Knowledge that Transforms

Work history information reflected in resumes and job application forms is commonly used to screen job applicants; however, there is little consensus as to how to systematically translate information about one's work-related past into predictors of future work outcomes. In this article, we apply machine learning techniques to job application form data (including previous job descriptions and stated reasons for changing jobs) to develop interpretable measures of work experience relevance, tenure history, and history of involuntary turnover, history of avoiding bad jobs, and history of approaching better jobs. We empirically examine our model on a longitudinal sample of 16,071 applicants for public school teaching positions, and predict subsequent work outcomes including student evaluations, expert observations of performance, value-added to student test scores, voluntary turnover, and involuntary turnover. We found that work experience relevance and a history of approaching better jobs were linked to positive work outcomes, whereas a history of avoiding bad jobs was associated with negative outcomes. We also quantify the extent to which our model can improve the quality of selection process above the conventional methods of assessing work history, while lowering the risk of adverse impact. (PsycINFO Database Record

Research on workplace recovery recognizes that employees must restore lost resources after work to improve their subsequent well-being and performance. Scholars have noted that employees' recovery experiences-psychological detachment, relaxation, mastery, and control-vary day-to-day, yielding crucial implications for the aforementioned outcomes. Yet, despite these important theoretical and empirical insights, researchers to date have not comprehensively examined multiple daily recovery experiences in conjunction, instead studying the unique effects of only 1 or 2 experiences in isolation. Using a person-centric view of employees' recovery experiences, the current study examines whether profiles of daily recovery experiences occur for employees, and how these profiles (a) vary in membership from one day to the next, (b) are differentiated by daily job demands and resources experienced at work, and (c) predict employee well-being and discretionary behaviors during the subsequent workday. Using experience sampling data from 207 full-time employees, results revealed 5 profiles of daily recovery experiences that exhibited distinct relations with within-person antecedents and outcomes. As such, the current investigation represents a necessary first step in understanding how employees jointly experience recovery in relation to their daily work and well-being. (PsycINFO Database Record

How and to what extent does extraversion relate to work relevant variables across the lifespan? In the most extensive quantitative review to date, we summarize results from 97 published meta-analyses reporting relations of extraversion to 165 distinct work relevant variables, as well as relations of extraversion's lower order traits to 58 variables. We first update all effects using a common set of statistical corrections and, when possible, combine independent estimates using second-order meta-analysis (Schmidt & Oh, 2013). We then organize effects within a framework of four career domains-education, job application, on the job, and career/lifespan-and five conceptual categories: motivations, values, and interests; attitudes and well-being; interpersonal; performance; and counterproductivity. Overall, extraversion shows effects in a desirable direction for 90% of variables (grand mean ρ̄ = .14), indicative of a small, persistent advantage at work. Findings also show areas with more substantial effects (ρ̄ ≥ .20), which we synthesize into four extraversion advantages. These motivational, emotional, interpersonal, and performance advantages offer a concise account of extraversion's relations and a new lens for understanding its effects at work. Our review of the lower order trait evidence reveals diverse relations (e.g., the positive emotions facet has consistently advantageous effects, the sociability facet confers few benefits, the sensation-seeking facet is largely disadvantageous), and extends knowledge about the functioning of extraversion and its advantages. We conclude by discussing potential boundary conditions of findings, contributions and limitations of our review, and new research directions for extraversion at work. (PsycINFO Database Record

The attention paid to intraindividual phenomena in applied psychology has rapidly increased during the last two decades. However, the design characteristics of studies using daily experience sampling methods and the proportion of within-person variance in the measures employed in these studies vary substantially. This raises a critical question yet to be addressed: are differences in the proportion of variance attributable to within- versus between-person factors dependent on construct-, measure-, design-, and/or sample-related characteristics? A multilevel analysis based on 1,051,808 within-person observations reported in 222 intraindividual empirical studies indicated that decisions about what to study (construct type), how to study it (measurement and design characteristics), and from whom to obtain the data (sample characteristics) predicted the proportion of variance attributable to within-person factors. We conclude with implications and recommendations for those conducting and reviewing applied intraindividual research. (PsycINFO Database Record

-the degree to which a scale's items correspond more to the construct's definition than to the definitions of other orbiting constructs. (PsycINFO Database Record

Drawing on conservation of resources theory (Hobfoll, 1989) and the model of proactive motivation (Parker, Bindl, & Strauss, 2010), this research employs experience sampling methods to examine how employees' off-job experiences during the evening relate to their proactive behavior at work the next day. A multilevel path analysis of data from 183 employees across 10 workdays indicated that various types of off-job experiences in the evening had differential effects on daily proactive behavior during the subsequent workday, and the psychological mechanisms underlying these varied relationships were distinct. Specifically, off-job mastery in the evening related positively to next-morning high-activated positive affect and role breadth self-efficacy, off-job agency in the evening related positively to next-morning role breadth self-efficacy and desire for control, and off-job hassles in the evening related negatively to next-morning high-activated positive affect; next-morning high-activated positive affect, role breadth self-efficacy, and desire for control, in turn, predicted next-day proactive behavior. Off-job relaxation in the evening related positively to next-morning low-activated positive affect, and off-job detachment in the evening had a decreasingly positive curvilinear relationship with next-morning low-activated positive affect. However, as expected, these two types of off-job experiences and low-activated positive affect did not relate to next-day proactive behavior. (PsycINFO Database Record

, an organization's use of current employees' social networks (referrers) to fill job openings with new hires (referred workers), is a popular organization practice. This topic has been studied for decades by scholars, and research remains vibrant across several disciplines. While reviews of recruitment methods and their influence on job seekers and organizations exist, they give minimal attention to employee referrals. This gap is critical because an assessment of the employee referral literature exposes numerous theories, deviations in methodological approaches, and other important nuances. The research developed, and emerging across different disciplines, is also disconnected, often overlooking promising findings from each other. Furthermore, the impact of technology and the changing nature of work requires a renewed attention to the methodological and theoretical underpinnings of the referring phenomenon. Our review integrates the multidisciplinary literature to address important knowledge gaps and confront the underlying complexities of the referral hiring phenomenon. We review 101 relevant referral hiring studies from 86 published and unpublished articles across a variety of disciplines, and, in the process, we develop a model of employee referral hiring in organizations. This model portrays the pathways and contextual variables that describe the referring process (e.g., referrer motivations, the hiring process, and referrer and referred worker outcomes). Last, we advance an agenda for future research on this promising topic. (PsycINFO Database Record

This study expands our understanding of the negative impact of work demands on work outcomes by examining this impact in light of the family domain. We explore how the family domain plays a role in this process by considering mechanisms that capture both spillover and crossover effects. We investigate the spillover of work demands (i.e., role conflict and role overload) through work-to-family conflict on work attitudes (i.e., job satisfaction and affective commitment) and self-reported work behaviors (i.e., citizenship behavior and absenteeism). We also consider the double crossover of work demands through work-to-family conflict to stress transmission, and back to the incumbent's family-to-work conflict on both attitudinal and behavioral work outcomes to examine the impact of work demands. Using a time-lagged matched sample of 389 dual career couples, we found spillover effects for the work attitudes and crossover effects for the work behaviors, suggesting work demands uniquely shape outcomes depending on the path they take. We close by offering implications for research and practice. (PsycINFO Database Record

The inflow of immigrants challenges organizations to consider alternative selection procedures that reduce potential minority (immigrants)-majority (natives) differences, while maintaining valid predictions of performance. To deal with this challenge, this paper proposes response format as a practically and theoretically relevant factor for situational judgment tests (SJTs). We examine a range of response format categories (from traditional multiple-choice formats to more innovative constructed response formats) and conceptually link these response formats to mechanisms underlying minority-majority differences. Two field experiments are conducted with SJTs. Study 1 (274 job seekers) contrasts minority-majority differences in scores on a multiple-choice versus a written constructed response format. Written constructed responses produce much smaller minority-majority differences (d = .28 vs. d = .92). In Study 2 (269 incumbents), scores on a written constructed versus an audiovisual constructed format are compared. The audiovisual format further reduces minority-majority differences (d = .09 vs. d = .41), with validities remaining the same. Results are suggestive of cognitive load as a contributor to the reduction in minority-majority differences, as are rater effects: Scores of raters evaluating transcribed audiovisual responses, which anonymized test takers, produce larger differences. In sum, altering response modality via more realistic response formats (i.e., the audiovisual constructed format) leads to significant reductions in minority-majority differences without impairing criterion-related validity. Implications for selection theory and practice are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record

Although gratitude is a key phenomenon that bridges helping with its outcomes, how and why helping relates to receipt of gratitude and its relation with helper's eudaimonic well-being have unfortunately been overlooked in organizational research. The purpose of this study is to unravel how helpers successfully connect to others and their work via receipt of gratitude. To do so, we distinguish different circumstances of helping-reactive helping (i.e., providing help when requested) versus proactive helping (i.e., providing help without being asked)-and examine their unique effect on the gratitude received by helpers, which, in turn, has downstream implications for helpers' perceived prosocial impact and work engagement the following day. Using daily experience sampling (Study 1) and critical incident (Study 2) methods, we found that reactive helping is more likely to be linked to receipt of gratitude than proactive helping. Receipt of gratitude, in turn, is associated with increases in perceived prosocial impact and work engagement the following day. Our study contributes to the helping literature by identifying receipt of gratitude as a novel mechanism that links helping to helper well-being, by distinguishing proactive and reactive helping, and by highlighting eudaimonic well-being as an outcome of helping for helpers. (PsycINFO Database Record