Knowledge that Transforms

In this study, we examine the effects of two key variables associated with union effectiveness on the job performance of employees, and the mechanisms that explain such effects. More specifically, we investigate whether employees' perceptions that their union has a constructive relationship with management (industrial relations climate) and is able to act as an agent for their concerns (union instrumentality) promotes their job performance by enhancing their perceived job security and trust in management. Drawing on three waves of data from 303 employees and their immediate supervisors within 17 private enterprises in China, we find employees' perceptions of union effectiveness influence their job performance by enhancing both their perceived job security and trust in management. These findings are consistent with social exchange theory and conservation of resources theory. This article contributes to the literature by improving our understanding of how unions influence employees' work performance and by explaining how employees' perceptions of the industrial relations climate and union instrumentality influence their job performance. It also sheds light on the important issue of the effectiveness of unions in China, a country where the centrality of the Chinese Communist Party is often considered to have reduced the instrumentality of unions.

This research examines the relationship between innovation‐led strategy and innovation‐led HR policy (hereafter, management initiatives) and innovation performance. Our research model is theorized and tested in the Vietnamese context, based on the servant leadership theory and componential theory of creativity. We draw upon constructs of management initiatives, servant leadership, employee creativity, and firm innovation to hypothesize serial mediation mechanisms linking management initiatives to firm performance. Using a multilevel sample of 56 service firms, we conduct multilevel path analyses. We find that (a) individual‐level servant leadership mediates the top‐down relationship between management initiatives and employee creativity, (b) employee creativity mediates the bottom‐up relationship between individual‐level servant leadership and firm‐level innovation, and (c) firm‐level innovation mediates the bottom‐up relationship between employee creativity and firm‐level market performance. We conclude by discussing both theoretical and practical implications.

Idiosyncratic deals (i‐deals) have become an increasingly popular human resource management practice to attract, retain, and motivate employees. This is particularly true for those employees whose jobs require some level of creativity, as these types of jobs are often the ones that allow for or benefit most from these customized work arrangements. Using social cognitive theory that focuses on the development of self‐efficacy as a conduit between environmental cues and behavioral outcomes, we explored the relationships between two predominant types of i‐deals—developmental i‐deals and flexibility i‐deals—and employee creativity through the mediating effect of creative self‐efficacy (CSE). Results based on a study of 177 full‐time employees from three organizations supported our hypotheses for developmental i‐deals and employee creativity, with CSE fully mediating this relationship. We also discovered a curvilinear relationship between flexibility i‐deals and creativity in additional post hoc analyses. There are three main contributions of our work. First, using social cognitive theory, we explored an internal motivational mechanism (i.e., CSE) of these customized employment arrangements, adding to the more traditional use of social exchange theory in the extant literature. Second, we found that the two different types of i‐deals have differential effects on employees' creativity through the mediation mechanism of CSE. These results shed light on how the motivational properties of i‐deals differentially affect employee creativity and suggest that there may be alternative intervening mechanisms for flexibility i‐deals. Third, this study contributes to both the creativity and human resource management literatures by examining a new type of work condition, i‐deals, that could enable employees' creativity.

This study investigates the effect of training and development (T&D) on firm innovation. Given the inconsistent findings on the performance implications of T&D and the lack of studies on the T&D–innovation relationship, we elaborate the multiple dimensions of T&D, intermediate employee outcomes, and boundary conditions to elucidate the pathways of T&D toward firm innovation. We specifically identify two distinct T&D dimensions, namely, firm investment and employees’ positive perceptions. The former and the latter, respectively, reflect top‐down and bottom‐up approaches. We suggest that these two dimensions indirectly affect firm innovative performance by enhancing employees’ competence and commitment. We further hypothesize that T&D‐related contingencies (i.e., employees’ voluntary participation and T&D evaluation) moderate the indirect effects of T&D on firm innovative performance. We examine the current framework by using multisource data collected at three time points over a 5‐year period from 325 Korean organizations. Our analysis confirms that the positive indirect effect of T&D on firm innovative performance through employees’ competence and commitment becomes stronger (a) when employees voluntarily participate in T&D and (b) when firms do not implement T&D evaluation. This study provides useful and valid theoretical explanations and practical insights into the design and implementation of T&D in firms.

This study integrates social information processing theory with leadership and climate literature, and aims to produce novel theoretical insights into whether and how spiritual leadership and task uncertainty foster conditions to enhance meaningfulness climate and subsequent team effectiveness in China. Team effectiveness was operationalized as team performance and team organizational citizenship behavior (OCB). Based on data collected at three time points over 12 months from multiple sources of 123 teams in China, we found that spiritual leadership was positively related to team performance and team OCB through meaningfulness climate. Further, the relationship between spiritual leadership and meaningfulness climate was stronger for teams with high task uncertainty than teams with low task uncertainty.

Research on women's career equality and leadership is growing in importance for advancing social justice, equal employment opportunity, and global and national economic goals. Despite the increased attention being paid to gender equality for decades, progression has slowed or stalled around the globe, in many countries, such as United States. The goal of this special issue is to address the persistent research‐to‐practice gap in developing and implementing practical solutions for a positive change to advance women's career equality. In this introduction, we provide a brief overview of the approaches used to study women's careers and discuss how research and practices that are more inclusive of women's needs, values, and career experiences should be broadened to include more expansive and less‐gendered notions of careers. Then, we introduce the articles in the special issue that inform current directions in (a) career and leadership theory, research, and methodologies for gender equality and (b) the application of scholarship to organizations. We conclude with a summary of some lessons for future research and practice on closing the women's career‐equality gap.

We investigate the relationship between high‐commitment human resources (HCHR) practices and chief executive officer (CEO) charismatic leadership on voluntary employee turnover and relative performance to peers in a sample of 281 small firms. In this study, we expand upon prior conceptualizations of fit within the literature on strategic human resources (HR) to include the fit of HCHR with other aspects of the people management system. Specifically, we hypothesize a variety of relationships that may occur (e.g., positive synergistic, deadly combination, or substitution) and find that when a firm uses a system of HCHR practices and has a charismatic leader, performance is highest and turnover lowest. Conversely, when a firm does not invest in either, performance is lowest and turnover highest. We also found some support for a substitution effect as our data showed that when there is a mismatch between a firm's HR system and the leadership characteristics of the CEO, turnover is higher and performance lower than the high‐investment people management system (high HCHR and high‐charismatic leadership), but turnover is lower and performance higher than the low‐investment (low HCHR and low‐charismatic leadership) people management system.

Female representation at senior organizational levels lags well behind male representation. We investigate whether there is a positive nonlinear relationship between female board representation and female executive representation: the trickle‐down effect. We investigated 1,387 organizations listed on the Australian Securities Exchange between 2003 and 2012 and found the hypothesized nonlinear trickle‐down effect operating between board and executive levels. The trickle‐down effect was strongest after 1 year but still significant after 5 years. We investigated two potential moderators of the effect: organization size and gender diversity recommendations. There was no moderating effect of organization size, but contrary to expectations, gender diversity recommendations slowed the trickle‐down effect. Our findings suggest that organizations can address the paucity of women at senior organizational levels by starting at the top. Specifically, organizations making multiple appointments of female board members should expect improvements in female executive representation. However, the signaling and advocacy opportunities afforded by female board appointments may be less potent in the context of external interventions. Our findings contribute to the ongoing policy debate about the value of regulatory interventions to increase female representation at senior organizational levels and highlight the need for research on the unintended consequences of these interventions across national contexts.

With the growing global emphasis on welfare‐to‐work policies, an increasing number of people with disabilities (PWD) have entered the workforce. However, studies on PWD have focused primarily on company practices to accommodate PWD, with a limited understanding of factors affecting psychological integration of PWD into the workplace. This scarcity in research makes it difficult for managers to utilize the full work potential of PWD. To fill this research gap, the current study focuses on the job self‐efficacy of PWD and investigates how employee disability interacts with inclusion and team‐learning climate to affect job self‐efficacy, and in turn thriving at work. Using a sample of 485 employees in 114 teams, surveys found job self‐efficacy was a key intervening mechanism linking employee disability to thriving at work. These results suggest high workplace inclusion can buffer potential negative effects of disability at the individual level, strengthened further by a high team‐learning climate. The data supported a three‐way cross‐level interaction effect of disability, inclusion, and team‐learning climate on the thriving of employees with disabilities, through job self‐efficacy. Our results demonstrate the importance of inclusion and team‐learning climate to foster employee thriving in a diverse workforce.

Scholars and practitioners are making a strong business case for greater representation of women and other underrepresented groups on senior management teams and boards. A model is developed that highlights how to create optimal developmental networks—groups of developers who help advance people's careers and personal growth—that can assist in propelling diverse leaders into the upper echelons of their organizations and board positions. Several literature streams are integrated in order to identify developmental networks that will help diverse leaders overcome barriers to breaking the glass ceiling in greater numbers. Numerous strategies intended to shape diverse leaders' network structure and content are discussed, as are contextual challenges that may inhibit optimal networks' development. Lastly, theoretical and practical implications for individuals and organizations are highlighted.