Beyond personal Leader Member Exchange (LMX) quality:the effects of perceived LMX variability on employee reactions

A fundamental tenet of Leader–Member Exchange (LMX) theory is that leaders develop different quality relationships with their employees; however, little research has investigated the impact of LMX differentiation on employee reactions. The current research investigates whether perceptions of LMX variability (the extent to which LMX relationships are perceived to vary within a team) affects employee job satisfaction and wellbeing beyond the effects of personal LMX quality. As LMX variability runs counter to principles of equality and consistency, which are important for maintaining social harmony in groups, it is hypothesized that perceptions of LMX variability will have a negative effect on employee reactions, via its negative impact on perceived team relations. Two samples of employed individuals were used to investigate the hypothesized relationships. In both samples, an individual's perception of LMX variability in their team was negatively related to employee job satisfaction and wellbeing (above the effects of LMX), and this relationship was mediated by reports of relational team conflict.

Determining consumer satisfaction and commitment through self-service technology and personal service usage

This paper expands research into self-service technology in the service encounter. Self-service technology is where customers deliver service themselves using some form of a technological interface. There is still a great deal unknown about self-service technology, in particular its impact on consumer satisfaction and consumer commitment. With that in mind, this empirical study explores the relative impact of self-service technology on consumer satisfaction and on a multidimensional measure of consumer commitment containing affective commitment, temporal commitment and instrumental commitment. The results reveal that in a hotel context personal service still remains very important for assessments of satisfaction, and affective and temporal commitment. What is particularly interesting is that self-service technology, while impacting these constructs, also impacts instrumental commitment. This suggests that positive evaluations of self-service technology may tie consumers into relationships with hotels. A discussion and implications for managers are provided on these and other results, and the paper is concluded with further potential research.

Relationship status and identity construction in heterosexual women:A discourse analytic and personal construct study

This thesis reports the findings of three studies examining relationship status and identity construction in the talk of heterosexual women, from a feminist and social constructionist perspective. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 12 women in study 1 and 13 women for study 2, between the ages of twenty and eighty-seven, discussing their experiences of relationships. All interviews were transcribed and analysed using discourse analysis, by hand and using the Nudist 6 program. The resulting themes create distinct age-related marital status expectations. Unmarried women were aware they had to marry by a ‘certain age’ or face a ‘lonely spinsterhood’. Through marriage women gained a socially accepted position associated with responsibility for others, self-sacrifice, a home-focused lifestyle and relational identification. Divorce was constructed as the consequence of personal faults and poor relationship care, reassuring the married of their own control over their status. Older unmarried women were constructed as deviant and pitiable, occupying social purgatory as a result of transgressing these valued conventions. Study 3 used repertory grid tasks, with 33 women, analysing transcripts and notes alongside numerical data using Web Grid II internet analysis tool, to produce principle components maps demonstrating the relationships between relationship terms and statuses. This study illuminated the consistency with which women of different ages and status saw marriage as their ideal living situation and outlined the domestic responsibilities associated. Spinsters and single-again women were defined primarily by their lack of marriage and by loneliness. This highlighted the devalued position of older unmarried women. The results of these studies indicated a consistent set of age-related expectations of relationship status, acknowledged by women and reinforced by their families and friends, which render many unmarried women deviant and fail to acknowledge the potential variety of women’s ways of living.

Small business owners’ success criteria, a values approach to personal differences

This study of 150 Dutch small business owners, identified through business/ network directories, investigated relationships between owners’ understanding of success and their personal values. Business owners ranked 10 success criteria. Per- sonal satisfaction, profitability, and satisfied stakeholders ranked highest. Multidi- mensional scaling techniques revealed two dimensions underlying the rank order of success criteria: person-oriented (personal satisfaction versus business growth) and business-oriented (profitability versus contributing back to society). Furthermore, business growth, profitability, and innovativeness were guided by self-enhancing value orientations (power and achievement). Softer success criteria, such as having satisfied stakeholders and a good work–life balance, were guided by self-transcendent value orientations (benevolence and universalism).

Are guanxi-type supervisor-subordinate relationships culture-general? An eight-nation test of measurement invariance

Three dimensions of subordinate-supervisor relations (affective attachment, deference to supervisor, and personal-life inclusion) that had been found by Y. Chen, Friedman, Yu, Fang, and Lu to be characteristic of a guanxi relationship between subordinates and their supervisors in China were surveyed in Taiwan, Singapore, and six non-Chinese cultural contexts. The Affective Attachment and Deference subscales demonstrated full metric invariance whereas the Personal-Life Inclusion subscale was found to have partial metric invariance across all eight samples. Structural equation modeling revealed that the affective attachment dimension had a cross-nationally invariant positive relationship to affective organizational commitment and a negative relationship to turnover intention. The deference to the supervisor dimension had invariant positive relationships with both affective and normative organizational commitment. The personal-life inclusion dimension was unrelated to all outcomes. These results indicate the relevance of aspects of guanxi to superior-subordinate relations in non-Chinese cultures. Studies of indigenous concepts can contribute to a broader understanding of organizational behavior. © The Author(s) 2014.

"I'm a better manager":A biographic narrative study of the impact of personal trauma on the professional lives of managers in the UK

This doctoral study aims to understand how experiences of critical illness or bereavement affect the way managers view and approach their work and their relationships at work. This is an interpretative phenomenological study examining the subjective meanings of personal experience and is underpinned by biographic narratives from four participants and interviews with their nominated workplace witnesses (i.e. colleagues who worked alongside the individual at the time of their trauma). As a consequence of the findings that have emerged across this study, three contributions to theory are presented. All four participants described their traumas as a professional growth experience for themselves as managers, which resulted in self-reported and observed behaviour change at work. Consequently, the first area of theoretical contribution is a suggested extension to the post-traumatic growth (PTG) framework (Calhoun & Tedeschi, 2006) with the addition of a new behavioural dimension called ‘managerial growth’, when applied to the context of ‘ordinary’ organizations. The second area of theoretical contribution arose through the reflexive process that was created during data collection where participants and their witnesses remembered episodes of compassion interaction at work. The second area of contribution thus seeks to extend the existing model of compassion at work (Dutton, Worline, Frost and Lilius, 2006), by conceptualising compassion as a dyadic process between a compassion ‘giver’ and a compassion ‘receiver’ in which the compassion receiver ‘trusts or ‘mistrusts’; ‘discloses’ or ‘withholds’; ‘connects’ or ‘disconnects’ with the compassion giver. The third area of contribution is a new conceptualisation of reflexivity, ‘three-dimensional reflexivity’ (3DR) (Armstrong, Butler and Shaw, 2013). 3DR brings together three of the elements that have been missing from critically reflexive management research; by working with multiple variants of reflexivity in the same study; surfacing different reflexive voices to guard against the researcher’s (potentially) solipsistic own; and remaining sensitive to the concept of reflexive time. In doing so, 3DR not only provides a deeper understanding of individual lived experience; it is also a vehicle in which self-insight is gained. Furthermore, by engaging in its practice, those involved in this study have developed both personally and professionally as a result.

Medical students' personal experience of high-stakes failure:case studies using interpretative phenomenological analysis

Abstract (provisional): Background Failing a high-stakes assessment at medical school is a major event for those who go through the experience. Students who fail at medical school may be more likely to struggle in professional practice, therefore helping individuals overcome problems and respond appropriately is important. There is little understanding about what factors influence how individuals experience failure or make sense of the failing experience in remediation. The aim of this study was to investigate the complexity surrounding the failure experience from the student’s perspective using interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA). Methods The accounts of 3 medical students who had failed final re-sit exams, were subjected to in-depth analysis using IPA methodology. IPA was used to analyse each transcript case-by-case allowing the researcher to make sense of the participant’s subjective world. The analysis process allowed the complexity surrounding the failure to be highlighted, alongside a narrative describing how students made sense of the experience. Results The circumstances surrounding students as they approached assessment and experienced failure at finals were a complex interaction between academic problems, personal problems (specifically finance and relationships), strained relationships with friends, family or faculty, and various mental health problems. Each student experienced multi-dimensional issues, each with their own individual combination of problems, but experienced remediation as a one-dimensional intervention with focus only on improving performance in written exams. What these students needed to be included was help with clinical skills, plus social and emotional support. Fear of termination of the their course was a barrier to open communication with staff. Conclusions These students’ experience of failure was complex. The experience of remediation is influenced by the way in which students make sense of failing. Generic remediation programmes may fail to meet the needs of students for whom personal, social and mental health issues are a part of the picture.

Training perceptions, engagement and performance:comparing work engagement and personal role engagement

The purpose of this study was to compare two engagement constructs (work engagement and personal role engagement) with regards to their relationship with training perceptions and work role performance behaviours. It was hypothesised that personal role engagement would show incremental validity above that of work engagement at predicting work role performance behaviours and be a stronger mediator of the relationships between training perceptions and such behaviours. Questionnaire data was gathered from 304 full-time working adults in the UK. As predicted, personal role engagement was found to explain additional variance above that of work engagement for task proficiency, task adaptability, and task proactivity behaviours. Moreover, personal role engagement was a stronger mediator of the relationship between training perceptions and task proficiency as well as between training perceptions and task adaptability. Both work engagement and personal role engagement mediated the relationship between training perceptions and task proactivity to a similar degree. The findings suggest that personal role engagement has better practical utility to the HRD domain than work engagement, and indicates that future research may benefit from adopting the personal role engagement construct.

How can personal role engagement lead to increased engagement? The roles of meaningfulness and perceived line manager relations

There is an increasing need to understand the psychological processes that link personal development with employee engagement, particularly the boundary conditions at which these occur. The current study sought to meet this need by testing whether perceived opportunities for development are positively associated with job engagement indirectly through the experience of meaningfulness, and whether this indirect relationship is conditional on the level of perceived line manager relations. Questionnaire data was collected from 152 UK workers from a range of occupations and organizations. The results found support for all the hypotheses. In particular, the positive effects of perceived opportunities for development on job engagement (measured one month later) via meaningfulness were only significant for those who perceived that they had a good relationship with their line manager. Thus, there is a need for line managers to develop high quality relationships with their direct reports in order for development practices to translate into positive psychological outcomes. Engagement theory could be advanced by further understanding broaden-and-build and social exchange processes.