Decision-Making Processes in the Workplace: How Exhaustion, Lack of Resources and Job Demands Impair Them and Affect Performance

The present study aims to connect more the I/O and the decision-making psychological domains, by showing how some common components across jobs interfere with decision-making and affecting performance. Two distinct constructs that can contribute to positive workplace performance have been considered: decision-making competency (DMCy) and decision environment management (DEM). Both factors are presumed to involve self-regulatory mechanisms connected to decision processes by influencing performance in relation to work environment conditions. In the framework of the job demands-resources (JD-R) model, the present study tested how such components as job demands, job resources and exhaustion can moderate decision-making processes and performance, where high resources are advantageous for decision-making processes and performance at work, while the same effect happens with low job demands and/or low exhaustion. In line with the formulated hypotheses, results confirm the relations between both the decision-making competences, performance (i.e., in-role and extra-role) and moderators considered. In particular, employees with low levels of DMCy show to be more sensitive to job demands toward in-role performance, whereas high DEM levels increase the sensitivity of employees toward job resources and exhaustion in relation to extra-role performance. These findings indicate that decision-making processes, as well as work environment conditions, are jointly related to employee functioning.

Dynamic Self-Regulation and Multiple-Goal Pursuit

Self-regulation is the dynamic process by which people manage competing demands on their time and resources as they strive to achieve desired outcomes, while simultaneously preventing or avoiding undesired outcomes. In this article, we review the current state of knowledge regarding the process by which people manage these types of demands. We review studies in the organizational, cognitive, social psychology, and human factors literatures that have examined the process by which people (a) manage task demands when working on a single task or goal; (b) select which tasks or goals they work on, and the timing and order in which they work on them; and (c) make adjustments to the goals that they are pursuing. We review formal theories that have been developed to account for these phenomena and examine the prospects for an integrative account of self-regulation that can explain the broad range of empirical phenomena examined across different subdisciplines within psychology.

Being While Doing: An Inductive Model of Mindfulness at Work

Mindfulness at work has drawn growing interest as empirical evidence increasingly supports its positive workplace impacts. Yet theory also suggests that mindfulness is a cognitive mode of "Being" that may be incompatible with the cognitive mode of "Doing" that undergirds workplace functioning. Therefore, mindfulness at work has been theorized as "being while doing," but little is known regarding how people experience these two modes in combination, nor the influences or outcomes of this interaction. Drawing on a sample of 39 semi-structured interviews, this study explores how professionals experience being mindful at work. The relationship between Being and Doing modes demonstrated changing compatibility across individuals and experience, with two basic types of experiences and three types of transitions. We labeled experiences when informants were unable to activate Being mode while engaging Doing mode as Entanglement, and those when informants reported simultaneous co-activation of Being and Doing modes as Disentanglement. This combination was a valuable resource for offsetting important limitations of the typical reliance on the Doing cognitive mode. Overall our results have yielded an inductive model of mindfulness at work, with the core experience, outcomes, and antecedent factors unified into one system that may inform future research and practice.

The Role and Reprocessing of Attitudes in Fostering Employee Work Happiness: An Intervention Study

This intervention study examines the iterative reprocessing of explicit and implicit attitudes as the process underlying associations between positive employee attitudes (PsyCap), perception of positive organization culture (organizational virtuousness, OV), and work happiness. Using a quasi-experimental design, a group of school staff (N = 69) completed surveys at three time points. After the first assessment, the treatment group (n = 51) completed a positive psychology training intervention. Results suggest that employee PsyCap, OV, and work happiness are associated with one another through both implicit and explicit attitudes. Further, the Iterative-Reprocessing Model of attitudes (IRM) provides some insights into the processes underlying these associations. By examining the role and processes through which explicit and implicit attitudes relate to wellbeing at work, the study integrates theories on attitudes, positive organizational scholarship, positive organizational behavior and positive education. It is one of the first studies to apply the theory of the IRM to explain associations amongst PsyCap, OV and work happiness, and to test the IRM theory in a field-based setting. In applying attitude theory to wellbeing research, this study provides insights to mechanisms underlying workplace wellbeing that have not been previously examined and in doing so responds to calls for researchers to learn more about the mechanisms underlying wellbeing interventions. Further, it highlights the need to understand subconscious processes in future wellbeing research and to include implicit measures in positive psychology interventions measurement programs. Practically, this research calls attention to the importance of developing both the positive attitudes of employees and the organizational culture in developing employee work happiness.

It’s About Time

Organizational scholars have grown increasingly aware of the importance of capturing phenomenon at the within-person level of analysis in order to test many organizational behavior theories involving emotions, motivation, performance, and interpersonal processes, to name a few. Experience sampling methodology (ESM) and diary-based procedures provide data that better match many dynamic organizational theories by measuring constructs repeatedly across events or days, providing an inter-episodic understanding of phenomena. In this article, we argue for the value of another measurement procedure that also adopts a repeated measures approach but does so by continuously measuring psychological processes without any gaps over relatively short timeframes. More specifically, we suggest that continuous rating assessments (CRA) can serve as a tool that enables the measurement of dynamic intra-episodic processes that unfold over the course of events, enabling precise determination of how, when, and in what way constructs change and influence each other over time. We provide an overview of this methodology, discuss its applicability to understanding time-based phenomena, and illustrate how this technique can provide new insight into dynamic processes using an empirical example.

Career Goal Importance as a Moderator in the Relationship Between Career Feedback and Career-Related Stress

Based on goal-setting theory, this study examined the relationship between negative career goal feedback and career-related stress, tested whether career goal–performance discrepancy operated as a mediator in this relationship, and assessed whether career goal importance strengthened the indirect effect of negative feedback on stress via discrepancy. Using a sample of 317 health profession university students (mean age = 19.5 years), we found that negative feedback was associated positively with stress and that discrepancy mediated this relationship. Consistent with goal-setting theory, we also found that discrepancy was higher at higher levels of negative feedback for those with higher goal importance, and the indirect effect of negative feedback on stress through discrepancy increased with increasing goal importance. These findings highlight important roles for career goal feedback and career goal importance in young peoples’ career goal pursuit.

Testing a Goal-Orientation Model of Antecedents to Career Calling

The dual-process framework proposes that there are two main orientations that affect goal development and management. We examined this framework as an explanatory model for the development of career calling, using a sample of young adults ( N = 213, Mage 19.9 years). The model included goal orientation (assimilation and accommodation) as distal, trait-based characteristics influencing goal approach (engagement and disengagement), which, in turn, influences the development of a calling (an important domain-specific goal) and calling-related strategies (goal-implementation actions). The model was largely supported: Assimilation related positively to engagement and negatively to disengagement. Engagement related positively to calling and strategies, and engagement and disengagement mediated between assimilation and calling, explaining 45% of the variance in calling. Few studies have tested antecedents to career calling, meaning little research has focused on its development. This study illustrates a potential explanation for the development of a calling based on goal-setting and self-regulation approaches.

Workplace safety

Unsafe work environments have clear consequences for both individuals and organizations. As such, an ever-expanding research base is providing a greater understanding of the factors that affect workplace safety across organizational levels. However, despite scientific advances, the workplace safety literature suffers from a lack of theoretical and empirical integration that makes it difficult for organizational scientists to gain a comprehensive sense of (a) what we currently know about workplace safety and (b) what we have yet to learn. This review addresses these shortcomings. First, the authors provide a formal definition of workplace safety and then create an integrated safety model (ISM) based on existing theory to summarize current theoretical expectations with regard to workplace safety. Second, the authors conduct a targeted review of the safety literature and compare extant empirical findings with the ISM. Finally, the authors use the results of this review to articulate gaps between theory and research and then make recommendations for both theoretical and empirical improvements to guide and integrate future workplace safety research.

Development and Initial Validation of a Measure to Assess Career Goal Feedback

Career goal feedback provides information about career goal suitability, adequacy of goal progress, and whether changes are needed to reach the goals. Feedback comes from external (e.g., parents, peers) and internal sources (e.g., self-reflection), and plays an important role in the career development of young people. As there is no existing measure that adequately captures this construct, we devised and validated a 24-item inventory for use with young adults. In Study 1, initial items were developed, expert reviewed, and administered to a sample of Chinese university students ( N = 1,055; MAGE = 19 years). We used exploratory factor analysis to test the factor structure and confirmatory factor analysis on a holdout sample to validate a third-order solution (one third-order factor manifested by three second-order factors). In addition, we provided evidence for convergent and incremental validity. In Study 2, we confirmed the factor structure on Australian university students ( N = 184; MAGE = 19 years).

Psychological Training for Entrepreneurs to Take Action

Entrepreneurship is one of the most effective means to alleviate poverty in developing countries. Effective entrepreneurship requires psychological approaches—in particular, active (i.e., agentic) approaches. We introduce an action-regulation training approach, focusing on self-regulation and active behavior in entrepreneurship as a bottom-up solution for poverty reduction. We present two different training interventions. The first focuses on enhancing personal initiative in entrepreneurs from developing countries. The second aims at boosting startup rates in these countries by enhancing participants’ entrepreneurial skills and motivation. We describe underlying theoretical assumptions, structures, and effects of both training interventions and discuss evaluation studies with randomized pretest-posttest control-group designs showing that action-regulation training is a successful means to promote entrepreneurship in developing countries.

Salesperson work engagement and flow

Purpose

– The purpose of this paper is to provide an interpretation of the lived experiences of salespersons’ work engagement and work-related flow and how these states are related.

Design/methodology/approach

– A mixed-methods qualitative investigation on a sample of 14 salespeople from a large Australian-based consumer goods enterprise was conducted. Using interpretative phenomenological analyses and ethnographic content analyses the antecedents and conditions for salesperson work engagement and work-related flow were investigated.

Findings

– The data showed that affective, cognitive and conative dimensions underpinned the experience of work engagement and work-related flow. Work engagement was interpreted as an aroused and self-regulated psychological state of energy, focus and striving aimed to address the situational and task relevant opportunities and demands encountered. Work-related flow was characterized by passion, absorption, eudaimonia and automatic self-regulation of goal pursuit.

Research limitations/implications

– The sample was from a single manufacturing organization with sales roles focussed primarily on business-to-business selling, and as such the generalizability of results to salespeople working in different contexts (e.g. retail sales, telesales) needs to be established.

Practical implications

– The research helps sales managers to take more account of the conditions that foster salesperson engagement and flow.

Originality/value

– This study represents one of the first attempts to interpret, compare and contrast the lived experience of salesperson work engagement with that of work-related flow. The study also adds to the relative paucity of research published on work engagement using qualitative methods.

Self-reflection as a mediator between self-efficacy and well-being

Purpose

– How does self-efficacy affect employee well-being? The purpose of this paper is to increase insight in the underlying process between employee self-efficacy and well-being at work (i.e. emotional exhaustion and job satisfaction) by investigating the mediating role of employees’ engagement in reflection and rumination.

Design/methodology/approach

– A representative sample of the Dutch working population (n=506) filled out an online questionnaire. Structural equation modeling was used to test the measurement model and research model.

Findings

– As predicted, self-efficacy was significantly related to emotional exhaustion and job satisfaction. Rumination mediated the self-efficacy-exhaustion relationship. Reflection did not serve as a mediator; although reflection was predicted by self-efficacy, it was unrelated to exhaustion and job satisfaction.

Research limitations/implications

– This cross-sectional study was restricted to self-report measures. Longitudinal research is needed to validate the findings and to further investigate the relationship between reflection and rumination.

Practical implications

– Organizations might try to support their employees’ well-being through interventions that strengthen employees’ self-efficacy, and prevent or decrease rumination.

Originality/value

– This study increases the understanding of the role of reflection and rumination at work. The findings indicate that self-reflection can have positive as well as negative outcomes.

Dynamics of Social Capital: Effects of Performance Feedback on Network Change

We present a theory of social capital dynamics. In particular, we examine how individuals in organizations respond to events such as performance evaluations by changing whom they interact with and the extent to which they utilize their contacts. We argue that positive performance feedback from supervisors increases levels of self-efficacy and results in the creation of new social capital as well as the increased utilization of existing social capital (i.e., forming new ties with sources of information and aid, and increasing interactions with existing contacts). In addition, negative feedback decreases self-efficacy, resulting in reallocation of social capital utilization to concentrate on a small number of existing frequently-accessed contacts (i.e., decreasing interactions with some contacts while increasing interactions with others). Our arguments highlight the role of individual agency in social capital dynamics and clarify the role that individual performance evaluations can play in the evolving structure of social networks. To test our hypotheses, we use a longitudinal social network data-set collected over a six-year period in the IT department of a global engineering firm. Using fixed-effects panel regression models, we find support for our hypotheses, suggesting that performance feedback is a determinant factor in social capital dynamics.

Reflexive work and the duality of self-leadership

The concept of self-leadership is known and accepted, but still under-researched. By considering the reflexive work involved in the process of self-leadership, we seek to understand what factors are relevant for managers to be effective in a sustainable and productive way. We ask how managers engage in self-leadership. Empirically, we find that self-leadership is a process that can be translated into the capability of handling and sustaining four dualities: challenge and routine; self and others; nonwork and work; mind and body.

Self-Regulatory Strategies in Daily Life: Selection, Optimization, and Compensation and Everyday Memory Problems

The effective use of self-regulatory strategies, such as selection, optimization, and compensation (SOC) requires resources. However, it is theorized that SOC use is most advantageous for those experiencing losses and diminishing resources. The present study explored this seeming paradox within the context of limitations or constraints due to aging, low cognitive resources, and daily stress in relation to everyday memory problems. We examined whether SOC usage varied by age and level of constraints, and if the relationship between resources and memory problems was mitigated by SOC usage. A daily diary paradigm was used to explore day-to-day fluctuations in these relationships. Participants (n=145, ages 22 to 94) completed a baseline interview and a daily diary for seven consecutive days. Multilevel models examined between- and within-person relationships between daily SOC use, daily stressors, cognitive resources, and everyday memory problems. Middle-aged adults had the highest SOC usage, although older adults also showed high SOC use if they had high cognitive resources. More SOC strategies were used on high stress compared to low stress days. Moreover, the relationship between daily stress and memory problems was buffered by daily SOC use, such that on high-stress days, those who used more SOC strategies reported fewer memory problems than participants who used fewer SOC strategies. The paradox of resources and SOC use can be qualified by the type of resource-limitation. Deficits in global resources were not tied to SOC usage or benefits. Conversely, under daily constraints tied to stress, the use of SOC increased and led to fewer memory problems.

Pay, Intrinsic Motivation, Extrinsic Motivation, Performance, and Creativity in the Workplace: Revisiting Long-Held Beliefs

The role of compensation or extrinsic rewards, including pay for performance (PFP), has received relatively little attention in the organizational behavior/psychology literature on work motivation. What attention it has received has often taken the form of raising cautions about the potential harmful effects of PFP on (intrinsic) work motivation, as well as on creativity. We critically assess the theory and evidence that have provided the basis for such arguments and conclude that support for such claims (in workplace settings) is lacking. We seek to provide a more accurate view of how extrinsic rewards such as PFP operate in the workplace and how they influence workplace motivation, creativity, and performance. We document how social determination theory and creativity theory have recently undergone major changes that better recognize the potential positive influence of extrinsic rewards such as PFP. Finally, we identify areas in need of further research.

The Modeling and Assessment of Work Performance

Individual work role performance drives the entire economy. It is organizational psychology and organizational behavior’s (OP/OB’s) most crucial dependent variable. In this review, alternative specifications for the definition and latent structure of individual performance are reviewed and summarized. Setting aside differences in terminology, the alternatives are remarkably similar. The Campbell (2012) model is offered as a synthesized description of the content of the latent structure. Issues pertaining to performance dynamics are then reviewed, along with the role played by individual adaptability to changing performance requirements. Using the synthesized model of the latent content structure and dynamics of performance as a backdrop, issues pertaining to the assessment of performance are summarized. The alternative goals of performance assessment, general measurement issues, and the construct validity of specific methods (e.g., ratings, simulations) are reviewed and described. Cross-cultural issues and future research needs are noted.

Is it Time to Voluntarily Turn Over Theories of Voluntary Turnover?

The current research literature on voluntary employee turnover exhibits at least four shortcomings: low predictive validity, excessive exuberance with predictors, low rigor, and little relevance. Existing theories of voluntary employee turnover research are under specified, as none contains the full range of variables originally hypothesized by March and Simon as contributing to individual employees' decisions to quit their jobs. March and Simon (1958) contributed to the current state of affairs by making at least one assumption that subsequent results do not support. Subsequent efforts to expand theory and to detect and integrate new explanatory constructs have led to a much deeper understanding of the same small portion of turnover variance explained in employee decisions to quit. Deficiencies in current approaches and what a nondeficient model of voluntary employee turnover might look like are described. Directions for future voluntary turnover research are identified, as are past trends that need to be discontinued.

What Have We Learned That Is Critical in Understanding Leadership Perceptions and Leader-Performance Relations?

In this article, we provide a brief review of the current and past research on leadership perceptions and performance. We then describe four principles that have emerged from many decades of research, which can provide new directions for future leadership theory and research.

The benefits of belongingness and interactional fairness to interpersonal citizenship behavior

Purpose

– The purpose of this paper is to examine the main and indirect effects of belongingness and interactional fairness on interpersonal citizenship behavior.

Design/methodology/approach

– Field data were obtained from 141 subordinate-supervisor dyads from diverse occupations and organizations within Canada. The study was cross-sectional in nature.

Findings

– Consistent with expectations the findings demonstrates that interactional fairness positively predicts employee sense of belongingness, and employees show more helping behavior (supervisor rated) when they have a stronger sense of belongingness at work. Belongingness partially mediates the relationship between interactional fairness and interpersonal behavior.

Research limitations/implications

– Future research could involve investigating a broader range of mediating mechanisms that might promote interpersonal citizenship behavior; for example, trust. As previously indicated, belongingness partially mediates the relationship between interactional fairness and interpersonal citizenship behavior, implying other possible mechanisms through which interactional fairness influences follower behaviors. Moreover, this research can be extended to include to other forms of prosocial behaviors (e.g. innovative behavior).

Practical implications

– Satisfying employees’ need for belonging is an important aspect of organizational life and useful in promoting helping behaviors among coworkers, it is essential for organizations to, therefore, create a work culture of inclusiveness. It is prudent for organizations to also expend greater effort to maximize interactional fairness by introducing programs intended for training organizational leaders how to be fair.

Originality/value

– Interpersonal citizenship behavior is important for group and organizational functioning; however, current psychological models are insufficient for understanding these behaviors. To advance the understanding, this study attempts to directly test individuals’ sense of belongingness as the psychological mechanism through which interactional justice can influence interpersonal citizenship behavior.

Measuring self-differentiation and academic commitment in University students: A case study of education and engineering students

More than half of university students in South Africa leave university before they complete their studies. Factors associated with student drop out include poor schooling, lack of fluency in the language of instruction, poor financial support, and inadequate student support services. In the present study, we focus on the way meaningful commitment influences self-regulation, and we draw on the investment model of commitment to examine the hypothesis that commitment will be related to satisfaction, quality of alternatives, and investment size, and that self-differentiation will provide additional predictive power to commitment. Results indicate that satisfaction and self-differentiation only are significant predictors of level of academic commitment. Meaningful commitment is predicted by satisfaction, quality of alternatives, investment, and self-differentiation to a lesser extent. Investment size was associated significantly with self-regulatory behaviours such as setting learning goals, managing studies effectively, and spending more time on studies. The results are discussed in terms of the literature on commitment, self-differentiation, and academic achievement in higher education.

An evaluation of the effects of the occupational safety and health inspectors' supervision in workplaces

The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of the administrational supervision of occupational safety and health (OSH) inspectors in the workplaces that they inspect. In the questionnaire survey, the respondents were OSH managers and workers' OSH representatives in the chemical companies' plants. For workers, the aggregated variable 'General OSH enforcement operations' was positively related to the aggregated variable 'Effects of the current OSH inspection'. In contrast, for the OSH managers, the corresponding data did not reveal any correlation. The professional competence in carrying out the OSH inspections was positively related to the different variables of the aggregated variable 'Effects of the current OSH inspection (Outputs)'. In contrast, for the workers' OSH representatives, the analysis failed to confirm this relationship. The present findings are that OSH managers and workers' OSH representatives desired that the OSH inspector should follow up more effectively that OSH management systems are being implemented in practice. They should provide more advice to workplaces in order to help them to exceed the minimum level laid down by law. Workers' OSH representatives expressed clearly that the OSH inspector should more often impose binding obligations. The professional skills of the OSH inspectors need to correspond better to the needs of today's working life and to be able to react to system changes in the workplaces. The OSH enforcement approach should become more uniform and be harmonized between the individual OSH inspectors and the OSH agencies. The development of the quality of OSH inspections and the professional competence of inspectors are important aspects from the point of the effectiveness.

Appelbaum S. MBA program enrolment as a catalyst for boundaryless career goals (part two)

Purpose

– Further investigation of the thoughts and attitudes contributing to the voluntary pursuit of an MBA degree and career change is necessary to better understand career motivations and to satisfy career goals. The purpose of this two-part paper is to achieve this objective.

Design/methodology/approach

– Factors contributing to the cognitive decision to enroll in an MBA program and the subsequent impact of self-discovery gained upon program entry on career strategy were explored using a 32-question survey based on empirical research findings.

Findings

– Part-time and full-time MBA students exhibited differences in decision criteria applied for MBA program entry. Following program enrollment, opportunities for career growth led to upward goal revision and increasingly focussed goals.

Research limitations/implications

– Participation was potentially limited by survey distribution during a demanding academic period where many project reports and group presentations were due. A single MBA program in the downtown Montreal area may not be representative all programs in the population.

Practical implications

– Anchoring individual career identity and social identity has become increasingly complex as employers in many industries undergo continuous transformational change.

Social implications

– Integration within the work environment of identified career roles requires additional attention to validate an individual's strategic career efforts.

Originality/value

– Surveying MBA candidates about career decisions and goal-revision allows for a valuable “snapshot” of career evolution over time. By promoting increased self-awareness, applied knowledge gained through MBA program activities acts as a catalyst for self-efficacy beliefs which results in upward distal goal-revision or increased goal focus.

The relationship between motivation to work and workers’ pay flexibility

Purpose

– The purpose of this paper is to explore the role of motivation to work in explaining workers’ pay flexibility – as measured by their reservation wage ratio – across the lifespan. This is important since pay inflexibility may undermine mature age workers’ retention at the workforce.

Design/methodology/approach

– Relying on self-determination theory the paper broadens the role of “motivation to work” from the overall work valence an individual attaches to work to the underlying work values (i.e. the perceived value of work for its intrinsic vs extrinsic outcomes) and work motives (i.e. the underlying autonomous vs controlled reasons regulating one's work participation). The authors conducted hierarchical linear regression analyses on a sample of 1,577 Belgian workers to explore how individuals’ work values and work motives, in addition to work valence, shape workers’ reservation wage ratios across the lifespan.

Findings

– Results indicate that work valence and holding relative intrinsic work values and relative autonomous work motives are associated with lower reservation wage ratios. Finally, age moderates all three relationships. Whereas the negative impact of work valence and relative autonomous work motives is stronger at older age, the negative impact of relative intrinsic work values is stronger at younger age.

Research limitations/implications

– Motivational predictors are differently related to reservation wage ratios across the lifespan.

Practical implications

– By fostering overall work valence and autonomous work motivation practitioners can exert influence on mature age workers’ pay flexibility.

Originality/value

– This study extends prior research on pay flexibility by focussing on the content of motivation to work (i.e. work values, work motives) and its role across the lifespan.

Career Compromise, Career Distress, and Perceptions of Employability

We surveyed 175 university undergraduates and assessed whether career compromise was associated with career distress and perceptions of employability (employment demand and employment confidence), and tested whether core-self evaluations and social capital buffered the effects of career compromise. Career compromise was associated positively with career distress and negatively with self-perceptions of employment demand. Social capital moderated the relationship between compromise and employment demand and between compromise and employment confidence. No assessed variable moderated between compromise and career distress. Understanding the correlates of career compromise and under what conditions these relationships are strengthened or weakened contributes to an understanding of how goal adjustment in the career domain might affect young people’s well-being and career progress.

The Development and Initial Validation of a Career Calling Scale for Emerging Adults

Career calling, a salient career goal that is personally meaningful and oriented toward helping others, is a developmental construct that is especially important for emerging adults when making career decisions and setting career goals. As no existing measure reflects the developmental aspect of career calling, we devised an age-appropriate measure suitable for use with this population. We reviewed the extant literature, conducted focus groups, and used expert reviews to generate 34 initial items. Item and exploratory factor analyses were employed to reduce these items to 15, representing three reliable subscales (Study 1; N = 345 emerging adults). Confirmatory factor analysis supported the initial factor structure (Study 2; N = 527). Expected correlations with adult measures of career calling (search and presence), general career indecision, and life satisfaction supported construct validity (Study 2; N = 435). The implications for research and practice are discussed.

Sekerka L. Taking time for patience in organizations

Purpose

– Patience is underestimated in organizations. The purpose of this paper is to explore the concept of patience and the individual and organizational benefits it confers. Then, the paper discuses emotional self-regulation and explain how two self-regulatory techniques can affect the patience of individuals in organizations.

Design/methodology/approach

– The paper considers religious, philosophical, and psychological perspectives on patience; and highlight the emotional underpinnings of patience.

Findings

– The paper argues that patience plays an important role in organizations and that individuals can use emotional self-regulation to enhance their patience. The paper offers two key points about the relationship between self-regulation strategies and patience: first, situation selection mitigates the need for patience and second cognitive reappraisal facilitates the execution of patient responses and the development of the virtue itself.

Practical implications

– The paper provides recommendations for increasing individuals’ patience in organizational settings.

Originality/value

– The virtue of patience has received scant research attention. This paper focusses on the importance of patience in the workplace and examines how emotional self-regulation can facilitate its activation.

Unique self-leadership: A bifactor model approach

A crucial point of debate around the construct of self-leadership is its supposed lack of distinctiveness from other theoretically related constructs. We empirically investigate in professionals with leadership experience ( N = 374) with a bifactor structural equation modeling approach to what extent self-leadership (a) is distinct from related classic motivation constructs (need for achievement, self-regulation, self-efficacy) and (b) harbors incremental predictive validity over and above these motivation constructs in predicting individual job performance and leadership behavior styles (transformational leadership, transactional leadership, laissez-faire leadership). Findings yielded that self-leadership (a) generally showed only moderate associations with constructs of classic motivation literature and was sufficiently distinct from them and (b) could incrementally predict outcomes above and beyond related classic motivation constructs, alluding to its uniqueness. We discuss self-leadership as a unique and useful construct worthy of own systematic research.