsequent increases (vs. decreases) in employees' willingness to engage in risk. In a 10-day experience sampling study of full-time employees who personally invest in the South Korean stock market, a more positive morning fluctuation in stock holding value than they typically experience predicted higher state risk propensity, which subsequently led to greater risk-taking behavior and voice. These indirect effects were moderated by long-term orientation, such that employees lower (vs. higher) in long-term orientation showed greater sensitivity to morning fluctuation in stock holding value. We then conducted two complementary experiments that supported the theorized regulatory focus mechanism by demonstrating that more positive fluctuation in personal stock holdings elicited promotion focus, whereas more negative fluctuation heightened prevention focus, and that these motivational states subsequently shaped employees' willingness to engage in risk. Together, these findings highlight employees' personal stock holdings as an overlooked source of daily behavioral variability at work. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
Creative idea evaluation affects trust in decision-makers: the interpersonal consequences of creative idea recognition (failure)
🔓
European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology Velvetina Lim, Verena Krause, Joshua H. Katz September 23, 2026
Performance Networks Research Methods Health & Well-Being
Despite organizations espousing a desire for creative ideas, decision-makers often do not recognize creative ideas and reject them. We ask what the consequences of creative idea recognition failure are for the relationship between the idea generator (as well as others who witness the failure) and the decision-maker. We theorize and show in two experiments that idea generators and third-party observers trust a decision-maker less when the decision-maker fails to recognize a creative idea, because they view the decision-maker as less competent. This effect holds when we manipulate the idea’s creativity (Study 1), use participants’ subjective perceptions of the idea’s creativity (Studies 1 and 2), and when using creativity ratings by external raters (Study 2). Additionally, we also demonstrate that idea generators and third-party observers trust a decision-maker more when the decision-maker recognizes a creative idea, because they view the decision-maker as more competent. This effect only consistently emerges when using participants’ subjective creativity perceptions. We also find perceived warmth as a parallel mediator, but only when using participants’ subjective creativity perceptions. Finally, we demonstrate that these effects are not solely due to accuracy or surprise. We discuss the theoretical implications of these findings and provide directions for future research.
Show more Read full article →
Beyond Good and Bad: Understanding the Contradictory Effects of Positive Leadership Behavior and Negative Leadership Behavior
Journal of Management Haoying Xu, Xing Wang, Daan van Knippenberg September 22, 2026
Leadership Performance Motivation Training & Development Social Responsibility
Organizational scholarship has long focused on leadership behavior, largely assuming that “good” and “bad” leaders can be distinguished by distinct sets of behaviors that can be organized into constructs with an inherent positive or negative valence (e.g., transformational, ethical, abusive). This assumption has guided extensive construct development and generated a substantial body of evidence consistent with each leadership construct’s expected valence. Yet, emerging research has documented the “dark side” of positive leadership and the “bright side” of negative leadership, revealing effects that contradict these expectations—effects that we call leadership contradictory effects. Despite growing interest in this line of research, the literature remains fragmented, with limited clarity regarding its scope and little theoretical integration explaining why, how, and when such effects occur. This motivates our review, which synthesizes these fragmented findings into a cohesive theoretical account organized around shared themes that cut across leadership constructs. First, we define leadership contradictory effects and review major approaches to operationalize them. Then, we advance an integrative framework that delineates three major theoretical themes, their associated theories, and three categories of boundary conditions to explain why, how, and when leadership contradictory effects arise. Finally, we propose paths forward, including suggestions to guide future research in this emerging domain. Overall, our work reorients scholars and points them beyond valence-based assumptions about leadership effects as a means to explore a broader range of consequences.
Show more Read full article →
Partitioning menus to nudge single-item choice
🔓
Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes David Tannenbaum, Craig R. Fox, Noah J. Goldstein September 21, 2026
Selection & Assessment Performance Health & Well-Being Teams Diversity & Inclusion
Decision makers are often called on to choose a single item from a menu of options: employees pick health plans from provider-sponsored lists, citizens vote for a representative among candidates, physicians select a treatment from an order set. Because options are often organized or grouped into subsets, the question arises whether the grouping of menu items affects the options ultimately selected by decision makers. Across ten experiments, we provide robust evidence of single-item partition dependence — decision makers are more likely to choose from response categories that are more finely partitioned, holding the underlying set of options constant. For example, an employee choosing a health plan from a menu that lists HMOs individually but groups PPOs into a single category with sub-options may be biased toward choosing an HMO. Unlike prior work on multi-item allocation decisions, the traditional explanation of partition dependence — a bias toward even allocation — cannot apply to single-item choice, because singular choices are not divisible. Instead, we find that finer partitions receive greater choice share because decision makers infer that separately listed options are more popular on average than grouped ones. More broadly, strategic partitioning of the menu space may serve as a simple and effective tool for managers, policymakers, and choice architects: listing options separately rather than grouping them together tends to increase their choice share, without fundamentally altering the underlying set of alternatives or the effort required to choose among them.
Show more Read full article →
Passing on Talent: A Generativity Perspective on the Effects of Perceived Overqualification Among Older Employees
Journal of Management Jia Yu, Deshani Buddhika Ganegoda, Chao Ma September 21, 2026
Performance Motivation Selection & Assessment Job Attitudes Leadership
Drawing on generativity theory, we examine the positive effects of perceived overqualification among older employees. Specifically, we argue that perceptions of overqualification in older employees are positively associated with a core generativity motive—that is, a desire to support and guide the next generation and be needed by them. Further, we argue that generativity motive predicts prosocial attitudes and behaviors in the form of prosocial meaning of work for future generations and helping behavior. Additionally, we identify mature-age practices—that is, human resource practices tailored to address older employees’ needs—as a key contextual factor that strengthens the indirect pathway between perceptions of overqualification in older employees and their prosocial attitudes and behaviors. We test and find support for our hypotheses in two independent field studies—a three-wave field study of older employees (Study 1, N = 261) and a dyadic three-wave field study of employees of various ages and their respective supervisors (Study 2, N = 274 dyads). Theoretical and practical implications of our study are discussed.
Show more Read full article →
Think political leader — think he or she? A multi-country test of a gender-fair language intervention to reduce gendered leadership stereotypes
🔓
Leadership Quarterly Kim Peters, Alma Jeftić, Timothy Ballard, Steven Zhou, Niklas K. Steffens, et al. September 21, 2026
Diversity & Inclusion Leadership Selection & Assessment Organizational Change Individual Differences
Women are greatly underrepresented in positions of political leadership around the world. In seeking to explain this underrepresentation, some researchers have pointed to people's tendencies to stereotype leaders as more similar to men than women as these tendencies can support the belief that women are unsuited to leadership. This project aimed to test whether a subtle linguistic intervention was able to ameliorate this gender bias in political leadership stereotypes across different languages and national contexts (country/region N = 42, language N = 30, sample N = 22,996). Specifically, this project examined whether gender-fair language (e.g., the use of paired pronouns ‘he or she’) can reduce the tendency for people to stereotype political leaders as more similar to men than women. To increase the rigor with which these stereotypes were measured, this project complemented the dominant ‘cheap talk’ measure of personal stereotype content with an incentivised community measure of this content. As expected, participants stereotyped political leaders as more similar to men than women; this pattern was stronger on the incentivised measure of community stereotypes. Unexpectedly, there was no evidence that paired pronouns reduced this bias (there was weak exploratory evidence that paired nouns increased participants' tendencies to stereotype political leaders as more similar to women). This project suggests that the ability of gender-fair language interventions to ameliorate gender bias in the political leadership domain may be limited.
Show more Read full article →
Revealing the divide: Differential impact of inclusive leadership on marginalized and dominant group members
🔓
Leadership Quarterly Wei Zheng, Haoying Xu, Ronit Kark September 21, 2026
Diversity & Inclusion Teams Leadership Training & Development Research Methods
There have been increasing pushbacks against diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts in society and organizations, revealing a deepening divide across social groups. Although inclusive leadership has been linked to positive outcomes, existing research has three critical limitations. First, research has yet to adequately account for the role of diversity in defining inclusive leadership and in shaping followers' responses to inclusive leadership. Second, prominent definitions often conflate inclusive leadership behaviors with their intentions or effects, blurring cause-effect distinctions, thereby generating overly positive findings that limit clarity about when, how, and for whom inclusive leadership may generate benefits or risks. Third, much of the empirical literature remains vulnerable to endogeneity threats, which undermine causal inferences about the impact of inclusive leadership. Aiming to address these issues, we draw on signaling theory to develop a diversity-sensitive, behavior-based reconceptualization of inclusive leadership grounded in prior literature. We further advance a conceptual model explaining how inclusive leadership differentially affects marginalized and dominant group members. By doing so, we help enhance conceptual precision and contextual sensitivity in inclusive leadership research. We also provide a roadmap that can enable stronger causal tests of inclusive leadership.
Show more Read full article →
Artificial Agents as Leaders and Followers: An Integrative Role-Congruity Review
🔓
Group & Organization Management Christoph Daldrop, Annabelle Ludwig, Claudia Buengeler September 21, 2026
Leadership Artificial Intelligence/Technology Performance Training & Development Diversity & Inclusion
Artificial agents such as algorithms, virtual agents, and robots increasingly occupy organizational roles as leaders, followers, and partners. However, evidence on how people evaluate these nonhuman role occupants is mixed. We systematically review 107 empirical studies across management, psychology, engineering, and computer science through a role-congruity lens. A consistent pattern emerges: Artificial agents in leader roles face role incongruity, driven largely by perceived deficits in morality (e.g., fairness, trustworthiness). Agents in follower roles are evaluated as largely congruent with role expectations. Agents in partner and teammate roles show conditional congruity that depends on task context and design-based social cues (e.g., appearance, voice). We integrate these patterns into the Artificial Agent Role Congruity (AARC) model, a conceptual model that extends role congruity theory to artificial agents: perceived role (in)congruity occurs when observers compare role prescriptions with the attributes they ascribe to an agent from its design-based cues along a task dimension (competence, assertiveness) and a social-emotional dimension (warmth, morality). Based on this synthesis, we outline theoretical extensions, an agenda for future research, and guidance for managers and designers deploying artificial agents in organizational roles.
Show more Read full article →
Who Benefits From Compressed Workweeks? The Role of Job Autonomy and Task Interdependence in Shaping Longitudinal Changes
Journal of Organizational Behavior Inchul Cho, YoungAh Park, Yijue Liang, Nanhee Kim September 20, 2026
Job Design Performance Organizational Change Research Methods HR Systems & Talent Management
ABSTRACT Compressed workweeks (CWW)—compressing the regular 5‐day workweek into fewer workdays—are gaining global popularity as an alternative work arrangement for jobs that are not suitable for remote work. Yet research on CWW has stagnated over the last decade, leaving us with little evidence and knowledge about whether and under which conditions CWW brings about positive changes over time. To revitalize research on CWW and provide insights for theory advancement and effective practices, longitudinal data were collected over 6 months ( N = 147), both before and after implementation of CWW. Using conservation of resources (COR) theory, the work redesign literature, and growth curve modeling, this research reveals theoretically and practically meaningful patterns of change in employees' outcomes after CWW implementation. Specifically, significant decreases in stress and increases in health were observed among employees with greater job autonomy but not among those with lower job autonomy. Interestingly, for employees with lower job autonomy, perceived organizational support decreased over time; the same was not true for those with higher autonomy. Moreover, task performance increased for employees with less interdependent tasks, but not for those performing highly interdependent tasks. Therefore, organizations should carefully consider important job characteristics when designing and implementing CWW.
Show more Read full article →
Explaining Uneven and Reversible Gender Equality Outcomes: A Relational Open‐Systems Perspective on Gender Diversity and Inclusion in Multinational Corporations
🔓
Human Resource Management Fang Lee Cooke, Chidozie Umeh, Qijie Xiao, Xiji Zhu September 20, 2026
Diversity & Inclusion Training & Development Selection & Assessment Performance Individual Differences
ABSTRACT Multinational corporations (MNCs) increasingly adopt common gender diversity and inclusion (GDI) policies, yet gender equality outcomes continue to diverge across subsidiaries and may stall or reverse as institutional and political conditions change. Existing human resource management (HRM) research offers important accounts of policy design, transfer, performance rationales, and individual experience, but provides less integrated explanation of how cross‐border institutional pressures are translated into organizational rules that allocate opportunity, recognition, mobility, protection, and status. We develop a relational open‐systems perspective on GDI in MNCs. Open systems theory provides the architecture for conceptualizing GDI as embedded, interdependent, and feedback‐driven, while relational inequality theory specifies how categorization, social closure, and relational claims‐making shape resource allocation within that system. Intersectionality operates as a cross‐cutting logic that conditions actors' positions, power, and claim legitimacy across institutional and organizational settings. The resulting framework explains how formally similar GDI arrangements can generate substantive inclusion, selective advancement, symbolic maintenance, persistent exclusion, or retrenchment across subsidiaries. The paper contributes by linking the evolution and adaptation of multinational HRM systems to the concrete organizational relations through which differentiated gender equality outcomes are produced and revised over time.
Show more Read full article →
Leisure under lock: cognitive activation and motivation erosion as mechanisms undermining experiential quality of leisure time
🔓
Work & Stress Rosine L. J. Rutten, Wilken Wehrt September 19, 2026
Motivation Research Methods Job Attitudes Health & Well-Being Selection & Assessment
Most people switch between work and nonwork roles daily. Past research shows that work stressors can impair micro-role transitions from work to nonwork by activating work-related cognitions. However, motivational processes may be equally important for understanding why psychologically transitioning into nonwork roles fails. Therefore, we examine motivation erosion (i.e. reduced leisure-related self-efficacy) alongside cognitive activation (i.e. increased negative work prospection) as parallel processes interfering with successful transitioning from the work role to nonwork roles. Accordingly, in a preregistered 14-day diary study with morning and after-work measurements, we examined the effects of daily unfinished tasks and anticipated workload on evening experiential quality of leisure time (i.e. the extent to which free time is pleasurable, meaningful, and engaging) via increased negative work prospection and diminished leisure-related self-efficacy. In addition, we tested job involvement, trait mindfulness, and psychological flexibility as cross-level moderators. Dynamic multilevel structural equation model path results (N = 179, n = 1,849) support all hypotheses. Additionally, we found that psychological flexibility offsets the negative effect of unfinished tasks on leisure-related self-efficacy. Our findings highlight that work demands spilling over into nonwork time affects leisure time experiences, impacting daily quality of life through a cognitive, as well as a motivational mechanism.
Show more Read full article →
Extended Responses in Asynchronous Video Interviews: Investigating Antecedents, Content, and Consequences
🔓
International Journal of Selection and Assessment Koralie Orji, Adrian Bangerter, Elisabeth Germanier, Laetitia Aurelie Renier, Marianne Schmid Mast September 19, 2026
Selection & Assessment Performance Job Attitudes Individual Differences HR Systems & Talent Management
ABSTRACT Past‐behavior questions prompt interviewees to recount past work experiences as stories. Telling a good story, however, typically relies on feedback from the audience. In asynchronous video interviews (AVIs), which lack real‐time interaction, interviewees often produce extended responses , continuing to speak after an identifiable point of closure in their response. This behavior may be influenced by longer response‐time limits and the absence of interviewer feedback. Using data from 114 mock AVIs, this study examined the prevalence and antecedents (individual differences) of extended responding, its content (i.e., disfluencies and storytelling), and its consequences for interview evaluations (i.e., performance, engagement, persuasiveness) and honest impression management. Over 75% of participants produced at least one extended response. Emotionality was positively associated with extended responding. Compared with initial responses, extended responses included more pauses but not more fillers. Extended responses contained more utterances about results and values/opinions, whereas initial responses contained more situational and task/action utterances. Extended responding was positively related to honest self‐promotion. Performance and persuasiveness ratings were higher for initial responses than for overall (initial + extended) responses. While extended responding is common in AVIs, it appears to provide limited benefits and was associated with less favorable performance and persuasiveness ratings.
Show more Read full article →
Predicting leadership self-concepts: The role of memory in processing self-relevant and relational events
🔓
Journal of Business and Psychology Yue Fu, Robert G. Lord, Susanne Braun September 18, 2026
Leadership Artificial Intelligence/Technology Training & Development Networks Research Methods
Abstract Leaders develop through experience, particularly self-relevant and relational events that facilitate the development of domain-specific cognitive structures. Building on event system theory, we argue that coherent memory of an event can provide developmental benefits for leadership. While memory proces3es may differ between individuals, little research has examined how such differences play a role in leadership development. Across one pilot study, one correlational survey (study 1), and one experiment (study 2) with UK students and working adults collected online ( N total = 373), we examined how event binding capacity (EBC), which refers to the ability to bind and integrate relevant features of an event in memory for later access, relates to leadership self-concepts (i.e., leader identity and leadership self-efficacy). In study 1, findings revealed that EBC moderated the relationship between prior leadership experience on leader identity, but not on leadership self-efficacy. Participants with more leadership experience and higher EBC expressed stronger leader identity. In study 2, we further examined the role of event characteristics (self-relevant and relational events) as moderators of the EBC–leadership self-concepts relationship. Participants reported higher levels of leader identity and leadership self-efficacy after experiencing highly self-relevant and relational events, and this relationship was moderated by EBC. We derive implications for event system theory and the practical applications of EBC for leadership self-concept formation.
Show more Read full article →
Work-family enrichment: An integrative literature review and future research agenda
🔓
Journal of Vocational Behavior Yiqi Jiang, Ying Wang, Haiying Kang September 18, 2026
Research Methods Training & Development Health & Well-Being Job Design Performance
Work-to-family enrichment, a desirable experience where individuals' work improves their performance in family roles, has attracted growing scholarly interest for its development and influence. Despite this interest, there is a lack of effective literature synthesis that helps illuminate the intellectual landscape of work-to-family enrichment, leaving our knowledge about the empirical development of this construct fragmented. Synthesizing findings from 96 journal articles, we provide organized insights into its theoretical foundations, measurements, and nomological network of antecedents, outcomes, and moderators. By integrating these insights, we propose a forward-looking agenda for future research to advance scholarly knowledge in this domain. Specifically, we call on researchers to introduce novel theoretical perspectives to explain how work-family enrichment develops and exerts influence. It is imperative to extend its nomological network by exploring underexamined elements such as individual traits, career outcomes, and potential negative pathways. We also call for the adoption of more rigorous research designs to capture causal dynamics within its nomological network. Furthermore, we advocate for leveraging methodologies grounded in generative AI and machine learning to uncover innovative insights that challenge or expand our understanding of work-family enrichment.
Show more Read full article →
Leadership and Followership as Evolved Systems: Origins, Mechanisms, and Organizational Implications
Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior Mark van Vugt September 18, 2026
Leadership Training & Development Individual Differences Teams Conflict
Leadership and followership are universal features of human social life, yet leadership research has focused largely on describing leader traits and behaviors while giving less attention to their evolutionary origins and functions. This review synthesizes two decades of research through the lens of evolutionary leadership theory (ELT), integrating evidence from psychology, anthropology, biology, and organizational science. It examines why leadership evolved as a solution to recurrent coordination and conflict problems; the psychological, neural, biological, and behavioral mechanisms that regulate leader–follower relations; and how these mechanisms develop across the lifespan and evolutionary history. It further shows how ecological conditions and gene–culture coevolution jointly shape variation in leadership and followership across societies and organizations. By grounding leadership in evolved follower needs, ecological fit, and adaptive trade-offs (e.g., dominance versus prestige), ELT explains when different forms of leadership are likely to emerge, succeed, or fail; why modern organizations are prone to evolutionary mismatch; and how existing leadership theories can be integrated within a broader evolutionary framework.
Show more Read full article →
Who do employees follow? An analysis of contrasting and compensatory effects between abusive supervisors in multiple team membership contexts.
Journal of Applied Psychology Damian Claudio Zivic, Cristiano Levi Oseliero Guarana, Troy A. Smith, Michael Jared Emanuel Nugent, Gilad Chen September 17, 2026
Teams Performance Leadership Networks Motivation
In today's competitive environment, followers are increasingly assigned to work on multiple teams simultaneously (i.e., multiple team membership), oftentimes led by multiple leaders. While existing scholarship suggests that a leader's positive behaviors can spill over to positively impact follower motivation and task performance in another team (led by another leader), we reveal that a leader's aversive behaviors (e.g., abusive supervision) on one team are associated with a cross-leader differentiation pattern in another team. Drawing on contrast-based perspectives, and building on reactive compensation research, we argue that abusive supervision by one leader is associated with more favorable evaluations of an alternative leader, particularly when the latter leader engages in lower levels of abusive supervision. Across two scenario-based experiments and a field study, we find consistent support for this pattern: Abusive supervision by one leader is positively related to satisfaction with another leader, which is in turn associated with performance in that leader's team. These findings contribute to the abusive supervision and multiple team membership literatures by showing how employees differentiate between leaders across teams, and we discuss implications for theory and practice. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
Extrapolation in congruence research: A conceptual framework and diagnostic strategy.
Journal of Applied Psychology Yongheng Angus Yao, Guangrui Guo September 17, 2026
Research Methods Training & Development Selection & Assessment Networks HR Systems & Talent Management
Polynomial regression analysis (PRA) has played a central role in recent advances in congruence theory and research. Yet, the potential of PRA depends on careful management of extrapolation. We organize extrapolation around two broad uses of PRA in congruence research: theory development and theory application. In theory development, extrapolation concerns drawing inferences (conclusions) about theorized response-surface features beyond regions supported by the observed data. In theory application, extrapolation concerns making predictions beyond the observed data range. Within theory development, we further distinguish inadvertent and purposeful extrapolation. We conceptualize inadvertent extrapolation not as a merely methodological artifact but as a symptom of deeper misalignment among theory, method, and data. To manage theory development extrapolation, we propose a five-step strategy that can be routinely applied in PRA studies: (1) contextualize theory, (2) design for full-range sampling, (3) examine empirical support in the joint predictor space, (4) restrict interpretation to empirically supported regions, and (5) leverage purposeful extrapolation to guide theory building and future research. We also introduce Convex Hull, an app that visually distinguishes observed from extrapolated regions in the joint predictor space. Using empirical illustrations and simulations, we demonstrate both the risks of inadvertent extrapolation and the benefits of our strategy. This approach strengthens theoretical precision, empirical transparency, and cumulative theory development in congruence research and beyond. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
How leaders respond to team time urgency diversity: A functional leadership perspective.
Journal of Applied Psychology Jiaxin Xue, Jing-hao Zhang, Yuhui Li, Gerben S. van der Vegt, Niannian Dong, et al. September 17, 2026
Leadership Teams Diversity & Inclusion Motivation Networks
Prior research on team time urgency diversity (TUD) has positioned team temporal leadership as a moderator of the relationship between TUD and team outcomes, suggesting that team temporal leadership may buffer TUD's risks or unlock its benefits. This perspective assumes that leaders naturally respond to TUD, yet it offers little insight into whether, why, and when they choose to do so. Drawing on functional leadership theory, we propose that TUD acts as a contextual trigger that may elicit team temporal leadership by generating unmet temporal needs, thereby motivating leaders to intervene. We further argue that leaders' own time urgency shapes these responses, such that the positive relationship between TUD and leaders' motivation to improve temporal functioning is stronger among leaders with higher time urgency, thereby leading to greater team temporal leadership. Results from a multiwave, multisource field study and two experiments consistently supported our proposed model. Together, our findings offer a more nuanced account of how leaders respond to temporal diversity and extend the broader diversity literature by reframing diversity as a trigger for leader actions. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
Is the job-hopping penalty merited? Predicting selection decisions, turnover, and performance of job hoppers.
Journal of Applied Psychology Jake T. Harrison, Emily D. Campion, Chad H. Van Iddekinge, Michael A. Campion, Carter Gibson, et al. September 17, 2026
Selection & Assessment Performance Turnover & Retention Artificial Intelligence/Technology
= 37,105). Together, these studies show that job hoppers are penalized, the penalty is warranted, and career progression and prehire experience can weaken the impact of the penalty. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
The Causes and Outcomes of Meaningful Work: An Integrative Model
Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior Michael F. Steger, Bryan J. Dik, Kyle M. Inselman September 17, 2026
Research Methods Performance Training & Development Motivation Leadership
Despite rapid growth, claims about the causes and outcomes of meaningful work remain diminished by reliance on correlational evidence. We review 70 longitudinal and experimental studies in which meaningful work is modeled as an antecedent, mediator, or outcome to evaluate what can be concluded about its causes and effects. Drawing exclusively on causally informative evidence, we develop an integrative model that advances prior frameworks and unifies leading perspectives, including the job characteristics model, self-determination theory, person-environment fit, and positive organizational scholarship. In doing so, we provide a rigorously grounded and integrative account of how meaningful work emerges and the outcomes it produces. Our hope is that this model provides a roadmap for future research and evidence-backed interventions to foster and prosper from meaningful work.
Show more Read full article →
Ambidexterity Across Levels and Over Time
Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior Cristina B. Gibson, Tad Machrowicz September 17, 2026
Selection & Assessment Performance Research Methods Individual Differences Health & Well-Being
Ambidexterity is a multilevel capacity for balancing competing imperatives such as adaptability and alignment. If left unmanaged, these imperatives create tensions that challenge performance and continued viability. The construct of ambidexterity has a long and varied history in the organizational literature, generating hundreds of articles, meta-analyses, and literature reviews. Findings regarding performance effects are mixed, and research has been plagued by fragmentation due to different levels of analysis and operationalizations, and samples derived from vastly different economic and industry environments. Many open issues remain, with critics arguing for greater conceptual clarity, multilevel frameworks, and more contemporary perspectives that account for an ever-changing organizational environment. Our review assesses progress in the field, integrating macro-, meso- and micro-level approaches to ambidexterity, providing particular attention to recent research on team- and individual-level applications of the concept. In doing so, we aim to expand our understanding of ambidexterity to include an embedded, contingent, episodic perspective.
Show more Read full article →
Meeting Cadences in Organizations: A Multilevel Conceptualization
Group & Organization Management Liana M. Kreamer, Delia Bingea, George B. Stock, Victoria Massey September 17, 2026
Research Methods Teams Job Attitudes Networks
Employees often spend hours of their workday in meetings, with virtual and hybrid formats streamlining the scheduling of meetings, while simultaneously increasing meeting load. While prior research has focused on meeting quality (e.g., agendas, facilitation, engagement), much less attention has been given to meeting scheduling cadence, defined as the pattern, frequency, and spacing of a set of related meetings over time. This conceptual paper positions meeting cadence as a distinct organizational construct and argues it is central to how individuals, dyads, teams, and organizations coordinate work. We propose a set of theoretical approaches for studying meeting cadence at multiple levels of analysis, highlighting its multilevel nature and outlining directions for future research on this theoretically grounded and practically meaningful phenomenon. This work advances understanding of the temporal structuring of meetings and calls for empirical research to inform evidence-based meeting scheduling practices in organizations.
Show more Read full article →
The Alignment Paradox: A Theory of AI ‐Driven Misalignment in HR Systems
🔓
Human Resource Management Pankaj C. Patel, Yasin Rofcanın, Rıfat KamaƟak, Maksim Belitski September 15, 2026
Artificial Intelligence/Technology HR Systems & Talent Management Training & Development Individual Differences Health & Well-Being
ABSTRACT The core principle in strategic human resource management (SHRM) holds that organizations gain competitive advantage from HR systems with practices that work well together (horizontal alignment) and that support overall strategy (vertical alignment). This paper develops a theory explaining how artificial intelligence integration, a tool intended to improve alignment, can unintentionally cause alignment breakdown. Drawing on SHRM theory and the process‐based model of HRM system strength, we build four propositions. We argue that AI's operational requirements weaken horizontal alignment by creating logic conflicts within HR systems, cause employee skill development to drift from strategic needs, cause employees to default to metric‐aligned behaviors, and diminish workforce value as a competitive resource. We synthesize these dynamics in a framework of four organizational states, Strategic Synergy, Contested Alignment, Strategic Fragmentation, and Algorithmic Capture that characterize firms at different stages of AI‐driven misalignment. This paper contributes a process‐based theory explaining organizational risks of AI adoption in management systems.
Show more Read full article →
Vibe Managers, Gurus, and Rockstars: Decoding the Strategic Use of Unconventional Job Titles in Organizations
Academy of Management Review Elizabeth H. Eley September 15, 2026
Selection & Assessment Training & Development HR Systems & Talent Management
Job titles communicate occupational role and status in a form readily understood within and across organizations. However, popularization of a new class of job titles challenges the extant theoretical understanding of job titles as standardized categorization tools. Titles such as “chief storyteller” or “happiness hero” raise questions about why organizations would assign such titles. In this paper, I take a strategic human resource management perspective and develop theory to explain how organizations use unconventional job titles to signal: (a) the re-bundling of new tasks into novel roles, and (b) the rebranding of a role to reflect the organization’s symbolic attributes. Drawing on these two signals, I differentiate four types of titles: “conventional,” “elastic,” “semantic,” and “transfigured.” I then link these job title types to both intended and unintended outcomes in the hiring process. I identify two downstream signal cost mechanisms—(1) legibility costs at attraction and (2) verification costs at selection—that reveal the costs organizations bear when they deploy signals outside established institutional infrastructure. As a whole, I seek to revitalize dormant theory on job titles and offer a timely lens into how titles function as some of the first signals of a broader human resource management system in a dynamic labor market environment.
Show more Read full article →
CEO 's Influence on Top Management Team's Employee Engagement: A Qualitative Study
🔓
Human Resource Development Quarterly Wafa Damlaj, Matthew W. Hurtienne, Laura E. Hurtienne September 15, 2026
Job Attitudes Research Methods Teams Networks Selection & Assessment
ABSTRACT This study explores how chief executives officers (CEOs) influence top management team (TMT) members' employee engagement. Using a constructivist phenomenological approach, the research examines ways CEOs shape TMT's employee engagement. Fifteen TMT professionals participated in semi‐structured interviews, and the data were analyzed through a three‐step coding process: open coding to identify key concepts, axial coding to refine categories by examining relationships, and thematic coding to organize the data into central themes. Findings revealed that CEOs influence TMT's employee engagement by addressing needs at three levels: individual, team, and organizational. Each level of needs aligns with specific CEO leadership styles and essential qualities required to meet these needs. These attributes were shown to enhance TMT's employee engagement, providing practical and future research implications for HRD.
Show more Read full article →
Do interactions matter? Assessing the role of job characteristics interactions on employee well-being.
🔓
Journal of Applied Psychology Jan Digutsch, Richard N. Landers, Hannah M. Schade, Hans-Joachim Lincke, Matthias NĂŒbling, et al. September 14, 2026
Selection & Assessment Health & Well-Being Job Design Performance Diversity & Inclusion
= 100,000) stratified by industry, gender, age, and employment status. We compared the out-of-sample predictive performance of models capturing main effects (linear mixed-effects models) with models capable of modeling complex interactions (boosting algorithms). The inclusion of interaction effects did not improve predictive accuracy beyond models based solely on main effects. These findings challenge the validity of buffer and boost effects as global mechanisms across jobs and organizations, as interactions among job characteristics did not meaningfully contribute to predicting either burnout or work engagement. Instead, job characteristics appear to exert only additive effects. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
Breadcrumbs to transformational acts: Enacting implicit leader prototypes to become psychologically empowered as a leader.
Journal of Applied Psychology Fadel Khalil Matta, Charles Bennion, Emma L. Frank, Cory M. Eisenhard September 14, 2026
Leadership Organizational Change Training & Development Research Methods Selection & Assessment
Despite recent critiques, transformational leadership continues to be of immense interest to both scholars and practitioners. Typical approaches to facilitating transformational leadership tend to view it as a between-leader style of leadership-one that is often considered to flow from stable leader traits and/or that leaders can be trained to execute in a one-time or intermittent manner. We offer an alternative approach. Drawing from theory on the process of psychological empowerment, we suggest that transformational action is most likely to emerge in discrete moments when one feels psychologically empowered (i.e., moments when one experiences a sense of meaning, competence, self-determination, and impact) as a leader. In line with the prescriptions offered by the theory, we develop tangible and actionable implicit leader prototype interventions tailored to provide leader-relevant "microwins" that foster such psychological empowerment within leaders. To test our theorizing that implicit leader prototype interventions trigger a state of psychological empowerment conducive to subsequent transformational action (as rated by the self, others, and multiple direct reports), we conduct three studies-a preregistered pilot experiment, a 15-day within-person experimental experience sampling method field study, and a preregistered within-leader field experiment. Taken together, our work provides a prescriptive and theoretically grounded means by which to cultivate transformational leadership in everyday organizational life through brief implicit leader prototype interventions that build a leader's psychological empowerment. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
Adverse impact, job performance, and diversity outcomes of applicant attraction: A simulation and paradox.
Journal of Applied Psychology Matt Cho, Daniel A. Newman, Chen Tang, Leo Alexander September 14, 2026
Performance Selection & Assessment Diversity & Inclusion Research Methods Teams
Jones et al. (2022) specified conditions where applicant attraction on vocational interests would reduce adverse impact, by treating vocational interests as an attraction variable that can be related to both race and the predictor composite. We extend Jones et al.'s model of attraction and adverse impact to also include (a) job performance outcomes and (b) diversity (proportion of hires from the minority group), by comparing six generic applicant attraction scenarios. Using Monte Carlo simulations of a hiring process where applicants are attracted simultaneously based on minority/majority status (e.g., diversity recruiting) and/or on applicant qualifications (e.g., qualifications-based recruiting), prior to being screened on a selection predictor composite, we formalize the patterns of attraction effects on adverse impact, diversity, and job performance. Results reveal a paradox: No single attraction scenario improves all three outcomes (adverse impact, diversity, and job performance), although there exist applicant attraction conditions that can improve any two of the three. The pattern of attraction scenario results and the paradox persisted across a wide range of predictor composites. Counterintuitive implications for practice are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
Her Vision Guiding Him Toward Change: The Interactive Effects of Visionary Leadership, Leader Gender, and Follower Gender
🔓
Journal of Organizational Behavior Martin Buss, Mara J. Metzger, Eric Kearney September 14, 2026
Leadership Performance Diversity & Inclusion Organizational Change Motivation
ABSTRACT Visionary leadership is widely regarded as an effective tool for motivating followers. However, two influential theories make opposing predictions about what happens when women enact agentic leadership behavior. Role congruity theory predicts that such behavior can produce backlash effects, whereas expectancy violation theory predicts especially favorable evaluations. Integrating an identity‐based perspective on leader‐follower relationships (Sluss and Ashforth 2007) with expectancy violation theory, we argue that when female leaders engage in visionary leadership—an agentic behavior that aligns with followers' prototypical expectations regarding the leader role while exceeding gender‐stereotypical expectations regarding agentic behavior—the effect of visionary leadership on perceptions of competence is more strongly positive than when male leaders do so. We argue that these competence perceptions are then positively related to follower identification with the leader and, in turn, to follower support for change. Moreover, building on research showing that men tend to hold more traditional gender stereotypes than women, we propose that these effects are particularly pronounced among male followers. We test our hypotheses using an experimental vignette study and a three‐wave leader‐follower field study. Our findings advance understanding of how gender shapes the effects of visionary leadership on follower support for change.
Show more Read full article →
Correction
🔓
European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology September 13, 2026
Networks
Article title: Profiles of boundary tactics when working from home and their relationship with recovery.Authors: Pohlner, M., Seibel, S., & Haun, V.C.Journal: European Journal of Work and Organizat...
Read full article →
How Do Organizations Address Anti‐ DEI Pressure? Problematization and Perspectivization
🔓
Human Resource Management Matthew B. Perrigino, Shaun Michael Pichler September 11, 2026
Diversity & Inclusion Training & Development HR Systems & Talent Management
ABSTRACT Underneath headlines that decree organizations are increasingly abandoning or rolling back diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives in response to anti‐DEI pressures, we argue that how organizations are doing this warrants further focus. While the strategy literature speaks to tactics for addressing institutional pressures, missing in the study of how organizations address anti‐DEI pressures is consideration of how HRM systems impact and are impacted by such action. Incorporating a strategic human resource management (SHRM) view, we offer three approaches—all of which are substantiated with evidence from contemporary organizations—that range in the extent to which organizations resist or embrace anti‐DEI pressures. The common thread linking these approaches is that each one moves beyond an oversimplified emphasis on “alignment.” We do not advocate misalignment per se but underscore how the nuances embedded in each approach reflect the intentionality of organizations and how they consider contingencies (i.e., external alignment) and configurations (i.e., internal alignment) in proactively adapting HRM systems in response to anti‐DEI pressures. In advancing these views, we develop an agenda to drive future empirical research addressing the intersection of DEI backlash and HRM.
Show more Read full article →
Feel Free to Chat About Your Kids? Exploring the Effects of Workplace Parenting Conversations
Organization Science Yuxin Lin, Allison S. Gabriel, Katina B. Sawyer, Zhengguang Liu September 11, 2026
Performance Networks Research Methods Selection & Assessment Teams
Workplace conversations are essential for collaboration, knowledge sharing, and relationship building. Although much of the literature has focused on work-related discussions, recent shifts toward the blurring of professional and personal boundaries suggest that employees may increasingly converse about aspects of their nonwork lives. One such topic of conversation—parenting—presents a unique and understudied type of workplace exchange given the central role of the parental identity for working parents and the opportunity for them to highlight this important identity through dialogue. In the current set of studies, we introduce workplace parenting conversations as dialogical, in-depth exchanges about parenting-related topics between coworkers who are parents. Drawing from identity management and boundary management theories, we propose that these conversations offer instrumental, affective, and relational benefits that positively impact behaviors across work and parenting role domains. Using a mixed-methods triangulation approach, we first explore the content and processes of workplace parenting conversations through qualitative interviews (Study 1A), followed by an experience sampling study testing our model, complete with behavioral outcomes at work and home (Study 1B). We then explore the underlying micromechanisms connecting workplace parenting conversations to the mechanisms in our model through additional interviews (Study 2A) and a field experiment (Study 2B). Our findings contribute to the literature on workplace conversations by identifying an overlooked yet impactful form of workplace dialogue, exploring its primarily positive effects on employees’ behaviors in both work and home contexts and uncovering unique micromechanisms associated with this specific type of conversation. Funding: This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China [Grant 72102210].
Show more Read full article →
Curiosity at Work: A Productive Inefficiency Model
Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior Todd B. Kashdan, Patrick E. McKnight, Spencer Huber Harrison September 11, 2026
Performance Selection & Assessment Individual Differences Leadership Organizational Change
Curiosity is increasingly recognized as consequential for work outcomes including achievement and creativity. Unlike related constructs such as growth mindset and openness, curiosity involves active deviation from familiar paths, inviting workers to slow down, ask additional questions, and entertain multiple possibilities when speed and closure are typically prized. This review positions curiosity as a productive inefficiency, which reflects a force that prolongs decision-making and consumes resources in the short term while enabling vitality, agility, and potential breakthrough solutions over the long term. We review evidence on multidimensional models of curiosity, examine costs and benefits, explore the emerging literature on leader curiosity and curiosity's upward influence, and address assessment advances. We conclude with practical recommendations alongside a future research agenda emphasizing temporal dynamics and interventions. Throughout, we argue that managing curiosity effectively requires treating it as a strategic tool to be budgeted rather than a universal good to be maximized.
Show more Read full article →
Who Gets Selected in Rigid Hierarchies? Early Happiness at Work and Competitive Leadership Selection
International Journal of Selection and Assessment Xyle Ku September 11, 2026
Selection & Assessment Job Attitudes Leadership Performance Research Methods
ABSTRACT Leadership selection is typically attributed to ability, performance, and dispositional advantage. Yet evaluative processes may also reflect how individuals experience and engage with their work over time. We tested whether early happiness at work prospectively predicts selection into objectively assigned leadership roles under formalized selection and pronounced role scarcity in the Korea Military Academy. First‐ and second‐year cohort cadets ( N = 444) reported happiness at work in 2023, and competitive leadership appointments were assessed approximately 2 years later in the fourth year. Leadership positions comprised roughly 4% of each cohort. Penalized logistic regression showed that higher happiness at work predicted a greater likelihood of leadership selection (OR = 1.68, 95% CI [1.04, 2.72]), controlling for baseline cumulative performance score, gender, and cohort. Among the subcomponents, affective organizational commitment significantly predicted leadership selection (OR = 1.77, 95% CI [1.07, 2.94]), whereas engagement (OR = 1.63, 95% CI [1.00, 2.66]) and job satisfaction (OR = 1.34, 95% CI [0.85, 2.14]) did not reach the conventional 0.05 significance threshold. Taken together, the findings suggest that early happiness at work may play a meaningful role in shaping who is ultimately selected into positions of authority, even in systems structured to privilege meritocratic evaluation.
Show more Read full article →
Juggling Hats and Ladders: A Social Identity and Social Status Framework for Multiple Team Membership
🔓
Group & Organization Management Hendrik Johan Van De Brake September 11, 2026
Teams Training & Development Measurement & Psychometrics Performance Individual Differences
Employees increasingly belong to more than one team at the same time, yet similar multiple team membership (MTM) profiles can support effectiveness and well-being in some cases and undermine them in others. Team counts and membership variety capture how employees are distributed across teams, but leave open how they experience the particular memberships that make up those profiles. I argue that MTM’s consequences depend on two psychosocial features of each membership: how strongly the team defines the employee’s work identity and how much local member status it grants for the employee’s contribution. I integrate social identity theory and status characteristics theory into a multilevel framework in which these identity and status positions (the hats employees wear and the ladders they climb) shape MTM experiences across levels. Within each membership, identification and local member status give rise to social validation or identity threat. Across an individual’s portfolio, identity variety and status inconsistency create learning opportunity or switching load. Within teams, identification climate and external team status shape external knowledge access or coordination demands. The framework explains why structurally similar MTM profiles generate different resources and demands depending on how employees are positioned within and across their concurrent teams.
Show more Read full article →
Critical mass theory: An integrative conceptual review.
Journal of Applied Psychology Traci Sitzmann, Rong Su, Zhengyan Kang September 10, 2026
Performance Teams Diversity & Inclusion Research Methods Selection & Assessment
While the axiom that diversity is a competitive advantage has become commonplace, research has not provided a definitive answer regarding how much diversity is needed to attain this advantage. Critical mass theory proposes that a qualitative shift in group dynamics occurs when minority group representation reaches a threshold, strengthening members’ influence on work processes and outcomes. We conducted an integrative conceptual review of 277 studies to evaluate and advance critical mass theory. Nearly a third of quantitative studies do not meet the methodological requirements for testing critical mass theory, including failing to model nonlinear relationships and lacking sufficient representation to detect a threshold. Among studies meeting methodological requirements, 83% support critical mass threshold effects, with a mean threshold of 29% (SD = 6.67%). Across methodologically sound studies, attaining a diversity critical mass is associated with improved interpersonal dynamics with downstream effects on employee satisfaction, the success of diversity and corporate social responsibility initiatives, misconduct, financial risk, innovation, organizational reputation, and performance. Critical mass effects are stronger and the threshold is lower when underrepresented members hold leadership roles, organizations operate in more equitable contexts, organizational and societal values align with those of the minority group, and organizations have stronger prior performance. Political divides and other within-group differences can hinder coordination among minority group members, weakening critical mass effects. Our review clarifies when and why a diversity critical mass contributes to competitive advantage and provides guidance for future research and for organizations seeking to leverage critical mass effects.
Show more Read full article →
Can Nonprofits Gain an Advantage in Employee Retention Through Management Practices? A Comparative Lens for Managing Nonprofit Versus for‐Profit Employees
🔓
Personnel Psychology Zhefan Huang, Kaidi Wang, Yixuan Li, Mo Wang, Aaron Hill, et al. September 10, 2026
Turnover & Retention Research Methods Training & Development Selection & Assessment Performance
ABSTRACT Nonprofit organizations (NPOs) face growing competition for human capital from for‐profit organizations (FPOs). However, little research adopts a comparative lens to explore management practices that are associated with an advantage in retaining employees for NPOs relative to FPOs. Integrating resource orchestration theory and firm‐specific incentives theory, we contend that employee‐centered management practices (i.e., employee benefits, participation, and training) should be more effective in retaining NPO (versus FPO) employees. We tested our theory with four studies. The Preliminary Study documented that NPO employees rated their organization more positively than FPO employees when their organization implemented more employee‐centered management practices. Study 1 utilized archival survey data from Statistics Canada and showed that employee‐centered management practices were associated with lower voluntary turnover rates in NPOs (versus FPOs). Further, through Study 2, a qualitative study, we identified psychological contract fulfillment as a possible employee‐level mechanism that explained the observed differential effects for NPO versus FPO employees. We further tested this mechanism using scenario experiments in Study 3, finding support for the mediating role of psychological contract fulfillment. Our work suggests that NPOs may achieve an employee retention advantage over FPOs by aligning management practices with their institutional contexts and employee values.
Show more Read full article →
Does narcissistic leadership promote or inhibit employee voice? The roles of team chaxu climate and work-family balance
Journal of Managerial Psychology Pengyu Chang, YuanXiong Liu, Le Hu, Yangchun Fang, Xinxing Dai, et al. September 10, 2026
Health & Well-Being Teams Leadership Research Methods Organizational Culture
Purpose Drawing on conservation of resources theory, this study examines how and when employees' perceptions of narcissistic leadership influence their promotive and prohibitive voice. Design/methodology/approach Data were collected from 408 employees and 68 supervisors in China using a three-wave time-lagged survey. The hypotheses were tested through multilevel path analysis and the Monte Carlo method. Findings The results indicate that narcissistic leadership is positively related to promotive voice but negatively related to prohibitive voice. Moreover, team chaxu climate mediates the relationships between narcissistic leadership and both forms of employee voice. In addition, leaders' work-family balance weakens the positive association between narcissistic leadership and team chaxu climate. Originality/value This study advances understanding of how narcissistic leadership shapes employee voice by distinguishing its effects on promotive and prohibitive voice and by highlighting the mediating role of team chaxu climate. It further identifies leaders' work-family balance as a key boundary condition influencing their relational strategies with employees.
Show more Read full article →
A Commentary on Perrigino and Raveendhran’s “A Theory of Strategic Boundary Control for Remote Work”: Boundary not Borderless
🔓
Group & Organization Management FrantiĆĄek Sudzina, Michal JirĂĄsek September 10, 2026
Remote Work Performance Teams Networks Job Design
Perrigino and Raveendhran's (2025) theory of strategic boundary control for remote work offers a strong framework for aligning human resource management (HRM) systems with the design of work-nonwork boundaries. We argue that this theory is fundamentally an ostensive account: it specifies the intended architecture of boundary control configurations but is silent on how these designs are performatively enacted once employees interact with the technologies that implement them. Drawing on routine dynamics and technology-in-practice research, we contend that the effects of any boundary control configuration on organizational performance are mediated by how employees appropriate, adapt, and circumvent the underlying technology. We extend the theory by proposing three boundary conditions, each tied to a distinct performative response. First, behavior-oriented control's benefits are contingent on technology re-adaptability: strict monitoring and connectivity mandates can trigger psychological reactance and technostress that inadvertently enable cyberslacking. Second, output-oriented control's benefits depend on task-technology fit: when monitoring platforms poorly suit employees' actual tasks, autonomy encourages job crafting through unsanctioned tools, eroding the visibility such control requires. Third, technical controls' benefits depend on Shadow IT's accessibility: overly rigid restrictions push employees toward unauthorized applications to sustain collaboration and social connection, undermining the controls meant to focus attention. Together, these boundary conditions show that employee enactment is a critical determinant of whether formal boundary control systems succeed. We conclude that effective HRM design cannot rely solely on top-down specification; it must anticipate the adaptive, performative ways employees enact workplace technology.
Show more Read full article →
Wise Moves at Work: Initial Validation of the Dutch Wise Proactivity Scale Among Elderly Care Employees
🔓
International Journal of Selection and Assessment Sai̇t GĂŒrbĂŒz, Annet de Lange, Marit Christensen, Siw Tone Innstrand September 09, 2026
Measurement & Psychometrics Selection & Assessment Training & Development Job Attitudes Performance
ABSTRACT Wise proactivity refers to employees' change‐oriented initiative guided by practical judgment, balancing situational demands (context), stakeholder relationships (others), and self‐regulation (self). Although the recently developed Wise Proactivity Scale (WPS) has shown validity across countries, evidence for its applicability in Western European contexts remains limited. This study adapted and validated the short‐form WPS in the Netherlands and examined its factorial, discriminant, and incremental validity. To evaluate the psychometric properties and validity of the modified Dutch version of the short‐form WPS, a forward‐backward translation procedure and expert review were conducted, and data were collected from a sample of 184 Dutch employees working in elderly care. Wise proactivity was assessed alongside related self‐regulatory resources (self‐leadership, reflective ability, and resilience) and outcomes including job satisfaction and employability. Results supported the hypothesized higher‐order structure, with three first‐order dimensions (context, others, and self) loading onto a single overarching wise proactivity factor, supporting construct validity. The modified Dutch version of the short‐form WPS demonstrated discriminant validity from related constructs and incremental validity by explaining additional variance in job satisfaction and employability beyond demographics and the self‐regulatory resources. These findings provide initial evidence supporting the psychometric properties of the modified Dutch version of the short‐form WPS in a sample of Dutch elderly care employees.
Show more Read full article →
How (Not) to Incorporate Employee Well‐Being as a Selection Criterion: Commentary on König et al. (2026)
🔓
International Journal of Selection and Assessment Anna Luca Heimann, Pia V. Ingold September 09, 2026
Selection & Assessment Diversity & Inclusion Health & Well-Being Motivation Individual Differences
ABSTRACT In their “Provocation Article,” König and colleagues (2026) make an important contribution by advocating for the explicit inclusion of employee well‐being as an outcome in personnel selection. We appreciate this perspective and support the view that fostering a healthy and happy workforce is a central organizational goal that should be more systematically considered in selection practices. At the same time, however, we argue that some of the proposed approaches risk unintentionally fostering discrimination against applicants with reduced well‐being or mental health and of intruding into their privacy, given that mental health information is legally protected as sensitive personal data in various jurisdictions. We therefore outline alternative pathways for integrating well‐being and mental health into selection systems while mitigating these risks. Specifically, we elaborate on two indirect pathways already noted in the provocation article: (a) the structured assessment of person–environment fit and (b) applicants' potential impact on others' well‐being and mental health in the workplace. In addition, we introduce two complementary approaches: (c) assessing how applicants interpret work situations (situation construal) as a cognitive process relevant to well‐being and mental health–related outcomes, and (d) selecting for health behaviors as a criterion instead of directly targeting well‐being and mental health itself. Together, these approaches demonstrate how employee well‐being and mental health can be incorporated as criteria in personnel selection, while safeguarding fairness and minimizing the risk of well‐being and mental health‐related discrimination and privacy intrusion.
Show more Read full article →
The Family Job Hunt: The Influence of Family Member Active Job Search Behavior on Family–Work Conflict
🔓
Journal of Organizational Behavior Michael J Halinski, Jennifer A. Harrison September 08, 2026
Conflict Individual Differences Networks Social Responsibility Research Methods
ABSTRACT Existing research shows that family members may draw on work and personal resources to support job seekers. This research, however, explores the reverse: how the behaviors of job‐seeking family members may impact non‐job‐seekers' ability to manage work and life demands. Using the sustainable career ecosystem perspective and conservation of resources theory, we hypothesize that job search interdependence moderates the relationship between family member active job search behavior and non‐job‐seeker family–work conflict, and non‐job‐seeker work identity further amplifies these crossover effects. Study 1 employs a two‐wave, dyadic field study ( n 1 = 178 undergraduate child job seekers and their employed parents), whereas Study 2 employs a scenario‐based experiment ( n 2 = 483) involving a spouse job seeker and a non‐job‐seeking partner. Findings from both studies provide partial support for the moderation of job search interdependence in our model, as the pattern of findings shows an asymmetry by the type of job‐seeking family member (i.e., child versus spouse). In Study 2, the hypothesized three‐way interaction with work identity was not supported. Exploratory follow‐up analyses, however, indicated that the two‐way interaction emerged among non‐job‐seekers high in work identity but not among those low in work identity. These findings underscore the importance of family context for job searches and offer insights into effective work‐family strategies.
Show more Read full article →
The Role of Emotions in Engendering Commitment to an Organizational Purpose
🔓
Academy of Management Journal Matthew James Hurst, Davide Nicolini, Rene Wiedner September 08, 2026
Job Attitudes Motivation Training & Development Teams Conflict
Creating a compelling organizational purpose that motivates employees and resonates with stakeholders is a key responsibility of top management teams (TMTs). While much is known about how TMTs seek employee commitment, little is understood about the exact process through which TMTs develop and commit to an organizational purpose themselves. In this ethnographic study, we examine and theorize the mechanisms that promote the emergence of commitment to an organizational purpose for those who craft it. Through analysis of both successful and failed instances of facilitated purpose creation in companies across various industries, we show that emotional dynamics play a central role in the process. Diverging from traditional perspectives, we highlight the importance of negative emotions and the crucial role of coexisting conflicting positive and negative emotions. We also demonstrate that maintaining discomfort by preventing premature closure, carefully managing emotional transitions, and strategically using timing, spacing, and materiality can significantly enhance the emergence of commitment.
Show more Read full article →
The role of workplace bullying on burnout and life satisfaction over time: the moderating effect of contextual and individual resources
Journal of Managerial Psychology Pegah Sajadi, Sarah‐GeneviĂšve TrĂ©panier September 08, 2026
Research Methods Health & Well-Being Performance Job Attitudes Networks
Purpose Drawing on Job Demands–Resources (JD-R) model, we examine the longitudinal effects of workplace bullying on two key outcomes – burnout and life satisfaction – as well as the potential buffering roles of social support and psychological capital. Design/methodology/approach We conducted a two-wave study among a sample of 696 employees in Canada to examine these relationships and used structural equation modeling (Mplus) for the analysis. Findings The results indicated that workplace bullying significantly predicted subsequent burnout. Moreover, interaction effects suggested that psychological capital and supervisor support moderated the relationship between workplace bullying and life satisfaction. Originality/value By using a longitudinal design and testing reverse and reciprocal models, we strengthen inferences about the directionality of relationships between workplace bullying, burnout, and life satisfaction. Moreover, by examining life satisfaction, an often-overlooked outcome, we provide insight into the potential spillover of workplace bullying beyond the work domain. Finally, we address recent calls for research identifying specific personal and contextual factors that influence the consequences of workplace bullying.
Show more Read full article →
Legitimizing the Regulatory State: How Institutional Intermediaries Facilitate Inclusive and Effective Co-creation in Emerging Economies
🔓
Administrative Science Quarterly Allen D. Hicken, Edmund J Malesky, Songkhun Nillasithanukroh, Markus David Taussig September 07, 2026
Diversity & Inclusion Performance Job Attitudes Selection & Assessment Leadership
Theory indicates that inclusive regulatory co-creation between firms and their governments activates a procedural justice mechanism that improves firms’ views of state legitimacy and leads to rules that better fit the full spectrum of real-world operating conditions. Emerging economies, however, face what we argue is a legitimacy–co-creation paradox: Widely held baseline views of government as corrupt and captured by elite interests lead many firms to balk at engaging with the state, thereby impeding opportunities for mutually beneficial co-creation. To address this challenge, we pilot and test the impact of a third-party intervention that we name the RegRoom, wherein an expert helps firms refine their comments on draft regulation before submitting them and, in so doing, increases the firms’ understanding of the regulation’s public purpose. We hypothesize and find evidence through a field experiment in Thailand that this institutional intermediation improves firms’ perceptions of state legitimacy and observable engagement in regulatory co-creation. Further exploration of our data leads us to theorize a sequence by which institutional intermediaries overcome the legitimacy–co-creation paradox; specifically, legitimacy deficits need to be addressed before capability enhancement can occur. Our study shows how institutional intermediaries can contribute to the expansion of fairer and more-sustainable markets.
Show more Read full article →
The Networks of Others: A Model of Secondhand Brokerage and its Effects on Employee Innovation
🔓
Journal of Management Rohit Subhash Piplani, Travis J. Grosser September 07, 2026
Networks Performance Diversity & Inclusion Training & Development Research Methods
Social network research on creativity and innovation has primarily focused on the focal employee (i.e., ego), implicitly assuming that ego’s own network position determines the resources available for creative work. We advance an alter-centric perspective, arguing that what matters is not merely the availability of diverse information but the capacity of network contacts (i.e., alters) to make it usable. The brokerage characteristics of ego’s alters (i.e., secondhand brokerage) are decisive in that alters who are brokers are likely to have both valuable non-redundant information and the capability to convey it effectively. Prior work treating secondhand brokerage as a monolithic construct has yielded equivocal results; we reconcile these findings by decomposing it into distinct forms and matching each to the demands of a specific phase of the innovation process (i.e., idea generation, idea elaboration, idea championing, and idea implementation). We theorize that external secondhand brokerage facilitates idea generation, internal secondhand brokerage facilitates idea elaboration, internal alters’ network oscillation facilitates idea championing, and external alters’ network oscillation facilitates idea implementation, with ego’s knowledge integration capability, psychological ownership, organizational status, professional status, and tie strength serving as phase-specific and cross-phase boundary conditions. In doing so, we also challenge the prevailing view of brokers as default opportunists, specifying when cooperation, rather than opportunism, is the more rational strategy. By integrating the social network and innovation literatures, our framework clarifies how, when, and why the networks of others shape ego’s success across the innovation process.
Show more Read full article →
Human and chimpanzee leaders are more risk-loving
🔓
Leadership Quarterly Lou Marie Haux, Kamil FuƂawka, Gert G. Wagner, Ralph Hertwig, Esther Herrmann September 07, 2026
Leadership Networks Organizational Culture Research Methods
Leadership and risk-taking are often assumed to be interrelated, but this assumption has rarely been investigated empirically in humans or other species. Analyzing data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP) and observer reports from two African chimpanzee sanctuaries, this study finds that risk preferences are positively associated with leadership status in humans and with hierarchical rank in chimpanzees. The link between leadership and willingness to take risks was much stronger in chimpanzees than in humans. Risk preference also correlated positively with average income in humans and was generally higher in males than females in both species. Understanding leadership and hierarchical structures through an evolutionary lens is crucial. The present results suggest that risk-taking is a fundamental aspect of leadership that may have deep evolutionary roots. A stronger connection between leadership and risk-taking in chimpanzees may be attributable to cultural mechanisms for the transmission of leadership in human societies.
Show more Read full article →
Underemployment, need frustration, and the delayed amplification of meaninglessness in peripheral economies
Journal of Managerial Psychology Phan Khanh Duy, Phuc Nguyen Hoang September 07, 2026
Research Methods Motivation Selection & Assessment Training & Development Health & Well-Being
Purpose This study develops and tests a dynamic deprivation model linking regional underemployment to emotional exhaustion through cumulative psychological need frustration and emergent meaningless work. It examines whether structural labour misallocation predicts intra-individual growth trajectories rather than static strain differences and whether motivational erosion generates nonlinear depletion over time. Design/methodology/approach A three-wave longitudinal panel of 336 employees in peripheral-region small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) was analysed using parallel-process latent growth curve modelling (a statistical technique that tracks how several variables change together over time). Latent intercepts and slopes (respectively, each person's starting level and their rate of change across the three waves) were estimated for psychological need frustration, meaningless work, and emotional exhaustion. Nonlinearity was tested via a latent basis specification, and moderated sequential mediation (a chain of indirect effects whose strength depends on the level of a moderating variable) was assessed using bias-corrected bootstrapping of conditional indirect effects (a resampling procedure used to test whether an indirect effect is statistically reliable). Findings Regional underemployment predicted both the level and growth of psychological need frustration, which sequentially transmitted to growth in meaningless work and accelerated emotional exhaustion. Slope-mediated pathways accounted for substantially greater variance than intercept effects. Perceived organisational support attenuated this growth-based transmission. Originality/value The study advances state-of-the-art theory by repositioning meaningless work from a contemporaneous perceptual state to a cumulative, slope-driven deprivation process rooted in regional labour structures. It integrates macro-level economic misallocation into Self-Determination Theory, identifies psychological need frustration growth as the core transmission mechanism, and empirically demonstrates delayed amplification dynamics that conventional cross-sectional mediation models cannot detect.
Show more Read full article →
Bridging Leadership and HRM: An Integrative Framework of Transformational Leadership and the Ability-Motivation-Opportunity (AMO) Model
🔓
Group & Organization Management Chidiebere Ndukwe Ogbonnaya, Tomasz Gorny, Guanglei Zhang, Jintao Lu, Chinedu I. Eke, et al. September 07, 2026
Leadership Motivation Organizational Change Performance Training & Development
Leadership and human resource management (HRM) research have each advanced our understanding of how organisations foster employee well-being and organisational performance. While leadership research focuses on inspiring and motivating followers to pursue organisational goals, HRM research examines how organisations use formal people management systems to develop employee capabilities. Despite their complementary focus, these literatures have largely progressed in parallel, which limits insight into how leadership behaviours and HRM systems jointly influence both employee and organisational outcomes. In this article, we synthesise existing scholarship on the leadership-HRM interface and develop an integrative framework explaining when and how leadership behaviours and HRM practices may reinforce one another. Specifically, we pursue three aims: (i) to consolidate dispersed research on leadership and HRM by drawing on transformational leadership theory and the ability–motivation–opportunity (AMO) model; (ii) to conceptualise how distinct leadership behaviours may be reinforced through specific HRM practices; and (iii) to clarify how the leadership-HRM interface may generate shared benefits for employees, leaders, and organisations. Overall, our framework offers an integrated understanding of the leadership-HRM interface and sets out a clear agenda for future research.
Show more Read full article →
A paradox of brokerage: alter distrust, network self-promotion, and the willingness to accept referrals from brokers
🔓
Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes Raina A. Brands, Garrett L. Brady, Ajay Mehra September 06, 2026
Networks Motivation Performance Individual Differences Health & Well-Being
Individuals embedded in networks rich in structural holes are well positioned to broker referrals between otherwise disconnected others. Yet these hole-rich networks create a paradox: although they help brokers identify valuable opportunities, they also undermine the trust required for others to accept a referral—an action that makes recipients vulnerable to the broker's judgment and motives. We address this paradox by examining how brokers use network self-promotion, strategically highlighting their network quality and matchmaking competence, to mitigate trust deficits. Across a field study and two experiments, we show that network structure and network self-promotion jointly shape referral acceptance. Specifically, network self-promotion has asymmetric effects across the facets of trust: it substitutes for the reputational cues of a broker's ability where shared contacts cannot supply them, but amplifies the integrity-based trust that shared network ties convey where those ties are present, and does not condition the role of benevolence-based trust. By situating brokerage within the psychological literature on trust, we demonstrate how brokers' strategic impression management interacts with network structure to overcome the trust deficits inherent in networks that are rich in structural holes.
Show more Read full article →
Structuring Educational Benefits to Promote Low‐Skilled Worker Retention
Human Resource Management Caitlin M. Porter, Ashley H. Pearson, Peyton Berry, Bryan L. Malone September 06, 2026
Turnover & Retention HR Systems & Talent Management Training & Development Selection & Assessment Networks
ABSTRACT Persistent talent shortages require employers to pursue novel approaches for recruiting and retaining workers. In this paper, we investigate one such approach, that is, offering educational benefits to low‐skilled workers, a segment of the workforce that less frequently accesses such benefits. In Study 1, we examine an operational educational benefits program targeted at employees occupying low‐skilled jobs, demonstrating that program participation is associated with reduced turnover. Building upon this insight, we draw from exchange perspectives on the employee‐organization relationship to investigate how different benefit structures shape low‐skilled worker retention and why. Across two vignette‐style between‐person experiments, we compare types of educational benefit programs and find that educational benefits with little to no upfront costs—termed tuition assistance programs—are more strongly associated with reduced turnover intentions, a relationship that is partially explained by perceived organizational support for development; importantly, this type of educational benefit more clearly contributes to a social exchange relationship with the employer. This indirect relationship is stronger when potential employees perceive internal career opportunities, and this pattern of results persists across social classes (and low and high‐skilled workers). We offer practical insights for how employers may structure educational benefit programs to retain (low‐skilled) workers.
Show more Read full article →
Myopic Expansions on Digital Platforms
🔓
Administrative Science Quarterly Ahmadreza Mostajabi, Aldona Kapacinskaite, Keyvan Vakili September 05, 2026
Artificial Intelligence/Technology Performance Job Attitudes Selection & Assessment
Digitization has enabled modern firms to expand at unprecedented rates, but there are downsides to rapid expansion. Prior research has highlighted how digital platforms facilitate mass-market expansions by resolving frictions associated with market entry. Accordingly, various studies have emphasized the positive impact of market-friction reduction on aggregate market size and efficiency. In this article, we argue that the extreme resolution of frictions may also have a downside: It can nudge platform participants to overlook the heterogeneous nature of different markets and, consequently, to engage in large-scale, potentially myopic market expansions. These expansions, in turn, may engender lower customer satisfaction and firm performance. We test our arguments in the context of Apple’s App Store. We find that apps that undergo rapid, large-scale market expansions, relative to apps that do not expand or that expand more gradually, see a short-run increase in client base but longer-run declines in ratings, downloads, financial performance, and innovation. By addressing the underexplored negative side of resolving market frictions on platforms, the study advances knowledge of digital strategy and scaling.
Show more Read full article →
Cold Starts and Burning Desires: Reputation System Misalignment and Late-Career Transitions to Platform Work
🔓
Administrative Science Quarterly Sienna Helena S. Parker, Paul M. Leonardi September 05, 2026
Motivation Job Attitudes Networks Artificial Intelligence/Technology Performance
Workers face a cold start when entering new work contexts in which their reputations do not precede them. Cold starts are a particularly challenging problem for late-career workers who leave decades-long careers in formal organizations to pursue freelancing through online labor platforms. Unlike early- and mid-career freelancers, who are typically motivated by long-term career advancement, late-career workers are motivated to make work less central to their lives, although many still want and need to engage in paid labor in retirement. However, the question of how late-career workers navigate the cold-start problem is not well understood. In our study, we examine how late-career workers (55+ years old, 30+ years of work experience) manage the transition to platform-based freelancing. We find that for these workers, the cold-start problem is especially challenging as it is underpinned by reputation system misalignment, a clash between fundamentally different regimes for evaluating, recognizing, and assigning workers’ value. Although late-career workers expected their credentials to confer credibility in platform work, overcoming the cold-start problem required recalibrating their motivations and sense of professional worth. Our findings advance theoretical conversations on algorithmic management and visibility, career transitions to platform work, and retirement.
Show more Read full article →
Enhancing political ambition in women: A field intervention targeting political self-efficacy and perceived barriers
🔓
Journal of Vocational Behavior Aleksandra Luksyte, Winny Shen, James W. Beck September 04, 2026
Organizational Change Leadership Training & Development Research Methods Performance
Despite efforts to promote gender equality in vocations and careers, women continue to be underrepresented in male-dominated occupations, including politics. Women's underrepresentation is unwarranted given they are as effective as leaders as men, and there may even be unique benefits when women lead. For these reasons, this research explores factors that could enhance women's interest in pursuing political office and careers. That is, we examined the efficacy of a female-only political leadership development program, where cohorts of women who aspire to political office are provided knowledge about the political process, access to politicians and government officials, and opportunities to develop their leadership capabilities, in strengthening women's political ambition. We also explored whether and why this program was successful as well as for whom. The results of our multilevel analyses ( n = 73 of matched pre- and post-intervention data) revealed that participation in this program increased women's political ambition. This program also strengthened women's political efficacy and decreased their perceptions of gender-, experience-, and guidance-related barriers. Yet only increased political self-efficacy and decreased perceptions of gender-related barriers explained increases in women's political ambition. Finally, this intervention was particularly successful at breaking down gender-related barriers for women who hold nontraditional gender role attitudes. Our research has implications for organizations and societies on how to spark women's career interests and empower them to join traditionally male-dominated fields.
Show more Read full article →
What Drives Chief Executive Officer Activism and What Chief Executive Officer Activism Drives: Why Chief Executive Officers Speak Out, When Firms Translate Activist Stances into Action, and How Chief Executive Officer Activism Builds Social Momentum
Organization Science Ghina Chammas September 04, 2026
Training & Development Performance Individual Differences Networks
Chief executive officer (CEO) activism—CEOs’ personal and public expression of a stance on a sociopolitical debate aimed at influencing opinions in the espoused direction—is often understood as stemming primarily from CEOs’ political ideology and studied through its effects on distinct audiences, such as employees, consumers, and investors. Building on CEO activism research and integrating insights from upper echelons theory, institutional theory, nonmarket strategy, social movements, psychology, and social evaluations, this dissertation unpacks what remains less clear on both sides of this definition. On the “personal expression” side, it introduces CEO narcissism as a complementary explanation given its prevalence among CEOs, link to attention seeking, and relevance to a visible act like CEO activism. On the “public influence” side, it examines consequences beyond isolated audience reactions: whether public stances are followed by firm sustainability-related initiatives and how CEO activism travels through several actors whose interactions can generate social momentum and raise issue salience for policymakers. Across three essays, issue characteristics emerge as central to understanding why CEOs choose particular topics and what follows once they do. The issues that CEOs choose shape the attention that a CEO’s stance attracts, the conditions for firm follow-through, and the likelihood that a stance travels into public and political debate. Taken together, the essays show that issues most likely to draw attention to CEOs may be least likely to generate firm follow-through yet still matter for public and political debate. Funding: This work was supported by funding from the French National Research Agency (Agence Nationale de la Recherche) under the Investissements d’Avenir programme [Grant ANR-18-EURE-0005 / EUR DATA EFM].
Show more Read full article →
A Commentary on Schertler et al. (2026): Rethinking Inclusion in Remote Work
🔓
Group & Organization Management Jane Park, Peter D. Harms September 04, 2026
Diversity & Inclusion Remote Work Teams Individual Differences Leadership
Schertler and colleagues (2026) find that remote work intensity is associated with lower belongingness and that leaders’ virtual collaboration behaviors may temper this relationship. We extend their account by framing remote inclusion as a signal-detection problem within the team’s interaction environment. Employees infer whether they belong from cues generated through coworker exchanges, communication technologies, participation norms, and leader-supported routines. Leaders shape this environment, and team members enact it through their everyday interactions. This perspective may explain why stable differences in leaders’ average collaboration behaviors mattered more than within-person fluctuations in those behaviors. We also distinguish belongingness from authenticity and clarify that authenticity should not be treated as equivalent to uniqueness. Remote work may affect these dimensions through difference processes. Future research should examine the interaction routines that make inclusionary cues easier to detect, along with the relational histories and individual differences that shape how those cues are interpreted.
Show more Read full article →
A Commentary on Shepherd, Wincent, and Chase (2025): Moving Past the WEIRD Divide
🔓
Group & Organization Management Vishal K. Gupta, Athina Skiadopoulou, Sandra C. Mortal September 04, 2026
Leadership
a mature and influential field (Hunt & Townsend, 2026), producing insights that inform theory, practice, and policy (Nason et al., 2026;Wiklund, 2026).Research on entrepreneurial phenomena appears regularly in leading academic journals and top conferences (Davidsson, 2016;Thurik et al., 2024), widely recognized for publishing rigorous and high-impact scholarship (Gupta, 2020;Kuratko & Morris, 2018).Yet, as Shepherd et al. (2025) argue, much of this knowledge remains grounded in Western, Educated,
Show more Read full article →
Uplifting or off-putting? The effects of supervisors capitalizing on their involvement in positive moral events on employee outcomes.
Journal of Applied Psychology Grace Ching Chi Ho, Hudson Sessions September 03, 2026
Leadership Performance Job Attitudes
-has the distinct potential to morally elevate their employees but also make uniquely distasteful impressions. Indeed, calling attention to one's own morality can convey a holier-than-thou image, marred by self-superiority, virtue signaling, and disingenuousness. Accordingly, we theorize how and why supervisors' self-focused moral capitalization may invite employee moral elevation-feeling uplifted by a supervisor's moral purity-but also its oppositional counterpart, employee disgust, feeling repulsed by a supervisor's moral impurity. Drawing on theory regarding moral emotions, we unpack this tension and important countervailing implications for employee citizenship behavior. We also theorize that supervisors can tip employee outcomes toward moral elevation and improved citizenship-and away from disgust and diminished citizenship-by sharing the spotlight, specifically as they capitalize on others' involvement in positive moral events. In a field study of 254 supervisor-employee dyads and an experiment involving 233 employees, we found that supervisor self-focused moral capitalization was positively related to employee moral elevation and, in turn, increased citizenship. However, for supervisors who engaged in less other-focused moral capitalization, supervisor self-focused moral capitalization instead triggered employee disgust and decreased citizenship behavior. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
Can formative latent variables represent psychological concepts? Replication and extension of MacKenzie et al. (2005).
🔓
Journal of Applied Psychology Miguel Ignacio Aguirre-Urreta, Reza Yamini, Mikko Rönkkö September 03, 2026
Networks Diversity & Inclusion Measurement & Psychometrics Research Methods
We revisit MacKenzie et al.'s (2005) influential work on bias in path estimates arising from the misspecification of formative latent variable models as reflective ones. Using simulations, we demonstrate that the bias in unstandardized path coefficients reported by MacKenzie et al. is due to scaling differences rather than model misspecification. When these differences are taken into account, the bias nearly disappears. Building on their work, we also demonstrate that the formative indicators in their model are unnecessary. This is because the formative latent variables derive their identity from the reflective indicators added for model identification. Removing one or even all formative indicators is inconsequential for estimating the paths between latent variables. Our study reveals a fundamental problem with this approach: Formative latent variables (whether first or higher order) cannot represent psychological concepts as intended because their identity derives from downstream reflective indicators rather than the formative indicators. We conclude by discussing the implications for measurement and index construction. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
Rise and shine: Morning blue light exposure, sleep, and work.
Journal of Applied Psychology Kathleen R. Keeler, Christopher M. Barnes, Yiming Huang, Brian Gunia, Jason HJ Moy September 03, 2026
Performance Research Methods Organizational Change HR Systems & Talent Management
In contrast to prior research demonstrating that blue light filtering glasses worn at night improve employee sleep and work outcomes, we build from circadian theory to examine whether morning blue light exposure may provide complementary benefits. A within-person field experiment prompted 182 full-time employees to wear blue light emitting glasses for 30 min each morning over two work weeks. Participants were randomly assigned to a treatment-first or control-first condition, with glasses programmed to emit either 100% (treatment) or 1% (control) blue light intensity. Results showed that morning blue light exposure improved sleep outcomes later that night, which enhanced next-day alertness, reduced depletion, and ultimately improved outcomes at work. Exploratory moderation analyses showed that employees with preexisting sleep problems and younger employees experienced greater benefits from blue light exposure in the morning, translating to meaningful improvements in work outcomes. This study provides evidence for a comprehensive 24-hr approach to light-dependent circadian regulation in workplace contexts. Additionally, it suggests that using blue light emitting glasses represents a simple, cost-effective intervention that organizations can implement to support employee performance, particularly for younger workers and those with existing sleep difficulties. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
Personality testing for autistic individuals: Potential issues for selection.
Journal of Applied Psychology Benjamin Moon, Kabir N. Daljeet, Joshua Steven Bourdage, Adam W. McCrimmon September 03, 2026
Selection & Assessment Individual Differences Research Methods Performance Leadership
= 2,898) equally comprised of formally diagnosed autistic individuals, self-identified autistic individuals, and allistic (i.e., nonautistic) individuals matched across several individual differences. Our findings suggested that preemployment personality tests may disadvantage both formally diagnosed and self-identified autistic individuals, not due to measurement noninvariance, but because of substantial mean trait differences likely leading to adverse impact, particularly with the traits of extraversion and conscientiousness. We largely replicated these findings across subsamples by regions of residence and a supplemental sample from the same platform, which also linked extraversion and conscientiousness with employment status. While we are not calling for a stoppage in the use of these tests, there is a need to evaluate how they are used in selection contexts to ensure fairness for autistic individuals. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
Socializing through the grapevine: A content-based functional perspective on the receipt of workplace gossip during newcomer socialization.
Journal of Applied Psychology Rui Zhong, Yingxin Deng, Ryan Tucker September 03, 2026
Training & Development Job Attitudes Selection & Assessment Performance Organizational Culture
During organizational entry, informal communication plays a critical role in newcomer socialization. One common yet underexamined form of informal communication is the receipt of workplace gossip from coworkers. Existing evidence, though limited, has highlighted the null or detrimental effects of receiving gossip on newcomers. In contrast, our research challenges this view by proposing that receiving gossip can also play a functional role in socialization but uncovering this potential requires moving beyond the predominant focus on gossip frequency to consider the content of the gossip itself. To this end, we develop a content-based functional perspective, proposing that the qualitative attributes of received gossip-specifically, work-relatedness, truthfulness, and interestingness-underpin its informational and relational functions during socialization. We tested our theoretical model using a 12-week experience-sampling study conducted over newcomers' first 3 months of organizational entry, involving 168 newcomers and 1,741 weekly observations. The results largely supported our hypotheses, showing that, above and beyond the frequency of gossip received, the three attributes of gossip content enhanced newcomers' norm clarity and social integration. In turn, norm clarity increased task proficiency, while social integration improved affective commitment. We conclude by discussing the theoretical and practical implications of these findings. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
The man of the (second) moment: How greater male variability affects the gender composition and productivity of the workforce.
Journal of Applied Psychology José M. Cortina, Imran Kadolkar, Stefan Volk, Christian Thöni September 03, 2026
Performance Diversity & Inclusion Selection & Assessment
are used as selection tools, women end up being underrepresented. Moreover, selection systems with particular (and not uncommon) attributes result in a workforce that is not only mostly male but also inferior with regard to expected job performance. We suggest solutions that lessen the impact of greater male variability on selection-related decisions. Finally, we discuss the implications of our findings for gender disparities in promotion and career progression, the gender wage gap, and other related topics. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
Managing internal mobility: How social and human capital shape movers’ integration over time.
Journal of Applied Psychology Yezi Kang, Ngoc HĂąn Nguyen, Thomas Arend De Vries, Gerben S. van der Vegt, Floor A. Rink September 03, 2026
Training & Development Teams Health & Well-Being Networks Research Methods
(prominence in the former team) shape the integration process. Using longitudinal email communication data and internal mobility records from a health care company, we find that movers with preentry relationships in their new teams exhibit higher initial levels of integration, whereas those with more internal mobility experience or greater prominence in their former teams integrate more rapidly over time. Our findings underscore the importance of considering both pre- and postentry dynamics over time to adequately manage how different forms of capital support the successful integration of internal movers into a new team. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
A longitudinal person-centred investigation of bullying profiles in a police organisation
🔓
Work & Stress Alexandre J. S. Morin, Nicolas Gillet, Sarah‐GeneviĂšve TrĂ©panier, Rhonda G. Craven, Herbert W. Marsh September 03, 2026
Research Methods Health & Well-Being Training & Development Job Attitudes Turnover & Retention
This person-centred study investigates how perceptions of various types of bullying behaviours (verbal, social, physical, and power abuse) combine within profiles of employees, and examines the characteristics, stability, predictors, and outcomes of these profiles. A sample of 3333 employees from an Australian police organisation was surveyed twice over 18 months. Our results revealed four profiles characterised by Low, Moderately Low, Moderately High, and High levels of bullying behaviour. Alternative results from a bifactor measurement model also revealed four profiles: High Global and Physical Bullying Behavior, High Global and Social Bullying Behavior, Normative, and High Global, Verbal, and Physical Bullying Behavior. These profiles displayed a moderately low within-sample similarity and within-person stability over time. Role ambiguity, role conflict, and perceived organisational support were all associated with profile membership. Well-being, life satisfaction, stress at work, turnover intention, binge drinking, and alcohol use also differed across profiles, with the highest levels of well-being and life satisfaction found in the Low Bullying / Normative profiles and the highest levels of stress at work, turnover intention, binge drinking, and alcohol use found in the High Bullying Behavior / High Global and Social Bullying Behavior and High Global, Verbal, and Physical Bullying Behavior profiles.
Show more Read full article →
Negative Feedback as Performance Conversations: An Event Systems Perspective
🔓
Human Resource Management Emily Sue Corwin, Christopher C. Rosen, Hun Whee Lee, Lauren Simon, RUSSELL E. JOHNSON September 03, 2026
Performance Research Methods Training & Development Motivation Turnover & Retention
ABSTRACT Although feedback is intended to facilitate employee effectiveness, negative feedback sometimes impedes, rather than improves, employee outcomes. We draw from Event Systems Theory to develop a conceptual model that identifies how event‐based characteristics of negative feedback (i.e., novelty, disruption, and criticality) relate to employee effectiveness (i.e., work goal progress, work withdrawal, and interpersonal helping) via two mechanisms—felt competence and cognitive depletion. Results from a 10‐week event sampling study were generally supportive of our theory, indicating that felt competence and cognitive depletion play key roles in mediating the effects of event‐based negative feedback characteristics on employee outcomes. These findings indicate that specific, event‐based characteristics of negative feedback play an important role in explaining employee reactions to such feedback, determining whether it facilitates (vs. hinders) employee effectiveness.
Show more Read full article →
The Double-Failure Trap: Workers’ Sensemaking as Insiders and Victims of Life-Threatening Organizational Wrongdoing
🔓
Administrative Science Quarterly Elisa Giuliani, Andrew H. Spicer September 03, 2026
Health & Well-Being
Workers in many industrial settings remain in jobs that expose them to life-threatening harm, occupying a dual position as insiders within the firm and victims of its consequences. We examine how workers make sense of organizational wrongdoing from this dual position, through an inductive study of the ILVA steel plant in Taranto, Italy, where public scandal revealed chronic toxic emissions. We find that workers’ sensemaking cannot be explained by insider or victim status alone but, instead, emerges at their intersection. While external actors interpret as complicity workers’ continued participation in the firm following the exposure of wrongdoing, workers frame remaining as a survival-oriented response to life-threatening harm, condemning the organization as the source of injury while depending on it for survival. At the same time, as workers fail to secure recognition as victims beyond the firm, they come to view institutional inaction in the face of their suffering as evidence of systemic abandonment and injustice. We theorize that these processes—survival-based resignation to continue working and perceived institutional abandonment—reinforce each other, creating a double-failure trap in which workers endure life-threatening harm not because they fail to recognize its dangers but because they no longer believe protection or escape is possible.
Show more Read full article →
Who Is to Blame? A Network Perspective on Workplace Injustice
🔓
Journal of Organizational Behavior Jeffrey Joseph Haynie, Bryan Fuller, Hettie A. Richardson, Christopher L. Martin, Pierre Andrieux September 02, 2026
Networks Training & Development Leadership Research Methods Selection & Assessment
ABSTRACT Organizational justice research typically assumes that accountability for injustices is localized to the direct offender. Yet growing evidence suggests that blame can extend to indirect actors, calling into question such a narrowed view of injustice. By integrating fairness and power‐dependence theories, we develop a model of blame‐shifting to explain how victims can hold both coworkers (direct offenders) and supervisors (indirect offenders) accountable when coworker offenses arise. Across two studies, we theorize and test the mechanisms through which blame migrates from a direct offender to a background actor, highlighting the importance of power‐based network considerations for workplace injustices. In Study 1, event‐based data demonstrate that coworker injustice predicts supervisor injustice through the sequential mediation of coworker and supervisor blame. Study 2 constructively replicates this effect and tests boundary conditions involving formal (delegation‐based, vertical) and informal (status‐based, horizontal) power asymmetries. Results indicate that perceived intermediary delegation (PID)—the degree to which victims view coworkers as agents acting under supervisory authority—strengthens the blame migrating effect when victims concurrently hold lower relative statuses with their supervisors than their offending coworkers. Together, these findings suggest that accountability judgments arise within power‐laden networks rather than in isolated dyads. Such a network perspective offers a deeper understanding of accountability judgments thereby advancing justice theory and practice.
Show more Read full article →
Emotion Regulation at Work: A Social Perspective
🔓
Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior James M. Diefendorff, Karen Rochelle Niven, Xin Wei Ong September 02, 2026
Training & Development Organizational Culture Selection & Assessment Diversity & Inclusion Motivation
Emotion regulation is centrally important to work life. Being able to control one's emotions and show what is needed on the job is highly valued, as is being able to manage the emotions of others. Dominant perspectives of emotion regulation tend to emphasize the experience of the regulator in isolation. In this review, we adopt an explicitly social lens through which to view emotion regulation at work. Specifically, we consider social influences at three levels: ( a ) relational, with a focus on the role and impact of one's interaction partners; ( b ) professional, with a focus on the role of shared occupational and organizational norms in shaping emotion regulation; and ( c ) societal, with a focus on how widely shared beliefs or expectations relating to culture, race, and gender can influence emotion regulation. Focusing on four phases of emotion regulation (i.e., emotion goal selection, affect and discrepancy detection, emotion regulation strategy use, and outcomes of emotion regulation), we consider social influences from all three levels on intrapersonal and interpersonal emotion regulation. Finally, we conclude with research questions and practical implications, as well as a call for research to adopt an integrative approach that examines intrapersonal and interpersonal emotion regulation at work together.
Show more Read full article →
Participatory work design intervention in a disability support organization: effects on job demands, social support, and burnout
🔓
European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology Arian Kunzelmann, Connie Deng, Lucinda J. Iles, Ryan Cheng, Helena Nguyen, et al. September 02, 2026
Performance Health & Well-Being Organizational Change Training & Development Job Design
This study evaluates the effectiveness of a participatory work design intervention to improve job quality and mental well-being in a disability support organization. We investigate whether the intervention is associated with changes in burnout (i.e. disengagement, work-related, client-related), and we assess the changes in work design through which the intervention has its effects. We hypothesized that the effects of the work design intervention on burnout occur via changes in social support (i.e. co-worker instrumental and emotional support) and job demands (i.e. role conflict, time pressure). 72 participants were involved (N = 21 in the intervention group, 66.7% female; N = 51 in the non-intervention group, 82.4% female). The intervention was associated with lower job demands, higher co-worker instrumental support, and lower burnout disengagement. Multilevel analyses revealed that changes in job demands, rather than changes in support, appeared to account for the changes in burnout disengagement. The results highlight how, in the challenging context of disability care, participatory work redesign can reduce burnout disengagement through changes to job demands.
Show more Read full article →
Colleagues' job crafting: How inspiration and anxiety relate to helping and undermining behaviour
Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology Qiqi Wang, Erich C. Dierdorff, Yiwei Yuan, Zhe Shang, Jun Liu September 01, 2026
Research Methods Job Design Networks Training & Development
Abstract Previous research on job crafting has predominantly focused on an ‘actors' perspective’, failing to comprehensively explore how job crafting relates to others within the work context. Drawing upon the appraisal theory of emotion, this study adopts an ‘others' perspective’ and proposes a dual pathway framework to illustrate both the negative and positive behavioural responses associated with coworker job crafting. We argue that coworker job crafting is associated with observer functional behavioural responses (i.e., more helping and less undermining) and dysfunctional behavioural responses (i.e., less helping and more undermining) through its associations with observer inspiration and anxiety. We also propose that construal level acts as an important boundary condition of these indirect relationships. Results from a three‐wave study and an experience sampling study indicated that inspiration mediated the relationship between coworker job crafting and both helping behaviour and social undermining, while anxiety only mediated the relationship between coworker job crafting and social undermining. Construal level further moderated the indirect relationship between coworker job crafting and social undermining via observer anxiety. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.
Show more Read full article →
Getting stuck and sick by motherhood discrimination: Conservation of resource theory perspective of interactive effects of on‐the‐job and off‐the‐job embeddedness
🔓
Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology Vesa Peltokorpi September 01, 2026
Performance Diversity & Inclusion Turnover & Retention Networks Research Methods
Abstract Working mothers continue to experience motherhood discrimination in the workplace. This paper draws on conservation of resources theory to examine how on‐the‐job and off‐the‐job embeddedness—work and community‐related web of forces that keep employees from leaving organizations—moderate the first‐stage relationship between motherhood discrimination and turnover intentions, which in turn is associated with the indirect effects of discrimination on two outcomes: (1) voluntary turnover and (2) poor physical health. The results of time‐lagged survey data from 719 working mothers in Japan suggest that turnover intentions mediate the positive relationships between motherhood discrimination and both voluntary turnover and poor physical health. Moreover, high on‐the‐job embeddedness weakens the relationship between motherhood discrimination and turnover intentions, reducing its indirect effects on voluntary turnover and poor physical health. In contrast, off‐the‐job embeddedness strengthens the relationship between discrimination and turnover intentions, amplifying its indirect effects on voluntary turnover. This paper contributes to the literature by providing a conservation of resource theory‐based rationale and findings that on‐ and off‐the‐job embeddedness operate as distinct resource pools that differentially influence employees' responses to adverse workplace conditions.
Show more Read full article →
Aligned coaching approaches: Uncovering the roles of goal level and coachees' cognitive needs and preferences
🔓
Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology Ana Stojanović, Daan A. H. Fris, Edwin A. J. van Hooft, Matthijs de Hoog, Anne P.J. de Pagter September 01, 2026
Training & Development Motivation Selection & Assessment Performance Individual Differences
Abstract Although professional coaching is increasingly recognized as an effective tool for personal and professional development, it remains unclear how coaching goal level and coachees' cognitive preferences shape perceptions of different coaching approaches. Building on goal hierarchy theory, we examined whether task‐ versus identity‐level goals and coachees' cognitive needs influence the perceived alignment, attractiveness and effectiveness of solution‐focused coaching (SFC) and cognitive‐behavioural coaching (CBC). Two experimental vignette studies were conducted. Study 1 ( N = 198 coaches) explored how professional coaches evaluated the fit between coaching approaches and goals. Results suggested that coaches perceived SFC as more aligned with task goals than CBC, but no differences emerged for identity goals. Study 2 ( N = 142 potential coachees) examined coachees' perspectives. Goal level had little influence, whereas cognitive preferences were more consistently related to coaching evaluations: individuals higher in locomotion preferred SFC, while those higher in self‐reflection and assessment favoured CBC. Across studies, the anticipated effectiveness of SFC and CBC was comparable. Overall, the findings suggest that support for goal–approach fit was limited, whereas support for person–approach fit was more consistent. Theoretically, the studies extend coaching effectiveness models; practically, they underscore the need for flexible, personalized coaching approaches.
Show more Read full article →
Enhancing team effectiveness through responsible leadership: A dual harmony perspective
🔓
Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology Yu Tu, Qing Qu, Pengyu Chen, Wei Liu September 01, 2026
Teams Performance Leadership Research Methods Training & Development
Abstract Moving beyond leader–subordinate dyads, we investigate the multifaceted impacts of responsible leadership on both internal and external team effectiveness. Integrating cognitive appraisal theory with the dualistic model of harmony, we propose a double‐edged sword model that elucidates the underlying mechanisms and boundary conditions of responsible leadership effects on team creativity and organizational citizenship behaviour toward stakeholders (OCBS). Three studies were conducted to progressively test our theoretical model. Study 1 used two independent samples to develop measures for dual team harmony—team genuine and superficial harmony toward stakeholders. In Studies 2 and 3, using the multilevel, multisource, time‐lagged, and cross‐cultural survey design, we found that responsible leadership activates both types of interpersonal harmony, which further mediate the relationships between responsible leadership and both team creativity and OCBS. Mastery climate amplifies the relationship between responsible leadership and genuine harmony, as well as the positive mediating effects of genuine harmony. Conversely, mastery climate mitigates the relationship between responsible leadership and superficial harmony, along with the negative mediating effects of superficial harmony. Performance climate exhibits the opposite patterns. These findings advance our understanding of the double‐edged sword effects of responsible leadership and extend the research framework regarding its internal and external effectiveness.
Show more Read full article →
Adoption of Nontraditional Labor Market Approaches: A Neo‐Institutional Theory Approach
🔓
Human Resource Management Etka Topaloglu, Rory Eckardt, Chou‐Yu Tsai, Shelley D. Dionne, Seth Michael Spain September 01, 2026
Selection & Assessment Performance Organizational Culture Research Methods
ABSTRACT Despite firms' increasing experimentation with nontraditional human capital sourcing and selection approaches, our understanding of how and why these are adopted and diffuse among competitors is limited. Drawing on neo‐institutional theory, we examine how mimetic, coercive, and normative pressures influence firms' adoption of nontraditional labor market approaches. We conceptualize labor markets as “traditional” and “nontraditional” based on firms' observable human capital selection activities and investigate how competitors' prior use of nontraditional sourcing approaches (mimetic pressures), coercive pressures stemming from customer‐based demand conditions, and top manager institutional agency (the capacity of top managers to interpret and act against prevailing normative pressures) influence adoption. We further examine how field‐level performance feedback from nontraditional‐sourced human capital influences the impact of these institutional pressures and aspects of adopting these alternative sourcing approaches. Using a longitudinal dataset of Major League Baseball franchises from 1977 to 2002 and event‐history models of first adoption of non–South/Central American international player sourcing, we assess how organizational and contextual conditions affect the timing of adoption. Results indicate mimetic and coercive institutional pressures, top manager institutional agency, and field‐level performance feedback systematically influence adoption decisions. The findings contribute to our understanding of institutional drivers in firms' human capital sourcing and selection behavior and offer insights into the broader dynamics that drive the adoption of nontraditional labor market approaches across firms.
Show more Read full article →
Issue Information
🔓
Human Resource Management September 01, 2026
Performance Networks Selection & Assessment Leadership Artificial Intelligence/Technology
Electronic performance monitoring (EPM) has been widely used in organizations in the expectation of promoting performance.However, its effectiveness sometimes falls short of these expectations.Most previous studies have examined EPM's side effects from the perspective of psychological reactance, treating it simply as a monitoring stressor.To extend this literature, we draw on workplace objectification theory and propose that EPM fosters employees' perceived objectification by signaling objectifying cues, which in turn undermines employee job performance.Moreover, supervisor monitoring styles (observational and interactional) can either strengthen or weaken the relationship between EPM and perceived objectification.We tested our model using an online experiment with 199 US participants and a multi-wave field survey with 294 Chinese employees, and all hypotheses were supported.Theoretically, this research complements the psychological reactance perspective in EPM research by introducing perceived objectification as a humanity-related mechanism through which EPM may shape employee performance.We also advance workplace objectification theory by extending its scope from human-human interactions to human-technology interactions.Practically, we offer guidance on preserving employees' humanity while adopting technological and human monitoring to maintain performance.1099050x, 2026,
Show more Read full article →
From Scarce Resources to Resourcing Spirals: A Theory of Mindful Resourcing
Organization Science Cristina Rubino, Sara Jansen Perry, Ravi S. Kudesia, Ari A. Malka September 01, 2026
Training & Development Research Methods Individual Differences Social Responsibility Health & Well-Being
People in organizations often face demands in excess of their resources. Psychological theories of resources reflect this scarcity, emphasizing how people conserve or balance resources. Although they acknowledge that interventions, like mindfulness training, can create resources, these theories struggle to explain how as they assume that resources are necessarily scarce. In this study, we introduce a theory of mindful resourcing. Rather than reducing mindfulness to a scarce psychological resource that a person has, it reveals mindfulness to be a skillful practice that a person does to enhance their agency to create resources. Mindful resourcing theory shows how mindfulness skills form a foundation for resourcing—the ability to create and enact resources—and how resourcing reciprocally enhances mindfulness skills such that the practices of mindfulness and resourcing intertwine as mutually sustaining and supporting practices. We develop this theory across a three-phase research design that (1) introduces a conceptual model that sequences how these practices intertwine and (2) uses this sequencing to surface the otherwise implicit design structure of mindfulness trainings before (3) abductively building theory on how people enact and develop competence in mindful resourcing from longitudinal qualitative data of 98 nonprofit employees undergoing training. Our theory-building discovers the critical role of resourcing spirals—showing how employees create and enact resources by skillfully assembling spirals and recursively expanding those spirals into longer and more impactful sequences as they gain competence. Taken together, our study illuminates the understudied human activities by which people not only create and enact resources but learn to do so more mindfully. Funding: This work was supported by a California State University, Northridge Research, Scholarship, and Creative Activity (RSCA) Award. Supplemental Material: The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2022.17009 .
Show more Read full article →
The Beacon Effect: A Model of Humanistic Impression Management
🔓
Organizational Psychology Review David Montgomery Long September 01, 2026
Measurement & Psychometrics Performance Motivation Individual Differences Job Design
Impression management is often portrayed as a self-serving strategy for personal gain. We propose that impression management can also operate as a humanistic act—one in which actors generate favorable impressions through non-exploitative efforts to satisfy the psychological needs of audiences. Drawing on self-determination and signaling theories, we theorize that expressions of mindfulness, curiosity, and encouragement function as relational signals that fulfill audiences’ needs for autonomy, relatedness, and competence. When these signals are received as clear, reliable, and need-supportive, they generate experiences of validation, interest, and confidence that foster favorable impressions. We introduce the beacon metaphor to organize this process, illustrating how impression management can shift from instrumental self-presentation to need-supportive signaling, and we conceptualize impression formation as a reciprocal process whereby audience responses operate as countersignals. Our model shifts attention to the audience's experience of signaling and explains impression management as a relational, need-based process that is dynamically co-constructed.
Show more Read full article →
Why and when algorithmic management influences gig workers' work-family interface? Based on goal-setting theory
Journal of Managerial Psychology Long Chen, Xinyu Gao, Feisi Yao September 01, 2026
Artificial Intelligence/Technology Health & Well-Being Research Methods Motivation Networks
Purpose The purpose of this study is to explore the mechanism and boundary conditions underlying the effect of algorithmic management on work-family spillover among gig workers in the gig economy. Design/methodology/approach Based on goal-setting theory, this study constructed a moderated mediation model to examine the mediating role of concentration and the moderating effect of depletion sensitivity in the relationship between algorithmic management and work-family spillover. By collecting three-wave time-lagged survey data from 658 gig workers, this study tested the hypotheses. Findings This study demonstrates that algorithmic management can promote positive work-family spillover and inhibit negative work-family spillover by enhancing concentration. As gig workers' depletion sensitivity increases, the positive indirect effect of algorithmic management on positive work-family spillover and its negative indirect effect on negative work-family spillover, are both attenuated. Practical implications To help gig workers balance work and family life, gig platform managers should fully leverage the advantages of algorithmic management in goal setting and provide necessary support for gig workers with high depletion sensitivity. Originality/value These findings empirically reveal the positive effects of algorithmic management on gig workers' family life.
Show more Read full article →
Who sees visions as plausible? The joint effect of leader vision communication and employee work passion on job performance
Journal of Managerial Psychology Junmei Lan, Li Guo, Peipei Shu, Wenxing Liu, Yang Bai September 01, 2026
Performance Leadership Motivation Networks Research Methods
Purpose This study aims to examine how leader vision communication shapes follower job performance by shifting the focus from leaders to followers. Specifically, it highlights the roles of perceived vision plausibility and follower work passion in explaining when and why leader vision communication becomes effective. Design/methodology/approach Using the dualistic model of passion and motivated information processing theory, the study proposes that harmonious work passion (but not obsessive work passion) enhances the positive effects of leader vision communication on followers' perceptions of vision plausibility. A multisource, time-lagged survey of 229 leader–follower dyads tested these hypothesized relationships. Findings The results demonstrate that follower harmonious work passion amplifies the impact of leader vision communication on perceived vision plausibility, which mediates the relationship between leader vision communication and follower job performance. Originality/value This study integrates leadership and passion research to clarify when and how leader vision communication becomes effective, highlighting harmonious work passion and perceived vision plausibility as key follower-driven mechanisms. It offers actionable guidance for improving vision effectiveness and performance.
Show more Read full article →
When uncertainty strikes: how job insecurity elicits workplace anxiety and distinct behavioral responses
Journal of Managerial Psychology Qingxiong Derek Weng, Mingzhi Xie, Lixin Chen September 01, 2026
Research Methods Training & Development Job Attitudes Networks Selection & Assessment
Purpose This study aims to investigate how job insecurity shapes employees' maladaptive coping responses. Drawing on appraisal theory, we develop a theoretical model proposing that job insecurity elicits workplace anxiety, which in turn increases cyberloafing and reduces help-seeking behavior, with individuals' regulatory focus as a key boundary condition governing the strength of the sequential mechanism. Design/methodology/approach A three-wave, one-month time-lagged survey was conducted among 321 full-time employees in China. Mediation and moderation hypotheses were tested using Hayes' PROCESS macro with bootstrapping procedures. Findings Workplace anxiety mediated the relationships between job insecurity and the two coping responses by increasing cyberloafing and reducing help-seeking behavior. Moreover, promotion focus attenuated the negative association between anxiety and help-seeking, whereas prevention focus amplified the positive association between anxiety and cyberloafing. Practical implications Organizations should reduce job insecurity through transparency and predictable evaluation systems, while offering emotion-regulation support. Tailored management practices can discourage avoidance and promote constructive engagement. Originality/value Integrating appraisal theory with regulatory focus theory, this study advances job insecurity research beyond traditional stress–strain perspectives by identifying workplace anxiety as a key mechanism linking job insecurity to employees' maladaptive coping responses. Furthermore, this study elucidates the pivotal role of regulatory focus is shaping how employees cope with workplace anxiety.
Show more Read full article →
Developing Judgment: Responsible AI Use for Peer Reviewers
Human Resource Development Quarterly Oliver Stephen Crocco, Rajashi Ghosh, Sewon Kim, Toby Marshall Egan September 01, 2026
Training & Development Artificial Intelligence/Technology Performance Individual Differences Networks
ABSTRACT Reviewing is the science and art of scholarly judgment, which forms a core pillar of knowledge production. Generative artificial intelligence (AI) poses a risk to this judgment during the review process. Evidence from outside human resource development (HRD) shows that AI‐assisted reviews are generally more lenient and converge on one another. This editorial develops reviewer‐facing guidance for HRD by identifying three points at which AI might enter the review process: the transmission of the manuscript, the expression of the report, and the formation of judgment. Transmission is prohibited across nearly all current policies; expression may be assisted and disclosed; and judgment must remain the reviewer's own. The argument we make here rests on research into cognitive offloading and expertise, and therefore on what a reviewer loses by delegating parts of this process to AI. We close with a research agenda to explore the potential for responsible AI use in reviewing.
Show more Read full article →
Information for Contributors
🔓
Human Resource Development Quarterly September 01, 2026
Training & Development Research Methods Selection & Assessment Performance Health & Well-Being
Human Resource Development Quarterly (HRDQ) is the first scholarly journal focused directly on the field of human resource development (HRD) sponsored by AHRD (the Academy of Human Resource Development).It provides a central focus for research on HRD issues as well as the means for disseminating such research.HRDQ recognizes the interdisciplinary nature of the HRD field and brings together relevant research from related fields, such as economics, education, management, sociology, and psychology.It provides an important link in the application of theory and research to HRD practice.Prior to submission authors are strongly encouraged to review past volumes of HRDQ and other journals sponsored by the Academy of Human Resource Development (AHRD) www.ahrd.org to identify the potential contribution of their work to the HRD research and literature base.In general, HRDQ publishes the following types of contribution:‱ Empirical scholarly work that addresses the theoretical foundations of HRD, HRD research, and evaluation of HRD interventions and contexts, whether qualitative, quantitative or mixed methods.‱ Methods papers that demonstrate or discuss a quantitative, qualitative, or mixed method with relevance to HRD and related fields that contribute to the advancement of research methods and scholarship in the HRD field.‱ Conceptual papers are considered appropriate for publication in HRDQ only when their purpose is to develop and justify an empirical research agenda which can stimulate future research avenues and methods in a new area.Articles that specifically focus on theory and integrative literature reviews are typically not considered within the scope of HRDQ.
Show more Read full article →
A distinction with little difference: Incompetent leadership is destructive
🔓
Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice Zofia Ann Walters, Liana M. Kreamer September 01, 2026
Leadership Job Attitudes Health & Well-Being Teams Conflict
In their focal article, Ducheyne and De Fruyt (2026) argue that the lack of distinction between toxic/destructive and incompetent leadership is hindering research progress and creating challenges for practitioners.We agree that many "dark" leadership constructs are often conflated but contend that both toxic and incompetent leadership can be equally harmful for employees, teams, and organizations.Further, we argue that placing the responsibility of "correctly" labeling poor leadership on followers is unfair and could cause further harm.Rather than emphasizing the distinction between leader incompetence and toxicity, we propose a behavior-and outcomecentered framework.We recommend organizations focus on measurable behaviors and outcomes rather than relying on perceptions of poor leadership, arguing that a leader's competence or intentions matter less than the consequences of their behaviors.First, Ducheyne and De Fruyt rely on the leader's intentions to differentiate toxic and incompetent leadership.However, behavioral intentions are not only challenging to capture but are less relevant than the outcomes that result from behaviors (or a lack thereof).For example, laissez-faire leadership, defined as "the absence of leadership, the avoidance of intervention, or both" (Bass & Avolio, 1994, p. 20), demonstrates how leader incompetence can be just as destructive as malicious intent, producing negative employee outcomes comparable to those generated by actively toxic leaders (e.g., role conflict, role ambiguity, interpersonal conflict; Skogstad et al., 2007).Further, failing to support individuals often results in increased anxiety, increased role strain, and well-being decrements (Skogstad et al., 2007).Thus, laissez-faire would not meet the competent leadership dimensions of (a) steer/support the team and (b) steer/support the individual (Table 1 , Ducheyne & De Fruyt, 2026).Relatedly, failing the minimal competencies of (a) creating a safe environment and (b) fostering a climate of trust (Table 1, Ducheyne & De Fruyt, 2026) can set followers up for harm, regardless of whether the harm is intentional or not.An analogy for this would be viewing child welfare cases: Neglect and abuse are treated as similar crimes (Abuse of Children, 2018) despite the caregiver's intentions (i.e., intentional abuse or absentminded neglect).The negative outcomes of these offenses are detrimental to the child, and the consequences are similar.The bottom line is that a leader's failure to cultivate a supportive environment ultimately inflicts damage, regardless of whether the behavior stems from incompetence or intentional harm.Second, the focal article focuses on perceptions of leader behaviors, claiming that the behavior must be "perceived as threatening, intimidating, or discrediting " (p.13), and the leader must be "experienced as" untrustworthy by others to qualify as toxic (p.13).This is problematic because perceptions and evaluations of behavior are distinct from behavior itself (see Banks et al., 2023).For example, if a leader engages in toxic actions, such as shifting blame or interpersonal hostility,
Show more Read full article →
Circular economy implementation in small businesses: Perspectives on the field of entrepreneurship
Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice Chao Miao, Shanshan Qian, Jan Baum, Bart J. Debicki September 01, 2026
Schilling et al. (2026) presented a study discussing how industrial and organizational (I-O) psychology science and practice can be employed for the implementation of circular economy (CE). The discussions in the focal article were conducted under the assumption and in the context of established businesses where the resources needed for the promotion and implementation of CE practices should be reasonably sufficient and available to these businesses. Expanding this boundary condition elicits the question whether the findings and recommendations from the focal article can be generalized to small businesses, startups, and family firms, which may not have comparable resources available to them to implement CE.
Show more Read full article →
But what is good leadership? A conceptual critique of defining leadership through psychological safety and trust
🔓
Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice Carsynn Miller September 01, 2026
Leadership Health & Well-Being Motivation Training & Development Teams
Recent efforts to distinguish toxic leadership from incompetent leadership aim to clarify theoretical boundaries and improve organizational responses to leadership failure.Ducheyne and De Fruyt's (2026) recent focal article provides a thoughtful and practically motivated framework for differentiating these constructs, particularly by emphasizing intent, repetition, and follower perceptions.I concur that distinguishing between forms of poor leadership is both necessary and valuable.However, a more fundamental conceptual issue underlies the proposed distinction: The focal article implicitly defines leadership effectiveness in terms of its relation to outcomes (i.e., psychological safety and follower trust).A central premise of the focal article is that "to be effective as a leader : : : contemporary leaders need to bring two critical psychological conditions in the workplace, that is (a) creating a safe psychological environment and (b) develop a climate of trust by being trustworthy themselves" (Ducheyne & De Fruyt, 2026, p. 286).These constructs are then used to distinguish incompetent, toxic leadership, and, by proxy, effective leadership.Within this conceptualization, incompetent leadership reflects a lack of ability or skill, whereas toxic leadership involves harmful, self-serving, or unethical behavior that actively undermines others, regardless of leader competence.Psychological safety and trust play a key role in distinguishing the two; incompetent leaders may still be trusted and maintain some degree of psychological safety, whereas toxic leaders erode trust and create psychologically unsafe environments.Ducheyne and De Fruyt frame this distinction as important because incompetence can often be addressed through development, whereas toxic leadership requires protective and corrective action to prevent harm.Although intuitive and consistent with discourse on team dynamics (e.g., Edmondson, 1999), this approach raises a key concern: Psychological safety and trust are theoretical outcomes of leadership, not leadership itself; though one could also argue that perceptions of leaders are driven by global perceptions of trust (i.e., halo effect), which Ducheyne and De Fruyt's paper does not do.Recent scholarship has emphasized the importance of defining leadership in terms of behaviors, processes, or competencies that produce outcomes, rather than by the outcomes themselves, aligning with broader critiques in the literature (Banks et al., 2016;Fischer et al., 2024;Hogan & Kaiser, 2005).By embedding these outcomes directly into the definition of leadership, the focal article unintentionally introduces multiple conceptual, methodological, and practical problems.
Show more Read full article →
Tracing the shadow: A practitioner’s guide to conceptualizing and identifying toxic leadership
Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice Andrew C. Loignon, Thomas Fischer, George C. Banks September 01, 2026
Leadership Networks
We welcome the focal article ’ s (Ducheyne & De Fruyt, 2026) focus on distinguishing between “ toxic ” and “ incompetent ” leadership. In this commentary, we take the authors ’ ideas as a point of departure for considering how leadership practitioners may (a) define and (b) identify toxic leaders in their own efforts. We conclude with recommendations for practice.
Show more Read full article →
Dysfunctional leadership as a dynamic and relational process
🔓
Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice Rory E. Kuhn, S. Burak Ozkum September 01, 2026
Leadership Selection & Assessment Networks
First paragraph in lieu of abstract: The focal article by Ducheyne and De Fruyt (2026) calls for a clear conceptual distinction between toxic and incompetent leadership, proposing that these categories can guide research and practice by reducing ambiguity. Although we agree that this differentiation offers useful conceptual clarity, we contend that it becomes unstable in its application. Dysfunctional leadership unfolds through both temporal fluctuation in leader behavior and relational variation in follower appraisal. These intertwined processes suggest that the same leader may appear toxic in one moment and merely incompetent in another, depending on shifting behavioral cues and the relational context in which followers interpret them. From this perspective, dysfunctional leadership is not a fixed category but an emergent pattern shaped by ongoing leader–follower dynamics.
Show more Read full article →
(Re)Making the case for the 4 Rs of talent management in I-O psychology
🔓
Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice Peter D. Harms, Bradley James Brummel September 01, 2026
Turnover & Retention HR Systems & Talent Management Performance Organizational Culture Social Responsibility
Schilling and colleagues (2026) make an interesting and compelling case for integrating the mindset and concepts associated with the circular economy (CE) using the strengths of the field of I-O psychology.We agree that using such frameworks could prove fruitful for both research and practice, but not necessarily for the same reasons.In fact, we would argue that I-O psychologists have already been applying these concepts in their talent management work for a very long time, even if they have been underused, understudied, and discussed using different terms.To make this point, we briefly discuss how I-O psychologists have made use of versions of the 4 Rs described as foundational concepts of the CE.Specifically, we reframe these concepts not as things humans do to the material world but as things organizations (and frequently human resource divisions) do to working people.The reframe of how restructuring talent-related work in I-O psychology according to the R-strategies is directly aligned to the social pillar of the CE.We further argue that organizations who treat their people as resources to extract and then discard are unlikely to build cultures that support and implement CE regardless of how much I-O research practice is used to support the implementation.That is, effective implementation of the 4 Rs in talent management is a vital part of achieving a sustainable organizational culture.We do acknowledge that in this reframing of the 4 Rs we take concepts designed for products and materials, and apply them to human actors with intentions, agency, and consciousness.Our applications are meant to be illustrative more than comprehensive, and further work would need to be done to unpack the implications of these distinctions more fully.First, reduce can be thought of as lowering unnecessary "talent extraction" and preventing avoidable "human-capability waste."I-O psychologists have well-developed theories and evidence concerning why people leave organizations and how organizations can design environments to retain their human capital.For example, research on voluntary turnover shows that exits are often predictable and shaped by shocks, scripts, and decision pathways (Lee & Mitchell, 1994).Similarly, job embeddedness research highlights the web of links, fit, and sacrifice that keeps people in place, thus reducing the likelihood of unwanted exits (Mitchell et al., 2001).On the involuntary turnover side, work on responsible restructuring (Cascio, 2002) offers alternatives to layoffs, such as retraining or redeployment, which prevent unnecessary workforce losses and minimize "talent leakage."Moreover, the increasing emphasis on workforce planning contributes toward efforts to reduce talent loss by proactively addressing workforce needs, ensuring that talent is strategically retained and deployed (Ployhart & Morris, 2024;Schweyer, 2004).These strategies aim to prevent the "waste" of talent, ensuring that capability stays within the system and isn't prematurely discarded.Although many of these ideas are well-established in I-O psychology, the circular economy framework encourages a more focused approach to how organizations can design
Show more Read full article →
Work analysis and competency modeling in effective circular economy implementation
🔓
Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice Katherine C. Wheeler, S. Burak Ozkum September 01, 2026
Performance Motivation Research Methods Selection & Assessment Organizational Culture
In their focal article, Schilling et al. (2026) specifically illustrate how interorganizational and intraorganizational cooperation are the most critical areas through which I-O psychology can contribute to a sustainable circular economy (CE) transition.This commentary elaborates on the application of I-O psychology by highlighting how work analysis and competency modeling enable effective CE implementation through organizational cooperation.Transitioning from a linear to a CE represents a major organizational change.During this change, organizations must ensure that their systems remain aligned.Work analysis and competency modeling are crucial to this alignment.As defined by Brannick et al. (2017), work analysis is the systematic process of gathering and analyzing information about work content, worker attributes related to work performance, and work context.Job/work analysis provides the foundation for most HR systems (Sanchez & Levine, 2012).Furthermore, competency models are frameworks that describe worker competencies required for effective performance across jobs at an organization, with competencies meaning knowledge, skills, abilities, traits, attitudes, values, and motives that contribute to the goals and culture of an organization (Brannick et al., 2017;Campion et al., 2011).Competency modeling creates a shared understanding and a common language within an organization, which is a powerful tool for aligning all employees towards a common goal (Campion et al., 2011).Both work analysis and competency modeling make unique contributions to CE implementation.Work analysis contributes in a role-specific way by detailing specific tasks and technical knowledge, skills, abilities, and other characteristics (KSAOs) for immediate CE work design and subsequent HR functions.Competency modeling contributes in a broader way, serving as a framework that connects employee behaviors and attitudes to larger organizational goals in relation to CE processes and outcomes.We argue that these unique yet connected contributions establish work analysis and competency modeling as essential first steps toward successfully initiating a change to a CE.As highlighted in the focal article, within-unit cooperation is important to effective CE implementation.Working alongside other processes such as team building, selection, and training, work analysis and competency modeling are foundational frameworks that support and structure this important element of cooperation by informing work design and competency alignment.Thus, when applying I-O psychology domains to CE implementation, work analysis and competency modeling should not be overlooked.
Show more Read full article →
Can I-O psychology contribute to circular economies without circularizing its own knowledge?
🔓
Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice Sophie A. Kay, Matthew A. Cronin, Oana Branzei September 01, 2026
Performance Selection & Assessment Networks Organizational Culture
Schilling and colleagues (2026) argue that I-O psychology theories of intra-and interorganizational cooperation offer essential yet still missing contributions toward the implementation of circular economy (CE) practices, recasting the CE transition as a "fundamentally a behavioral and cooperative one" (p.321).However, in advocating for I-O psychology's role in the circular economy, Schilling et al. overlook a crucial reverse insight: our field must itself function as a circular economy of knowledge production.Recognizing this parallel is not just metaphorical; it is essential for I-O psychology to operate as an applied science.This commentary argues that only by circularizing our own knowledge flows can I-O psychology meaningfully contribute to CE implementation.We first explain the parallel between material and knowledge circularity, then identify key stakeholders in the I-O knowledge value chain, and finally offer concrete recommendations for making our field more circular. Circularity of knowledge in applied scienceCronin et al. (2025) recently articulated an integrated "knowledge production system," explaining how different types of contributions flow within and between different types of contributions.Their model (see Figure 1) describes a value cycle moving through four interconnected phases: generation (findings that explain phenomena), synthesis (integrating findings into coherent frameworks), education (teaching frameworks to students and managers), and application (enabling practitioners to solve specific organizational problems using those frameworks).Their model displays a circular value chain of knowledge production, where the scientific process discovers and integrates findings into teachable information that is delivered, refined, and improved through the interaction of scholars, students, and practitioners.To be effective, knowledge needs to be effectively "cycled," whereby its education and/or application bring about new questions for generation (Augustine et al., 2025; Shiefling & Soderstrom, 2022).Not only is the presence of circular knowledge flows essential (Kaplan et al., 2017), but its absence can be profoundly detrimental (Lobbedez et al., 2025).The parallel between material circularity and knowledge circularity is striking.Just as the CE seeks to eliminate waste by keeping materials in productive use through multiple cycles, applied science eliminates wasted knowledge by ensuring findings circulate through generation, synthesis, education, and application.Just as CE systems fail when materials become "stuck' at one stage
Show more Read full article →
Addressing the proliferation of incompetent leaders: The imperative role of improving follower status and stability
🔓
Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice Cassandra N. Phetmisy, Diana Warner, Karen Ahumada Villanueva September 01, 2026
Leadership Motivation Training & Development Selection & Assessment Individual Differences
It is estimated that nearly half of all managers will fail to meet organizational objectives due to lacking skills and traits necessary for the role (Hogan et al., 2010).Possible reasons for the proliferation of incompetent leaders could be related to poor selection decisions and a lack of guidance for addressing competence issues.Indeed, Ducheyne and De Fruyt (2026) assert that organizations should consider motivation and competence in leader selection processes, and the authors offer solutions rooted in development and training.We agree that it is imperative to select the people who both want and can lead others.However, given that incompetent leadership is so widespread, it is fruitful to take a few steps back and reflect on why people who lack the necessary motivation or competencies consider and accept leadership roles.We bring attention to social tendencies of prioritizing leadership, in which society has elevated the importance of leaders over followers.This is evident as leaders are rewarded with better pay, respect, and stability compared to followers.Given that most people are worried about money, work, and the economy (American Psychological Association, 2025b), workers may strive to advance their career by attaining leadership positions-even if that does not align with their interests or skills.A potential answer to this issue lies in the need to uplift the role of being "just a follower."Organizations can do this by promoting systems that emphasize followership principles, 1 using equity theory to support followers and their contributions, and offering mechanisms for advancement that do not push people into managerial roles.
Show more Read full article →
Destructive leadership versus leader ineffectiveness: Leveraging arguments from prior research to clarify the distinction and construct boundaries
🔓
Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice Dina V. Krasikova, James M. LeBreton September 01, 2026
Leadership Networks Performance
The argument that destructive leadership (DL) should be distinguished from ineffective leadership is important and timely (Ducheyne & De Fruyt, 2026). At the same time, this distinction has been articulated previously in the literature. In particular, Krasikova et al. (2013) proposed a theoretical framework that explicitly differentiated DL from ineffective leadership and identified the intentional nature of harmdoing as the key demarcation between the two forms of leadership (see the section titled Destructive Leadership Versus Ineffective Leadership , pp. 1314 – 1315). In this commentary, we build on that earlier work and clarify conceptual issues that are central to distinguishing DL from leader ineffectiveness. Specifically, we: (a) discuss definitional issues related to the construct domain of DL; (b) explain why the focal article ’ s definition of DL, which allows DL to be either intentional or unintentional, blurs the theoretical boundary between DL and ineffective leadership; and (c) posit that ineffective leadership is better conceptualized as the low end of the broader leadership effectiveness continuum rather than as a distinct construct.
Show more Read full article →
The circle of science: Applying circular economy principles to I-O psychology research and academia
🔓
Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice Micha Hilbert, Franz W. Mönke, Lucas Alexander Maunz September 01, 2026
Selection & Assessment Performance Training & Development Social Responsibility Leadership
In their focal article, Schilling et al. (2026) examine how I-O psychology can contribute to advancing circular economy (CE) approaches.In this commentary, we mirror and extend this perspective by suggesting that the underlying logic of the CE-reduce, reuse, and recycle-can also beneficially apply to I-O psychology research and our behavior as researchers.Specifically, we propose conceptualizing I-O psychology as embedded in a CE of knowledge production rather than an end-of-life economy, as is often the case in current practice.We argue that adopting a CE perspective can help address persistent challenges in the field-such as limited relevance for organizational strategies, questionable research practices, and the replication crisis-by offering practical guidelines for more sustainable research. End-of-life characteristics in current I-O psychology research practiceThe products of I-O psychology research industry could be understood in terms of insight into novel phenomena relevant to individuals in organizations.An optimistic perspective on the life cycle of those phenomena is provided by Hunt (1999) who proposed three stages: (1) concept introduction and elaboration, (2) concept assessment and augmentation, and (3) concept consolidation and accommodation.Therefore, ideally, our research industry introduces a new concept, subsequently evaluates and refines it through empirical testing and theoretical elaboration, and eventually integrates it into the broader body of knowledge, as its core propositions become consolidated and adapted to related research domains.However, a less optimistic-and perhaps more realistic-perspective on the life cycle of concepts is offered by Alvesson and Einola (in Gardner et al., 2021).They argue that concepts often enter an escalation of critique, become the subject of discussions about their limitations, and are eventually left behind as most advocates move on to new, more "megatrend topics" and seemingly promising ideas.Alvesson and Einola conclude that "concepts [in our field] do not tend to evolve successfully-and there are many of them left 'hanging'" (Gardner et al., 2021, p. 6).The comparison to a linear business model is apparent: current research practices resemble a linear process in which concepts are created, briefly developed, and quickly discarded.In fact, most (79%) of new concepts in psychology are not reused more than twice (Anvari et al., 2025).Beyond concept development, research insights rarely translate into practice, suggesting that the intellectual effort invested in producing knowledge often leads to little real-world use (Negt & Haunschild, 2025;Voss et al., 2025).Therefore, much like other linear economic processes, the current academic end-of-life approach risks wasting substantial financial and intellectual resources (see Schilling et al., 2026).
Show more Read full article →
Beyond the toxic/incompetent divide: The roles of behavioral stability and source in destructive leadership
🔓
Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice Emma Gerritsen, Ivana VranjeĆĄ, Hans van Dijk September 01, 2026
Leadership Training & Development Networks Turnover & Retention Measurement & Psychometrics
Ducheyne and De Fruyt (2026) raise an important concern that the conceptual boundary between toxic and incompetent leadership is insufficiently defined, creating a risk of conflation that carries real consequences for how organizations diagnose and respond to harmful leadership behavior.We share their view that destructive leadership behavior does not always originate from malevolence, and that greater nuance is needed to reduce stigmatization and to make the complexities of destructive leadership more discussable.At the same time, we argue that the focal paper's proposed route to nuance rests on criteria that are neither reliable nor uniquely tied to either toxicity or incompetence and leave specific types of destructive leadership unaccounted for.In doing so, the framework risks reproducing the very ambiguity and stigmatization it aims to resolve while also generating a new and more serious risk: providing a conceptual justification for treating genuinely harmful leadership behavior as a development problem rather than an accountability problem.
Show more Read full article →
Considering entrepreneurship and bricolage connections with the circular economy
Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice Monica Amadio, Gordon Bruce Schmidt September 01, 2026
Networks Performance Training & Development Selection & Assessment Motivation
The focal article by Schilling et al. (2026) advances an important discussion of how industrial-organizational psychology can enable circular economy implementation within established organizations and deepen our understanding of how these processes work. Much of the discussion in the focal article on circular economy implementation focuses on how incumbent organizations can adapt their existing production and management systems. Less attention has been given to which types of companies and contexts are likely to adopt and test circular economy elements. Organizations of all sizes share a responsibility in advancing the circular economy. Large established corporations and organizational ecosystems have established processes and supply chains that rely on significant workforces trained and rewarded to operate within them. A circular economy does not emerge solely through scale but through distributed adaptation. Implementing a circular economy in such well-established companies or ecosystems is a difficult task beyond small-scale pilots or experiments.
Show more Read full article →
Beyond incompetence: Why destructive leadership research must make the right distinctions
🔓
Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice Peter D. Harms, Alaric Bourgoin, Tyler N. A. Fezzey, Jane Park September 01, 2026
Leadership Motivation Individual Differences Networks Research Methods
Ducheyne and De Fruyt (2026) make a timely and worthwhile case for distinguishing destructive or toxic leadership from mere incompetence.Their central point, that not all poor leadership is malicious, and that conceptual precision matters, is important.As the authors argue, conflating incompetent leadership with destructive leadership risks obscuring important differences in intent, mechanisms, and consequences.This can potentially lead to organizations misdiagnosing leadership problems and applying inappropriate interventions.At the same time, the distinction Ducheyne and De Fruyt advocate may be better understood as a reminder for the leadership literature to correct course rather than as a conceptual breakthrough.The central conjecture of the target article echoes a similar call advanced more than a decade ago by Krasikova et al. (2013) in their comprehensive review of destructive leadership.These authors highlighted persistent problems such as unclear construct boundaries, the proliferation of labels, and the absence of a unified framework.Notably, they argued that future research on destructive leadership should distinguish between destructive intentions and destructive outcomes, a distinction that closely parallels the difference between well-intentioned but ineffective leadership (incompetence) and leadership driven by selfish or hostile motives (destructive leadership).Krasikova et al.'s insights opened the door to a more differentiated research agenda attentive to the distinct antecedents and consequences of destructive forms of leadership.Accordingly, further differentiation of destructive leadership is warranted given what research already suggests about the personality profiles and behavioral patterns of destructive leaders.Although Ducheyne and De Fruyt call for greater conceptual precision, their framework still relies on the broad category of "destructive leadership," thereby retaining some of the very construct conflation they seek to overcome.This category may encompass distinct motives, traits, and behavioral patterns, and treating it as unitary risks obscuring meaningful differences in antecedents, mechanisms, and consequences.To be clear, this tendency is not unique to their article.It also appears in prior reviews of destructive leadership (e.g., Mackey et al., 2021), dark personality (e.g., Moshagen et al., 2018), and workplace deviance more broadly (e.g., O'Boyle et al., 2012).At the same time, this is not an argument for endless splitting or construct proliferation.Distinctions are most useful when they improve explanation, prediction, or intervention, not when they merely multiply labels (which can also be an issue in this literature; see Schyns & Schilling, 2013).This point becomes especially clear when considering personality antecedents.If destructive leadership is not a unitary phenomenon, then its dispositional roots should not be modeled as though they were.Research increasingly suggests that dark traits may be correlated, but they are not interchangeable (Harms, 2022;Muris et al., 2017;Paulhus & Williams, 2002).Treating them as equivalent simply because they are aversive or moderately associated may simplify measurement,
Show more Read full article →
The perfect storm: how leader perfectionism fuels employee work-family conflict and presenteeism
🔓
Work & Stress Rahul Goel, Ana Isabel Sanz‐Vergel, Annilee Game, Mariella Miraglia August 31, 2026
Health & Well-Being Leadership Conflict Research Methods Networks
Prior research links leader traits and employee health outcomes, but the processes connecting leaders’ other-oriented perfectionism (LOOP) to employee presenteeism – particularly through work-family conflict – are not well understood. Integrating Conservation of Resources theory and the scarcity hypothesis, we propose that employees’ work-family conflict mediates the relationship between team-level perceptions of LOOP and presenteeism. The hypothesis was tested using a multilevel mediation model based on a three-wave longitudinal survey collected over six months from 483 employees nested within 102 teams. Supporting predictions, shared team perceptions of LOOP were positively related to employees’ work-family conflict, which, in turn, was positively linked to employees’ presenteeism. These effects were observed even after accounting for baseline work-family conflict and presenteeism, and other controls (negative affect, general health, workload, job control, and demographics). Findings contribute to occupational health psychology, indicating that LOOP extends its influence beyond the workplace, impacting employee health and family outcomes.
Show more Read full article →
One of Few or One of Many? The Negative Affective Consequences of Family‐To‐Work Interruptions While Working Remotely
🔓
Human Resource Management Kristie Lynne McAlpine, Matthew M. Piszczek, Sumita Raghuram August 31, 2026
Remote Work Selection & Assessment Research Methods Performance Health & Well-Being
ABSTRACT With expanded access to remote work, employees are spending a greater share of their time working from home. As a result, work and family demands increasingly intersect during the workday, creating more opportunities for interruptions from family members. Drawing on boundary theory, we argue that family‐to‐work interruptions differ from interruptions that originate within the work domain because they require employees to navigate a cross‐domain role transition involving distinct expectations, relationships, and role demands. To advance our understanding of the affective consequences of family‐to‐work interruptions, we leverage affective events theory to examine the effect of daily family‐to‐work interruptions on negative affect at the end of the workday and, in turn, emotional exhaustion in the evening. Importantly, we assess the role of individuals' general perceptions of family‐to‐work conflict and schedule autonomy as cross‐level moderators. We find that the positive effect of daily family‐to‐work interruptions on end‐of‐workday negative affect is stronger for individuals with higher overall perceptions of family‐to‐work conflict and with lower schedule autonomy. Finally, post hoc analyses suggest that gender further shapes these relationships, with the moderating effect of family‐to‐work conflict emerging only among women and the moderating effect of schedule autonomy being substantially stronger for women than for men.
Show more Read full article →
When AI Makes Final Decisions: The Effects of HR Decision Authority Within AI ‐Enabled HRM on Organizational Reputation
Human Resource Management Xiaoying Zheng, Ye Li, Qiaowei Liu August 31, 2026
Performance HR Systems & Talent Management Artificial Intelligence/Technology Individual Differences Networks
ABSTRACT As organizations increasingly embed artificial intelligence (AI) into human resource management (HRM), research has largely examined whether and when AI is used in HRM and how such use affects internal stakeholders. Much less is known about how the allocation of final HR decision authority between AI and human shapes external stakeholders' evaluations of the focal organization. Drawing on signaling theory, this research proposes that when information about AI‐enabled HR decision authority becomes available or knowable to external stakeholders, it can function as an organizational signal that shapes organizational reputation. Across three studies, we show that when AI rather than human HR specialists holds final decision authority over consequential HR decisions, external stakeholders infer greater employee objectification, which, in turn, damages organizational reputation. This process further depends on receiver‐side heterogeneity: the effect is attenuated when perceived AI humanlikeness is higher and amplified when HR issue relevance is higher. These findings contribute to the literature on AI‐enabled HRM, organizational reputation, and signaling theory, and provide implications for how organizations integrate, govern, and communicate AI use in HRM practices.
Show more Read full article →
Resolving the Performance Feedback Puzzle: CEO Psychopathy, Heterogeneous Emotional Responses to Aspiration Gaps, and Risk-Taking
🔓
Academy of Management Journal Remzi GözĂŒbĂŒyĂŒk, Steffen Burkert, Aino TenhiĂ€lĂ€, Carl Joachim Kock, Jukka Pekka Partanen August 31, 2026
Performance Networks Measurement & Psychometrics Research Methods Motivation
Theoretical perspectives provide conflicting predictions regarding how firms adjust risk-taking in response to performance–aspiration gaps. The behavioral theory of the firm attributes increased risk-taking to problemistic search under negative gaps, whereas threat–rigidity theory predicts a reduction in risk-taking. Under positive gaps, the behavioral theory of the firm’s satisficing logic implies decreased risk-taking, while slack search theory indicates the opposite effect. We integrate these competing theoretical logics through trait activation theory by introducing CEO psychopathy as a source of heterogeneity in responses to performance feedback. We argue that performance–aspiration gaps function as situational cues that activate differences in CEOs’ sensitivity to threat and reward cues, generating distinct emotional responses. The relationship between performance–aspiration gaps and risk-taking shifts from negative at lower levels of CEO psychopathy to positive at higher levels. Using fixed effects models on a longitudinal dataset of Finnish firms and a population-scale psychometric measure of CEO psychopathy collected independently of firm outcomes, we find empirical support for these predictions. Our theory reconceptualizes satisficing, threat–rigidity, problemistic search, and slack search as conditionally activated behavioral regimes rather than competing predictions tied solely to the valence of the performance–aspiration gap.
Show more Read full article →
Close Friends, Closer Comparisons: Regulating Envy in Multiplex Relationships
Academy of Management Review Amnah Ameen, Alexandra Rheinhardt Beer, Jo K. Oh August 31, 2026
Networks Training & Development Motivation Organizational Culture Individual Differences
Workplace envy is a socially embedded experience with important personal and relational implications. Yet, not all workplace relationships provide the same context for experiencing and regulating envy. In contemporary organizations, work is increasingly carried out within multiplex relationships that span both professional and personal domains. These relationships broaden the dimensions along which social comparisons occur and heighten the self-relevance of others’ successes, advantages, and favorable life circumstances, making envy especially likely. At the same time, friendship obligations, professional norms, and ongoing work responsibilities can constrain how envy is managed and expressed. Drawing upon emotion regulation theory and research on workplace relationships, we develop a theoretical model that explains how individuals regulate envy within multiplex relationships. We argue that envy simultaneously makes salient personal and relational motives—the desire to reduce the sting of envy and the desire to preserve a valued workplace relationship. These motives, in turn, activate a dual-motive appraisal process through which individuals arrive at key decision points that culminate in one of three regulatory pathways—experience-, situation-, or expression-level regulation—with each pathway producing distinct emotional and relational trajectories. In laying out this model, we seek to advance research on workplace envy and multiplex relationships.
Show more Read full article →
More identification, less pain? Leader identification helps followers reduce burnout when facing leader workaholism
Journal of Managerial Psychology Yu Zhu, Fan Luo, Jing Yang, Yanfei Wang August 31, 2026
Health & Well-Being Leadership Motivation Networks Performance
Purpose This study investigates whether and how leader identification attenuates the effects of leader workaholism on follower obsessive passion and subsequent burnout. Although prior research has documented the harmful consequences of leader workaholism on followers, less is known about when followers themselves may be able to buffer these effects. By adopting a recipient-centric perspective, this study identifies a potentially actionable means of reducing the mental health costs of leader workaholism for followers and protecting employee well-being. Design/methodology/approach A multi-wave field study was conducted among 292 full-time employees to examine how leader workaholism and leader identification influence followers’ obsessive passion and burnout. Findings Leader identification attenuates the positive relationship between leader workaholism and follower obsessive passion, thereby weakening the positive indirect effect of leader workaholism on burnout. Practical implications Organizations should monitor and manage not only leaders’ workaholic tendencies but also followers’ signs of obsessive passion, while fostering healthy and bounded leader identification to reduce the mental health risks that leader workaholism poses to followers. Originality/value This research extends prior work that has primarily documented the negative implications of leader workaholism for follower mental health by showing that follower reactions may vary. It also provides initial evidence for important nuances within controlled motivation in the SDT framework.
Show more Read full article →
O*NET Plus: A Review and Organizing Framework Extending O*NET’s Content Model in Management Research
🔓
Journal of Management Gavin Joseph Williamson, Emily D. Campion, Janelle Bremer August 29, 2026
Measurement & Psychometrics Networks
The Occupational Information Network (O*NET) is a database of occupational descriptors sponsored by the U.S. Department of Labor. Since its release around the turn of the century, O*NET has taken on a broad and important role in management and organizational research as a key data source for occupational characteristics. It is common practice for researchers to combine or adapt descriptors from O*NET’s content model to measure constructs that O*NET does not capture directly (e.g., job complexity, emotional labor demands). This practice has enabled a great deal of research and poses potential extensions to O*NET’s content model, but has also come with challenges, including the proliferation of redundant measures with varying levels of validation. The purpose of this review is to synthesize the studies using O*NET-based measures and curate a database of measures with considerable evidence supporting their validity. In doing so, we contribute to the literature in three ways: (1) we introduce an extended content model that we call “O*NET Plus” and offer it as an expanded organizing framework for occupational description; (2) we review evidence for the psychometric soundness of O*NET Plus measures, highlight those with considerable evidence, and amass these measures in a central location to offer a “one-stop-shop” for researchers looking to leverage O*NET Plus; and (3) we offer guidance and implications for further expansions to O*NET Plus.
Show more Read full article →
From peaks to plummets—linking sleep, effort, and absorption to trajectories of energetic activation during the day
🔓
Journal of Business and Psychology Kirsten Handschuch, Oliver Weigelt, Richard Janzen, Corinna Peifer August 28, 2026
Research Methods Artificial Intelligence/Technology
Abstract This study examines daily energy trajectories at work from a temporal self-regulation perspective, addressing the paradoxical finding that effort can be both energizing and depleting. Rather than treating daily energy curves as purely descriptive, we distinguish three self-regulatory phases of energetic activation—resource mobilization, resource utilization, and resource retraction—and investigate sleep quality, effort, and absorption as phase-specific regulatory predictors. Using experience sampling data from 106 employees over 10 workdays, comprising four daily self-reports (2552 observations), we applied piecewise growth curve modeling to analyze within-person variations in energy trajectories. Our findings confirm an inverted U-shaped energy trajectory, peaking at midday. Sleep quality emerged as a key driver of the resource mobilization phase, associated with higher baseline energy levels but a flatter energy increase during the first half of the workday. During the resource utilization phase, higher noon effort was associated with a steeper decline in energetic activation over the work episode, independent of noon absorption. During the resource retraction phase, afternoon effort predicted a steeper evening decline, although this association did not persist once absorption was included. Effort and absorption also interacted in predicting evening energy trajectories, such that absorption differentiated evening declines primarily when effort was low, whereas differences were smaller under high effort. These results advance theoretical frameworks on energy regulation by identifying distinct mechanisms across daily phases and by showing that the energetic consequences of effort and absorption are temporally structured rather than uniform, becoming most visible after work.
Show more Read full article →
Changes in work-related boredom and their affective and behavioural consequences: the moderating role of job control
🔓
Work & Stress Madelon L. M. van Hooff, Edwin A. J. van Hooft, Ilke Grosemans August 28, 2026
Research Methods Organizational Change Networks
Boredom is a common emotional experience at work and may therefore fluctuate over time. An important question is how employees respond to changes in work-related boredom. The present study therefore examined (1) if changes in work-related boredom relate to changes in depressed mood and frustration and if job control moderates these associations, and (2) if changes in those affective outcomes mediate the relationships between changes in work-related boredom and changes in procrastination and counterproductive work behaviour. We also explored whether these associations occur concurrently or lagged. Survey data were collected in a three-wave design with six weeks between waves (nt1 = 1018; nt2 = 750; nt3 = 547). Latent change scores analyses showed that changes in work-related boredom were positively associated with concurrent (but not lagged) changes in depressed mood and frustration, and that these relationships were weaker for higher levels of job control. Changes in depressed mood and frustration mediated the positive relationships between changes in work-related boredom and concurrent (but not lagged) changes in procrastination and counterproductive work behaviour. These findings show how changes in work-related boredom co-occur with changes in negative affect and work behaviour, and suggest that increases in boredom are accompanied by concurrent changes in these outcomes.
Show more Read full article →
The Digital Visibility‐Belonging Paradox: Digital Cohesion and Control in Contemporary Organizational Management
🔓
Human Resource Management Miles Min-Huei Yang, Richard A. Hunt, Fang Lee Cooke, Ying Lu August 28, 2026
Artificial Intelligence/Technology Performance Networks Research Methods Training & Development
ABSTRACT Digital visibility has become a central organizing condition in digitally mediated work, reshaping how employees are recognized, evaluated, and connected. In this conceptual paper, we theorize digital visibility as a sociomaterial HRM condition that simultaneously enables recognition and generates performative pressures. Anchored in relational cohesion theory, we develop the Digital Visibility–Belonging Paradox concept to explain why the same visibility infrastructures that make employees more observable may also weaken the relational foundations of belonging. We distinguish between authentic belonging and simulated belonging to show how digital visibility can simultaneously support felt recognition and relational connection while encouraging employees to display connection, availability, and engagement through digitally visible cues. We further identify cognitive, emotional, and structural mechanisms through which visibility shapes these divergent trajectories, as well as organizational and system‐level boundary conditions that influence whether visibility supports relational connection or intensifies performative availability. The paper contributes to HRM scholarship by repositioning visibility governance as a relational and humanistic responsibility in digitally mediated work.
Show more Read full article →
When Managing Time Comes at a Cost: A Cross‐Role Resource Tradeoff Perspective on Team Temporal Leadership
🔓
Journal of Organizational Behavior Jiaxin Xue, Jing-hao Zhang, Yuhui Li, Chenghao Men, Liying Bai, et al. August 26, 2026
Teams Leadership Performance Research Methods Health & Well-Being
ABSTRACT While team temporal leadership (TL) has been widely regarded as beneficial for team functioning, existing research has largely overlooked the potential resource costs underlying these benefits. Drawing on conservation of resources theory, we conceptualize TL as a form of leader resource investment that may create a cross‐role resource tradeoff between leader costs and follower benefits. Using two multiwave, multisource field studies, we examine how TL shapes resource dynamics that ultimately influence the task performance of both leaders and followers. Study 1 indicates that TL increases leaders' emotional exhaustion while reducing followers' emotional exhaustion, thereby shaping their respective task performance. Moreover, the beneficial effects of TL on follower outcomes are stronger under higher team task complexity. To unpack this tradeoff, we further theorize mental effort and process clarity as two micromechanisms. Study 2 shows that team task complexity does not moderate the effect of TL on leaders' mental effort but strengthens the effect of TL on leaders' process clarity, with downstream implications for their emotional exhaustion and performance. Team task complexity also strengthens TL's effects in reducing followers' mental effort and enhancing their process clarity. Overall, these findings suggest that team task complexity primarily amplifies the benefits rather than the costs of TL, making TL a more favorable resource investment when team tasks are more complex. This study advances TL research by uncovering its underlying resource tradeoff and clarifying how it is shaped by cognitive processes and contextual demands.
Show more Read full article →
An analysis of quiet quitting from the perspective of psychological capital theory
Journal of Managerial Psychology Clara Bouchet, Virginie Gallego-Roquelaure August 26, 2026
Turnover & Retention Research Methods Performance Job Attitudes Selection & Assessment
Purpose This article aims to explore the phenomenon of quiet quitting in the context of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) by applying the theoretical framework of psychological capital, in order to better understand the psychological mechanisms underlying employees' altered engagement. Design/methodology/approach The research method is based on an exploratory qualitative study involving 24 interviews in French SMEs that had experienced at least one case of quiet quitting. Findings Two processes of quiet quitting were identified: a temporary or cyclical decline in engagement affecting optimism and hope but preserving self-efficacy and resilience; and de facto quiet quitting resulting from deterioration in optimism and hope, followed by self-efficacy and resilience. Practical implications By leveraging insights from psychological capital theory, this study offers practical guidance for managers and employees in SMEs to recognise early signs of quiet quitting and implement proactive strategies to mitigate its potentially detrimental effects on individual and organisational performance. Originality/value By drawing on psychological capital theory and four resources – hope, self-efficacy, resilience and optimism – the authors shed light on a little explored phenomenon found in SMEs: quiet quitting. Given the specific characteristics of SMEs, the authors highlight two processes, thereby improving our understanding of this phenomenon.
Show more Read full article →
Is general mental ability still the best predictor of job performance? Integrating contemporary meta-analytic evidence
🔓
Journal of Business and Psychology Saron Demeke, Paul R. Sackett, Christopher D. Nye, Yujia Li, Nathan R. Kuncel August 25, 2026
Performance Individual Differences Measurement & Psychometrics Research Methods Networks
Abstract For decades, general mental ability (GMA) has been described as the single best predictor of job performance, with meta-analyses suggesting corrected validities near .50. This conclusion has been recently challenged on two fronts: methodologically, with arguments that earlier research applied overly liberal range restriction corrections (Sackett et al., 2022), and more foundationally, with the recognition that evidence largely relied on data collected prior to 1980 (Sackett et al., 2024). Three recent meta-analyses, covering studies between 1990 and 2022, report lower estimates of the GMA-job performance relationship between .16 and .23 (Nye et al., 2022; Sackett et al., 2024; Steel & Fariborzi, 2024). These meta-analyses overlap somewhat, but each also included unique studies not examined in the other papers. To produce comprehensive estimates of this relationship, we obtained all three datasets and conducted new meta-analyses on all available studies. Across multiple analyses, the mean operational validity of GMA for overall job performance falls in the .18–.22 range (total k = 212; N = 109,396). Moderator analyses examining whether O*NET-derived job complexity dimensions (i.e., “Data,” “People,” and “Things”) account for variability in estimates indicated little relationship between Data (cognitive complexity) or People (interpersonal) and validity, a positive relationship for Things (manual), and higher validity in jobs combining greater Data and Things, challenging the traditional view that GMA is most predictive in jobs that are high on cognitive complexity alone. We offer .20 as a summary estimate of the contemporary GMA-job performance relationship and recommend reporting modern findings separately from older data.
Show more Read full article →
What is the role of direct and indirect participation in organisational occupational health interventions? A configural perspective
🔓
Work & Stress Susanne Tafvelin, Marta Anna Roczniewska, Ole Henning SÞrensen, Michael BaumgÀrtner, Karina Marietta Nielsen, et al. August 25, 2026
Health & Well-Being Organizational Change Selection & Assessment Networks Research Methods
Employee participation is considered an essential element when implementing organisational occupational health interventions (OOHIs), yet little is known about the relative importance of different forms of participation, such as direct and indirect participation. The current study examines whether direct participation is necessary to succeed with OOHIs or whether indirect participation is sufficient, as well as whether there are conditions where participation is less important, such as when the intervention is perceived as highly relevant. We used data from the intervention units of a randomised controlled OOHI trail implemented in 64 Danish preschools. We employed coincidence analysis (CNA) to analyse the data to assess causal complexity not captured by regression-based methods. Our results suggest that direct and indirect participation depend on each other – for instance, when one is low, the other needs to be high, and vice versa. Furthermore, perceptions of high relevance constitute an independent route to achieve intended intervention outcomes, questioning the central role of participation in OOHIs. The findings reveal the complexity involved in implementing OOHIs, and CNA offers a way forward to capture this complexity.
Show more Read full article →
Rejected Applicant Reactions to Artificial Intelligence/Human Manager‐Based Recruitment
Human Resource Management Lingjun Zhou, Jinsong Li, Jie Cao August 25, 2026
Selection & Assessment Artificial Intelligence/Technology Individual Differences Leadership Organizational Change
ABSTRACT The increasing use of artificial intelligence (AI) in job recruitment has transformed recruitment practices. Little is known, however, about how applicants react to AI‐based rejection. Drawing on appraisal theory, we propose that applicants rejected by AI tend to appraise the rejection as others' responsibility, leading to negative emotions and adverse reactions against the organization. Using a person‐centered approach and mixed‐methods design in two studies, we identify four distinct profiles based on the combination of outward‐focused negative emotions (OFNE) and inward‐focused negative emotions (IFNE). Specifically, we argue and test that introducing a human manager to review AI‐based rejection can soothe rejected applicants. Our findings show that involving human touch can shift applicants' profiles, leading to better reactions toward the organization. Theoretical and practical implications for rejected applicant reactions in the context of AI‐based recruitment processes are discussed.
Show more Read full article →
A Process Model of Managerial Phronesis in the Age of Generative AI
Academy of Management Review Dirk Lindebaum, Natarajan Balasubramanian, Mehreen Ashraf, Patrick Haack August 25, 2026
Artificial Intelligence/Technology Training & Development Individual Differences
Managerial phronesis involves first-hand experience that helps managers make moral and context-specific judgments at work in pursuit of the common good. Yet, as managers increasingly rely on generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) at work, many of these first-hand experiences are replaced by synthetic outputs. While past research has investigated how human–AI interactions alter managerial agency, we do not know why, how, and under which conditions GenAI affects the development of managerial phronesis. Answering these questions is important because phronesis underpins much of knowledge use in organizations. Consequently, we develop a baseline model that advances our understanding of how phronesis emerges in the absence of GenAI, introducing conceptual innovations that explain how new experiences are generated. We then extend this model by explaining why and how GenAI shapes the development of phronesis. Specifically, we theorize how GenAI can shift the development of phronesis toward what we term epistemic de-skilling, when conditions of perceived time pressure prompt cognitive offloading of tasks, and toward epistemic up-skilling, when conditions of accountability activate managerial reflexivity. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of our model, and articulate an agenda for future research.
Show more Read full article →
Regulatory Balancing Acts: Lobbying and Medical Device Approval
Organization Science Jake B. Grandy, Joel Andrus, Zhe Xing, Jieun Lee August 25, 2026
Performance Health & Well-Being Training & Development Job Attitudes Social Responsibility
Lobbying is one of the primary nonmarket strategies firms use to shape regulatory outcomes, yet it is often treated as either an informational input that helps regulators make better decisions or a distortionary influence that undermines bureaucratic judgment. We develop a reputation-based theory of how regulators interpret lobbying under uncertainty. Because agencies are evaluated for both acting too quickly and acting too slowly, regulators use discretion over decision time to manage reputational risk. From this perspective, lobbying matters less as persuasion and more as sustained engagement that affects regulators’ confidence that foreseeable risks have been identified and addressed. We argue that the effects of lobbying depend on firm-level reputational cues that influence how regulators interpret lobbying activity, ultimately affecting the speed at which agencies grant regulatory approval. Using a novel dataset of FDA medical device approvals from 2002 to 2021, we find that lobbying is associated with faster approval on average. However, following product recalls this effect can reverse, suggesting that regulators treat interaction as misplaced confidence and increase scrutiny to reduce exposure to decisions that may become reputationally costly. By contrast, innovation reputation signals strengthen the approval-accelerating effect of lobbying by making timely approval more defensible to external audiences. Our theory suggests that the success of lobbying depends on how regulators interpret it in light of firm reputational cues, providing a reputation-based explanation for prior mixed findings on lobbying effectiveness.
Show more Read full article →
Why Organizations Resist Change: A Multilevel Model of Human, Systemic, and Causal Constraints
🔓
Organizational Psychology Review Lorne Michael Hartman August 25, 2026
Organizational Change Research Methods Organizational Culture Social Responsibility Performance
Organizational change has long been understood as a problem of human resistance, often attributed to self-interest, misunderstanding, or low tolerance for uncertainty. Yet such explanations remain superficial, describing the symptoms of resistance rather than its sources. This paper argues that resistance to change is not merely psychological or cultural, but a manifestation of deeper constraints embedded in human cognition, organizational systems, and the structure of causality itself. Drawing on insights from cognitive neuroscience, systems theory, and complexity science, a multilevel framework is proposed to explain why change is inherently difficult to implement and sustain. At the human level, neurocognitive mechanisms such as loss aversion and synaptic strength bias individuals toward familiar routines. At the organizational level, systems principles such as homeostasis and free-energy minimization drive collective structures to preserve predictability and stability. At the causal level, the nonlinear dynamics of complex systems render cause-and-effect relationships opaque, making effective intervention uncertain. Together, these forces create a deep architecture of resistance that persists despite managerial effort or strategic intent. The paper concludes by discussing implications for theory and practice, suggesting that effective change requires designing interventions that align with, rather than oppose, these intrinsic constraints.
Show more Read full article →
Intervention outcomes in practice: an exploratory study of natural organisational intervention case studies
🔓
Work & Stress Kevin Teoh, Rashpal K. Dhensa‐Kahlon, Marit Christensen, Karina M Nielsen August 24, 2026
Organizational Change Performance Training & Development Job Attitudes Health & Well-Being
Natural interventions take place without input from external researchers and practitioners. A better representation of this data source advances the literature on the outcomes that require change as perceived by employees and organisations. We draw on this data source by reviewing 19 natural organisational interventions from the English and Welsh National Health Service to examine the outcomes employees and organisations seek to change. Drawing on these interventions, which seek to improve how work is designed, organised, and managed, we propose a scaffold of outcomes that seeks to capture the interdependencies between outcomes. Where proximal resources (Learning and Decent Work) provide the basis for distal outcomes (Wellbeing, Performance, and Workforce), rather than treating wellbeing and performance as isolated endpoints, we postulate that multiple outcomes function as interdependent resources that build organisational change capability over time through virtuous gain spirals. From an empirical perspective, we highlight the distinction between proximal shifts and distal impacts, with implications for how success is measured across multiple levels. This work demonstrates the need to engage and align internal stakeholders, all the while ensuring that intervention outcomes reflect actual internal organisation needs, and that interventions are not dominated by the perspectives of researchers and the research literature.
Show more Read full article →
Effort–reward imbalance at work and home: Longitudinal research with continuous time modeling.
Journal of Occupational Health Psychology Eunae Cho, Laurenz Linus Meier, Yu-Chi Lin August 24, 2026
Research Methods Performance Health & Well-Being Networks Social Responsibility
= 937)-to examine Work and Home ERI as dynamic constructs. Based on the ERI theory, we hypothesized significant within-person, within-domain relationships between ERI and well-being (exhaustion) and performance (job and family performance) outcomes. We also explored cross-domain relationships between Work/Home ERI and home/work outcomes. Data were analyzed using random-intercept cross-lagged panel models with continuous time structural equation modeling. Contrary to hypotheses, the lagged effects of Work and Home ERI on most outcomes were not significant, both within and across domains, which was largely consistent across the two studies. In light of the extant literature, our results suggest that ERI may function primarily as a chronic rather than acute stressor, with well-being and functional consequences emerging only after sustained exposure. In sum, our research calls for further investigation to better understand when and how ERI becomes detrimental. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
A Commentary on Schertler et al. (2026): The Ambivalent Visibility of Remote Inclusion
Group & Organization Management Deniz Tunçalp August 24, 2026
Diversity & Inclusion Remote Work Teams Performance Job Design
Schertler et al. find that remote work intensity predicts lower belongingness, buffered by leaders' virtual collaboration behaviors, but find no comparable effects for authenticity. This commentary argues that this divergence reflects distinct mechanisms: belongingness depends on interactional density, while authenticity depends on identity discretion. Drawing on hybrid surveillance theory, it contends that virtual collaboration is ambivalent, capable of fostering recognition while also intensifying visibility and control. Remote inclusion should therefore be theorized as the governance of visibility, autonomy, and recognition, not simply the transmission of inclusionary cues.
Show more Read full article →
Pursuing Leadership on One's Own Terms: A Human Resource Development Perspective on Leadership Aspiration, Identity, and Organizational Influence
🔓
Human Resource Development Quarterly Bishakha Mazumdar, Stephanie Gilbert, Megan Marie Walsh August 24, 2026
Training & Development Leadership Diversity & Inclusion HR Systems & Talent Management Performance
ABSTRACT Leadership aspiration is not simply a product of ambition or capability, but a dynamic, context‐sensitive phenomenon shaped by how individuals understand leadership and whether pursuing it feels feasible, meaningful, and sustainable. Using phenomenographic analysis of semi‐structured interviews with 23 employees and drawing on Leadership Identity Development Theory and Social Cognitive Career Theory, we identified four themes shaping aspiration: leadership conceptualization, self‐efficacy and identity, outcome expectations, and contextual enablers and constraints. These themes constitute an outcome space mapping the qualitatively distinct ways leadership aspiration is experienced and structured. A central finding is that what may appear as withdrawal or career plateauing often reflects intentional recalibration—an agentic renegotiation of the scope and conditions of leadership pursuit in response to contextual realities and identity alignment. Human resource development practitioners should foster inclusive messaging, flexible development opportunities, and relational supports that accommodate the diverse ways individuals navigate leadership aspiration.
Show more Read full article →
Gender Similarity in Hierarchical Work Relationships: A Meta‐Analysis
Journal of Organizational Behavior Caitlin M. Porter, Cassondra L. Batz-Barbarich, Nicole A. Alonso, Feigu Zhou August 23, 2026
Networks Diversity & Inclusion Research Methods Performance Training & Development
ABSTRACT Hierarchical work relationships, such as mentoring and supervisor relationships, provide access to key resources that promote employee well‐being and effectiveness. As such, scholars have investigated factors that enable relational success, with gender similarity being a key consideration. Despite abundant theoretical explanations for the importance of gender similarity in promoting high‐quality relationships and improved work outcomes, the empirical evidence is inconclusive. To add conceptual and empirical clarity to this literature, we meta‐analytically summarize the associations between gender similarity and a range of interpersonal (i.e., perceived similarity, relationship quality, and support) and work outcomes (i.e., work attitudes, performance, and turnover intentions). Moreover, we draw from social identity theory, as a basis for understanding when—or for whom—gender similarity in hierarchical work relationships is beneficial. Findings reveal that gender similarity promotes perceived similarity and relationship quality, but not work‐related outcomes. Moreover, junior women report higher perceived similarity and support in gender similar dyads than men. Finally, junior men report higher relationship quality in gender similar dyads, whereas junior women report comparable relationship quality across gender similar and dissimilar dyads. We discuss the implications for gender similarity and managing hierarchical work relationships.
Show more Read full article →
“Menopausal, Depleted, and Nostalgic”: The Bittersweet Effects of Menopause for Women Leaders
🔓
Journal of Organizational Behavior Olga Epitropaki, Maria Kakarika August 23, 2026
Leadership Performance Training & Development Health & Well-Being Research Methods
ABSTRACT Menopause is a natural but underexamined female experience in work settings, with significant implications for women in leadership positions. Drawing on self‐regulation perspectives, we develop a conceptual model examining how menopausal symptom severity shapes women leaders' experiences at work. We propose that severe menopausal symptoms act as a regulatory stressor that depletes leaders' psychological resources, triggering nostalgia for a premenopausal self. Nostalgia, in turn, can give rise to dual regulatory responses, enhancing empathy for subordinates on the one hand and fostering psychological withdrawal on the other. In Study 1 ( N = 341), using critical incidents, we found that menopausal symptom severity increased leader empathy and psychological withdrawal through a serial mediation of depletion and nostalgia. Study 2, employing a causal chain experiment with novel manipulations, supported the positive effects of (a) menopause severity on depletion (Study 2a, N = 203), (b) depletion on nostalgia (Study 2b, N = 132), and (c) nostalgia on empathy but not on psychological withdrawal (Study 2c, N = 115). We discuss implications for understanding women leaders' health and bodily experiences at work.
Show more Read full article →
Book Review: Lori Rosenkopf. Unstoppable Entrepreneurs: 7 Paths for Unleashing Successful Startups and Creating Value Through Innovation RosenkopfLori. Unstoppable Entrepreneurs: 7 Paths for Unleashing Successful Startups and Creating Value Through Innovation. Wharton School Press, 2025. 144 pp.
🔓
Administrative Science Quarterly Thomas Eisenmann August 22, 2026
Organizational Culture Training & Development Job Attitudes Individual Differences Health & Well-Being
Lori Rosenkopf's Unstoppable Entrepreneurs surveys seven entrepreneurial paths-Disruptor, Bootstrapper, Social Entrepreneur, Technology Commercializer, Funder, Acquirer, and Intrapreneur-each anchored in the story of a Wharton-affiliated entrepreneur.The book's conceptual spine is Rosenkopf's "Six Rs" framework (p.4), her list of defining attributes of the entrepreneurial mindset: Reason, Recombination, Relationships, Resources, Resilience, and Results.By profiling different types of entrepreneurs, Rosenkopf widens the image of who can be an entrepreneur beyond the venture capital-backed tech bro stereotype.Giving equal billing to bootstrapping, social enterprise, entrepreneurship through acquisition, and intrapreneurship expands options for individuals deciding whether to become entrepreneurs, which seems to be the book's primary audience.Also, for prospective founders, the Six Rs provide a useful mnemonic: Do they have a compelling Reason, strong Relationships, adequate Resilience, etc.? Finally, the book's case studies provide relatable role models for aspiring entrepreneurs.Readers will value the featured founders' candor.For example, one admits to having "tons of self-doubt, tons of fear" (p.20).The book's accounts of setbacks and how founders addressed them can help prepare someone who hasn't yet experienced entrepreneurship's emotional roller coaster.Unstoppable Entrepreneurs could be a good addition to an introductory entrepreneurship course syllabus.However, the book should not serve as the sole source of decision support for students asking, "Should I do this now?"A prospective entrepreneur needs both inspiration and information regarding downside risks.Entrepreneurial failure rates are very high-90 percent in one study that Rosenkopf cites.While Unstoppable Entrepreneurs spotlights founders' struggles, in the end each of the book's protagonists is successful.By contrast, failure is final for most entrepreneurs, and the consequences can be severe: deep psychological pain, personal finances in disarray, strained relationships, and stigmatization in some cultures.Rosenkopf does not position Unstoppable Entrepreneurs as a contribution to academic theory.Even so, for scholars, the book sparks several research questions.Its case studies emphasize the positive aspects of resilience.However, the confidence and optimism that underpin resilience can, in excess, yield maladaptive behavior, in particular the escalation of commitment when pivoting or shutting down a venture would be a better choice.Using Rosenkopf's typology of entrepreneurs and her Six R framework, one could explore the potential dark side of resilience: Are different types of entrepreneurs more vulnerable?How do the other Rs interact with resilience?Another possible research topic relates to the role of institutional privilege in entrepreneurial success.Rosenkopf acknowledges that the Wharton-affiliated entrepreneurs she profiles benefited from the school's prestige and access to its accomplished alumni.That observation suggests
Show more Read full article →
The Connectivity Paradox of Flexible Team Arrangements
Academy of Management Journal Stefan Berger, Hendrik Johan Van De Brake, Heike Bruch, Gerben S. van der Vegt August 21, 2026
Teams Networks Training & Development Performance Selection & Assessment
Organizations rely on team-based structures to promote connectivity and performance. Yet, recent research suggests that increasingly flexible team arrangements, characterized by multiple team membership (MTM) and fluid team membership (FTM), may simultaneously foster and undermine social capital in organizations. To address this connectivity paradox of flexible team arrangements, we integrate research on MTM and FTM and develop multilevel theory linking these practices to social capital and performance at the firm and individual levels. We test our theory in two complementary studies. Study 1 uses fine-grained data from a knowledge-intensive organization (n = 3,690 employees) to examine our individual-level predictions. Study 2 tests the full model with multi-source data from 106 organizations (n = 15,342 employees). Across both studies, MTM is positively related to individual social capital and indirectly to individual performance, whereas FTM shows negative associations. Study 2 further shows that flexible team arrangements (i.e., firm-level structures based on MTM and FTM) are related positively to organizational social capital and indirectly to firm performance. Our findings contribute to research on teams in general and flexible team arrangements in particular, and hold important implications for social capital theory.
Show more Read full article →
Social Performance Feedback and Managerial Moral Self-Regulation: The Microfoundations of Corporate Social (Ir)Responsibility
🔓
Organization Science Benjamin G. Perkins, Yilin Liu, Songcui Hu, Cuili Qian, Sarah Doyle August 21, 2026
Performance Training & Development Social Responsibility Research Methods Turnover & Retention
Despite growing interest in the microfoundations of corporate social activities, prior research has not articulated the full chain connecting firm-level conditions to managers’ psychological processes (a top-down pathway) and back to firm-level corporate social behavior (a bottom-up pathway), leaving existing microfoundational accounts incomplete. Drawing on the behavioral theory of the firm and moral self-regulation theory, we develop a crosslevel moral feedback model that integrates both pathways by linking firm-level social performance feedback, individual-level managerial cognition, and firm-level corporate social responsibility (CSR) and corporate social irresponsibility (CSI). We argue that social performance feedback activates managers’ moral self-regulation. When a firm falls below its social performance aspiration, its managers perceive a diminished firm image, which undermines their moral self-image and triggers moral cleansing behaviors—manifested as increased CSR and/or reduced CSI. Conversely, when a firm exceeds its social performance aspiration, its managers perceive an enhanced firm image, which elevates their moral self-image and activates moral licensing behaviors—manifested as reduced CSR and/or increased CSI. Study 1 uses archival data to examine the main effects of firms’ social performance feedback on CSR and CSI. Study 2 uses a series of experiments to examine the proposed microlevel mechanisms, demonstrating how managers’ perceived firm image and moral self-image sequentially mediate the effects of social performance feedback on CSR and CSI. These studies provide complementary evidence for our multilevel behavioral model. Our study contributes to research on the microfoundations of corporate social activities, behavioral strategy, and moral self-regulation. Funding: The authors acknowledge financial support for this research from the University of Arizona’s Center for Leadership Ethics. Supplemental Material: The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2024.19440 .
Show more Read full article →
Survival of the Flattest: Teams with Low (but Not High) Status Differentiation Turn Failure into Success by Adding High-Status Members
Organization Science Yufei Zhong, Huisi (Jessica) Li, Xirong Shen, Nicholas A. Hays, Jizhen Li August 21, 2026
Teams Performance Training & Development Networks Selection & Assessment
Most prior research on teams’ responses to failure treats teams as closed systems. However, after failures, teams may seek to improve performance by bringing in new members. Adopting a teams-as-open-systems perspective, we test which teams are more willing to add high-status members following failures and whether doing so improves team performance. Drawing on status hierarchy research, we posit that after a team failure, members will feel uncertain about their own status (particularly those with high status). More importantly, we predict that the impact of this status uncertainty on members’ willingness to add high-status new members depends on teams’ preexisting status differentiation. Specifically, status uncertainty leads members in low-status-differentiation teams to perceive adding a high-status new member as a potential benefit to collective performance, whereas it leads members in high-status-differentiation teams to perceive the addition as a potential threat to their own status. We theorize that these individual perceptions shape teams’ collective decisions through an emergent process. Taken together, we predict that at the team level, failure will increase the willingness to add high-status members in teams with low but not high status differentiation and that such addition improves subsequent team performance. Using longitudinal archival data on product development teams (Study 1, n = 4,811 teams) and two preregistered experiments at the individual (Study 2, n = 783 participants) and team levels (Study 3, n = 222 teams), we found support for these predictions. This research advances the literature on team failure and illuminates dynamics between membership change and social hierarchy. Supplemental Material: The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2024.19306 .
Show more Read full article →
Can Task Motivation Backfire? The Roles of Perceived Task Interdependence and Interaction Avoidance
Organization Science Dan Ni, Hansen Zhou, Xin Qin, Jie Zhong, Xiaoming Zheng August 21, 2026
Motivation Performance Job Attitudes Health & Well-Being Leadership
The extant literature on task motivation has generally demonstrated its beneficial effects on workplace outcomes. Although some evidence has raised concerns about the potential link between task motivation and maladaptive behaviors, this line of work has been grounded in an intrapersonal perspective that focuses on employees’ internal regulation. Guided by motivated information processing theory, we adopt an interpersonal perspective to examine how task motivation may, under certain conditions, lead to interaction avoidance, a maladaptive workplace behavior with downstream implications for job performance. We theorize that, when perceiving a lower level of task interdependence, employees with higher task motivation are more likely to engage in interaction avoidance. This avoidance, in turn, is negatively related to job performance. Across an online experiment with a U.S. sample, a field experiment with a Chinese sample, and a survey with a Chinese sample, our hypotheses are supported. This research builds a more balanced understanding of how task motivation influences employee behavior and performance. In practice, managers should actively channel the effort of highly task-motivated employees to ensure their motivation translates into effectiveness rather than counterproductive avoidance. Funding: This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China [Grants 72202248 (D. Ni); 71872190, 72272155, and 72325012 (X. Qin); and 72172074 (X. Zheng)]. Supplemental Material: The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2024.18802 .
Show more Read full article →
Repatterning Interactions in Remote Work Environments: Bolstering Psychological Safety Through Mutually Humanizing Self-Disclosure
Organization Science Vanessa M. Conzon August 21, 2026
Remote Work Health & Well-Being Training & Development Job Attitudes Teams
Existing research on psychological safety suggests that remote work might make it more challenging for workers to engage in the sorts of interactions that promote psychological safety. This raises the question: How is psychological safety bolstered when groups work remotely? Drawing on data from a seven-year longitudinal qualitative study—including 275 interviews and approximately 330 hours of observations—of a professional services organization that shifted from an in-person work environment to a remote work environment, I present a process model of how psychological safety can be strengthened among workers interacting virtually. I find that remote work supports interactional patterns that facilitate self-disclosure among group members. Learning more about one another, workers become mutually humanized, and psychological safety is bolstered. This psychological safety is accompanied by a set of associated practices that help people coordinate on work tasks while also sustaining flexibility in where and when they work. Reflecting improved psychological safety and associated practices, group members attend to and accomplish both work tasks and nonwork activities. This study contributes to the psychological safety literature by identifying a distinct process through which psychological safety can be promoted in remote work environments: mutual humanization via self-disclosure, which is supported through interactional patterns facilitated by remote work. Importantly, this distinct group-initiated process expands theorization beyond its current focus on leader-initiated social learning. This study also identifies how psychological safety supports role management, integrating theories of psychological safety and work-nonwork roles to expand understanding of psychological safety’s positive consequences. History: This paper has been accepted for the Organization Science Special Issue on Psychological Safety.
Show more Read full article →
Dominant Deceptions: How Future-Oriented Narratives Transform into Deception
🔓
Organization Science Tiona ĆœuĆŸul, Aharon Cohen Mohliver August 21, 2026
Organizational Change Training & Development Job Attitudes Social Responsibility Research Methods
Drawing on a multiyear, qualitative study of a promising venture in a nascent industry, we develop a process model tracing how future-oriented narratives can transform into deception. In the venture that we studied, the founder’s future-oriented narratives were initially viewed as evidence of his visionary foresight. As these narratives traveled downward through the organization, employees responsible for operations translated this broad vision into specific targets and metrics. Some details described an attainable future; others were so far-fetched that they became liminal, falling into a gray zone between right and wrong. As internal and external demands for tangible progress grew, this expectations-reality gap prompted employees to engage in temporal reorientation, shifting their statements from “we will” to “we have.” Their statements crossed from liminal to deceptive, asserting as fact something that did not exist. Once formalized in presentations, websites, and other artefacts, the claims became dominant deceptions: codified, specific, past- or present-tense deceptions deliberately reproduced across the organization. In this codified form, the deceptions became misconduct that, if detected, could have been acted on by social control agents. We propose that three enabling conditions sustained this transformation: visionary attribution (belief in the founder’s unique foresight), interpretive flexibility (the ambiguity of new technologies that allows for multiple plausible meanings), and moral justification (the framing of deception as serving a higher mission). Because the process unfolded diffusely and incrementally, the transformation could only be observed retrospectively in the accumulation of actions across individuals and over time. By tracing this process, we extend research in narratives and in organizational misconduct. Funding: Funding for this research was provided by the London Business School and the Harvard Business School. Supplemental Material: The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2023.18038 .
Show more Read full article →
Corrigendum: Agreeable team members wanted: personality configurations of high-performing individuals in global virtual teams
Journal of Managerial Psychology August 21, 2026
Teams Individual Differences
It has come to the attention of the publisher that the article ƞahin F, Çetin F, Askun D, Tavoletti E, Taras V, Florea L (2026), “Agreeable team members wanted: personality configurations of high-performing individuals in global virtual teams”. Journal of Managerial Psychology, Vol. ahead-of-print No. ahead-of-print. Link to the DOI, was published with the incorrect affiliation for author Duysal Askun.Duysal Askun’s affiliation was incorrectly listed as “Jones School of Business, Rice University” and has now been corrected to “Department of Psychology, Istanbul Topkapi University”.The publisher asks that affiliation information be entered correctly at submission and confirmed at article proofing stage.
Show more Read full article →
Back to the Beginning: Rediscovering a Beginner’s Mind Enhances Advice Provision to Novices
Academy of Management Journal Ting Zhang August 20, 2026
Training & Development Selection & Assessment Individual Differences Organizational Culture Artificial Intelligence/Technology
People often seek advice from those with more expertise. However, expertise can create a barrier to providing useful advice as it limits advisers’ ability to communicate concretely, yielding advice that may fall short of its potential value. In this paper, I examine how rediscovering a beginner’s mind—defined as a process of experiencing one’s former novice state of development in a focal domain—enables advisers to give more useful advice to novices. Because every adviser was once a novice, this former self can be a valuable resource when giving advice. Building on construal theory, I test whether rediscovering a beginner’s mind helps advisers communicate more concretely, generating advice that novices view as more useful and worthy of adoption. Across three main studies featuring managers and musicians, including one correlational study and two experiments (with 656 advisers and 571 advisees, generating 3,762 unique pairs), I find the predicted patterns and demonstrate how rediscovering a beginner’s mind operates beyond recalling past experiences or learning new skills more generally. I discuss how these findings contribute to our understanding of how advisers can be better equipped to provide developmental advice.
Show more Read full article →
How Followers Respond to Leader Differentiation: The Importance of Considering All Leader Differentiation Properties
🔓
Journal of Management Yuchuan Liu, Gary J. Greguras August 20, 2026
Leadership Training & Development Research Methods Selection & Assessment Performance
A central tenet of many leadership theories is that leaders treat their followers differently. Although leader differentiation is ubiquitous, its effects on leaders and followers are not well understood and theory and research have not simultaneously considered its three key properties: Leader–member exchange (LMX) differentiation, LMX quality, and LMX social comparison. We developed a theoretical model in which these three properties interact to influence followers’ supervisory interactional justice perceptions and subsequently their supervisor-directed deviance and supervisor-directed organizational citizenship behaviors (OCBs). To test our model, we conducted a pre-registered experiment (Study 1), a single-level, multi-wave study (Study 2), and a multilevel, multi-wave, multisource study (Study 3). Results consistently supported our theoretical model. First, LMX differentiation indirectly influenced supervisor-directed deviance and OCBs via supervisory interactional justice. Second, the three leader differentiation properties interacted to predict supervisory interactional justice. Specifically, when LMX quality and LMX social comparison were both high, the negative impact of LMX differentiation on followers’ supervisory interactional justice perceptions was the weakest and did not reliably differ from zero. Third, when LMX quality and LMX social comparison were both high, LMX differentiation’s positive indirect effect on supervisor-directed deviance, and its negative indirect effect on supervisor-directed OCBs, via supervisory interactional justice perceptions, were the weakest and not reliably different from zero. These are among the first studies to simultaneously theorize and investigate the interactive effects of the three central properties of leader differentiation, and to demonstrate its effects for both followers and leaders.
Show more Read full article →
Countering Organizational Rigidity Through Operational Resource Bundling: Integrating Resource Orchestration and Dynamic Capabilities
🔓
Journal of Management Catherine Grace Collins, Cristina B. Gibson, Martijn van der Kamp August 20, 2026
Training & Development Teams Selection & Assessment Performance Health & Well-Being
As organizations mature, standardized systems help meet increasing needs for efficiency. However, this often results in resources being used in rigid ways, compromising the flexibility necessary to leverage opportunities, create value, and address customers’ emerging needs. Here we address solutions to this drift to rigidity, focusing on how operational managers bundle resources to create value for the firm. Our qualitative study is based on data collected from an organization with operations across 252 locations. This data consists of 92 interviews with strategic and operational managers, ethnographic observations, and archival records. We uncovered three pathways for resource bundling that are focused on markets, customers, or organizational renewal. In each, senior-level strategic managers initially provided resources, including channels for standardization, information systems, and technical infrastructure that became rigid in their usage. When operational managers sensed this drift to rigidity, they seized flexible resources (connection, solution development, and employee development processes) to combine with the rigid resources. We refer to this as Operational Resource Bundling (ORB). Strategic managers collaborated with the operational managers to adapt how resources were used, helping to ratify, endorse, and mobilize the bundles to achieve value creation and competitive advantage. We extend earlier work by specifying how a particular type of resource orchestration—ORB—constitutes a value-generating micro-mechanism of dynamic capabilities. ORB uncovers the role of operational managers in balancing standardization versus customization through identifying and combining resources.
Show more Read full article →
Old Theories, New Teams: Advancing Team Adaptation Theory for Human-Autonomy-Teams
🔓
Organizational Psychology Review Tilman Nols, Anna‐Sophie Ulfert, Josette Gevers August 20, 2026
Teams Training & Development Performance Individual Differences Networks
Human–Autonomy Teams (HATs), composed of humans and agents such as artificial intelligence, face distinctive challenges in dynamic environments. As a result, they often struggle to adapt effectively, limiting their potential. Traditional team theories do not fully capture the unique characteristics of HATs, and research remains fragmented across disciplines, offering limited theoretical and practical guidance. Consequently, we propose a holistic framework that integrates the dynamic interplay between team members, tasks, and the environment. Drawing on multidisciplinary insights, we identify four key conditions—predictability, observability, plannability, and directability—that govern how HATs respond to shifting interdependencies. For each condition, we advance testable propositions, illustrate their relevance through established HAT testbeds, and outline technical, organizational, and interactional strategies to foster their emergence. Finally, we discuss how the framework provides a conceptual foundation to guide future research, training, and the design of adaptive HATs, by reflecting on its broader theoretical and practical implications.
Show more Read full article →
The Process Model of Anxiety: A Framework and Review of Anxiety in the Workplace
Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior John P. Trougakos, Daniel Judson Beal, Milad Moghaddas August 20, 2026
Health & Well-Being Performance Networks Research Methods
Anxiety is an extremely common and consequential affective experience in organizational life, yet workplace anxiety research remains fragmented across theories, methods, and domains. In this review, we argue that anxiety is best understood not as a static or uniformly maladaptive state but as a dynamic process with identifiable stages. To organize research on workplace anxiety, we introduce the process model of anxiety (PMA), which specifies appraisal, activation, processing, fatigue, and behavior stages, while emphasizing feedback, regulation, recovery, and the role of contextual factors in modulating the process. We integrate research from organizational psychology, affective science, stress, cognition, and health to explain when anxiety undermines performance, well-being, and relationships, and when it may support vigilance, preparation, safety, or compensatory action. We conclude by identifying future directions for dynamic, multilevel, and intervention-oriented research on anxiety in organizations.
Show more Read full article →
It is all in the family: Understanding how and when family-work facilitation affects successful aging at work.
Journal of Occupational Health Psychology Guodong Cui, Zhiyu Xie, BEATRICE I. J. M. VAN DER HEIJDEN, Meng Song August 20, 2026
Networks Research Methods Health & Well-Being Selection & Assessment Performance
Successful aging at work is important for both older workers and organizations, but the mechanisms that explain the relationships between family-work interaction and successful aging at work remain unknown. In this scholarly work, we draw upon the work-home resources model to examine whether family-work facilitation can replenish personal resources, thereby ultimately contributing to older workers' successful aging at work. In Study 1, we collected three-wave data from a sample of 263 older workers (aged 45 years and above) working in 56 Chinese companies. The results indicated that family-work facilitation was indeed positively associated with psychological resilience at work, which, in turn, contributed to successful aging at work. To replicate the findings of Study 1 and to test the boundary conditions of the aforementioned relationships, Study 2 employed a three-wave online survey of 316 Chinese older workers. After controlling for alternative mechanisms of successful aging at work (i.e., person-job fit and occupational future time perspective), we found interesting moderation effects as well, indicating that the influence of family-work facilitation on psychological resilience at work was stronger for those individuals scoring higher in work centrality. Our research highlights the importance of a positive work-family interaction for older workers, which functions as a mechanism to capitalize on their resources to achieve successful aging at work. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
Search Heuristics Under Multiple Objectives: The Case of Corporate Social Responsibility
🔓
Academy of Management Review D. Albert, F. A Csaszar August 19, 2026
Training & Development Motivation Social Responsibility Performance Research Methods
Organizations increasingly pursue multiple objectives, yet we know little about how boundedly rational firms search for better strategies when performance is multidimensional. We use corporate social responsibility—pursuing social and financial outcomes simultaneously—as a motivating context. We distinguish multi-objective decision-making (choosing among known alternatives) from multi-objective search (discovering alternatives through path-dependent local moves), and argue that preferences matter through the heuristics that implement them during search. In a dual-landscape NK simulation, we compare five prominent heuristics: Maximize (improve financial performance only), Combine (raise the sum of financial and social performance), Alternate (pursue one goal until stuck, then switch), Penalize (maximize financial performance while deducting shortfalls below a social threshold), and Satisfice (prioritize financial performance only after meeting a social threshold). Across varying complexity, goal correlation, and thresholds, these heuristics produce systematically different trajectories and joint outcomes. Importantly, by escaping local financial optima, Alternate often discovers “oblique” strategies that match or exceed the financial performance achieved by profit-only local search while also improving social performance. We conclude that implementing the same multi-goal preferences through different search heuristics steers firms toward different regions of the social–financial frontier, shaping both the compromises they reach and the opportunities they discover.
Show more Read full article →
Filtering the Labor Pool: How Digitalization Redistributes Hiring Costs
Organization Science Moshe A. Barach August 19, 2026
Selection & Assessment Artificial Intelligence/Technology Training & Development Research Methods Leadership
I theorize that candidate filters, a core technology in digital labor markets considered central to cost-effective matching, redistributes costs from the search-and-screening stage to the job-offer stage of hiring. Filters cause employers to focus on applicants who display common preferred characteristics. At the search-and-screening stage, filters reduce the number of applicants interviewed and alter the composition of the interviewed pool by removing both lower and higher quality candidates. At the job-offer stage, filters lead employers to make job offers to candidates with easily observable signals of quality and higher wage demands. Additionally, I theorize that, if many firms target the same signals of quality, they may all pursue similar candidates. This increases bargaining power for those applicants, leading to more rejected job offers and higher wage demands. A randomized field experiment in a large online labor market confirms that filters redistribute hiring costs. The experiment shows that employers with access to filters interview 3.4% fewer applicants. Using a machine learning algorithm to proxy for unobservable-to-the-employer applicant quality, I show that filters cause employers to interview 28.9% fewer lower quality applicants and 36.9% fewer high-quality applicants per job. Among employers who actively used filters, I find suggestive evidence of worse job-offer outcomes: offers are 8.9% more likely to be rejected, and contracted wages are 2.5% higher. I discuss the implications of this cost redistribution for organizations, labor markets, and strategy research. Supplemental Material: The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2024.19407 .
Show more Read full article →
Survival Is Triumph Enough: Rhythmic Resilience Amid Chronic Adversity and Acute Shocks
🔓
Journal of Management Ramzi Fathallah, Trenton Alma Williams, Jay Joseph August 19, 2026
Training & Development Health & Well-Being Social Responsibility Research Methods Individual Differences
Contexts of adversity generate a wide range of challenges that expose entrepreneurs to compounding hardship yet paradoxically stimulate entrepreneurship as a means of regaining control. Existing research often portrays adversity in two distinct ways, either as a one-time disruptive event or as a persistent condition of the same underlying hardship, overlooking how adversity increasingly unfolds as chronic adversity compounded by multiple acute shocks—a setting that characterizes the lived reality of many entrepreneurs in today’s turbulent world. In such contexts, entrepreneurial resilience is not oriented toward recovery or thriving but toward enduring recurring crises, resource scarcity, and persistent uncertainty. We conducted an inductive, longitudinal study of 32 displaced entrepreneurs living in conflict-affected regions of Iraq. Our analysis reveals a process model of rhythmic resilience in a context of chronic adversity compounded by acute shocks. We show that resilience unfolds through dynamic cycles of withdrawal, reengagement, and adaptation over time that sustain survival across household, venture, and community levels. Yet these processes entail difficult trade-offs, giving rise to a resilience–survival paradox in which entrepreneurs protect survival at the expense of personal well-being, business growth, and social ties.
Show more Read full article →
Breaking the bond: abusive supervision and workplace mistreatment as predictors of anti-work attitudes and turnover intentions
🔓
Journal of Managerial Psychology Samantha Sinclair, Artur Nilsson, Kristoffer Holm August 19, 2026
Job Attitudes Turnover & Retention Leadership Research Methods Performance
Purpose In recent years, negative attitudes toward work have been spreading in online communities, yet research on the factors that shape these attitudes is scarce. One way in which negative attitudes toward work manifest is through anti-work orientation, a contentious rejection of work as a determinant of one’s self-worth or worth to society. This study examined whether perceptions of abusive supervision and workplace mistreatment (bullying, cyberaggression, sexual harassment, physical violence, and threats of physical violence) predict anti-work orientation and turnover intentions. Design/methodology/approach A preregistered survey study was conducted with a stratified sample of Swedish employees (N = 2,395). Findings In line with our expectations, abusive supervision and workplace mistreatment predicted both anti-work orientation and turnover intentions. Mediation analyses further demonstrated that anti-work orientation partially mediated the effects of mistreatment and abusive supervision on turnover intentions. Originality/value This study is among the first to empirically examine the organizational antecedents of anti-work orientation – an emerging construct with growing societal relevance. The findings suggest that anti-work sentiments may emerge as a psychological response to interpersonal workplace mistreatment and that they may fuel increased intentions to resign.
Show more Read full article →
Women’s Approachability Premium in Sales: A Field Experiment among Microentrepreneurs
Organization Science SolĂšne Delecourt, Laura B. Doering, Odyssia Ng August 18, 2026
Training & Development Job Attitudes Conflict Diversity & Inclusion Selection & Assessment
Female entrepreneurs consistently earn less than their male counterparts, a disparity that is particularly acute among microentrepreneurs in developing economies. Researchers often attribute this gap to structural constraints, but pay less attention to how social interactions shape earnings. This oversight is especially relevant in microentrepreneurship, where sales are contingent on customers approaching and interacting with sellers in the marketplace. Using an interactionist lens, we draw on social exchange theory and research on gender stereotypes to guide expectations. We anticipate that customers will more often approach female sellers, expecting warmer interactions, and that this higher volume will translate into higher earnings when business characteristics and selling behavior are held constant. Existing research hints at this dynamic, but methodological constraints have obscured it. To overcome these constraints and test our theory, we conducted a field experiment in two face-to-face markets in India. We trained confederate sellers to run identical, de novo microenterprises and follow standard protocols for customer engagement, thus isolating customer approach in response to sellers’ gender. Female sellers attracted 41% more customers, resulting in significantly higher sales than men, all else equal, in our experiment. Consistent with our theory, customers were more likely to talk with women about topics unrelated to the sale and attempt to bargain with women. This study advances research on gender dynamics in entrepreneurship, negotiation, and customer-facing work by identifying customer approach as a novel mechanism that can generate economic advantages for female microentrepreneurs and may shape gendered opportunities in other markets and organizations.
Show more Read full article →
Is Our Future Colleague Even Human? Advancing Human–AI Teamwork from an Organizational Perspective
Journal of Organizational Behavior Anna‐Sophie Ulfert, Eleni Georganta, Gudela Grote August 17, 2026
Teams Training & Development Artificial Intelligence/Technology Social Responsibility Individual Differences
ABSTRACT Artificial intelligence (AI) is increasingly part of collaborative work that was once carried out exclusively by humans. In this special issue, we ask whether our future colleagues will even be human and what this means for today's organizations. The eight contributions examine how design choices such as human‐likeness and gendered cues shape perceptions of AI, how AI alters team processes including decision‐making, trust, and stress, and how training and organizational integration condition sustainable human–AI collaboration. Together, the contributions suggest that AI reshapes collective work processes, not only individual judgments. Building on this insight and on sociotechnical systems thinking, we develop a framework that distinguishes where AI is positioned in the social system of work and how much agency it exercises. The framework also raises the normative question of how AI's position in organizations should be governed. Together, the contributions and the framework point toward a research agenda that differentiates between human–AI configurations and treats teams rather than dyads as the unit of analysis.
Show more Read full article →
Organizational Repression of Stakeholder Collective Action
Academy of Management Review Natalie Holzaepfel, Olga Voronina Hawn, Timothy Werner August 17, 2026
Selection & Assessment Teams Performance Training & Development Networks
Organizations face mounting pressure from stakeholders to change practices and policies, yet scholarly understanding of how organizations manage this pressure remains incomplete. While existing research has examined various organizational responses to stakeholder pressure—including acquiescence, neglect, collaboration, and resistance—these responses have been predominantly reactive and discrete, with research overlooking a more systematic approach organizations can employ to neutralize stakeholder pressure before it emerges, and end it if it materializes. To address this gap, this paper introduces organizational repression as an integrated strategy aimed at preventing, controlling, or constraining stakeholder collective action from evolving. Drawing on the social movements and state-based repression literatures, we theorize how organizations can effectively undermine collective action by targeting its enabling conditions across three distinct phases: emergence, coalescence, and formalization. We propose five key repressive tactics—manipulating threat perceptions, closing opportunity structures, restricting resources, selectively disincentivizing recruits, and fragmenting coalitions of members and allies—and explore how organizations can implement each. Ultimately, this paper contributes to the social movements and nonmarket strategy literatures by theorizing organizational repression as a stakeholder management strategy and revealing how organizations can undermine stakeholder efforts to produce organizational and societal change.
Show more Read full article →
The Behavioral Consequences of Artificial Intelligence at Work: Rethinking Jobs, Skills, and Organizations
🔓
Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior Peter H. Cappelli, Prasanna B. Tambe, Brook Jiang August 17, 2026
Artificial Intelligence/Technology Individual Differences Training & Development Performance Organizational Change
We review recent research on the trio of artificial intelligence (AI) practices—electronic platforms, machine learning, and large language models—and their effects on those who use and work with them. Because these tools take over specific tasks from existing jobs, the important effects are how the remaining work changes and how workers react to it. Perhaps our main conclusion is that choices as to how they are used are the most important factor in their effects on those who use them. For example, do they take over boring tasks like note-taking or interesting ones like drafting reports? Do workers spend their saved time checking AI output or taking on new tasks? We describe the wide variety of outcomes and emerging issues such as the ability of chatbots to show empathy, the ability to codify what had been tacit human knowledge, and the development of digital twins, which predict responses from specific individuals.
Show more Read full article →
Meaning gain spiral: need for sense-making promotes work engagement through searching and finding meaning at work. Results from a four-wave longitudinal study
Journal of Managerial Psychology Katarzyna Cantarero, Aleksandra Penza, Ewelina Smoktunowicz, Agata Gąsiorowska August 17, 2026
Job Attitudes Research Methods Selection & Assessment Individual Differences Leadership
Purpose This research tested a novel concept of the meaning gain spiral at work. Expanding conservation of resources (COR) theory, we examined whether individual differences in the need for sense-making (NSM) promote a meaning gain spiral that enhances work engagement through the processes of searching for work meaning and finding work meaningful. Design/methodology/approach A four-wave longitudinal study was conducted with a sample of 371 employees to test the proposed model. Findings Our results indicate that NSM triggers a gain spiral by increasing the search for meaning at work, which, in turn, leads to finding work meaningful and ultimately boosts work engagement. Originality/value This study advances COR theory to meaning-making processes in the workplace and refines theoretical perspectives on the antecedents and mechanisms of work engagement. Understanding how individuals' NSM relates to their work engagement offers valuable insights for organizational strategies. This knowledge can help organizations better provide resources that support employee sense-making and engagement.
Show more Read full article →
Newcomer and Incumbent Exit After Comobility Hiring Events
🔓
Personnel Psychology Luciana Zheng Manroop, Rhett Andrew Brymer, Aaron Hill August 15, 2026
Selection & Assessment Turnover & Retention Training & Development Performance Teams
ABSTRACT Newcomers comprise substantial portions of modern workforces, yet they represent high exit risks due to their lack of embeddedness in their new firms. Organizations often source new employees via comobility, wherein newcomers join simultaneously from another firm. Despite the prevalence of comobility and other affiliation‐based hiring practices, research to date has not considered if, when, or how those affiliations affect newcomer retention. We also have scant research on the effects of such comobile, affiliation‐based hiring on incumbent retention, a vital consideration for organizations. Integrating comobility and turnover event theorizing, we explore how comobility affects subsequent exit likelihood. We argue that comovers benefit from the embeddedness fortified through shared ties and work structures with other comovers, increasing their retention. Conversely, we posit that the arrival of comovers negatively impacts incumbents’ social and work structures, reducing incumbents’ job embeddedness and increasing their exit likelihoods. We expect these effects to be amplified when comobility groups are larger and have a leader. We test our framework in two archival analyses of United States (U.S.) college football coaches and U.S. law firm partners (2001‐2018). To investigate how comobility affects embeddedness with comovers and incumbents, we conducted an exploratory cross‐industry survey of full‐time U.S. workers and targeted interviews with comovers to illustrate the phenomenon.
Show more Read full article →
Fit to Print? How Political Bias Affects Media Coverage of Corporate Sociopolitical Activism
Organization Science Farhan Iqbal, Michael D. Pfarrer, Abhinav Gupta August 14, 2026
Training & Development Diversity & Inclusion Performance Motivation Health & Well-Being
Organizational research has largely treated media coverage of firms as insulated from news outlets’ political biases, implicitly assuming that it provides a balanced representation of firm behaviors. However, increasing political polarization and firms’ growing involvement in social and political controversies challenge this assumption by creating greater scope for news outlets’ political orientations to shape business reporting. We explore this possibility by developing a two-stage framework that discerns news outlets’ attention (i.e., what firm behaviors they cover) from their tone (i.e., how they portray those behaviors). We argue that media organizations face two competing pressures: an incentive to cultivate ideological differentiation that appeals to readers and an incentive to maintain credibility that appeals to advertisers. We find that ideological congruence between a news outlet’s political orientation and a firm’s behavior increases the likelihood that the behavior receives coverage but does not influence the evaluative tone of that coverage—a pattern we term bias allocation. Supplemental analyses also reveal ideological asymmetries across left- and right-leaning outlets. We conclude by discussing the implications of our findings for research on the media, organizational political ideology, and strategic management. Supplemental Material: The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2025.20084 .
Show more Read full article →
Toward a Better Understanding of Job Performance When Working Remotely: Evidence, Boundaries, and Trade-Offs
Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior Tammy D. Allen, Kristen Michelle Shockley, Ryan S. Grant August 14, 2026
Performance Remote Work Teams Networks Health & Well-Being
Despite the prevalence and stability of remote and hybrid work, debate persists regarding whether these arrangements help or harm job performance. In this review, we synthesize research on the complex relationship between remote work and performance, focusing on objective and supervisor-rated job performance as well as innovation and creativity outcomes. We then examine theoretical mechanisms and boundary conditions that explain why and when remote work facilitates or constrains performance. Additionally, we provide recommendations for individual employees, managers, human resource departments, organizations, and policymakers aimed at maximizing performance in remote and hybrid work contexts. Finally, we outline future research directions that move beyond simple comparisons of work location to examine how collaboration processes, location–task fit, different forms of hybrid work, and contextual factors are associated with the relationship between remote work and performance.
Show more Read full article →
The Gendered Returns to Power: How Gender, Structural Power, and Perceived Resource Sufficiency Shape Meritocracy Perceptions in Organizations
🔓
Journal of Organizational Behavior Sonya Mishra, Julia Lee Melin, Laura J. Kray, Cameron P. Anderson August 13, 2026
Diversity & Inclusion Research Methods Performance Motivation Organizational Change
ABSTRACT Why do women remain underrepresented in positions of power? The present work leverages four studies ( N = 99,293) spanning archival, qualitative, and experimental methods to surface one novel antecedent to this gender gap. Men (vs. women) tend to perceive their organizations as more meritocratic as a function of their structural power (Studies 1–2). This gender difference is statistically accounted for by the fact that men's power is more often accompanied by perceived resource sufficiency , or the appraisal that one has adequate instrumental and material resources to meet role demands and exercise authority effectively (Studies 1–3). A preregistered experiment finds that higher (vs. lower) perceived resource sufficiency increases meritocracy perceptions, which in turn increase career investment intentions but weaken support for equity‐enhancing initiatives (Study 4). Together, these findings reveal that structural power's psychological consequences are not uniform across gender but depend on whether authority is accompanied by the resources needed to exercise power. The gender gap in power may thus reproduce itself, as women become less convinced that the system rewards their effort, whereas men with the authority to change organizational systems become least likely to see the need for change.
Show more Read full article →
More Money Than Him, More Conflict for Her: A Longitudinal Investigation of the Partner Pay Gap, Work–Family Conflict, and Well‐Being
Human Resource Management Sabrina L. Speights, Andrew C. Loignon, Cynthia Saldanha Halliday August 13, 2026
Research Methods Conflict HR Systems & Talent Management Networks Performance
ABSTRACT Women's earnings have risen, yet work–family conflict (WFC) remains persistent, raising questions about how income differences within couples shape these experiences. We examine the partner pay gap—the difference in earnings between partners—as a household financial structure that conditions work‐family experiences and introduce a gendered relative resources framework to theorize why relative earnings carry different meanings for women and men. Analyzing longitudinal dyadic data from over 4000 German couples, we use a polynomial regression approach embedded within a longitudinal actor‐partner interdependence model. Results show that larger partner pay gaps are associated with higher WFC for women, but not for men. These gendered effects are stronger in more traditional normative contexts, including when women hold traditional gender role beliefs, are parents, or receive lower partner support. We further show that WFC operates as a chronic, accumulating stressor that mediates the relationship between the partner pay gap and women's long‐term well‐being. Post hoc analyses suggest a front‐loaded pattern, with women's WFC increasing most sharply at modest deviations from traditional earning arrangements and leveling off as pay gaps widen. We replicate our findings in a U.S. sample, supporting cross‐national generalizability. Together, these results highlight household earning arrangements as structural conditions that shape whether HRM systems can be effectively translated into reduced WFC, underscoring the importance of integrating household financial dynamics into HRM theory and practice.
Show more Read full article →
The more deeply embedded in AI, the more creative you become? Investigating the pathways linking AI identity and creative deviance
Journal of Managerial Psychology Xinru Xu, Changbin Wang, Chao Liu, Giang Huong Nguyen August 13, 2026
Artificial Intelligence/Technology Research Methods Selection & Assessment Teams Performance
Purpose This study aims to explore how the formation of artificial intelligence (AI) identity impacts employees' creative deviance. Drawing on role theory and the cognitive-affective system theory, it analyzes the pathways and boundary conditions of this influence in the AI-integrated workplace. Design/methodology/approach Using a multi-wave research design, we collected survey data from 379 employees across various industries. The data were analyzed using SPSS to test a dual-path mediation model, examining how creative self-efficacy and AI dependency mediate the AI identity–creative deviance relationship. Post hoc interviews were conducted to provide additional qualitative evidence and insights for future studies. Findings Results reveal that AI identity has competing effects: it enhances creative deviance through increased creative self-efficacy, while suppressing it through heightened AI dependency. Notably, prevention-focused employees experience stronger suppression effects from AI dependency, whereas promotion focus shows no significant moderating effect on the positive pathway. Practical implications The study provides organizations with dual-path management strategies to balance AI adoption and employee innovation, requiring both the cultivation of creative confidence and the prevention of technological overreliance, thereby optimizing human–AI collaborative innovation effectiveness. Originality/value This study contributes to the literature by introducing AI identity as a key psychological construct in the context of AI-driven workplaces. By integrating role identity and cognitive-affective processing system theory, this study elucidates the dual mechanisms through which AI identity affects creative deviance, advancing theoretical understanding. It also identifies regulatory focus as a boundary condition, providing fresh insights into how AI identity shapes employee innovation.
Show more Read full article →
Virtual Reality-, Video- or Text-Based SJTs: Investigating the Effect of Stimulus Format on Presence and Organizational Attractiveness Across Age Groups
🔓
Group & Organization Management Maaike Schellaert, Janneke K. Oostrom, Eva Derous August 13, 2026
Research Methods Selection & Assessment Performance Teams Training & Development
Emerging technologies, such as virtual reality (VR), are increasingly used in personnel selection processes, for example, to present scenarios in situational judgment tests (SJTs). Despite growing concerns about workforce aging and labor market shortages, limited research has explored how test characteristics interact with applicants’ age. Drawing on the modular approach to personnel selection procedures, two experimental studies among 122 (Study 1: video- vs. text-based stimulus) and 121 participants (Study 2: VR- vs. text-based stimulus) investigated the interaction between stimulus format and test-takers’ age in relation to perceptions of presence and organizational attractiveness. Results of Study 1 showed that a video-based format increased presence but did not significantly affect organizational attractiveness compared to a text-based format. Further, presence did not mediate the relationship between stimulus format and organizational attractiveness, and age did not moderate the effects. In contrast, a VR-based stimulus significantly enhanced both presence and organizational attractiveness compared to a text-based format, with stronger effects among younger and middle-aged test-takers than older ones. Moreover, presence mediated the relationship between stimulus format and organizational attractiveness. These findings emphasize the importance of applying a human-centric approach when considering test characteristics and age-related differences in the development of fair selection procedures.
Show more Read full article →
Hinting or Boasting? How Attributions of Leaders' Stress Bragging Shape Employee Behavior Through Rumination and Reflection
🔓
Journal of Organizational Behavior Houyong Tao, Jiayu Li, Xiao Deng August 12, 2026
Health & Well-Being Performance Job Attitudes Organizational Culture Training & Development
ABSTRACT The rise of performance excellence cultures and intensifying competitive pressure have made stress bragging a common workplace phenomenon. Although existing research has focused on stress bragging among peers, its effects when enacted by leaders remain poorly understood. Grounded in attribution theory and cognitive theories of repetitive thought, this study investigates how subordinates' attributions of leaders' stress bragging (performance improvement vs. impression management) shape their cognitive and behavioral responses. The results of Study 1 (a scenario‐based experiment with 294 employees) and Study 2 (a two‐wave survey of 332 employees) reveal that these attributions yield divergent outcomes. When perceived as performance oriented, such behavior prompted task‐focused reflection, thereby boosting work engagement. Conversely, when interpreted as impression management, it sparked leader‐focused rumination, which subsequently led to interpersonal withdrawal. These findings underscore the pivotal role of attributional processes in explaining the double‐edged effects of leaders' stress bragging on both work‐related and interpersonal outcomes.
Show more Read full article →
Rewarded to Reject? Exploring Motivational Roots of Idea Rejection in Teams
🔓
Journal of Organizational Behavior Matthias Felix Sinnemann, Matthias Weiß, Julia Backmann August 12, 2026
Motivation Teams Performance Diversity & Inclusion Health & Well-Being
ABSTRACT Teams hold the potential for creative performance, yet diverse perspectives may also lead to the premature rejection of unconventional ideas. Because such rejection can prevent teams from realizing their creative potential, understanding what motivational processes drive idea rejection during brainstorming is critical. Drawing on the Motivated Information Processing in Groups model (MIP‐G), we identify the reward structure offered to teams as an antecedent of idea rejection and examine how individual, team, and mixed rewards affect idea rejection and, ultimately, team creativity. We propose that individual rewards foster proself motivation, increasing team idea rejection; team rewards activate prosocial motivation, reducing it; and mixed rewards balance both motives. In an experimental lab study using behavioral video coding of 80 teams comprising 290 participants, we find that individual rewards significantly increase team idea rejection. Contrary to our expectations, team rewards also lead to elevated rejection, whereas mixed rewards reduce rejection compared to individual and team rewards. Exploratory post hoc analyses indicate that team idea rejection varies as a function of teams' level of information elaboration. Moreover, rewards are associated with differences in the novelty of rejected ideas, and novel ideas tend to be rejected in later stages of the ideation process. In contrast, we find no evidence that the manner of rejection, whether collaborative or competitive, systematically influences team creativity. These findings show that integrating proself and prosocial motives through mixed rewards may support creative collaboration in teams more effectively than emphasizing either motive alone.
Show more Read full article →
Beyond Bidirectionality in Spill‐Overs: Asymmetrical Work‐Life Dynamics and Indigenous Support Systems in a Fragile‐State Military Context
🔓
Human Resource Development Quarterly Adejumoke Adeoti, J Akintunde, Clement Dabang, Chima Mordi, Babatunde Oluwatoyin Akanji August 12, 2026
Research Methods Health & Well-Being Performance Training & Development Job Attitudes
ABSTRACT Work‐life balance and work engagement are central concerns in human resource development because they shape employee well‐being, resilience, retention, and sustainable performance across demanding work environments. However, much of the literature on work‐life balance and engagement has been developed in relatively stable civilian and Western institutional contexts, where role boundaries are more manageable and formal support systems are often more reliable. These assumptions may not hold in fragile‐state military settings characterized by prolonged insecurity, deployment instability, rigid hierarchy, and uneven welfare provision. This study explores how personnel in the Armed Forces of Nigeria experience work‐life balance and work engagement under such conditions. Drawing on qualitative interview data from 60 military personnel and using a Gioia‐inspired analytical approach, the study integrates the Job Demands‐Resources (JD‐R) model and spill‐over theory to examine how demands, resources, and cross‐domain pressures interact in a fragile‐state military context. The findings show that work‐life spill‐over is not experienced as a balanced or consistently reciprocal process. Instead, participants describe a strongly asymmetrical dynamic in which prolonged deployment, hypervigilance, unpredictable scheduling, welfare strain, and institutional rigidity intrude into family life and weaken recovery, morale, and sustained engagement. At the same time, kinship ties, peer solidarity, and communal reciprocity emerge as culturally embedded informal resources that partially buffer these pressures where formal organizational supports are weak or unevenly accessible. The study contributes to HRD scholarship in two main ways. First, it refines spill‐over theory by showing that, in a fragile‐state military setting, spill‐over is better understood as structurally asymmetrical rather than presumptively bidirectional. Second, it extends JD‐R theory by demonstrating that resources are hierarchically mediated and culturally supplemented rather than simply organizationally present or absent. These findings extend work‐life and engagement research into an under‐studied Global South military context and underscore the importance of context‐sensitive HRD interventions in high‐risk institutional environments.
Show more Read full article →
The protective role of sleep in tempering the impact of ICT ‐driven off‐hour interruptions on exhaustion at work
Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology Angela R. Grotto, Rui Zhang Sundrup, Maura J. Mills August 11, 2026
Health & Well-Being Research Methods Performance Leadership Organizational Culture
Abstract Off‐hour work interruptions are prevalent in organizations that expect employee availability during off‐hours through information‐communication technologies (ICTs). We bring together domain switch theory and threaded cognition theory to argue that ICT availability demands increase off‐hour interruptions during periods intended for generating work‐relevant resources, resulting in exhaustion at work. We sought to identify how individuals could buffer this threat. While to date the literature has primarily examined sleep disruption as an outcome of ICT use or a means of restoring resources post‐stressor exposure, we extend the literature by exploring the protective power of sleep duration as a resource‐generating activity employees can leverage in ICT‐demanding work environments. Using multilevel data across a five‐day workweek from a sample of working adults (level 2: N = 176) with daily off‐hour interruption reports (level 1: N = 679), we found that sleep duration reduced the indirect effect of ICT availability demands on exhaustion via off‐hour interruptions, while controlling for sleep quality. These findings suggest that prioritizing sleep can help accrue resources needed for work, shifting the perspective from sleep as a reactive restorative process to a proactive protective mechanism. Results also underscore the potential value of organizational policies and leader behaviors that promote and enable sufficient off‐hours worker rest.
Show more Read full article →
Coworking: Finding Value Through Work Companions
Organization Science Christina B. Hymer, Mark A. Maltarich, Sherry M. B. Thatcher August 11, 2026
Organizational Culture Job Attitudes Remote Work Selection & Assessment Training & Development
Many workers have the flexibility to work across different work locations, and some choose to join coworking spaces, where they work alongside others with different employers, occupations, and backgrounds. Yet little is known about the nature of relationships formed within this type of work location, where individuals lack shared goals and a common organizational umbrella. Thus, we ask, how do workers manage and find value from relationships within coworking spaces? Applying grounded theory techniques to collect and analyze observational, archival, and interview data collected from 80 workers in 21 coworking spaces, we derive a theoretical model that centers around the novel construct of work companions: individuals who work alongside one another with a shared focus on work but without family, friendship, or employment relationship obligations. The coworking space environment, overseen by one or more space managers, provides favorable conditions for the formation of work companions. Through interaction flexibility, coworking space members socially engage or parallel work with work companions, extracting both personal and professional value. Relational embeddedness, defined as the existence of family, friendship, or employment relationships, imposes obligations that make work companion interactions less flexible, creating a boundary condition to these findings. Introducing the work companion construct and elaborating relationships among coworking space members offers promising avenues for future research and informs management practice on work companions, coworking, and remote work.
Show more Read full article →
Practitioner's Pulse: A Content Analysis Approach for Examining Prevalent Topics in HRD Practitioner Periodicals
🔓
Human Resource Development Quarterly Ellen Scully‐Russ, Sarah M. Ray, Henriette Lundgren August 11, 2026
Research Methods Training & Development Teams Selection & Assessment Performance
ABSTRACT This article presents a methodological approach for analyzing Human Resource Development (HRD) practitioner perspectives through a content analysis (CA) of periodicals. While CA has been applied to academic literature, its application to practitioner periodicals represents a methodological reorientation because these sources differ fundamentally in structure, language, purpose, and audience from academic publications. By analyzing these sources on their own terms—rather than through academic frameworks, we can systematically identify many practitioners' concerns, priorities, and evolving practices that might not be captured in traditional literature reviews. We utilize data from January 2018 to April 2019 as a case example to illustrate the effectiveness of this approach. This analysis is situated in the literature on the contours of the research‐practice gap in HRD and other applied human and organizational development disciplines, which makes the case for innovation approaches to facilitating dialogue and collaboration between HRD scholars and practitioners. We explain the methodology used for the CA based on practitioner periodicals, and we show how it offers a robust, rigorous, and replicable approach for continually tracking and analyzing content in practice journals. The significance of the findings, though now historical, reveals how issues are interrelated in practice and the way the social context shapes practice and the strategic importance of topics in practice. As the field continues to grapple with questions of relevance and impact, methodological innovations that facilitate meaningful dialogue between research and practice will be essential for advancing both the theory and practice of HRD.
Show more Read full article →
Daily temporal profiles at work: State-level dynamics in past, present, and future focus.
Journal of Applied Psychology Brian C. Holtz, Harshad Girish Puranik, Crystal Michele Harold, Kathleen R. Keeler, Yiming Huang, et al. August 10, 2026
Performance Teams Turnover & Retention
= 263), we replicate these results and identify one additional profile. Further, in Study 2, we find that daily fluctuation in profile membership is shaped by morning expectations about time affluence, time control, and economic mindsets. We also show that profile membership is associated with daily workplace outcomes, including task performance, collaboration, and withdrawal behavior. By demonstrating the variability and impact of state-level temporal focus profiles, this research advances our understanding of temporal focus in organizational contexts and sets the stage for future research in this area. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
Reinforcing or eroding norms? The team consequences of negative gossip network.
Journal of Applied Psychology Rui Zhong, Yimin He, Yinbo Zheng, Christopher M. Barnes, Kyle Wu, et al. August 10, 2026
Networks Teams Organizational Culture Job Attitudes Performance
While prior research has established that negative gossip can reinforce behavioral norms by deterring inappropriate conduct, these findings have largely been limited to the individual level. Accordingly, it remains unclear how gossip influences team norms at the team level-specifically, whether it continues to reinforce team norms against inappropriate conduct, as suggested by individual-level findings, or instead may backfire to erode such norms. Integrating the social network perspective with behavioral regulation theory, we propose competing hypotheses about how team-level gossip shapes proscriptive team norms, which serve to deter harmful behaviors that team members should not engage in: a norm-reinforcing effect and a norm-eroding effect. We conceptualize team-level gossip through both its prevalence (network density) and its distribution (network reciprocity and centralization). We further propose that gossip prevalence and distribution interact in predicting proscriptive team norms. We conducted a multiwave, multisource, round-robin study of 104 work teams with 1,344 team members and 104 supervisors. Contrary to the norm-reinforcing effect commonly shown in individual-level studies, our findings support a norm-eroding effect at the team level. Specifically, gossip density was associated with weakened proscriptive team norms, which in turn predicted increased proscription-based behavior-namely, team counterproductive work behavior. Furthermore, this norm-eroding effect of gossip density on team norms and counterproductive work behavior was amplified in teams with higher levels of gossip reciprocity or lower levels of gossip centralization. We conclude by discussing the theoretical and practical implications of our findings. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
Self‐monitoring and job performance: Substance or style? A meta‐analysis
🔓
Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology Klaus Moser, Katharina Ebner, DragoƟ Iliescu, Alexandru-Andrei Sürbu August 10, 2026
Performance Research Methods Selection & Assessment Networks Training & Development
Abstract Self‐monitoring aims at adjusting one's behaviour in social interactions. While scholars have been convinced that self‐monitoring predicts job performance, the strength and nature of the relationship between self‐monitoring and job performance remain unclear. Specifically, it may not be explained by a competency perspective but rather a biased‐perceiver perspective, where self‐monitors may primarily succeed in influencing raters' perceptions of their performance. Therefore, a meta‐analysis was conducted, identifying 35 samples that reported the respective correlations. The results reveal a modest overall relationship ( r = .12). Importantly, moderator analyses suggest that this relationship is driven by self‐monitors influencing supervisors' performance ratings. Likewise, a correlation between self‐monitoring and job performance was observed only in supervisor ratings, but not in performance assessments based on outcome measures, and the relationship was evident in ratings of contextual performance, but not of task performance. These findings tend to support a biased‐perceiver perspective, suggesting that self‐monitoring is more strongly related to impression formation than to actual job performance, though the magnitudes of moderator effects are modest, and residual heterogeneity in the data remains considerable. The modest relationship between self‐monitoring and job performance thus appears to be more about style (biased performance ratings) than substance (contributing to actual job performance).
Show more Read full article →
How we benefit from job satisfaction: The moderating effect of informal caregiving on the associations between job satisfaction and physiological and psychological stress.
🔓
Journal of Occupational Health Psychology Jensine Paoletti, Vincent D. Lai, Christopher P. Fagundes August 10, 2026
Research Methods Job Attitudes Health & Well-Being Performance Networks
Job satisfaction and the resource-building processes it supports may have meaningful implications for health and well-being. These processes may work differently for employees who have informal (i.e., unpaid) caregiving duties outside of work. Guided by conservation of resources theory, we examined two indirect stress-buffering pathways in a sample of 799 nursing home workers, measured four times over 18 months. We tested how job satisfaction affects gain strengthening (via higher positive spillover) and loss weakening (via lower work-family conflict), how these processes impact indices of physiological (i.e., C-reactive protein) and psychological (i.e., perceived) stress, and how informal caregiving status may moderate these associations. We did not find strictly distinct pathways by caregiver status, but we did find differential within-person patterns among informal caregivers and noncaregivers. Most relevant for noncaregivers, times of higher job satisfaction were indirectly associated with (a) lower C-reactive protein through times of higher work-family positive spillover and with (b) lower perceived stress through times of lower work-family conflict. When employees (regardless of caregiver status) reported job satisfaction that was higher than their own average, they also reported lower perceived stress and showed lower chronic inflammation than at times when their job satisfaction was equal to or lower than their own average. We discuss theoretical and practical implications. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
Sick of sexism? Ambivalent sexism, work–family conflicts, and physical health of working mothers.
🔓
Journal of Occupational Health Psychology Anna Katharina Bader, Vesa Peltokorpi August 10, 2026
Health & Well-Being Conflict Research Methods Networks Training & Development
Working mothers encounter persistent sexism in the workplace. This study draws on ambivalent sexism theory to examine the mediated relationships of supervisors' hostile and benevolent sexist behaviors and working mothers' physical health via conflicts in the work-family interface. Given the ambivalent nature of hostile and benevolent sexism, we hypothesize two distinct pathways: (a) a congruent pathway, in which hostile sexism, via work-to-family and family-to-work conflicts, is positively related to poor physical health and (b) an opposing pathway, in which benevolent sexism, via work-to-family and family-to-work conflicts, is respectively negatively and positively related to poor physical health. Because both hostile and ambivalent sexism are rooted in assumptions of traditional gender roles, we further hypothesize that working mothers' gender role orientation moderates the relationships between ambivalent sexism and conflicts in the work-family interface. Our findings from a three-wave, time-lagged study of 719 working mothers with young children under the age of 5 provide general support for these hypotheses. This study contributes to the literature by demonstrating how and why ambivalent sexism can simultaneously mitigate and exacerbate conflicts in the work-family interface, affecting mothers' physical health and the perpetuation of workplace gender inequality. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
Risk patterns of psychosocial job characteristics associated with exhaustion: Combining configurational and variable-centered approaches.
Journal of Occupational Health Psychology Ivon Ames, Jan Dettmers August 10, 2026
Health & Well-Being Research Methods Job Design Selection & Assessment Measurement & Psychometrics
Theoretical models on psychosocial job characteristics have proposed the interaction of demands and resources in shaping employee health, yet empirical evidence for their interplay in the development of impaired well-being using statistical approaches modeling interaction effects remains inconsistent. We propose fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis, a configurational approach, as an alternative to identify combinations of job characteristics that may be associated with impaired well-being outcomes such as exhaustion. Using a split-sample design, we analyzed data from 9,358 employees nested in 980 teams across 32 organizations. Eight job characteristics (five demands and three resources) were examined through fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis in one subsample and validated in the second using three-level generalized linear mixed models. The fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis yielded five configurations that were sufficient for the presence of exhaustion, three of which remained robust in sensitivity tests, as well as two protective configurations characterized by a complex pattern of multiple high resources and low demands. Multilevel validation analyses confirmed the estimation validity of all three robust risk configurations, with graded associations across partial configuration membership. Two of the three configurations demonstrated additional explanatory value beyond the individual job characteristics. These findings provide evidence for synergistic associations of specific demand-resource combinations. Practically, results highlight the need for configuration-sensitive risk assessments and interventions that address unfavorable constellations of job characteristics rather than isolated conditions. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
We Succeeded, But Did I Learn? How Team Role Orientations Affect Individual‐Level Transfer of Team Training
Personnel Psychology Erich C. Dierdorff, Tyree David Mitchell, Robert S. Rubin, Rhett Andrew Brymer August 09, 2026
Training & Development Teams Research Methods Selection & Assessment Job Attitudes
ABSTRACT An extensive body of evidence supports the benefits of team training on team outcomes, yet the extent to which individuals themselves benefit from such training remains largely underexplored. Drawing on role and self‐regulation theories, this study examines how team role orientations influence the extent to which team members acquire the targeted competencies of team training. We explain how team role orientations direct team member cognitive and behavioral resources in team training contexts, and team members’ specific role orientations can either aid or hinder individual learning outcomes. From a sample of 84 student teams ( N = 330) engaged in a simulation‐based team training program, we find that the Doer role orientation enhances taskwork knowledge and skill outcomes from team training, the Team Builder orientation enhances teamwork skill and knowledge outcomes, and the Organizer role orientation inhibits taskwork knowledge and skill and teamwork knowledge outcomes. We also hypothesize regulatory learning behavior (i.e., planning, assessing, and adjusting individual contributions to teams) as a key mediating mechanism that explains these effects and find supporting evidence as it relates to the Doer and Team Builder orientations. Further, we find support for the amplifying top‐down influence of team learning effectiveness on the relationships between Doer and Organizer orientations and learning outcomes. Our findings underscore the complexity of individual learning transfer in team training settings, emphasizing the need to consider team contexts, individual tendencies, and regulatory learning behaviors when designing team training interventions.
Show more Read full article →
Controlling Time or Controlled by Time? AI-Mediated Workflows as an Occasion for Structuring
Organizational Psychology Review Kuok Kei Law, Ricardo Lim, Gyung Yeol Yang August 08, 2026
Training & Development Teams Leadership Artificial Intelligence/Technology Individual Differences
How does artificial intelligence (AI) re-shape the temporal experience of work? We argue that AI does not determine work tempo on its own. Its temporal force is configured by leaders and enacted by workers. Building on structuration theory, we develop a process model in which leaders configure AI systems along the dimensions of temporal authority and interaction frequency, generating AI-driven time pressure that workers navigate through temporal job crafting. Whether this synchronization becomes subjugating or agentic depends on leaders’ temporal leadership, and the resulting individual and collective outcomes feed back to prompt continual re-configuration, with no optimal end. Our work contributes a non-deterministic account of AI and time, re-positions temporal leadership as socio-technical governance, and extends entrainment theory by linking micro-level adaptation to macro-level collaborative dynamics.
Show more Read full article →
Jailcraft: Atmospheric Security Work in Violent Contexts
Academy of Management Journal Adrian Marrison, Jaco Lok, Mark de Rond August 07, 2026
Job Attitudes Training & Development Networks Organizational Change Research Methods
Drawing on a 12-month immersive ethnography of prison officers in an English prison, we explore the relation between security work and atmosphere. We show how prison security hinges on officers becoming proficient in “atmospheric work,” or a bundle of practices purposively oriented at sensing and modulating atmospheres in situationally adaptive ways to prevent violence. Colloquially known as “jailcraft,” these practices involve sensing the prison’s atmosphere for signs of rising tension, amplifying atmospheric tension as a means of control, and dampening tension if actual violence is deemed imminent. Our conceptualization advances organization research that has tended to cast atmosphere as either a target object of aesthetic work or as a diffuse affective background to sensemaking. We show empirically that these approaches miss something crucial, and especially in the world of security work. This is because here atmosphere is neither a backdrop nor an embellishment but actively sensed and “worked” in real time. This means that security workers’ “atmotechnic” interventions reveal a form of agentic atmospheric engagement that is strikingly purposive, yet curiously non-aesthetic in orientation.
Show more Read full article →
Enhancing Mothers' Well‐Being: The Role of Stress Mindsets and Coping Appraisals in Addressing Maternal Discrimination at Work
Journal of Organizational Behavior Samantha C. Paustian‐Underdahl, Kaylee Jo Hackney, Shanna R. Daniels, Yingge Li, James Whyte, et al. August 06, 2026
Health & Well-Being Diversity & Inclusion Measurement & Psychometrics Organizational Change Performance
ABSTRACT Discrimination against working mothers is among the strongest forms of employment discrimination today. In the current study, we integrate the stress mindset literature with the organizational literature on stress and coping to examine how a stress‐is‐enhancing mindset improves women's primary and secondary coping appraisals of perceived maternal discrimination, which in turn relates to women's perceived health. Study 1 includes multi‐wave field data from working mothers across a variety of organizations in the United States, offering desirable external validity. Results show that stress mindset predicts more adaptive primary appraisals, which in turn relate to secondary appraisals and ultimately to better perceived health. Study 2 experimentally manipulates stress mindset through a video‐based intervention (vs. control) and examines changes in coping appraisals from pre‐ to post‐intervention. The intervention significantly improved secondary appraisals (but not primary appraisals), producing an indirect effect on perceived health through secondary appraisals alone. We conclude by discussing theoretical implications for stress mindset and appraisal research, methodological contributions, and practical recommendations for supporting working mothers facing discrimination.
Show more Read full article →
Performance Management
Human Resource Management Debashish Sengupta August 06, 2026
Performance Selection & Assessment Teams
This chapter explores the role of performance management systems in driving individual, team and organisational effectiveness. It examines the objectives, components, and cyclical nature of performance management, alongside managerial responsibilities in goal-setting and feedback. The chapter critically reviews the traditional appraisal methods and highlights their limitations, alongside growing doubts about their accuracy, relevance, and effectiveness. At the same time, it examines the contemporary methods of managing performance using continuous performance dialogues and regular reviews. Competency-based management of performance is explored as companies increasingly hire for skills and less for acquired formal qualifications.
Show more Read full article →
Employee Relations
Human Resource Management Debashish Sengupta August 06, 2026
Performance Training & Development Job Attitudes Conflict Networks
This chapter examines employee relations as a core function of human resource management, shaping workplace cooperation, trust, and organisational stability. It introduces key theoretical approaches, including systems theory, psychological contracts, legitimacy theory, symbolic self-completion, the ability-motivation-opportunity (AMO) model, and social exchange theory, to explain how employment relationships are formed and maintained. The chapter situates employee relations within the UK context by reviewing key legislation governing employment rights, equality, and trade union relations. It further examines the strategic role of employee relations in managing conflict, ensuring compliance, and promoting employee engagement and voice. Readers will develop a critical understanding of how effective employee relations contribute to organisational performance and workforce engagement.
Show more Read full article →
Building a Robust Hiring Process
Human Resource Management Debashish Sengupta August 06, 2026
Selection & Assessment Measurement & Psychometrics Performance Individual Differences Organizational Change
This chapter examines how organisations design and implement effective hiring systems in a rapidly evolving labour market. It examines recruitment objectives, key internal and external factors that influence recruitment decisions, and various sourcing strategies for attracting talent. The chapter analyses recruitment processes, the growing role of artificial intelligence and how it is changing the way companies hire, highlighting opportunities and challenges. It further investigates selection methods, including tests, interviews, and background verification, while addressing common errors in the selection process. The concepts of reliability and validity in selection tools are critically discussed to support evidence-based decision-making. By the end, readers will understand how to build fair, efficient, and evidence-based hiring processes.
Show more Read full article →
Contemporary Issues in HRM
Human Resource Management Debashish Sengupta August 06, 2026
Social Responsibility Training & Development Networks Diversity & Inclusion HR Systems & Talent Management
This chapter brings together the most forward-looking debates in human resource management (HRM). It examines emerging and complex challenges shaping contemporary human resource management. It explores the rise of the gig economy and associated HRM issues, including employment ambiguity, algorithmic management, worker wellbeing, and limited employee voice. The chapter analyses the devolution of traditional HR roles and the evolution of people management through stakeholder perspectives. It further investigates the relationship between HRM and innovation, sustainability, volunteerism, and global development goals. Generational diversity and empathy-driven leadership are examined as critical capabilities for managing modern workforces. By integrating theoretical perspectives with evolving workplace realities, the chapter equips readers to critically evaluate future HRM practices and design responsive, ethical, and sustainable people management strategies.
Show more Read full article →
When and Why Group Pay Dispersion Enhances Employee Performance: A Collective Identity Orientation Perspective
Human Resource Management Jih‐Yu Mao, Kong Zhou, Li Guo, Manlin LI, Wenxing Liu, et al. August 06, 2026
Performance Teams HR Systems & Talent Management Training & Development Motivation
ABSTRACT Organizations use compensation to attract, retain, and motivate employees to achieve their strategic goals. This research shifts the focus of pay differences from individuals to groups by focusing on pay differences among employees in the same functional work teams (i.e., within‐group pay dispersion) and between employees across functional work teams (i.e., between‐group pay dispersion). Drawing on identity theories, we propose that between‐group pay dispersion strengthens employee collective identity orientation, which in turn increases employee task performance and in‐group helping. This relationship is less salient when within‐group pay dispersion is larger and more salient when within‐group pay dispersion is smaller. The results of two multi‐wave field survey studies (Studies 1 and 4) support our predictions. Two controlled experiments (Studies 2 and 3) strengthen the causal explanations and enhance result robustness. Our findings suggest that between‐group pay dispersion may lead to desirable employee performance behaviors and provide insights into pay strategies.
Show more Read full article →
Artificial Intelligence in Human Resource Management
Human Resource Management Debashish Sengupta August 06, 2026
Artificial Intelligence/Technology HR Systems & Talent Management Individual Differences Teams Social Responsibility
The chapter explores various classifications and applications of artificial intelligence (AI), such as automated intelligence, augmented intelligence, autonomous intelligence, generative AI, predictive AI, and conversational AI. It also examines the challenges in AI integration with human resource management, whether it increases the general complexity of the HR function, or the problem of small data sets coupled with fairness and accountability concerns and ethical and legal constraints. The chapter also analyses the suggested principles for overcoming such challenges in a way that AI and HI (human intelligence) can work collaboratively in the future.
Show more Read full article →
HR Strategy and Planning
Human Resource Management Debashish Sengupta August 06, 2026
HR Systems & Talent Management Selection & Assessment Performance Organizational Culture Research Methods
The chapter introduces learners to the concept of Strategic Human Resource Management and outlines that the role of human resources (HR) in the modern-day world is to help organisations win in the marketplace. That requires one to examine the ‘why’ behind every HR decision and evaluate whether that not only contributes to meeting stakeholder needs but also contributes to competitive advantage. The chapter discusses various approaches to strategic human resource management, how HR strategy aligns with corporate strategy through vertical and horizontal integration and situates GR practices within strategic analysis frameworks. This chapter will help learners assess how HR strategy is formulated, aligned and implemented to create and maximise organisational value.
Show more Read full article →
Employee Engagement
Human Resource Management Debashish Sengupta August 06, 2026
Job Attitudes Performance Health & Well-Being Teams Social Responsibility
This chapter examines employee engagement as a critical driver of organisational performance and employee wellbeing. It introduces the concept and explores the three entities of engagement, distinguishing engagement from related constructs such as job involvement. The chapter analyses major theoretical perspectives, including the Job Demands–Resources model, self-determination theory, social exchange theory, and psychological safety theory, to explain how engagement emerges and is sustained. It further explores the building blocks of engagement, work–life balance dynamics, and the interplay of collaboration and competition at work. Methods of measuring engagement, including Gallup Q12, employee net promoter score, and the MADE model, are evaluated. Readers will gain insight into designing evidence-based strategies to foster and measure sustainable employee engagement.
Show more Read full article →
Rewards and Compensation Management
Human Resource Management Debashish Sengupta August 06, 2026
HR Systems & Talent Management Motivation Selection & Assessment Performance Diversity & Inclusion
This chapter discusses employee compensation and benefits. Living wages, their origin, purpose, initiatives of the UK Living Wage Foundation and benefits to workers are mentioned in the chapter. The principle of equity and how it governs the design of employee compensation and benefits is discussed, and learners are encouraged to compare and contrast this with the principle of equality in compensation. The chapter also focuses on variable pay systems that include employee stock options, bonuses, incentives, etc. Various employee benefits are also discussed with the learners, once again encouraged to assess how benefits should be designed and the degree to which employees should be involved in the co-design of benefit plans. Pyramidical structure of reward and recognition programmes is also discussed. Job evaluation and various methods used in the pricing of the jobs are discussed in detail.
Show more Read full article →
International Human Resource Management
Human Resource Management Debashish Sengupta August 06, 2026
HR Systems & Talent Management Training & Development Performance Selection & Assessment Health & Well-Being
This chapter examines the function of international human resource management (IHRM) as a strategic necessity for every organisation in a highly globalised world. It assesses the strategic role of HR in multinational companies, internationalisation strategies, and alternative international HR approaches, including adaptive, exportive, and integrative models. The chapter explores key IHRM roles, including process champion, custodian of culture, effective political influencer, network leader, articulating various international HR management basics, change partner, and navigator. It also focuses on key IHRM activities such as international staffing, cross-cultural management, global training and development, international performance and talent management, labour relations, compensation, and expatriate health and safety. Cultural challenges are analysed using Hofstede&s;s dimensions to highlight differences in management practices across contexts. Readers will develop an understanding of how IHRM aligns global integration with local responsiveness to build sustainable international capability.
Show more Read full article →
Effective Employee Training and Development
Human Resource Management Debashish Sengupta August 06, 2026
Training & Development Performance Selection & Assessment Measurement & Psychometrics
This chapter discusses learning as a process, how humans learn, various learning types, learning theories and their implications in designing instructions and in the overall instructional design strategy. The chapters also discuss how assessing learning as a discipline helps appreciate training as a practice. The challenges of transfer of learning, ensuring training effectiveness, ways to measure the usefulness of training, and practical limitations in training evaluation are discussed.
Show more Read full article →
Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion
Human Resource Management Debashish Sengupta August 06, 2026
Diversity & Inclusion Training & Development HR Systems & Talent Management Performance Networks
This chapter examines equality, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) as central concerns in contemporary human resource management. It introduces the rationale for EDI in modern organisations and positions EDI as a strategic human resource management (HRM) priority rather than a purely compliance-driven activity. The chapter explores conceptual foundations, including equality of opportunity and outcomes, inclusion beyond representation, and intersectionality. Key theoretical perspectives such as social identity theory, human capital theory, institutional theory, and critical diversity theory are analysed. It also reviews forms of workplace discrimination and the UK legal framework, particularly the Equality Act 2010, alongside positive action and good employment practices. Readers will develop the capability to design and evaluate inclusive and legally compliant HR strategies.
Show more Read full article →
Human Resource Automation, Audit, and Accounting
Human Resource Management Debashish Sengupta August 06, 2026
Performance HR Systems & Talent Management Artificial Intelligence/Technology Selection & Assessment Training & Development
This chapter explores how technology, evaluation, and measurement systems enhance the strategic contribution of human resource management. It examines HR automation, including HR information systems, payroll, recruitment, performance management, and employee self-service platforms, alongside the benefits and potential pitfalls of digitalisation. The chapter introduces human resource audits as tools for assessing legal compliance, benchmarking effectiveness, and strategic alignment, supported by practical audit approaches and checklists. It further analyses human resource accounting methods, including cost-based and economic value approaches, and debates their usefulness in organisational decision-making. Readers will develop critical insight into how automation, audit, and accounting practices improve HR efficiency, accountability, and strategic impact.
Show more Read full article →
Introduction to Human Resource Management
Human Resource Management Debashish Sengupta August 06, 2026
HR Systems & Talent Management Training & Development
This chapter shines a spotlight on the most important asset of any company – its human resources. It argues why employees are the company&s;s best brand ambassadors and how a firm can develop them as those who champion their brand. The chapter further delves into the evolution of human resources and the emergence of new-age human resource management. The chapter also introduces the readers to different human resource (HR) systems and processes. It also contrasts traditional and modern human resource management, and why HR today is less about HR and more about enabling businesses to win in the marketplace.
Show more Read full article →
Workforce Architecture
Human Resource Management Debashish Sengupta August 06, 2026
Selection & Assessment HR Systems & Talent Management Research Methods
This chapter discusses two major activities that precede the hiring operation – estimating the human resource needs or human resource planning, and analysing the job or jhob analysis. It examines the major implications of human resource plans and the wide range of HR operations and decisions that they influence. It discusses the various factors affecting human resource planning and different ways of demand and supply forecasting. The chapter also discusses job analysis in detail, outlining different ways of conducting job analysis, outlining in detail the questionnaire method and Position Analysis Questionnaire (PAQ) and the final outputs as job descriptions and job specifications, and how they impact various HR operations.
Show more Read full article →
Talent Management
Human Resource Management Debashish Sengupta August 06, 2026
Performance HR Systems & Talent Management Selection & Assessment Training & Development Individual Differences
The chapter examines how talent management has become a strategic necessity for organisations and their ability to attract, develop and retain individuals who can create value for the stakeholders. It examines the current trend in talent management and how its meaning and application are changing in an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven world. It aims to demystify how we define talent. Do we mean high performers when we say talent? Do talents only exist in the upper echelons of the organisation? The chapter evaluates the main areas of talent management and the relative responsibilities of various owners of the talent management process in an organisation. Furthermore, it assesses the future of talent management and how it needs to be integrated at all levels that align people&s;s capabilities with long-term organisational strategy and make the talent process efficient and effective.
Show more Read full article →
Trust Beyond Interpersonal Relationships: Unpacking Organizational Trust
Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior Oliver S. Schilke, Martin Reimann August 06, 2026
Networks Artificial Intelligence/Technology Remote Work
Trust has often been understood as an interpersonal leap of faith between individuals. But increasingly, that leap is directed toward organizations and enacted by organizations. As enterprise algorithms, marketplace platforms, and distributed work arrangements replace face-to-face interactions, vulnerability sits less in individual people and more in collective systems. This makes organizational trust a practically important but conceptually underspecified construct. In this review, we conceptualize organizational trust as a collective phenomenon in which the trustor, the trustee, or both are organizations. To structure our review, we use a trustor–trustee matrix that distinguishes between three constellations of organizational trust: individual → organization, organization → individual, and organization → organization. We then introduce a sixfold typology that explains what element (i.e., metaphor, agent substitution, composition, identity, network, or actorhood) carries trust at the organizational level. We also offer a decision tree that links research questions, mechanisms, and operationalizations with the appropriate carrier. Finally, we close by identifying research priorities for future work on organizational trust.
Show more Read full article →
Are All “Good” Employees Susceptible to Moral Biases? Exceptional (Versus Intermediate) Moral Character Shapes Resilience to Daily “DIAMONDS” Situations That Trigger Moral Disengagement
🔓
Journal of Organizational Behavior Babatunde Ogunfowora, Varun Sharma, Mohammad Khalilinejad, Kimberly Weston Moore August 05, 2026
Selection & Assessment Individual Differences Artificial Intelligence/Technology Research Methods
ABSTRACT The non‐rationalist view of morality holds that all employees—including “good” apples—are liable to do bad because they are susceptible to moral biases in everyday situational encounters. In contrast, the rationalist or trait view suggests that employees with strong moral character should be resilient against moral biases across situations and over time. Rather than treating these perspectives as competing explanations, we ask a more nuanced question: In which situational encounters and for whom does moral character shape susceptibility to daily moral biases at work? Drawing on research on moral exemplarity, we argue that “good” exists along a continuum from intermediate to exceptional moral character, with only the exceptional consistently exhibiting moral resilience. Integrating moral disengagement theory with the Situational Eight DIAMONDS model, we identify and test a comprehensive set of episodic work situations that may trigger daily within‐person fluctuations in state moral disengagement. Across two pilot studies, work situations characterized by Deception , Adversity / Negativity , and unexpectedly, Mating , positively predicted same‐day moral disengagement. In a 3‐week diary study, daily encounters of these situations triggered daily moral disengagement, which subsequently increased daily instrumental OCBs, reduced genuine OCBs, and heightened incivility among employees low to intermediate (but not exceptional) on trait Honesty–Humility. We also find that exceptional‐character employees exhibited low moral amplitude or volatility in moral disengagement over time. Our discussion highlights the necessity of considering both within‐person fluctuations and between‐person differences in resilience against moral biases at work.
Show more Read full article →
When play becomes pressure: how gamification and algorithms shape gig workers’ burnout
Journal of Managerial Psychology Jianing Cao, Mengxi Yang, Xiaojie Liang, Yihang Wei August 05, 2026
Artificial Intelligence/Technology Health & Well-Being Research Methods Selection & Assessment Performance
Purpose Grounded in Affective Events Theory and Self-Determination Theory, this study examines how work gamification shapes gig workers’ emotional labor strategies and burnout under different algorithmic features. Design/methodology/approach Using a three-wave survey of 311 gig workers, we tested relationships among work gamification, emotional labor strategies and burnout, along with the moderating roles of algorithmic monitoring and algorithmic fairness. Findings Under low algorithmic monitoring, work gamification reduces surface emotional labor and thereby lowers burnout. Under high monitoring, this indirect effect weakens. Under high algorithmic fairness, gamification promotes deep emotional labor and thereby reduces burnout; under low fairness, the deep emotional labor pathway disappears. Practical implications Platforms should balance monitoring intensity and fairness while using gamification to improve gig workers’ experience and well-being. Originality/value By treating algorithmic features as contextual moderators, this study extends understanding of how gamification affects gig workers’ emotional labor and identifies differentiated pathways linking gamification to burnout.
Show more Read full article →
Are you morally included? The mediating effect of subordinates' task performance and organizational citizenship behavior between political skill and abusive supervision
🔓
Journal of Managerial Psychology Teng Liu, Steven Kilroy August 05, 2026
Performance Research Methods Networks Leadership Selection & Assessment
Purpose This study aims to investigate whether and how subordinates' political skill influences abusive supervision via task performance and organization-directed organizational citizenship behavior (OCB-O). Design/methodology/approach A 3-wave survey of 224 employees was conducted at a Chinese transportation firm and the hypotheses were tested with multi-level Bayesian structural equation modeling in Mplus. Findings The findings reveal that individual political skill is not directly associated with abusive supervision but indirectly relates to abusive supervision through increased OCB-O. The mediating effect of task performance is not significant. Originality/value This study examined the direct relationship between political skill and abusive supervision, and using moral exclusion theory, explored the unique underlying mechanisms involved, i.e. through the performance outcomes of task performance and OCB-O. While subordinates' performance is typically considered as an outcome of abusive supervision, this study positions it as a key mediator linking political skill to abusive supervision.
Show more Read full article →
Workplace coaching at the crossroads: Introduction to the special issue
Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology Gil Bozer, Silja Christina Kotte, Almuth McDowall August 04, 2026
Training & Development Performance Job Attitudes Organizational Culture Organizational Change
Abstract This short editorial introduces the special issue in the Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology ‘Workplace coaching at the crossroads’. We outline how workplace coaching has grown into a preferred helping relationship to support workers and leaders in navigating increasingly complex and ever‐changing workplaces. Our definition of coaching frames it as a facilitative, dialectical process that enables positive change and outcomes for the coachee. We summarize that meta‐analytic evidence tells us that coaching ‘works’ by documenting positive impacts on a range of outcomes, including performance, learning and wellbeing. Yet, we know far less about how coaching works and the role of coaching contexts. The five contributions in this special issue address the coaching process. They are methodologically diverse and include both longitudinal and observational data. We posit that the meta‐theme for coaching to work is the coachee's active engagement in shaping the coaching process as they work towards proximal (e.g., self‐awareness) and more distal (e.g., long‐term goals) outcomes. We conclude with a call for future research to address the coaching context by considering micro‐level (e.g., stakeholder alignment), meso‐level (e.g., organizational strategy, coaching culture) and macro‐level considerations (e.g., societal culture, technological transformation).
Show more Read full article →
Bittersweet Symphony: A Music Theory Approach to Stakeholder Dissonance and Value Creation
Journal of Management Skyler Dana Clark-Hamel, Lena Bischoff, Zhongyuan Sun August 04, 2026
Organizational Culture Performance Networks Selection & Assessment Training & Development
Stakeholder theory emphasizes value creation for diverse stakeholders, yet it offers limited guidance for understanding how value is created when a firm’s and a stakeholder’s values differ. We reconceptualize firm–stakeholder relationships as dynamic processes in which value accumulates through the engagement and resolution of value dissonance. Drawing on tonal harmony from music theory, we develop a framework that treats dissonance not as a defect to be eliminated but as generative pressure for value creation. The framework evaluates value dissonance at the issue level and aggregates tension at the relationship level, enabling systematic assessment of where firms can productively intervene. We then theorize three mechanisms through which firms convert dissonance into value: managerial intervention, structural resolution, and timing. Our central insight is that value emerges from the sequenced movement between tension and release. This dynamic perspective advances stakeholder theory by explaining how value can be created across the full stakeholder portfolio, including relationships that firms might otherwise avoid, suppress, or attempt to force into alignment.
Show more Read full article →
Enacting Open Science values in qualitative leadership research: Existing practices and future directions
🔓
Leadership Quarterly Camille Grace Endacott, Brent Reed, Crystal Nicole Steltenpohl August 04, 2026
Research Methods Leadership Individual Differences Organizational Culture Training & Development
The open science movement has gained considerable momentum in advancing the transparency, credibility, and rigor of scientific research across disciplines. Within this broader landscape, leadership scholars have played a prominent role in developing formal guidance to strengthen open science practices in organizational research. To date, most recommendations have focused on quantitative research rooted in post-positivist traditions. However, qualitative scholars working from interpretivist perspectives share core values such as openness, integrity, and reproducibility with open science and enact them through practices grounded in inductive, context-sensitive inquiry. Bringing these two conversations into closer dialogue offers meaningful opportunities for both domains. Leadership research provides a particularly generative context for this exchange, as qualitative methods have influenced the field by illuminating the socially constructed and value-laden nature of leading. Drawing on these contributions, we present a set of 12 established practices through which interpretivist qualitative researchers have historically embodied open science values in leadership research, followed by six additional practices that can further enhance the openness, integrity, and reproducibility of interpretivist scholarship. By articulating how open science principles can be enacted in qualitative paradigms, we show that leadership scholars are well-positioned to extend the open science conversation across methodologies and communities of practice.
Show more Read full article →
Agreeable team members wanted: personality configurations of high-performing individuals in global virtual teams
Journal of Managerial Psychology Faruk ƞahin, Fatih Çetin, Duysal AƟkun, Ernesto Tavoletti, Vas Taras, et al. August 04, 2026
Teams Individual Differences Research Methods Performance Leadership
Purpose Although much research has been done on the Big Five personality traits that underpin individual performance in teams, knowledge of the interdependencies of traits for individual performance is rather limited and especially so in the new ordinary workplace represented by global virtual teams (GVTs). The purpose of the study is to explore how personality traits combine in configurations that lead to high individual performance in GVTs. Design/methodology/approach Based on the configurational perspective, we use fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis on a sample of 697 students nested within 171 GVTs to examine the influence of the personality traits on peer-rated individual performance. Findings Three distinct configurations of traits, each including agreeableness, account for high levels of individual performance in GVTs. Agreeableness, which is found to be a necessary condition, emerges as a favorable trait in GVTs and is associated with high individual performance across three different combinations with other personality traits. Originality/value This study offers a deeper understanding of the interplay between personality traits and their causal conditions for high individual performance in GVTs, thereby enriching the literature. It contributes to the growing body of literature on virtual team dynamics, providing insights that can help organizations optimize team composition and performance in the increasingly digital workplace.
Show more Read full article →
More than years? Salience of age differences in leader-member relationships and its relation to LMX, work engagement, and emotional exhaustion
Journal of Managerial Psychology Vera MĂŒller, Thomas Rigotti August 04, 2026
Job Attitudes Leadership Networks Research Methods Health & Well-Being
Purpose Prior research on age differences in leader-follower dyads has primarily focused on objective age differences while giving less attention to whether such differences are psychologically salient. This study examines how the salience of age differences between leaders and followers is associated with leader-member exchange (LMX) and, in turn, employees' work engagement and emotional exhaustion. Design/methodology/approach Drawing on self-categorization theory and the similarity-attraction paradigm, we conducted a time-lagged survey with two measurement points four weeks apart, using a sample of 504 employees. Findings Results show that the salience of age differences is significantly and negatively associated with LMX. In turn, LMX is positively associated with work engagement and negatively associated with emotional exhaustion. LMX statistically mediates the indirect associations between the salience of age differences and both outcomes. Practical implications The findings suggest that organizations should address the salience of age differences in leader-follower relationships, rather than focusing solely on objective age differences when managing age-diverse workforces. Originality/value This study advances research on age differences in leader-follower dyads by shifting the focus from objective age differences to the salience of age differences and its associations with leader-member exchange, work engagement, and emotional exhaustion.
Show more Read full article →
A Commentary on Hong & Thoroughgood (2025): Applying Theoretical Nuance to the Social Comparison Process Upon Witnessing Coworkers’ Gratitude Expression Toward Supervisors
🔓
Group & Organization Management Amanda S. Patel, Truit W. Gray, Haeseen Park, Joseph M. Yestrepsky August 04, 2026
Training & Development Leadership Selection & Assessment
commentary, social comparison, gratitude expressionHong and Thoroughgood provide important insight into social comparison processes around observing gratitude expressions at work.We argue that a more nuanced application of social comparison theory (SCT) challenges some of their assumptions and simultaneously sheds light on a more specified
Show more Read full article →
The Effectiveness of Machine Learning in Detecting Fakers Across Different Assessment Methods and Multiple Algorithms
Journal of Personnel Psychology Nidhal Mazza, Mohamed Zeid August 04, 2026
Artificial Intelligence/Technology Selection & Assessment Training & Development Research Methods Performance
Abstract: Faking, a prevalent phenomenon in noncognitive assessments, is a concern because of its potential negative effects on criterion-related validity. This study contributes to the faking detection literature by examining the effectiveness of machine learning (ML), specifically 8 algorithms, to classify fakers based on their responses on one of four assessment methods (single-statement Likert, single-statement true/false, a rate situational judgment test, and a rank situational judgment test). Using an MTurk sample ( N = 583), faking was manipulated in a between-subjects design. Classification accuracies comparable to those of previous studies were achieved for two of the four assessment methods albeit by different algorithms indicating that the effectiveness of the ML approach should not be blindly assumed and multiple algorithms should be considered.
Show more Read full article →
How the boss’s “right hand” becomes the group’s “go-to”: Leader–member exchange as a heuristic cue for everyday asks.
Journal of Applied Psychology Emma Laier Frank, Fadel Khalil Matta, Olympia M. Nakos, Jessica Beth Rodell August 03, 2026
Selection & Assessment Performance Leadership Research Methods Individual Differences
Prevailing theories suggest that workplace needs are allocated by matching specific problems to specific coworkers-either by approaching those best suited to address a given issue or by approaching others based on interpersonal relationships and affect. Yet, in most workplaces, coworkers can identify a particular employee who seems to function as the "go-to" person across people and problems, a pattern that is difficult to explain through careful matching alone. Our work addresses this puzzle by examining how such roles can heuristically emerge and become concentrated on certain employees. Drawing on qualitative data, we argue that workplace go-tos can be a byproduct of repeated, everyday help-seeking decisions in which reliance on decision shortcuts leads some employees to become the disproportionate answer when coworkers ask themselves, "Who can help me with this?" Integrating research on heuristics in decision making, we propose that coworkers often rely on an imitate-the-successful shortcut, substituting the complex judgment of who is best positioned to help with the simpler question, "Who does the boss go to?" Over repeated decisions, this process may bias selection toward employees with strong leader-member exchange relationships, inadvertently casting them as go-tos. We argue that while this concentration of reliance should facilitate performance, it also creates conditions that wear employees down. We test these predictions across three studies-an experiment, a vignette-based decision task, and a field study with employee-coworker-supervisor triads. Our work introduces a new lens for understanding how important roles may emerge through cue-based, heuristic processes and complicates assumptions about the uniformly positive consequences of high-leader-member exchange relationships. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
Ethics of care leadership expressions during a high-strength event: A gendered analysis of combative versus constructive policy suggestions during the Israel–Hamas war.
🔓
Journal of Applied Psychology Alexander D. Stajković, Kayla S. Stajkovic, Jenny M. Hoobler, Frederick P. Morgeson August 03, 2026
Social Responsibility Leadership Diversity & Inclusion Research Methods Selection & Assessment
The Israel-Hamas war is a protracted high-strength event, marked by peaks of conflict and sustained tension, that tests how leaders function in a context with competing national interests, moral strain, and wide-reaching human and political consequences. Guided by event system theory and ethics of care leadership (ECL), we track how members of the Israeli Knesset express their leadership during this conflict. We analyze 5.2 million words spoken by 152 legislators across 140 Knesset plenary sessions over 16 months. Using natural language processing, we score and classify 4,143 discursive policy suggestions as constructive (repair oriented) or combative (zero sum). We find that (a) expression of ECL is associated with a higher likelihood of constructive suggestions, (b) women express more ECL than men, and (c) men's care expression rises during peak-strength months, narrowing-but not eliminating-the gender gap in ECL. These findings position ECL expression as both a stable orientation and a context-responsive discursive behavior, clarifying who is most likely to express ECL and when constructive suggestions are likely to emerge as event strength fluctuates. Results advance event system theory by specifying a morally grounded ECL response in high-strength contexts, and they inform practice by identifying care-led discourse as a lever for constructive policy during volatile times. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
First Impressions at Work: A Meta‐Analytic Review
🔓
Personnel Psychology Junhui Yang, Brian W. Swider, Bingjie Lu, Kaidi Wang, T. Harris August 03, 2026
Training & Development Performance Selection & Assessment Conflict Artificial Intelligence/Technology
ABSTRACT First impressions are critical in shaping work‐related outcomes and social judgments in organizational contexts. However, research has generated conflicting findings and left unanswered questions about their dimensional structure, antecedents, consequences, and temporal stability. We meta‐analyzed 204 independent samples from 145 studies to address these ambiguities and generate a stronger foundation for future theoretical development. Results reveal that perceivers tend to form broad evaluations of displayers rather than unique, narrow impressions, as conceptually distinct impression dimensions demonstrated consistently positive and often sizable cross‐dimension correlations. While perceivers rely on a range of informational cues to form first impressions, certain types (i.e., communication cues) exert a more consistent impact than others (e.g., content cues). First impressions strongly predicted both achievement‐oriented and relational outcomes, and although these effects diminished somewhat over time, they remained highly durable even at longer durations (i.e., more than a month). Taken together, these findings help reconcile competing theoretical perspectives on first impressions and provide numerous insights for more coherent theorizing and precise applications in organizational settings.
Show more Read full article →
“Oh my gosh, you’re too young to be sick!”: Unpacking the consequences of workplace mistreatment for young adults with disabilities.
Journal of Occupational Health Psychology Angela M. Dionisi, Kathryne E. Dupré, Audrey Hodgins August 03, 2026
Research Methods Selection & Assessment Job Attitudes Health & Well-Being Teams
Despite comprising a significant percentage of the workforce and being susceptible to mistreatment, young adults with disabilities have not been widely focused on in the workplace mistreatment literature. In this study, we take an intersectional approach as we examine the specific workplace mistreatment-related ramifications that this cohort of the workforce experiences. Twenty-five semistructured interviews were conducted to better understand the outcomes of workplace mistreatment among young adult employees who self-identify as having a disability. Thematic analysis was used to analyze the qualitative data. Results suggest that workplace mistreatment may shape the identities, relationships, career-related attitudes and behaviors, and health outcomes of this group of employees. This study offers insights into how workplace mistreatment impacts an understudied and underemployed group of employees. By considering multiple axes of power and privilege, namely, disability and age, this study allows for the consideration of the potentially unique experiences encountered by employees who face multiple barriers to their flourishing at work. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
Better with age? Exploring age and interpersonal emotion regulation in the workplace
🔓
European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology Aishwarya Verma, Karen Rochelle Niven, Nicola Lawrence-Thomas August 03, 2026
Performance Motivation Training & Development Networks Research Methods
Workplaces are inherently emotional spaces, where employees often attempt to influence others’ feelings. While effective interpersonal emotion regulation benefits relationships and performance, older workers’ capabilities in this domain remain poorly understood. Drawing on lifespan development theories, we hypothesize that employees’ motivation to regulate others’ emotions, their use of adaptive regulation strategies, and their effectiveness at implementing interpersonal emotion regulation are all positively related to age. We further explore the moderating role of two contextual factors: the intensity of workers’ own negative emotions and their perceived closeness to the target of regulation. We tested hypotheses using a pre-registered, five-day experience-sampling study with 219 participants who completed surveys twice daily during their working day. Results show that age is positively associated with motivation to regulate others’ emotions and perceived implementation effectiveness but is unrelated to strategy use. Exploratory analyses indicate an indirect effect of age on perceived effectiveness of interpersonal emotion regulation, via motivation. Neither relational closeness nor negative emotion intensity moderates the effects of age. These findings extend lifespan theories to the interpersonal domain, suggesting that ageing is more strongly related to why, rather than how, employees regulate others’ emotions, positioning motivation as a critical yet overlooked strength of older workers.
Show more Read full article →
Technology Implementation and Job Crafting: A Process Model Built From a Systematic Literature Review
🔓
Group & Organization Management Renjie Sun, Pengji Wang, Kim‐Lim Tan, Shaoyuan Chen August 03, 2026
Job Design Artificial Intelligence/Technology Performance Job Attitudes Teams
With the rise of Industry 5.0, effective collaboration between humans and technology has become critical for both employees’ well-being and organizational performance. Job crafting represents a key mechanism through which employees can achieve human-centricity in this context. This systematic literature review aims to examine the current state of research on the role of technology in job crafting and to identify emerging trends and future directions in the field. Following the PRISMA model, we conducted a systematic literature review of 40 journal articles published between January 2001 and April 2024. Our results show the publication trend, the key publication outlets, research contexts in terms of countries, professions, technologies being examined, and methodologies being employed. A thematic analysis reveals four overarching themes in this research field: (1) a process-based model of how technology influences job crafting, (2) the factors that influence employees’ job crafting in technology implementation work context, (3) the ways in which employees use technologies for different forms of job crafting, and (4) the outcomes of employees’ engagement in job crafting under technology implementation context. Under each theme, we provide recommendations for future research agendas in terms of theory, context, and methodology framework.
Show more Read full article →
Understanding the Individual-Level Consequences of Strikes: A Systematic Review and Future Research Directions
Journal of Management Denise Vesper, Cornelius J. König August 01, 2026
Training & Development Research Methods Performance Job Attitudes Health & Well-Being
Strikes are a recurring workplace phenomenon that affects strikers, their families, and managers, but also others such as commuters. To date, studies examining individual-level effects of strikes have been scattered across different fields of study. This systematic literature review summarizes studies on these effects and on how unaffected third parties, such as the public, evaluate strikes. We conducted searches in four databases. The 72 included studies show that strikes can have detrimental effects, for example, on psychological health, but these can be decreased with resources such as social support. Based on the existing literature, we developed the comprehensive strike aftermath framework as an overarching framework in which we incorporate avenues for future research. We conclude that research on this work phenomenon is still scarce and future research on long-lasting effects of strikes on managers’ and employees’ health and work attitudes is needed.
Show more Read full article →
Breaking or Reinforcing the Cycle: The Role of Work-Family Identity Integration in Systemic Inequities
🔓
Organizational Psychology Review Hwayeon Myeong, Eden B. King August 01, 2026
Health & Well-Being Diversity & Inclusion Networks Organizational Culture Organizational Change
This article introduces the Cyclic Theory of Work-Family Identity Integration (WFII), which conceptualizes WFII, the perceived compatibility between work and family identities, as a critical mechanism for understanding and addressing inequities. Identity integration involves subjective sensemaking, but social environments tied to social identities, such as parenthood, gender, and cultural background, impose unique challenges to integrating work and family identities. We theorize that WFII reflects both individual differences and intergroup disparities, with the latter perpetuating structural biases through a self-reinforcing cycle. Crucially, WFII's malleability as a form of subjective sensemaking makes it a promising pathway for reducing inequities. By leveraging evidence from psychological interventions that create lasting effects, this framework underscores the complementary role of psychological approaches alongside contextual changes. Merging insights from work-family research, identity integration theories, and intervention scholarship, this theory offers strategies to disrupt inequities and promote equitable work and family outcomes across diverse populations. Plain Language Summary Title How Perceived Compatibility of Work and Family Identities Reproduces Inequality
Show more Read full article →
Testing After ChatGPT: Aggregate Change in Applicant Assessment Scores
International Journal of Selection and Assessment Alise Dabdoub, Rebecca Pool August 01, 2026
Selection & Assessment Research Methods Organizational Change Artificial Intelligence/Technology Performance
ABSTRACT The widespread adoption of large language model (LLM) chatbots has raised concerns about their potential misuse in high‐stakes employment contexts, including cheating on pre‐employment assessments. Although prior research demonstrates that LLMs can achieve desirable scores on cognitive and personality tests, little evidence exists regarding whether their availability has produced measurable score inflation in real‐world selection settings. The present study examines whether mean scores on commonly used pre‐employment assessments shifted following the public release of ChatGPT in November 2022. Using large archival samples of job applicants, we analyzed trends in scores on two cognitive assessments and one personality assessment. We also examined age as a moderator given evidence that younger individuals are more frequent users of LLM technologies. Regression and time‐trend analyses indicated statistically significant but practically negligible changes in assessment scores following ChatGPT's release. Across cognitive and personality measures, effect sizes were near zero and inconsistent in direction, providing no meaningful support for widespread LLM‐assisted cheating. Overall, results suggest that despite concerns about LLM misuse, there is currently little evidence of large‐scale score inflation in operational pre‐employment testing contexts.
Show more Read full article →
How Do “Funny” Job Postings Affect Job Seekers' Reactions? Humor and Job Attractiveness
🔓
International Journal of Selection and Assessment David Chee-mun Cheng, Miaojia Huang, Rajiv K. Amarnani, Alex Eapen, Patrick Damien Dunlop August 01, 2026
Selection & Assessment Research Methods Training & Development Performance HR Systems & Talent Management
ABSTRACT Organizations sometimes embed humor into recruitment materials such as job postings to try to attract talent. Our research investigates the efficacy of humorous job postings. On the one hand, humorous job postings may be beneficial because the use of humor may signal positive organizational attributes. On the other hand, humorous job postings could also inadvertently convey a lack of seriousness in the organization's HR practices. Integrating signaling theory with benign violation theory, we develop and test a theoretical model of the competing signals that humor in job postings might send. We conducted three experiments using single stimulus approaches (Studies 1 and 2) and stimulus sampling approaches (Study 3). Studies 1 and 2 showed a negative effect of humor on job attractiveness, whereas Study 3 showed no statistically significant effect of humor on job attractiveness. Consistently across studies, humorous job postings led potential job seekers to expect the organization to display lower levels of procedural justice. These findings suggest exercising caution when using humor in recruitment materials.
Show more Read full article →
Getting to the Heart of Conflict: Emotional Acknowledgment Reduces Negative Emotional Expression Intensity and Improves Intrateam Conflict Resolution
Organization Science Christina M. Bradley, Elizabeth Baily Wolf, Lindred L. Greer July 31, 2026
Conflict Motivation Training & Development Teams Selection & Assessment
During mixed-motive intrateam conflicts, wherein members must balance cooperative and competitive motives, negative emotions, such as anger and frustration, often arise and derail effective conflict resolution. To help teams navigate this important challenge, we develop and test theory about how, why, and when responses to expressed emotions can enable effective resolution of intrateam conflict. Although prior intrateam conflict research has shown that managing these emotions is critical for conflict resolution, the focus has been on broad conceptualizations of team emotion management that aggregate across discrete emotion-response strategies with both potentially divergent effects (e.g., acknowledgment, reframing, and suppression) and different actors (e.g., members and leaders). This aggregation masks tensions and trade-offs between different strategies and actors, and it offers team members limited guidance on how to respond to emotions during conflict. Therefore, responding to calls to focus on discrete emotion-response strategies, we identify emotional acknowledgment (i.e., the verbal recognition of another member’s emotional display) as a particularly effective strategy within intrateam conflicts because it addresses simultaneously cooperative motives by helping expressers feel seen and valued and competitive motives by creating an opportunity for expressers to advocate for their unique interests and priorities. We propose and find in two laboratory experiments of 496 three-person teams that emotional acknowledgment, particularly when coming from team leaders, reduces the intensity of negative emotional expression, thereby improving team conflict resolution. Funding: The authors thank the University of Michigan and INSEAD for research funding. Supplemental Material: The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2024.19578 .
Show more Read full article →
Harnessing Academic Science for Corporate Technology: Interpersonal Networks and Absorptive Capacity
Organization Science Sam Arts, Lee Fleming, Đ’Đ”Ń€Đ”Ń‚Ń‘ĐœĐœĐžĐș Đ•Đ»Đ”ĐœĐ° Đ’Đ°ĐŽĐžĐŒĐŸĐČĐœĐ° July 31, 2026
Networks Artificial Intelligence/Technology Job Attitudes Training & Development Individual Differences
If firms conduct less scientific research internally and yet increasingly rely on science for innovation, how do they gain access to external scientific knowledge? To examine the role of interpersonal networks among corporate inventors and academic scientists in facilitating scientific knowledge transfer from academia to industry, we construct a social network encompassing nearly the entire population of life science academic scientists and corporate inventors listed on U.S. patents. To isolate the influence of interpersonal connections from the inherent characteristics and commercial potential of scientific discoveries, we leverage paper twins—scientific papers with nearly identical findings published around the same time by independent academic teams—and analyze their citations in corporate patents. Although academic science is often viewed as a public good, our findings highlight the role of close interpersonal connections—within two degrees of separation—in harnessing academic science for corporate innovation. Moreover, corporate inventors’ ability to leverage these connections depends critically on their own active engagement in scientific research, as well as the alignment of their scientific expertise with the academic knowledge they seek to integrate. Supplemental Material: The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2025.20539 .
Show more Read full article →
Worker Repositioning and Technological Change: Evidence from an Online Labor Market
🔓
Organization Science Shun Yiu, Robert Seamans, Manav Raj, Teng Liu July 31, 2026
Artificial Intelligence/Technology Organizational Change Training & Development Selection & Assessment Performance
Technological change reshapes labor markets not only by changing labor demand but also by altering labor supply as workers reallocate effort across tasks and opportunities in response to technological advances. Yet research focuses more on demand-side effects than on how workers themselves adapt. In this research, we examine worker repositioning on a large online labor market following the launch of ChatGPT in November 2022. We argue that the launch of ChatGPT reduced expected returns to labor in exposed skill domains and develop and test a series of hypotheses regarding how this shock is associated with participation, horizontal positioning, and vertical positioning among workers on the platform. Using proprietary data on incumbent freelancers and a difference-in-differences design that leverages cross-sectional variation in preperiod AI exposure and skill level, we show that freelancers more exposed to AI shift away from prior domains and reorient bidding toward higher value contracts. In contrast, high skill-level freelancers, who face greater adjustment costs, are less likely to reduce participation on the platform, reposition across domains, and move upmarket. These findings highlight how technological shocks reshape labor markets through supply-side adaptation and how domain-specific human capital constrains worker responses. Funding: This work was supported by the Mack Institute for Innovation Management, Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania and the Smith-Richardson Foundation. Supplemental Material: The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2025.20566 .
Show more Read full article →
The Paradox of Inventors’ Job Security
Organization Science David Wehrheim, Eduardo Melero, Neus Palomeras July 31, 2026
Training & Development Research Methods Selection & Assessment Motivation Health & Well-Being
This paper investigates how job security affects the types of innovations generated by corporate inventors. By increasing inventors’ prospects of remaining with their current employer, job security strengthens their incentives to invest in firm-specific technological knowledge. Thus, whereas employment protection provides inventors with a safety net to fail that could facilitate exploration, it instead drives them to produce innovations that draw more heavily on internal technologies and are less novel. We test this argument using matched employer–employee data constructed from patent records. To examine inventor-level responses to increased job security, we exploit the staggered adoption of wrongful discharge laws across U.S. states between 1980 and 1999. Using cross-state variation over time in a difference-in-differences framework, we find that increased job security leads inventors to produce innovations that rely more intensely on their firms’ technologies, are less novel, and generate higher private value to their employers. Funding: This work was supported by Grants PID2021-126435NB-C21 and PID2021-126153NB-I00, both funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (MCIN) / State Research Agency (AEI) / 10.13039/501100011033 and by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) “A Way of Making Europe,” and by Grant PID2024-155952NB-I00, funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities (MICIU) / AEI / 10.13039/501100011033 and by the ERDF / European Union (EU)”. Supplemental Material: The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2025.21133 .
Show more Read full article →
A Multidimensional Model of Entrepreneurial Career Success: A Literature Review and Research Agenda
🔓
Journal of Management Maria S. Tamontseva, Scott E. Seibert, Jos Akkermans, Wouter Stam July 31, 2026
Measurement & Psychometrics Performance Training & Development Job Attitudes Health & Well-Being
People are choosing to pursue entrepreneurship as a career at increasing rates; yet, we lack an overarching conceptualization of entrepreneurial career success. Instead, scholars rely on a fragmented set of measures and outcomes, limiting cumulative knowledge about the factors that shape persistence and long-term success in entrepreneurial careers. To address this gap, we integrate career success and entrepreneurship research to develop a multidimensional model of entrepreneurial career success. Drawing on an empirically validated multidimensional framework from career literature, we organize the variety of individual success measures that have been used in the entrepreneurship literature, distinguishing entrepreneurial career success from related constructs such as venture performance and well-being. We further identify entrepreneurship-specific dimensions, including legacy and venture satisfaction, that reflect the heterogeneity of entrepreneurial careers and extend existing career success models. Using the ability-motivation-opportunity (AMO) framework, we review antecedents of entrepreneurial career success and suggest patterns of relationships with different objective and subjective success dimensions. We conclude by presenting an integrative model of antecedents, mechanisms, and boundary conditions to guide future research on entrepreneurial career success.
Show more Read full article →
Revisiting the Relationship Between Job Insecurity and Work Engagement: The Moderating Roles of Contract Type and Trait Negative Affectivity
🔓
Human Resource Development Quarterly Hui-Hsien Hsieh, Kuo‐Yang Kao July 31, 2026
Research Methods Job Attitudes Networks Individual Differences Social Responsibility
ABSTRACT This study proposes and tests a curvilinear effect of job insecurity on work engagement, while also examining the moderating roles of employment contract type (permanent vs. temporary) and trait negative affectivity on this relationship. Utilizing two waves of time‐lagged data from a sample of 397 participants (273 permanent and 124 temporary employees) in Taiwan, the results reveal a U‐shaped association between job insecurity and work engagement, with contract type and trait negative affectivity moderating this association. Specifically, for temporary employees or those with high trait negative affectivity, the relationship follows a U‐shaped pattern, indicating stronger curvilinear effects. In contrast, for permanent employees or individuals with low trait negative affectivity, the association is initially negative but levels off and becomes statistically nonsignificant beyond the inflection point, suggesting a plateauing trend rather than a pronounced curvilinear effect. This study contributes to the job insecurity literature by offering a more nuanced understanding of the conditions that shape this curvilinear relationship. Additionally, this study offers practical insights for organizations by underscoring the need to tailor engagement strategies to different employee groups, such as providing support to temporary workers and individuals with high trait negative affectivity, to sustain work engagement under uncertain employment conditions.
Show more Read full article →
Leader ambidexterity in goal orientation and team adaptive performance.
Journal of Applied Psychology Lisa Dragoni, Christina B. Hymer, Soohyun Yoon, Jeffery A. LePine, Todd Woodruff, et al. July 30, 2026
Performance Teams Training & Development Motivation Leadership
Team goal orientation-that is, team members' desire for learning or performance (or both) in achievement settings-has been treated as a stable team characteristic with benefits and costs that are contingent on the teams' circumstances. From this view, team effectiveness is thought to be a function of a team possessing the "right" goal orientation in the "right" situation. However, because no single goal orientation is conducive to effective team functioning across the range of complex and changing circumstances that teams may face, a more fluid view of goal orientation may be helpful in understanding how goal orientation in teams may foster team adaptive performance. Specifically, we propose that teams whose work involves complexity and change may adapt more effectively as a result of leader-initiated shifts in goal orientation as circumstances evolve. To examine this possibility, we develop and examine the concept of leader ambidexterity in goal orientation-defined as a leader's capability to switch across different goal orientations in response to various situational demands. Using a scale measure we developed and validated for this research, we explore the role of leader ambidexterity in goal orientation as a predictor of team adaptive performance using field data from 79 teams at a premier U.S. military academy. We found that team adaptive performance was higher in teams whose leaders scored higher on ambidexterity in goal orientation. This effect was robust even when accounting for stable leader and team-level goal orientation variables. We discuss theoretical and practical implications of this work. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Show more Read full article →
‘I'm farming because I'm a wife’ – An enduring navigational approach to meaningful work and vocational choice
🔓
Journal of Vocational Behavior Mai Chi Vu, Diep Nguyen, Stephen Teo, Nicholas Burton July 30, 2026
Organizational Culture Social Responsibility Selection & Assessment Training & Development Individual Differences
This paper investigates how meaningful work is sustained under conditions of social and cultural constraint. Drawing on interviews with thirty-eight female farmers in Northern Vietnam, it examines how meaningfulness emerges as an ongoing navigation between unification , the moral obligation to preserve familial harmony and social continuity, and contribution , the desire to act purposefully and be valued. The findings reveal a process of enduring navigation through which meaningful work is sustained, extending Rosso et al.'s (2010) framework, by showing that unification and contribution are not necessarily complementary pathways but can remain persistently in tension. Meaningful work is sustained not through resolution but through moral endurance, enacted in three recurrent dynamics: vital yet invisible, enduring yet confining, and conforming yet reclaiming. These dynamics shape vocational trajectories by normalising farming as a moral duty, constraining alternative aspirations, and preserving a quiet openness to future vocational possibilities. Meaningful work, in this view, is a relational and moral practice, a continual navigation of tension rather its resolution, recasting endurance as a subtle form of agency that enables individuals to preserve coherence, moral worth, and possibilities within constraining structures.
Show more Read full article →
The power of relational energy: mitigating incivility's toll on attention to detail
Journal of Managerial Psychology Na Zhu, Xiaobu Liu, Chiou‐Shiu Lin July 30, 2026
Research Methods Selection & Assessment Training & Development Networks Performance
Purpose Drawing on the job demands-resources model, this study aims to investigate how patient incivility affects healthcare professionals' attention-to-detail behavior via ego depletion and how relational energy moderates this process. Design/methodology/approach An experience sampling method and a scenario-based experiment were employed to test the proposed model. Findings Studies 1 and 2 show that relational energy attenuates both the positive relationship between patient incivility and ego depletion and the indirect effect of patient incivility on attention-to-detail behavior through ego depletion; these relationships are stronger when relational energy is low. Practical implications Organizations can mitigate the effects of patient incivility by managing professionals' self-regulatory capabilities and fostering relational energy through encouraging professional-supervisor interactions and conducting targeted supervisor selection and training. Originality/value This study provides a nuanced understanding of how and why patient incivility predicts professionals' attention-to-detail behavior via ego depletion and identifies relational energy as both a theoretical and practical buffer against incivility.
Show more Read full article →
Faking Does Not Impair the Validity of Construct‐Focused Situational Judgment Tests: An Experimental Study
🔓
International Journal of Selection and Assessment Daniel Danner, Lydia Oeljeklaus, Stefan Höft July 30, 2026
Measurement & Psychometrics Selection & Assessment Individual Differences Performance Organizational Change
ABSTRACT This experimental study examined whether faking affected a construct‐focused situational judgment test (SJT) measuring self‐organization. Using a within‐subjects design, the SJT and a single‐statement self‐report were administered to employees of a federal agency who were students at a cooperative university affiliated with that agency ( N = 256), under two conditions: honest responding and faking good. The SJT used knowledge instructions (“How should one behave?”) and an expert‐based scoring method whereby participants' responses were compared with those of subject‐matter experts. Construct validity was assessed using correlations with Big Five personality traits; criterion validity was evaluated based on correlations with participants' grade point averages (GPAs). Faking changed scores substantially on the single‐statement self‐report ( d = 1.04) but only modestly on the SJT ( d = 0.25). Structural equation modeling revealed that the construct validity of the single‐statement self‐report was reduced under faking conditions, whereas that of the SJT remained stable, showing consistent associations with Conscientiousness and Agreeableness. The criterion validity of the SJT was unaffected or even slightly enhanced under faking conditions. Supplementary analyses using binary scoring replicated prior findings of stronger effects of faking on single‐statement self‐report than on SJT scale scores but showed no detrimental impact on validity. These results suggest that construct‐focused SJTs are less vulnerable to faking than are single‐statement self‐reports, thus supporting their application in high‐stakes selection contexts.
Show more Read full article →
Am I Just a Digital Puppet? Exploring the Impact of Electronic Performance Monitoring and Supervisor Monitoring on Employee Performance From the Perspective of Objectification Theory
Human Resource Management Lixun Zheng, Wen Cheng, Wenzhu Lu, Xiaoming Zheng July 29, 2026
Performance Leadership Artificial Intelligence/Technology Networks Selection & Assessment
ABSTRACT Electronic performance monitoring (EPM) has been widely used in organizations in the expectation of promoting performance. However, its effectiveness sometimes falls short of these expectations. Most previous studies have examined EPM's side effects from the perspective of psychological reactance, treating it simply as a monitoring stressor. To extend this literature, we draw on workplace objectification theory and propose that EPM fosters employees' perceived objectification by signaling objectifying cues, which in turn undermines employee job performance. Moreover, supervisor monitoring styles (observational and interactional) can either strengthen or weaken the relationship between EPM and perceived objectification. We tested our model using an online experiment with 199 US participants and a multi‐wave field survey with 294 Chinese employees, and all hypotheses were supported. Theoretically, this research complements the psychological reactance perspective in EPM research by introducing perceived objectification as a humanity‐related mechanism through which EPM may shape employee performance. We also advance workplace objectification theory by extending its scope from human–human interactions to human–technology interactions. Practically, we offer guidance on preserving employees' humanity while adopting technological and human monitoring to maintain performance.
Show more Read full article →
Ideology or Identity? CEO Political Party Affiliation and Conformity in Competitive Strategy
Academy of Management Journal Krishnan Nair, Eric Y. Lee July 29, 2026
Performance Training & Development Networks Organizational Culture Artificial Intelligence/Technology
Building on the premise that political party affiliation reflects one’s ideology and core values, various studies in the upper echelons literature have examined the link between CEO political party affiliation and decision-making. In contrast, recent work in political psychology suggests that party affiliation shapes behavior largely because it serves as a salient social identity. Taking a reconciliatory approach, the present work highlights the value of both perspectives in explaining the CEO’s orientation toward conformity. According to the ideology literature, Republicans display greater conformity than Democrats due to dispositional differences in how much they value conformity. On the other hand, the identity perspective suggests that both Democrats and Republicans strive to conform to co-partisans and distinguish themselves from counter-partisans. Integrating insights from both perspectives, we theorize that Republican CEOs generally display greater conformity than Democratic CEOs due to dispositional differences, but that the extent to which these dispositional tendencies translate to competitive strategy depends on the political composition of CEOs in a given industry. Finally, we draw on self-concordance theory to theorize about the performance implications of fit and misfit between CEO party affiliation and conformity. We find support for our predictions in a sample of S&P 500 firms from 2010 to 2019.
Show more Read full article →
At what Price? A Meta-analysis of experiments assessing the impact of leader pay on employees and stakeholders
🔓
Leadership Quarterly Niklas K. Steffens, Ghassani Swaryandini, Kim Peters, Miguel Fonseca, Naomi Ellemers, et al. July 29, 2026
Research Methods Selection & Assessment Leadership HR Systems & Talent Management Performance
Over the last five decades, leader compensation has risen substantially, with the median CEO:worker pay ratio skyrocketing from 20:1 to around 268:1. This has raised concerns for both internal and external stakeholders. However, observational studies have difficulty isolating the causal impact of leader pay on employees and other stakeholders due to endogeneity issues. To address this, the present research synthesized findings from 23 experimental studies (11 third-person evaluative tasks, 7 first-person hypothetical scenarios, 5 immersive experiments) to examine how information about leader pay causally influences employee and stakeholder responses. Results indicate that higher leader pay has a significant negative effect on employee outcomes ( g = −0.53, 95%CIs [−0.68, −0.38], k studies = 12, n effect sizes = 83) as well as on external stakeholder outcomes ( g = −0.38, 95%CIs [−0.51, −0.26], k studies = 11, n effect sizes = 57). These negative effects did not depend on whether pay is presented in absolute terms or relative to employee pay. Counterintuitively, providing justification for high pay was ineffective in eliciting more positive responses. Dose-response analysis indicated that detrimental responses appear even at low pay ratios with no evidence of an incrementally compounding penalty. These findings highlight the need to do a better job of balancing the interests and demands of leaders with those of the broad range of stakeholders that they are notionally striving to lead.
Show more Read full article →
Silence hurts more among the entitled: Psychological entitlement amplifies the costs of workplace silence
🔓
Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology Wei‐Gang Tang, Christian Vandenberghe July 28, 2026
Job Attitudes Performance Training & Development Networks
Abstract Workplace silence has generally been studied from a social exchange perspective as a response to negative initiating actions. However, social exchange relationships involve ongoing transactional chains in which a given response may also serve as a new initiating event. Building on this perspective, we examine how a specific form of silence, supervisor‐directed improvement‐oriented (SDIO) silence, can function as a negatively valenced initiating event that carries forward into later employee responses. We specifically propose that SDIO silence undermines employees' felt responsibility for contribution, which in turn weakens positive, active social exchange responses. We argue that this process is stronger among employees high in psychological entitlement. Using a multi‐wave, multi‐source study of public sector employees ( N = 422), we find that SDIO silence reduces felt responsibility, which in turn weakens affective commitment, emotional job engagement, and promotive voice, and that these adverse effects are stronger for employees high in psychological entitlement. We discuss the implications of these findings for theory and practice.
Show more Read full article →
When productivity prevails: Governing trade-offs in women managers' career sustainability
🔓
Journal of Vocational Behavior Andrie Michaelides, BEATRICE I. J. M. VAN DER HEIJDEN July 28, 2026
Performance Social Responsibility Job Attitudes Health & Well-Being Research Methods
The sustainable careers framework conceptualizes career sustainability as the ongoing maintenance of productivity, health, and happiness over time. Yet in high-intensity managerial roles characterized by sustained performance demands, work intensity and evolving relational responsibilities, maintaining these indicators simultaneously may be difficult to achieve. This qualitative study, situated within an interpretivist epistemology and a constructionist ontology, examines how women managers sustain their careers under such conditions. Drawing on in-depth narrative accounts of 43 women managers in a large organization, we explore how career sustainability is enacted over time under conditions of bounded and relational agency. Our analysis identifies five configurations through which women govern sustainability trade-offs across their careers: Productivity-driven focus, Adaptation through regulation, Endurance under constraint, Externally regulated optimization, and Relationally enabled sustainability. These configurations illustrate how women dynamically adjust the prioritization of their productivity, health, and happiness amid changing work demands, relational arrangements, and life course circumstances. Overall, productivity remained the dominant organizing principle of career engagement, while health and happiness were variously prioritized, deferred, or renegotiated across career phases. We therefore show that career sustainability in high-intensity managerial contexts is enacted not through the balanced maintenance of productivity, health, and happiness, but through the ongoing governance of trade-offs among these indicators under conditions of bounded and relational agency. By bringing an interactionist perspective to the sustainable careers framework, this study advances understanding of how sustainable careers unfold through the situated recalibration of competing demands over time, and the role personal agency and contextual factors play in this regard.
Show more Read full article →
Mixing Motives: Political Donations by Corporate Executives
Organization Science Benjamin Barber, Daniel Blake July 28, 2026
Motivation Training & Development Teams HR Systems & Talent Management Measurement & Psychometrics
What motivates corporate executives to make political donations? Scholars interested in political ideology generally assign expressive motivations to executive donations, whereas corporate political activity scholars view executives as largely strategic donors. This study reconciles these two contrasting perspectives by reconceptualizing executives as mixed-motive donors who allocate their donations both strategically and expressively. To support this position, we construct the most comprehensive data set to date on executive donations from 1980 to 2024 and develop a measure of mixed-motive donations that reflects both expressive and strategic giving. Using nonexecutive donors as a counterfactual baseline of expressive donors, we provide evidence that bipartisan donations and donations to politically influential members of Congress are examples of strategic giving. We find that executives devote a larger share of their donations to strategic giving driven by their role as executives. This supports the argument, rooted in resource dependence theory, that executives face professional incentives to donate strategically. However, we also find evidence that a nontrivial portion of executives’ donations are expressive and that strategic giving varies across individuals and time. We find that variance in mixed-motive giving can be explained partly by executives’ compensation elasticity, firm size, political risk exposure, and whether an executive is the CEO of the company. Overall, our analysis reveals that scholars should refrain from making uniform assumptions about executives’ motivations to donate and view them as a varied group of mixed-motive donors. Funding: This work was supported by the Government of Spain’s Agencia Estatal de Investigación [Grant PID2022-138747NB-I00]. Supplemental Material: The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2024.19531 .
Show more Read full article →
Beliefs about the relationship between work and personal life: development and validation of three work-life belief scales
🔓
Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes Sabrina L. Speights, Lisa Michelle Leslie, Eden B. King, Elinor Flynn, Judith A. Clair July 27, 2026
Measurement & Psychometrics Training & Development Networks Individual Differences Health & Well-Being
Theory suggests work-life outcomes are shaped by three beliefs regarding how work and personal life relate to each other: fixed-expandable-pie beliefs (whether work and life compete with versus enhance one another), segmentation-integration beliefs (whether work and life operate as separate versus related domains), and work-life priority beliefs (whether work versus personal life takes precedence over the other domain). Yet no measure of work-life beliefs exists, which is an impediment to understanding their ability to advance the work-life literature. In 15 studies ( N = 6,568), using samples drawn from different populations (adults and students in the United States, adults with diverse cultural backgrounds in the United Kingdom, adults in Ghana, adults in South Korea), we develop measures of three work-life beliefs and document their utility for understanding the work-life interface. We find that work-life beliefs can be conceptualized as three or six dimensions, and that the measures have a replicable factor structure, are reliable, and have discriminant validity, in that they are distinct from other work-life constructs and beliefs about hard work and leisure. The work-life belief measures also have criterion validity; they contribute to understanding of work-life experiences and behaviors, both indirectly and directly. Our research advances the literature by providing insight into the nature of work-life beliefs and demonstrating their relevance for understanding the work-life interface. By developing measures, we also provide tools that can be used in future work to develop, test, and refine theory regarding the implications of work-life beliefs for understanding any number of additional phenomena.
Show more Read full article →
The Impact of Strategic Leaders’ International Experience on Organizations: An Integrative Review and Multilevel Framework
🔓
Journal of Management Fei Qin, Klaus E. Meyer, Sabina Nielsen July 27, 2026
Training & Development Research Methods Performance Teams Leadership
Internationally experienced business leaders bring distinct human capital, social capital, and cognitive schemas into organizations, influence strategic orientation through their decision-making, and in turn shape organizations’ strategies and performance. The impact of the international experience (IE) of an organization’s upper echelon has been studied in various bodies of management literature, varying in terms of the theoretical perspectives, conceptualizations of the IE construct, and outcomes considered. However, the effects are not straightforward with regard to which elements of IE affect which aspects of organizational dynamics, and how. This review integrates separate streams of organizational research to develop a more holistic understanding of the role of the IE held by strategic leaders such as chief executive officers, entrepreneurial founders, top management teams, and boards of directors, and its impact on organizational strategies and performance. We refine the conceptualization of the IE construct at multiple levels of analysis and explore cross-level mechanisms suggested by multiple theories to develop an integrative framework that links strategic leaders’ IE to organizational decisions, strategies, and performance. On this basis, we propose an agenda for future research.
Show more Read full article →
We work on our will, yet will we sustain? Documenting experiences of psychotherapists engaged in platform-mediated gig work
Journal of Managerial Psychology Sudipt Kumar, Marya Haque, Namita Ruparel July 27, 2026
Job Attitudes Social Responsibility Research Methods Selection & Assessment Health & Well-Being
Purpose To substantiate the evolving understanding of how digital platforms influence professional identity and clinical practice in the Indian mental healthcare sector, this study investigates the experiences of psychotherapists engaged in platform-mediated gig labour. It critically evaluates both the professional affordances and systemic challenges associated with this shift in the therapeutic work paradigm. Design/methodology/approach We employed a qualitative research design, and conducted in-depth interviews with 19 licensed Indian psychotherapists, who practiced on leading domestic teletherapy platforms. The participants were recruited purposively and snowballed until we achieved data saturation. Findings Broadly, our analysis revealed five key themes that include advantages and challenges of therapy provision through platform-mediated gig work, constraints on the therapeutic frame and career implications for therapists. These findings underscore the pressing necessity for legislative and organizational measures to protect both therapists and clients inside digital mental health frameworks, particularly in developing countries such as India. Practical implications Largely, the findings suggested measures include mandated credential verification, transparent pay structures and the introduction of community-driven supervision models that ensure professional quality, well-being and sustainability of practice. Originality/value This study is among the first to examine the experiences of psychotherapists engaged in gig-based digital platforms in the Global South. By centring Indian practitioners' voices, we offer novel insights into how platform-mediated mental health work reshapes professional identity and work trajectories, contributing meaningfully to debates on the gig economy and telehealth.
Show more Read full article →
Momentary energy management profiles: associations with energy, heart rate variability, and motivational states
🔓
Journal of Business and Psychology Stacey L. Parker, Niamh Dawson, Nerisa Dozo, Hannes Zacher July 25, 2026
Motivation Research Methods Training & Development Health & Well-Being HR Systems & Talent Management
Abstract During work, employees use a variety of energy management strategies to conserve or recover their subjective energy, including microbreaks (e.g., socializing, walking) or work-related strategies (e.g., organizing, reflecting on meaning). Research is yet to examine how these strategies co-occur and the implications of different configurations. Moreover, little is known about other associated benefits of energy management, beyond energy. Thus, we paired experience sampling with ambulatory heart rate monitoring to collect hourly data on energy management strategies and outcomes (i.e., energy, stress regulation as indexed by heart rate variability, and motivational states including intrinsic motivation and work mastery). Ninety-one employees provided hourly data throughout a workday ( M = 6.62 occasions). Multilevel latent profile analysis revealed a five-profile solution of momentary energy management strategies within hours of the workday: active strategizing (6%), moving (5%), socializing (15%), meaningful organizing (9%), and passive strategizing (65%). Outcome analyses revealed the active, moving, and socializing profiles were better for vitality than the meaningful organizing and passive profiles. The moving profile was best for heart rate variability, compared to meaningful organizing, active, and passive profiles. Finally, the active profile was better than all other profiles for motivational states. Overall, results suggest the combination of microbreaks and work-related strategies is associated with more energy and motivational states, whereas distinctive use of physical microbreaks is linked to energy and physiological stress regulation, and socializing is related to energy. Use of some work-related strategies (i.e., organizing, meaning) seems unrelated to outcomes when not paired with microbreaks.
Show more Read full article →
How and when remote workdays impact employee daily social need fulfilment
🔓
Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology Vera M. Schweitzer, Anne Burmeister, Laura Venz, Fabiola Heike Gerpott, Ulrike Fasbender, et al. July 25, 2026
Remote Work Training & Development Diversity & Inclusion Research Methods Performance
Abstract Hybrid working, as a now‐common flexible work arrangement, transforms how employees connect with each other and requires updated theorizing to understand its social implications. Grounded in interaction ritual theory, we examined how and when remote (vs. onsite) workdays impact employees' social need fulfilment, namely, coworkers making employees feel that they belong and that their uniqueness is valued. We propose that remote (vs. onsite) workdays distance employees from basic, natural and potentially energizing interaction rituals such as coworker small talk, with negative consequences for employees' fulfilment of uniqueness and belongingness needs at work. We further argue that organizations and their members can mitigate the negative social effects of remote (vs. onsite) workdays by implementing social virtual meeting rituals that serve relevant psycho‐social functions for mutual attunement with coworkers. Two experience sampling studies found support for our theorizing. Remote (vs. onsite) workdays had negative indirect effects on employees' uniqueness and belongingness at work via coworker small talk and relational energy. The negative indirect effect was buffered by social virtual meeting rituals—a contextual feature of virtual communication. Our research adds a psycho‐social lens to hybrid work research and sheds light on how organizations can foster inclusion by fulfilling employees' social needs.
Show more Read full article →
Sources
Academy of Management Journal | Academy of Management Review | Administrative Science Quarterly | Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior | European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology | Group & Organization Management | Human Performance | Human Resource Development Quarterly | Human Resource Management | Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice | International Journal of Selection and Assessment | Journal of Applied Psychology | Journal of Business and Psychology | Journal of Management | Journal of Managerial Psychology | Journal of Occupational Health Psychology | Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology | Journal of Organizational Behavior | Journal of Personnel Psychology | Journal of Vocational Behavior | Leadership Quarterly | Organization Science | Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes | Organizational Psychology Review | Personnel Psychology | Work & Stress