Benefit News: Employee Benefit News, Department of Administrative Services, October 2016

Benefit News, brought to you by the DAS Benefits Team, providing you with the most up-to-date information about the state of Iowa’s employee benefits.

Effects of subsidizing the first employee – Empirical evidence from Finland

Small businesses form a significant share of all businesses and employ a large share of all employees. Therefore, governments are often interested in subsidizing them and especially employment in smaller firms. Nonemployer firms have received special interest, especially in Finland, due to their large share of all businesses. It has been argued that the government should encourage them to hire by subsidizing employment. However, there is no evidence on the effectiveness of such policies. In general, there is surprisingly little evidence on how small firms react to employment subsidies or of employment subsidies targeted according to firm characteristics. The subject of this thesis is the effects of subsidizing the first employee. While theoretical background suggests the subsidy might have efficiency gains, because there might be market inefficiencies that lead to too little employment in small firms. The focus of this research, however, is on the empirical evidence. There was a regional subsidy for hiring the first employee in Finland between 2007 and 2011. Nonemployer firms in the subsidy area were eligible for a wage subsidy for two years when they hired the first employee. The design of the subsidy enables studying the effects in a natural experiment framework that are nowadays popular in public economics. It can be shown that the area without the subsidy provides a good counterfactual to the area where the subsidy was available. Therefore, the effects of the subsidy can be estimated with difference-in-differences method. This method compares the change in the subsidy area to the change in the area without the subsidy. The data used is firm level data spanning from 2000 to 2013. The data is provided by the Finnish Tax Administration including tax declarations by all Finland based companies. The effects for hiring decisions are estimated by examining the effects for alternative variables such as employment, wage expenditure and turnover. According to the results, the subsidy did not have statistically significant effect on any of the variables of interest. Therefore, it can be concluded that the subsidy did not increase hires in nonemployer firms. This implies that the labour demand elasticity of nonemployer firms is very small. The results are in line with previous literature on the effectiveness of general employment subsidies in Scandinavia that suggest that labour demand elasticity is rather small resulting in small or no effects of employment subsidies. However, my research provides new evidence on labour demand of nonemployer firms especially that has not been studied before. The results are in line with the observation that most nonemployer firms are self-employed persons who are not interested in growing their business to employ others as well, but only provide for themselves. Because of this employment subsidies to the self-employed are not particularly well targeted. The theoretical grounds for the subsidy actually hold for other small firms as well, so it can be argued the subsidy would be more effective if it was extended for hiring the first few employees.

Occupational safety and health for the Federal employee

Cover title.

Employee workplace rights.

"OSHA 3021-08R."

Abordagem multimetodológica do impacto da mentoria e relações de ajuda no processo informal de employee branding: o efeito de marca de empregado

O processo de employee branding tem demonstrado promover e reforçar o contrato psicológico entre os colaboradores e a organização, pelo incremento e potenciação do sentimento de comprometimento e lealdade do colaborador de acordo com Miles e Mangold. Esta investigação foca-se no estudo do impacto da mentoria e relações de ajuda no processo de employee branding, numa visão integrada da gestão de recursos humanos e do comportamento organizacional, com base nas relações de troca do marketing do relacionamento numa perspetiva da gestão por competências e foco nas Pessoas. Com a introdução da nova variável (mentoria e relações de ajuda) esta investigação, ao enriquecer e incrementar o processo de employee branding de Miles e Mangold proposto em 2004 e 2005, apresenta a construção de um instrumento de diagnóstico do inovador processo de Efeito de Marca de Empregado. A investigação decorreu em 30 organizações, com um total de 725 questionários, que permitiu a validação e fiabilidade do instrumento, bem como demonstra através de métodos estatísticos a influência das ações de mentoria e relações de ajuda e da atuação das relações interpessoais que promovem o processo employee branding. Se o processo de employee branding já incrementava os resultados organizacionais, com esta investigação, pode-se afirmar que o processo de Efeito de Marca de Empregado não só incrementa como também impulsiona a imagem de marca da organização pela atuação dinâmica e catalisadora das relações interpessoais dos seus colaboradores, dentro e fora da organização, com a introdução e promoção de ações mentoria e relações de ajuda entre chefias e chefiados; ABSTRACT: The employee branding process has shown as to promote and strengthen the psychological contract between employees and the organization, by increasing and maximizing the sense of employees’ commitment and loyalty, according with Miles and Mangold. This research focuses on the impact of mentoring and helping relationships in the employee branding process, in an integrated view of human resources management and organizational behavior, based on the exchange ratio of the relationship marketing in a perspective of management by competencies and people focused approach. With the introduction of the new variable (mentoring and helping relationships), this research enriches and enhances the Miles and Mangold employee branding process proposed in 2004 and 2005 and presents the construction of an diagnostic instrument for the innovative process of Employee Brand Effect. This research took place in 30 organizations with a total of 725 questionnaires, which allowed the validation and reliability of the instrument and the evidence through statistical methods of the influence of mentoring and helping relationships actions and of the interaction of interpersonal relationships promoting the employee branding process. If the employee branding process was already boosting organizational results with this research, it can be stated that the Employee Brand Effect process not only increases, but also boosts the organization’s brand image by the actuation of the dynamics of employees’ interpersonal relationships, inside and outside the organization, with the introduction and promotion of mentoring and helping relationships actions between leaders and followers.

Cultural audit as a tool to increase employee involvement in small firms: A case study

Employee involvement is a common goal for most companies. This research started when managers of a familyrun horticultural firm decided to increase employee commitment and improve organizational climate. To help them, we considered the possibility of developing a cultural audit, adapting the tool to the fact that it was a small family business. Therefore, this paper will firstly review the existing literature concerning organizational culture, specially which cultural characteristics should be more valuable to achieve employee commitment and involvement and how to run a cultural audit. Secondly, it will expose the design and implementation of a cultural audit at this company, through an explicative case study that aims to compare the existing culture with the characteristics described theoretically. The study discusses the lack of trust, of a creative atmosphere, and of a shared vission, and suggests some recommendations to develop these characteristics, in order to gain the desired level of employee involvement. Key words: Employee involvement, organizational

Jerónimo Martins and internal social responsibility : a case study on employee awareness

Mestrado em Ciências Empresariais

A study of employee affective organisational commitment and retention in Pakistan:the roles of psychological contract breach and norms of reciprocity

Social exchange theory and notions of reciprocity have long been assumed to explain the relationship between psychological contract breach and important employee outcomes. To date, however, there has been no explicit testing of these assumptions. This research, therefore, explores the mediating role of negative, generalized, and balanced reciprocity, in the relationships between psychological contract breach and employees’ affective organizational commitment and turnover intentions. A survey of 247 Pakistani employees of a large public university was analyzed using structural equation modeling and bootstrapping techniques, and provided excellent support for our model. As predicted, psychological contract breach was positively related to negative reciprocity norms and negatively related to generalized and balanced reciprocity norms. Negative and generalized (but not balanced) reciprocity were negatively and positively (respectively) related to employees’ affective organizational commitment and fully mediated the relationship between psychological contract breach and affective organizational commitment. Moreover, affective organizational commitment fully mediated the relationship between generalized and negative reciprocity and employees’ turnover intentions. Implications for theory and practice are discussed.

Employee engagement in the public sector:a narrative evidence synthesis

It has been claimed that employee engagement can harness public service motivation in ways that lead to better improve functioning and positive organizational outcomes, and can help address the increasingly complex challenges associated with public service in an era of austerity. Despite this, there has not yet been a systematic review of the literature that would enable researchers to understand more about the antecedent factors and the outcomes of engagement in the public sector. To address this issue, we undertook a systematic narrative synthesis of the empirical research on engagement that yielded 5111 published studies, of which just 59 were conducted in public sector settings and met our inclusion criteria. Studies generally found that motivational features of jobs (such as autonomy), group (such as social support), management (such as leader consideration), and organizations (such as voice mechanisms) as well as psychological resources were key antecedents of engagement within the public sector; and that engagement was associated with positive employee health/morale and enhanced performance behaviors. The evidence was far from conclusive, suggesting a need for much more rigorous research focused on the specific challenges of public sector settings. We make recommendations for further research on this important topic, particularly with regards to understanding the connection between public service motivation and engagement and the need to examine engagement across different public sector/service contexts.

The meaning, antecedents and outcomes of employee engagement:a narrative synthesis

The claim that high levels of engagement can enhance organizational performance and individual well-being has not previously been tested through a systematic review of the evidence. To bring coherence to the diffuse body of literature on engagement, the authors conducted a systematic synthesis of narrative evidence involving 214 studies focused on the meaning, antecedents and outcomes of engagement. The authors identified six distinct conceptualizations of engagement, with the field dominated by the Utrecht Group's ‘work engagement’ construct and measure, and by the theorization of engagement within the ‘job demands–resources’ framework. Five groups of factors served as antecedents to engagement: psychological states; job design; leadership; organizational and team factors; and organizational interventions. Engagement was found to be positively associated with individual morale, task performance, extra-role performance and organizational performance, and the evidence was most robust in relation to task performance. However, there was an over-reliance on quantitative, cross-sectional and self-report studies within the field, which limited claims of causality. To address controversies over the commonly used measures and concepts in the field and gaps in the evidence-base, the authors set out an agenda for future research that integrates emerging critical sociological perspectives on engagement with the psychological perspectives that currently dominate the field.

The relationship between perceived training and development and employee retention:the mediating role of work attitudes

This paper considers how utilizing a model of job-related affect can be used to explain the processes through which perceived training and development influence employee retention. We applied Russell’s model of core affect to categorize four different forms of work attitude, and positioned these as mediators of the relationship between perceived training and development and intention to stay. Using data from 1,191 employees across seven organizations, multilevel analyses found that job satisfaction, employee engagement, and change-related anxiety were significantly associated with intention to stay, and fully mediated the relationship between perceived training and development and intention to stay. Contrary to our hypotheses, emotional exhaustion was not significantly associated with intention to stay nor acted as a mediator when the other attitudes were included. These findings show the usefulness of Russell’s model of core affect in explaining the link between training and development and employee retention. Moreover, the findings collectively suggest that studies examining employee retention should include a wider range of work attitudes that highlight pleasant forms of affect.

Family supportive work environment, perceptions of the employment relationship and employee work outcomes

Data obtained from employed parents and their supervisors (N=230) in twelve South Korean organizations were used to test a model of the antecedents and outcomes of organizational social exchange. Structural equation modeling (SEM) results showed family supportive supervisor and perceived organizational family support to be related to organizational social exchange. Additionally, organizational social exchange was shown to be related to contextual performance and work withdrawal but indirectly through organization-based self-esteem. We discuss the implications of these findings for managing the employee-organization relationship in an increasingly diverse workforce.

Hybridity in contemporary commercial organizations: implications for employee trust

This study advances the concept of organizational hybridity (OH). By doing so, it takes into account the individual level of analysis often neglected in organizational theory. More specifically, it aims to understand the implications of organizational hybridity for employees’ trust in contemporary commercial organizations. Informed and guided by current literature, this study argues that the current literature on organizational hybridity fails to adequately address the consequences of hybridity for employees' behaviour. The empirical study was conducted in 2014 using data collected via semi-structured interviews and document analysis. The study was based on a comparison of two case studies in Nigeria: Alter Securities Limited and Barak Petroleum Limited. A total of forty (40) interviews were conducted; twenty (20) from each organization. The data were analysed using thematic analysis. The main findings are that organizational hybridity in this study produced tensions that resulted in negative behavioural responses and employees’ distrust in the commercial hybrid organizations. However, employees’ identification with non-market orientated institutional logics such as family, philanthropic and religious logics is seen to facilitate their commitment, honesty, and trust in the organizations. Nevertheless, caution is required here as religious logics may also lead to an acceptance of unethical behaviour by employees. Overall, this study contributes to the literature on organizational hybridity by extending on Battilana and Lee’s (2014) framework, which highlights governance, leadership, organizational culture and intra-organizational relationships as core organizational attributes in the context of which issues may arise in commercial hybrid organizations. Furthermore, it addresses a gap in Besharov and Smith’s (2014) hybrid typology framework by providing an alternative line of argument focused on understanding how tensions manifest within commercial hybrid organizations. The key recommendations of this research underscore the need for commercial hybrid organizations to invest in mechanisms for improving employees’ trust so as to reap the benefits associated with trust. This could be achieved by involving employees in the decision-making process and clearly communicating the organizations’ values, so as to minimise the misinterpretation of the embodied institutional logics by employees.

Estrategias organizacionais para a promoção de saude e qualidade de vida : avaliando a qualidade de vida no trabalho

Universidade Estadual de Campinas . Faculdade de Educação Física

Avaliação isocinetica de joelho em jogadores de futebol categoria sub-20

Universidade Estadual de Campinas . Faculdade de Educação Física