Benjamin Schneider

This paper advocates for the value of open science in many areas of research. However, after briefly reviewing the fundamental principles underlying open science practices and their use and justification, the paper identifies four incompatibilities between those principles and scientific progress through applied research. The incompatibilities conc...

The paper proposes that industrial-organizational (I-O) psychology will benefit greatly from expanding our research focus from predominantly individual differences to studying organizational differences. We argue here that an increased organizational frame of reference on variables of interest to I-O psychology (e.g., selection, job design, perform...

Advice about enacting change in organizations often treats culture as malleable: With the right processes, the right structures, and sufficient managerial resolve, cultural change will happen. But OD practitioners often discover that there are limits to how much culture can be changed. In this article, we argue that culture, rather than shaping peo...

This special issue introduces new perspectives on emotional labor in the service context. That is, while service work has been a focus of much of the emotional labor research world, explication of the context in which that service work occurs (including the customers served, the leadership of those who serve, and the larger organizational context)...

The chapter summarizes the conceptual and empirical writing and research on organizational climate surveys that have strategic foci. Strategic foci means that such surveys contain items descriptive of organizational policies, practices, procedures, and behaviors that get rewarded, supported, and expected and that link directly with important strate...

Perceptions of the effectiveness of performance appraisal and feedback techniques are frequently neutral to negative. This chapter proposes that a focus on techniques for doing appraisal and feedback has been shortsighted and argues that the creation and maintenance of a context delivering honest and effective feedback—here called a feedback climat...

The commentary first briefly presents selected notes on the Chen et al. (In Press) excellent and inclusive article on primed goals and their effects. Then it suggests that there exist at least two major streams of research that are conceptually allied with the priming construct that can serve to expand the range and importance of the implications o...

Call for Papers for the special issue of SMR Emotional Labor and Service

This commentary heartily endorses the organizational frontlines (OF) construct proposed in the special issue of Journal of Service Research. The central goal of the commentary is to facilitate the interdisciplinary focus of the OF construct so appropriately emphasized in the special issue by focusing in on the role of people throughout a service or...

The study of 234 organizations shows that the key to performance management effectiveness is creating a performance feedback culture (PFC). PFC creates the necessary environment that determines whether managers feel compelled to deliver high-quality performance feedback to employees. Key findings: 1. Performance feedback culture has strong effects...

I have three issues I would like to add to Rotolo et al.’s (2018) arguments for research foci and with which academics must be concerned as we move forward. We must pay attention to all of what Rotolo et al. said plus at least my three additions if we are to compete with other fields playing in the talent management (TM) space. First, I will argue...

Based on a review of the history of the employee engagement construct and its measurement, we define workforce engagement as the aggregate of the work engagement experiences of individual employees in an organization. In contrast to most research on employee engagement, we study companies rather than individuals and the companies represent a divers...

Based on attraction–selection–attrition theory, human capital resources theory, person‐organization fit theory and organizational climate/culture strength theory we hypothesize that (1) Big 5 aggregate conscientiousness, emotional stability and agreeableness will be significantly related to organizational financial performance (only conscientiousne...

We review the literature on organizational climate and culture paying specific attention to articles published in the Journal of Applied Psychology (JAP) since its first volume in 1917. The article traces the history of the 2 constructs though JAP has been far more important for climate than culture research. We distinguish 4 main periods: the pre-...

Organizational climate refers to employees' shared perceptions of the policies, practices and procedures and the behaviors that get rewarded, supported, and expected in a work setting. As a distinct construct from individual work attitudes like job satisfaction, climate exists at the group or organization level of analysis, and captures the human e...

This article presents a personalized view of the history, development, and current shape of the related fields of industrial-organizational (I/O) psychology and organizational behavior (OB) by two authors who have personally experienced many of the events and changes that have occurred in these fields over the past 50 or so years. Particular attent...

Theory and research on service climate are synthesized, and an extensive agenda for future research is proposed. The service climate construct is first differentiated from conceptually related but distinct constructs, such as job satisfaction, service culture, and service orientation. Then a framework is presented based on prior research that displ...

Irwin L. Goldstein-known as Irv by everyone-was born in New York City on October 4, 1937 and died on March 18, 2013. Irv loved ideas, especially good theoretical ideas that had practical applications. He was both a scholar and a practitioner of industrial psychology. At various times, he was associate editor of both the Journal of Applied Psycholog...

The fields of organizational climate and organizational culture have co-existed for several decades with very little integration between the two. In Organizational Climate and Culture: An Introduction to Theory, Research, and Practice, Mark G. Ehrhart, Benjamin Schneider, and William H. Macey break down the barriers between these fields to encourag...

We develop a framework of service-unit behavior that begins with a unit's leader's service-focused behavior and progresses through intermediate links (service climate and customer-focused organizational citizenship behavior) to customer satisfaction and then unit sales. Data from a sample of 56 supermarket departments provide at least moderate supp...

We develop a framework in which internal employees’ diagnoses of their firm’s service climate determine their role behavior towards customers and, ultimately, customer satisfaction, loyalty, retention and shareholder value. Elements of the framework include: (1) foundation issues (fundamental human behavior issues like the presence of necessary res...

Explores the history of the essentialist individual model in personnel selection, the potential for adding to that model issues concerning group and organizational behavior. The 1st section discusses how the early study of individual differences, and the confluence of forces, or zeitgeist, from which that early study emerged, had a long-term impact...

Organizational climate and organizational culture theory and research are reviewed. The article is first framed with definitions of the constructs, and preliminary thoughts on their interrelationships are noted. Organizational climate is briefly defined as the meanings people attach to interrelated bundles of experiences they have at work. Organiza...

Selection research tends to occur in a vacuum with a disproportionate emphasis on individual-level validity, seemingly oblivious to the world and context around it. We argue that selection research will be enhanced, and probably will more likely be implemented, if scholars take context seriously. However, doing so requires a change in theory, metho...

Organizational climate research: Achievements and the road ahead The purpose of this chapter is to provide an introduction to the topic of organizational climate, setting the stage for more specific discussions of climate and culture in the remainder of the Handbook . This introduction covers two general topics: (1) major achievements in research o...

We lend theoretical insight to the service climate literature by exploring the joint effects of branch service climate and the internal service provided to the branch (the service received from corporate units to support external service delivery) on customer-rated service quality. We hypothesized that service climate is related to service quality...

The chapter presents a summary and extension of our book, Winning the Service Game, published in 1995 by Harvard Business School Press (Schneider & Bowen , 1995). We summarize the “rules of the game” we had presented there concerning the production and delivery primarily of consumer services and note several advances in thinking since we wrote th...

We propose service attributes as boundary conditions of the relationship between service climate and customer satisfaction. Drawing on service climate theory and research, the customer contact model of service delivery, typologies of service attributes, and relational coordination theory, we hypothesized that customer contact frequency, service int...

Providing both practical advice, tools, and case examples, Employee Engagement translates best practices, ideas, and concepts into concrete and practical steps that will change the level of engagement in any organization. Explores the meaning of engagement and how engagement differs significantly from other important yet related concepts like satis...

talking points - rethinking engagement in organizations;overt displays of energy - persistence, adaptability, proactivity and role expansion;people's urge to being competent and successful;employee engagement principles;engagement requiring supportive and fair work environment;engagement occurs - people use their important skills in a way aligned w...

Pre-Survey Diagnostic ActivitiesThe Engagement SurveySummary

How Engagement Makes a Difference and WhatEngagement IsHow an Engaged Workforce Creates Positive Financial Consequences for OrganizationsOn High Performance Work Environments: Four Principles for Creating an Engaged WorkforceThe Remainder of the Book

Disengagement: Early Unmet Expectations at WorkThe Nature and Trajectory of BurnoutEffective Coping With BurnoutAdditional Stress Factors and DisengagementRemedies and InterventionsResistance to Change and Engagement: Another Dark Side of EngagementHow Should Engagement Initiatives be Communicated?Conclusion

What is Organizational Culture?Creating a Culture for Engagement: How People are Valued in OrganizationsThe Role of Culture in Creating Strategic Employee EngagementSummary

Survey Results InterpretationSurvey Results FeedbackPreparing the Organization for Taking ActionHow Much Measurable Change is Possible?Actual Changes That Build and Maintain EngagementSummary

We present an open systems model that describes the processes and systems whose cumulative effects shape the human side of service delivery. The human side of service delivery, we believe, has received less attention in the service science literature than the more technical side. The open systems view of consumer service organizations focuses on in...

The climate for service is conceptualized and studied as a correlate of customer satisfaction and corporate financial and market performance, with customer satisfaction as a mediator of the climate-performance relationship. Brief reviews of relevant literatures yield three hypotheses: (1) customer satisfaction will be a significant correlate of org...

The construct of Human Resource (HR) Attributions is introduced. We argue that the attributions that employees make about the reasons why management adopts the HR practices that it does have consequences for their attitudes and behaviors, and ultimately, unit performance. Drawing on the strategic HR literature, we propose a typology of five HR-Attr...

We emphasize that science and practice issues are equally salient when pursuing thinking and research on employee engagement. We agree with much of what the commentaries have to say, especially that organizational competitive advantage is the relevant focus of engagement research and practice and that engagement is not a new construct but one that...

The meaning of employee engagement is ambiguous among both academic researchers and among practitioners who use it in conversations with clients. We show that the term is used at different times to refer to psychological states, traits, and behaviors as well as their antecedents and outcomes. Drawing on diverse relevant literatures, we offer a seri...

If personnel selection is to remain a vibrant and important discipline of organizational science, it must adopt multilevel theories, methods, and models. To believe that effective selection procedures contribute to organizational effectiveness is to believe that the implications of personnel selection extend across levels of analysis. And yet other...

[Excerpt] The perceived reasons why management chooses a set of HR practices are linked to employee satisfaction, commitment, and on-the-job behavior. Employees individually make their own attributions about the purposes behind the practices, which are, in turn, associated with employees’ attitudes: a perception that management cares about service...

This article reviews the dynamic evolution of personality research and practice in work organizations from the early 1900s through the present. The article reveals steady-state equilibrium in the world of practice. In contrast, the world of research is shown to be punctuated by rapid changes in conceptual foci, levels of analysis, and methodologica...

Drawing on the organizational justice, organizational climate, leadership and personality, and social comparison theory literatures, we develop hypotheses about the effects of leader personality on the development of three types of justice climates (e.g., procedural, interpersonal, and informational), and the moderating effects of these climates on...

This article conceptually and empirically explores the relationships among manager personality, manager service quality orientation, and climate for customer service. Data were collected from 1,486 employees and 145 managers in grocery store departments (N = 145) to test the authors' theoretical model. Largely consistent with hypotheses, results re...

M M J u l y / A u g u s t 2 0 0 7 R 29 C orporate service intelligence (CSI) is the degree to which a company is organized to provide extraordinary levels of service quality to its customers. Service quality is most visible at the front lines— where the company meets the customer—but the essence of CSI is in an organization's design, communications...

Legal regulations pose both opportunities and constraints that can influence behaviours in and of organizations. This article uses a multiple constituency perspective to examine one such influence. Data from 340 units of a US medical service firm indicate that different legally mandated types of doctor involvement in unit operations are significant...

[Excerpt] Despite the rapid growth in the diversity of service consumers—both abroad and domestically—theoretical developments regarding this diversity in the service world have lagged far behind those that have characterized the world of manufacturing. With regard to international services, Knight (1999) conducted a review of the literature and co...

[Excerpt] In what follows we present a systems model of discrimination at the level of the organization. We elaborate the model shown in Figure 1 and illustrate the ways in which aspects of organizations – including formal and informal structure, organizational culture, leadership, strategy, human resource systems, and organizational climates – may...

A framework for understanding the etiology of organizational behavior is presented. The framework is based on theory and research from interactional psychology, vocational psychology, I/O psychology, and organizational theory. The framework proposes that organizations are functions of the kinds of people they contain and, further, that the people t...

A review of literatures thought to be relevant for understanding situational contributions to ability-performance relationships was conducted. The review suggested that only three sets of variables, incentive systems, job characteristics, and leadership style/management philosophy (“climates”) have recieved research attention from an ability/situat...

Two major implications of the papers presented on understanding ability-performance relationships are presented: (a) The chances of finding statistically significant algebraic interactions of ability and other variables (race, sex, situation), in field settings are poor; and, (b) an explanation for why algebraic interaction terms are not generally...

The application of job analysis techniques makes the implicit assumption that information about a job as it presently exists may be used to develop programs to recruit, select, train, and appraise people for the job as it will exist in the future. Given a rapidly changing internal and external world it is likely that many jobs will change in the fu...

We develop a framework in which internal employees' diagnoses of their firm's service climate determine their role behavior towards customers and, ultimately, customer satisfaction, loyalty, retention and shareholder value. Elements of the framework include: (1) foun dation issues (fundamental human behavior issues like the presence of necessary re...

In this chapter, we illustrate the ways in which characteristics of organizations may contribute to or attenuate discrimination throughout the organization. Grounded within an open-systems model of organizations, we begin with a brief overview of environmental factors, such as the legal, economic, and social environment that serve as inputs into th...

The article discusses the impact of good human resource management (HRM) practices on services management. Services management is traditionally dominated by marketing and operations management although customer satisfaction is closely linked to the design of service organizations and HRM. The major contribution HRM has made to understanding service...

Employee attitude data from 35 companies over 8 years were analyzed at the organizational level of analysis against financial (return on assets; ROA) and market performance (earnings per share: EPS) data using lagged analyses permitting exploration of priority in likely causal ordering. Analyses revealed statistically significant and stable relatio...

The paper presents a case study of a bank illustrating how service excellence results from a tightly aligned and mutually reinforcing set of positive, service-focused internal human resource processes (training and development, teamwork, goals and rewards, and people). We introduce alignment as a central theme useful for thinking about how internal...

Personnel selection has a long and successful record for effectiveness in applied psychology. We propose that this record for effectiveness has been narrowly focused on the individual level of analysis, resulting in a lack of suitability for addressing conceptual and applied phenomena at unit (group, organizational) levels of analysis. The chapter...

The article represents a trait theory approach to the prediction of peer nominations of adolescent leaders in high school. It reports confirmation of earlier results [Leadership Q. 10 (1999) 609.] using teacher ratings of these same adolescents. Results generally confirmed the earlier results, finding similar significant predictors of peer leader n...

Climate strength was conceptualized within D. Chan's (1998) discussion of compositional models and the concept of culture strength from the organizational culture literature. Climate strength was operationalized in terms of within-group variability in climate perceptions-the less within-group variability, the stronger the climate. The authors studi...

Customer-contact employees are a critical asset of service organizations due to the interactive nature of service delivery. Customer-contact employees are boundary spanners who attempt to serve both internal and external constituents. Attempting to serve two masters can result in role conflict and the present effort presents and tests a framework f...

We cluster the issues raised by Ostroff and Schmitt and respond to these clusters rather than to the more detailed ways in which each raised them. These issues concerned: (1) the collection of job analysis information at higher units of analysis (e.g. teams), (2) the analysis of such job analysis information, (3) the use of such job analysis inform...

The paper argues that two traditions have dominated research on person–environment fit, the individual differences tradition and the organisational psychology tradition. I briefly review these traditions using the present set of papers as exemplars of these traditions. Then the inclusion of national cultural issues in person–environment fit researc...

In this paper a framework is developed in which internal employees' experiences of their firm's service quality emphasis (service climate or service culture) determine their role behaviour towards customers and, ultimately, customer satisfaction, loyalty and retention. Elements of the framework include: (a) foundation issues (fundamental human beha...

Within the framework of relationship marketing, the authors hypothesized that the degree to which customers’ expectations were disconfirmed for different service dimensions would place customers on different levels of a commitment ladder. The steps on the commitment ladder studied ranged from being a one-time patron of an organization (a “customer”...

We describe the first stage of a longitudinal research program concerned with the prediction, understanding, and durability of early displays of leadership behavior. The predictability of teachers' ratings of leadership behavior for 242 high school students was explored with respect to predictors from the following construct domains: personality, i...

We describe the first stage of a longitudinal research program concerned with the prediction, understanding, and durability of early displays of leadership behavior. The predictability of teachers' ratings of leadership behavior for 242 high school students was explored with respect to predictors from the following construct domains: personality, i...

Evidence indicates that satisfied customers defect at a high rate in many industries. Because satisfaction alone does not translate linearly into outcomes such as loyalty in terms of purchases, businesses must strive for 100 percent, or total, customer satisfaction and even delight to achieve the kind of loyalty they desire. Current studies attribu...

The authors discuss the dangers for organizations of focusing too much on a single organizational goal or constituent, including the potential for service organizations to overemphasize a focus on end user consumer service quality. Several examples of "too much of a good thing" are presented, including examples of too much emphasis on service quali...

A central proposition of attraction-selection-attrition theory (B. Schneider, 1987) and of the literature on organizational socialization was tested. Support for the hypothesis that organizations are relatively homogeneous with respect to the personality attributes of their managers was found. A multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) conducted...

A set of foundation issues that support employee work and service quality is conceptualized as a necessary but not sufficient cause of a climate for service, which in turn is proposed to be reflected in customer experiences. Climate for service rests on the foundation issues, but in addition it requires policies and practices that focus attention d...

A set of foundation issues that support employee work and service quality is conceptualized as a necessary but not sufficient cause of a climate for service, which in turn is proposed to be reflected in customer experiences. Climate for service rests on the foundation issues, but in addition it requires policies and practices that focus attention d...

Discusses lessons that the authors' experiences in the area of service quality have taught them about how to help a business develop into the kind of company that can deliver quality service to its customers. A theme running through the article is that becoming such a company is a multistage process that involves coordinating changes in many facets...

In the light of recent thinking about relationship marketing, we reinterpret two earlier studies showing significant correlations between employees' perceptions of their workplace and customers' perceptions of service quality. We ask, and answer in the affirmative, the following questions of the prior studies: (1) Does an organizational focus on th...

Discusses lessons that the authors' experiences in the area of service quality have taught them about how to help a business develop into the kind of company that can deliver quality service to its customers. A theme running through the article is that becoming such a company is a multistage process that involves coordinating changes in many facets...