The link between age, career goals, and adaptive development for work-related learning among local government employees

More recently, lifespan development psychology models of adaptive development have been applied to the workforce to investigate ageing worker and lifespan issues. The current study uses the Learning and Development Survey (LDS) to investigate employee selection and engagement of learning and development goals and opportunities and constraints for learning at work in relation to demographics and career goals. It was found that mature age was associated with perceptions of preferential treatment of younger workers with respect to learning and development. Age was also correlated with several career goals. Findings suggest that younger workers’ learning and development options are better catered for in the workplace. Mature aged workers may compensate for unequal learning opportunities at work by studying for an educational qualification or seeking alternate job opportunities. The desire for a higher level job within the organization or educational qualification was linked to engagement in learning and development goals at work. It is suggested that an understanding of employee perceptions in the workplace in relation to goals and activities may be important in designing strategies to retain workers.

Embedding reflective practice in professional practice with portfolios

Completing a professional portfolio as part of coursework gives beginning library and information professionals a tool which helps them bridge the gap between being a student and a practitioner. Portfolios require them to reflect on their learning outcomes, so that they can communicate these to employers, and encourage them to design strategies for professional development. Portfolios promote reflective practice and may continue to be used in the workplace. They are also a useful mechanism for established librarians who wish to record their professional growth, plans and contributions. The idea may even be applied to monitoring the achievements and performance of whole libraries or smaller units within libraries. The first part of this paper reviews portfolios as a tool for reflecting on, showcasing and developing the practice of entry level library and information professionals. Examples of portfolio contents, and reactions to the process, in this part of the paper come from students, (now colleagues), who have recently completed the Graduate Diploma of Information Studies [GDLIS] at the Queensland University of Technology [QUT]. The potential of portfolios as a reflective professional development tool raises interesting possibilities for organisations, educational programs and professional associations. For example, LIS educators could consider strengthening the role of portfolios in courses; organisations could use them as part of the employee selection process; and professional associations such as ALIA could use them as one mechanism for recognising professional status, or establish them as a recommended professional development tool. These roles for the portfolio form the focus of the second half of this paper.

Employee perceptions of reputation : an ethnographic study

The ability of organizational members to identify and analyse stakeholder opinion is critical to the management of corporate reputation. In spite of the significance of these abilities to corporate reputation management, there has been little effort to document and describe internal organizational influences on such capacities. This ethnographic study conducted in Red Cross Queensland explores how cultural knowledge structures derived from shared values and assumptions among organizational members influence their conceptualisations of organizational reputation. Specifically, this study explores how a central attribute of organizational culture – the property of cultural selection – influences perceptions of organizational reputation held by organizational members. We argue that these perceptions are the result of collective processes that synthesise (with varying degrees of consensus) member conceptualisations, interpretations, and representations of environmental realities in which their organization operates. Findings and implications for organizational action suggest that while external indicators of organizational reputation are acknowledged by members as significant, the internal influence of organizational culture is a far stronger influence on organizational action.

Employee perceptions regarding the effectiveness of occupational road safety initiatives

A range of risk management initiatives have been introduced in organisations in attempt to reduce occupational road incidents. However a discrepancy exists between the initiatives that are frequently implemented in organisations and the initiatives that have demonstrated scientific merit in improving occupational road safety. Given that employees’ beliefs may facilitate or act as a barrier to implementing initiatives, it is important to understand whether initiatives with scientific merit are perceived to be effective by employees. To explore employee perceptions pertaining to occupational road safety initiatives, a questionnaire was administered to 679 employees sourced from four Australian organisations. Participants ranged in age from 18 years to 65 years (M = 42, SD = 11). Participants rated 35 initiatives based on how effective they thought they would be in improving road safety in their organisation. The initiatives perceived by employees to be most effective in managing occupational road risks comprised: making vehicle safety features standard e.g. passenger airbags; practical driver skills training; and investigation of serious vehicle incidents. The initiatives perceived to be least effective in managing occupational road risks comprised: signing a promise card commitment to drive safely; advertising the organisation’s phone number on vehicles for complaints and compliments; and consideration of driving competency in staff selection process. Employee perceptions were analysed at a factor level and at an initiative level. The mean scores for the three extracted factors revealed that employees believed occupational road risks could best be managed by the employer implementing engineering and human resource methods to enhance road safety. Initiatives relating to employer management of identified risk factors were perceived to be more effective than feedback or motivational methods that required employees to accept responsibility for their driving safety. Practitioners can use the findings from this study to make informed decisions about how they select, manage and market occupational safety initiatives.

The moderating effects of job control and selection, optimization, and compensation strategies on the age-work ability relationship

Work ability describes employees' capability to carry out their work with respect to physical and psychological job demands. This study investigated direct and interactive effects of age, job control, and the use of successful aging strategies called selection, optimization, and compensation (SOC) in predicting work ability. We assessed SOC strategies and job control by using employee self-reports, and we measured employees' work ability using supervisor ratings. Data collected from 173 health-care employees showed that job control was positively associated with work ability. Additionally, we found a three-way interaction effect of age, job control, and use of SOC strategies on work ability. Specifically, the negative relationship between age and work ability was weakest for employees with high job control and high use of SOC strategies. These results suggest that the use of successful aging strategies and enhanced control at work are conducive to maintaining the work ability of aging employees. We discuss theoretical and practical implications regarding the beneficial role of the use of SOC strategies utilized by older employees and enhanced contextual resources at work for aging employees.

Selection, optimization, and compensation strategies: Interactive effects on daily work engagement

The theory of selective optimization with compensation (SOC) proposes that the “orchestrated” use of three distinct action regulation strategies (selection, optimization, and compensation) leads to positive employee outcomes. Previous research examined overall scores and additive models (i.e., main effects) of SOC strategies instead of interaction models in which SOC strategies mutually enhance each other's effects. Thus, a central assumption of SOC theory remains untested. In addition, most research on SOC strategies has been cross-sectional, assuming that employees' use of SOC strategies is stable over time. We conducted a quantitative diary study across nine work days (N = 77; 514 daily entries) to investigate interactive effects of daily SOC strategies on daily work engagement. Results showed that optimization and compensation, but not selection, had positive main effects on work engagement. Moreover, a significant three-way interaction effect indicated that the relationship between selection and work engagement was positive only when both optimization and compensation were high, whereas the relationship was negative when optimization was low and compensation was high. We discuss implications for future research and practice regarding the use of SOC strategies at work.

Sexual selection in a tropical fruit fly : role of a plant derived chemical in mate choice

The specific mechanisms by which selective pressures affect individuals are often difficult to resolve. In tephritid fruit flies, males respond strongly and positively to certain plant derived chemicals. Sexual selection by female choice has been hypothesized as the mechanism driving this behaviour in certain species, as females preferentially mate with males that have fed on these chemicals. This hypothesis is, to date, based on studies of only very few species and its generality is largely untested. We tested the hypothesis on different spatial scales (small cage and seminatural field-cage) using the monophagous fruit fly, Bactrocera cacuminata. This species is known to respond to methyl eugenol (ME), a chemical found in many plant species and one upon which previous studies have focused. Contrary to expectation, no obvious female choice was apparent in selecting ME-fed males over unfed males as measured by the number of matings achieved over time, copulation duration, or time of copulation initiation. However, the number of matings achieved by ME-fed males was significantly greater than unfed males 16 and 32 days after exposure to ME in small cages (but not in a field-cage). This delayed advantage suggests that ME may not influence the pheromone system of B. cacuminata but may have other consequences, acting on some other fitness consequence (e.g., enhancement of physiology or survival) of male exposure to these chemicals. We discuss the ecological and evolutionary implications of our findings to explore alternate hypotheses to explain the patterns of response of dacine fruit flies to specific plant-derived chemicals.