Knowledge that Transforms

In this study, we examined how the dynamics of shared leadership are related to group performance. We propose that, over time, the expansion of shared leadership within groups is related to growth in group trust. In turn, growth in group trust is related to performance improvement. Longitudinal data from 142 groups engaged in a strategic simulation game over a 4-month period provide support for positive changes in trust mediating the relationship between positive changes in shared leadership and positive changes in performance. Our findings contribute to the literature on shared leadership and group dynamics by demonstrating how the growth in shared leadership contributes to the emergence of trust and a positive performance trend over time.

Perceived work ability refers to a worker's assessment of his or her ability to continue working in his or her job, given characteristics of the job along with his or her resources. Perceived work ability is a critical variable to study in the United States, given an aging workforce, trends to delay retirement, and U.S. policy considerations to delay the age at which full Social Security retirement benefits may be obtained. Based on the job demands-resources model, cognitive appraisal theory of stress, and push/pull factors related to retirement, we proposed and tested a conceptual model of antecedents and outcomes of perceived work ability using 3 independent samples of U.S. working adults. Data regarding workers' job characteristics were from self-report and Occupational Information Network measures. Results from relative importance analysis indicated that health and sense of control were consistently and most strongly related to work ability perceptions relative to other job demands and job and personal resources when perceived work ability was measured concurrently or 2 weeks later in samples with varying occupations. Job demands (along with health and sense of control) were most strongly related to work ability perceptions when perceived work ability was measured in a manufacturing worker sample 1.6 years later. Perceived work ability also predicted lagged labor force outcomes (absence, retirement, and disability leave) while controlling for other known predictors of each. Consistent indirect effects were observed from health status and sense of control to all 3 of these outcomes via perceived work ability.

In this article, some information about the data used in the article and a citation were not included. The details of the corrections are provided.] This study uses 3-level, 2-wave time-lagged data from a random sample of 55 high-technology firms, 238 teams, and 1,059 individuals in China to investigate a multilevel combinational model of employee creativity. First, we hypothesize that firm (macrolevel) high-commitment work systems are conducive to individual (microlevel) creativity. Furthermore, we hypothesize that this positive crosslevel main impact may be combined with middle-level (mesolevel) factors, including team cohesion and team task complexity, such that the positive impact of firm high-commitment work systems on individual creativity is stronger when team cohesion is high and the team task more complex. The findings from random coefficient modeling analyses provide support for our hypotheses. These sets of results offer novel insight into how firms can use macrolevel and mesolevel contextual variables in a systematic manner to promote employee creativity in the workplace, despite its complex nature.

Previous proactivity research has predominantly assumed that proactive personality generates positive environmental changes in the workplace. Grounded in recent research on personality development from a broad interactionist theoretical approach, the present article investigates whether work characteristics, including job demands, job control, social support from supervisors and coworkers, and organizational constraints, change proactive personality over time and, more important, reciprocal relationships between proactive personality and work characteristics. Latent change score analyses based on longitudinal data collected in 3 waves across 3 years show that job demands and job control have positive lagged effects on increases in proactive personality. In addition, proactive personality exerts beneficial lagged effects on increases in job demands, job control, and supervisory support, and on decreases in organizational constraints. Dynamic reciprocal relationships are observed between proactive personality with job demands and job control. The revealed corresponsive change relationships between proactive personality and work characteristics contribute to the proactive personality literature by illuminating more nuanced interplays between the agentic person and work characteristics, and also have important practical implications for organizations and employees.

The justice literature has paid considerable attention to the beneficial effects of fair behaviors for recipients of such behaviors. It is possible, however, that exhibiting fair behaviors may come at a cost for actors. In this article, we integrate ego depletion theory with organizational justice research in order to examine the consequences of justice behaviors for actors. We used an experience-sampling method in a sample of managerial employees to examine the relations of performing procedural justice and interpersonal justice behaviors with subsequent changes in actors' regulatory resources. Our results indicate that procedural justice behaviors are draining, whereas interpersonal justice behaviors are replenishing for actors. Depletion, in turn, adversely affected the performance of citizenship behavior, and depletion mediated relations of justice behavior with citizenship. Furthermore, 2 traits that impact self-regulatory skills--extraversion and neuroticism--moderated the replenishing effects of engaging in interpersonal justice behaviors. We conclude by discussing implications and avenues for future research.

This research tested the idea that the risk of exclusion from one's group motivates group members to engage in unethical behaviors that secure better outcomes for the group (pro-group unethical behaviors). We theorized that this effect occurs because those at risk of exclusion seek to improve their inclusionary status by engaging in unethical behaviors that benefit the group; we tested this assumption by examining how the effect of exclusion risk on pro-group unethical behavior varies as a function of group members' need for inclusion. A 2-wave field study conducted among a diverse sample of employees working in groups (Study 1) and a constructive replication using a laboratory experiment (Study 2) provided converging evidence for the theory. Study 1 found that perceived risk of exclusion from one's workgroup predicted employees' engagement in pro-group unethical behaviors, but only when employees have a high (not low) need for inclusion. In Study 2, compared to low risk of exclusion from a group, high risk of exclusion led to more pro-group (but not pro-self) unethical behaviors, but only for participants with a high (not low) need for inclusion. We discuss implications for theory and the management of unethical behaviors in organizations.

This article explores the role of within-person fluctuations in employees' daily surface acting and subsequent personal energy resources in the performance of organizational citizenship behaviors directed toward other individuals in the workplace (OCBI). Drawing on ego depletion theory (Muraven & Baumeister, 2000), we develop a resource-based model in which surface acting is negatively associated with daily OCBIs through the depletion of resources manifested in end-of-day exhaustion. Further integrating ego depletion theory, we consider the role of employees' baseline personal resource pool, as indicated by chronic exhaustion, as a critical between-person moderator of these within-person relationships. Using an experience-sampling methodology to test this model, we found that surface acting was indirectly related to coworker ratings of OCBI through the experience of exhaustion. We further found that chronic levels of exhaustion exacerbated the influence of surface acting on employees' end-of-day exhaustion. These findings demonstrate the importance of employees' regulatory resource pool for combating depletion and maintaining important work behaviors. Implications for theory and practice are discussed.

Taking a resource-based self-regulation perspective, this study examined afternoon emotional exhaustion as a mediator linking the within-person relations between morning work-family conflict and later employee displaced aggression in the work and family domains. In addition, it examined resource-related contextual factors as moderators of these relations. The theoretical model was tested using daily diary data from 125 employees. Data were collected at 4 time points during each workday for 3 consecutive weeks. Multilevel modeling analysis showed that morning family-to-work conflict was positively related to afternoon emotional exhaustion, which in turn predicted displaced aggression toward supervisors and coworkers in the afternoon and displaced aggression toward family members in the evening. In addition, morning workplace interpersonal conflict exacerbated the impact of morning work-to-family conflict on afternoon emotional exhaustion, whereas perceived managerial family support alleviated the impact of morning family-to-work conflict on afternoon emotional exhaustion. These findings indicate the importance of adopting a self-regulation perspective to understand work-family conflict at work and its consequences (i.e., displaced aggression) in both work and family domains.

Organizational justice has been shown to play an important role in employees' affective and performance outcomes particularly in uncertain contexts. In this study, we investigated the interaction effect of job insecurity and organizational justice on employees' performance, and examined the mediating role of work engagement from the perspective of uncertainty management theory. We used 2-wave data (Study 1) from a sample of 140 Chinese employees and 3-wave data (Study 2) from a sample of 125 Chinese employees to test our hypotheses. In Study 1, we found that when employees perceived low levels of organizational justice, job insecurity was significantly negatively related to job performance. In contrast, we found that job insecurity was not related to job performance when there were high levels of organizational justice. Study 2 again supported the interaction of job insecurity and organizational justice on job performance. Furthermore, it was found that work engagement mediated the interaction effect. The results of the mediated moderation analysis revealed that job insecurity was negatively associated with job performance through work engagement when organizational justice was low.

People often experience anxiety in the workplace. Across 6 studies, we show that anxiety, both induced and measured, can lead to self-interested unethical behavior. In Studies 1 and 2, we find that compared with individuals in a neutral state, anxious individuals are more willing (a) to participate in unethical actions in hypothetical scenarios and (b) to engage in more cheating to make money in situations that require truthful self-reports. In Studies 3 and 4, we explore the psychological mechanism underlying unethical behaviors when experiencing anxiety. We suggest and find that anxiety increases threat perception, which, in turn, results in self-interested unethical behaviors. Study 5 shows that, relative to participants in the neutral condition, anxious individuals find their own unethical actions to be less problematic than similar actions of others. In Study 6, data from subordinate-supervisor dyads demonstrate that experienced anxiety at work is positively related with experienced threat and unethical behavior. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of our findings.