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When Things Go From Bad to Worse: The Impact of Relative Contextual Extremity on Benjamin Montgomery’s Positive Leadership and Psychological Capital
Abstract
Drawing from positive organizational behavior, psychological capital has been shown to be a beneficial resource allowing leaders to remain positive and future-oriented. While having hope, optimism, confidence, and resilience are particularly effective in periods of great risk and uncertainty, extreme environments likely affect leaders’ psychological capital, as evidenced by changes to these comprising factors. Answering several recent calls for historical and narrative-based approaches to leadership in extreme events, we use content analysis and historiometrics in the case of Benjamin Montgomery, the first African American plantation owner in the post–Civil War U.S. South, who faced a sequence of extreme events after purchasing the plantation on which he was formerly a slave. We triangulate our examination through the letters Montgomery penned to his former owner Joseph Davis—the older brother of Confederacy President Jefferson Davis, records on the focal actors, and historical documents from the period. We then reconstruct and examine the relative contextual severity and its impact on Montgomery’s psychological capital across a 6-year period directly following the Civil War (1865-1870). We find that while unfamiliar extreme episodes erode leader psychological capital, those resources are restored when such periods are overcome and experience is gained. We also reconsider psychological capital as a profile multidimensional construct and show underlying pairs of dimensions, which we label as overt positivity (optimism and resilience) and realistic positivity (hope and confidence), trend similarly yet remain distinct from the other pair. The implications of these findings and future directions are then discussed.
... Positive leadership traits like realistic positivism (Baur et al., 2018) and simplism (Imam et al., 2020) is much needed for dealing with challenges in the constantly changing world of work. ...
... Originating in positive psychology, psychological capital is a higher-order construct comprised of four first-order constructs: self-efficacy, hope, optimism, and resilience. Team members high in psychological capital can more effectively address problems, cope with uncertainty, overcome challenges, and inspire others through a contagion effect (Baur et al., 2018). Psychological capital is a resource that allows teammates to remain positive despite obstacles and to serve as role models for others (Gooty et al., 2009). ...
The purpose of this article is to conceptualize a novel theoretical occurrence—team physical activity (PA)—and its relevance for researchers and organizations. By building a testable model of the consequences and contingencies of team PA, we integrate the science of teamwork with the scholarly domain of employee health and well-being. Hence, we clarify the construct of team PA, present a three-dimensional typology, and outline a model drawing on neuroscience, positive organizational behavior, and teams research. Our propositions and subsequent discussion proffer an outline of potential benefits for organizations when they increase the utility and frequency of team PA. We also suggest ways in which researchers can advance scholarship in this area.
... Economic research on the effect of unemployment on wellbeing indicates the impact of factors such as level of unemployment, the social norm to work, and social security systems (Carroll, 2007;Helliwell & Huang, 2014). This may not only affect the amount of psychological capital unemployed individuals possess given that context tends to not just influence the amount of psychological capital (Baur et al., 2018), but also how they apply it in coping with the uncertainties they face as a result of being unemployed or having a precarious job or the uncertainties of doing business. Accordingly, we expected the unemployed to report lower levels of psychological capital than their counterparts in salaried and self-employment. ...
The unemployed, as well as individuals in self and salaried employment, face several work-related risks and uncertainties which can result in diminished psychological wellbeing especially for individuals with high ambiguity intolerance. However, positive psychology literature suggests that individuals with strong psychological resources can be resilient in difficult circumstances. Using a sample of 922 individuals (including 240 unemployed, 391 salary-employed, and 291 self-employed) from Uganda and Kenya, we investigated the moderating effects of locus of control and psychological capital on the association between ambiguity intolerance and eudaimonic wellbeing, comparing the unemployed with individuals in salaried and self-employment. Our findings indicated that ambiguity intolerance and external locus of control are negatively associated with eudaimonic wellbeing. Conversely, internal locus of control and psychological capital were positively associated with eudaimonic wellbeing. The moderation analysis revealed that whereas an external locus of control boosts the negative effects of ambiguity intolerance on eudaimonic wellbeing, internal locus of control and psychological capital buffer against the negative effects of ambiguity intolerance on eudaimonic wellbeing. Differences between employment status groups and implications are discussed.
... Also, high PsyCap individuals are high in resilience which means that they can recover from threatening situations quickly and easily (Baur et al. 2018). We assert that since high PsyCap individuals have high resilience when faced with insulting and degrading behaviors like bullying, these individuals will positively cope up and continue putting in their utmost efforts, which results in eustress. ...
The present study expands the literature on bullying by unveiling why and when bullying might produce positive outcomes. Employing the cognitive appraisal theory of stress and coping, we hypothesize eustress as an important mechanism through which bullying might enhance the victim's job performance, career success, and creativity. Moreover, we hypothesized psychological capital as a moderator in the workplace bullying‐eustress relationship. We collected temporally segregated field data at three time intervals with a time lag of 2–3 weeks from matched data of employees and their fellow peers (n = 321) belonging to the service sector of Pakistan. Utilizing PROCESS macro, the results substantiated our hypothesized moderated mediation model, in that workplace bullying led to higher performance, career success and employee creativity through the mechanism of eustress and this indirect effect was stronger for individuals who possessed higher psychological capital. Our study opens up a new avenue in the workplace bullying literature by emphasizing the different side of bullying in an eastern cultural context. Key points Employee perception plays a key role in understanding workplace bullying and its outcomes. Workplace bullying, if perceived as a challenge, can result in positive outcomes. Stress is not always negative. In fact, eustress can be beneficial for the employees. Workplace bullying increases eustress which results in increased job performance, employee creativity, and career success. Employees with high psychological capital show eustress as a result of workplace bullying.
... We engaged in a close textual analysis of 12 of these corporate histories so as to obtain a better understanding of the reasons for their creation, their target readership, and the nature of the material that recurs frequently in many shashi. Recent works in management have demonstrated that historical and narrative-based approaches based on a quantitative content analysis can contribute our understanding of management phenomena (Baur et al. 2018). However, given the vast number of corporate histories that have been published in Japan, the researchers could not hope to read more than a tiny fraction of these books. ...
The seminal work on rhetorical history has inspired the production of an extensive body of research on how firms use history. However, the existing research is based on the experience of firms in a handful of Western countries. Our mixed-methods paper examines the use of history by Japanese firms so that we can see how history is used in a very different institutional and cultural context. The paper operationalizes the comparative capitalism approached developed. .For more than a century, Japanese firms have invested extensively in celebratory corporate histories called shashi. The paper is based on bibliometric and interview data as well as the close textual analysis of shashi from various decades. We show that until recently the main function of shashi was to inspire loyalty on the part of workers. We argue that the post-2000 decline in shashi production is primarily a function of profound changes in the nature of the Japanese variety of capitalism .. The relation between the change in governance and the use of corporate history is revealed by the new style of consumer-focused shashi that has emerged since 2000.
In the field of management and psychology, recent years have seen increased interest in the topic of leadership profiles. This research contains a bibliometric analysis followed by a literature review with a narrative approach on servant and positive leadership, using rstudio software with the bibliometrix function package, aiming to respond better to the volume of data. The bibliometrics resulted in identifying forms of grouping, the first by thematic mapping and the second by bibliographic coupling joined by keywords. The result provides an interpretative view of the data and recognises that the two leadership profiles are at different stages, highlighting the development of the servant leadership profile, which has a broad list of scale items and measuring factors, while positive leadership does not yet have well-delimited and developed constructs. As an initial contribution, gaps in the literature are indicated regarding the most appropriate behaviour for leaders at times of crisis, the possibility of studying the transversal nature of the dimensions of servant and positive leadership, and finally, the need to extend the scope of knowledge of the positive leader profile.
Deviance can impact team performance but it is unclear how this process unfolds. Common measures delineate between interpersonal and organizational deviance rather than considering the impact felt by teammates. Instead, we categorize deviant acts into team-relevant and team-irrelevant measures. We then consider how deviance severity and frequency impact affective states and team performance. Guided by affective events theory’s focus on work events shaping emotional reactions and subsequent behaviors, we suggest that deviant acts that are negative work events increase negative affect and harm team performance, particularly when frequent. Team-irrelevant deviance is not a negative work event and thus should not impact team affect or performance. Within team-relevant deviance, because severe forms are objectively wrong and punished severely, teammates can overcome them whereas subtle and clandestine minor forms harm the team the most, especially when frequent. Support was found within 1114 recorded deviant acts from 435 employees in 114 organizational teams.
This exploratory study proposes a conceptual framework based on the dynamic capabilities approach (DCA) to advance the understanding of firms' responses to turbulence, illustrated by the Brexit phenomenon. The case of wine producers is examined, with a particular focus on perceived impacts of and responses to Brexit among wineries predominantly involved in exports. Data from 281 mainly micro and small exporting Italian and Spanish winery firms were gathered. Various differences emerged in how both groups of businesses perceived Brexit's impacts, and how they planned to respond. Some of these ways revealed principles associated with the DCA, such as possessing critical organizational resources, notably, tangible, intangible, and human to create capabilities. Furthermore, while various comments denoted indecisiveness and uncertainty, others underscored the vital need to exploit opportunities through engaging with new international consumer markets. Overall, the proposed framework facilitates an in‐depth understanding of winery entrepreneurs' strategic behavior in response to turbulent situations.
This paper analyzes the role of transparency and credibility in accounting for the widely divergent macroeconomic effects of three episodes of deliberate monetary contraction: the post-Civil War deflation, the post-WWI deflation, and the Volcker disinflation. Using a dynamic general equilibrium model in which private agents use optimal filtering to infer the central bank's nominal anchor, we demonstrate that the salient features of these three historical episodes can be explained by differences in the design and transparency of monetary policy, even without any time variation in economic structure or model parameters. For a policy regime with relatively high credibility, our analysis highlights the benefits of a gradualist approach (as in the 1870s) rather than a sudden change in policy (as in 1920-21). In contrast, for a policy institution with relatively low credibility (such as the Federal Reserve in late 1980), an aggressive policy stance can play an important signalling role by making the policy shift more evident to private agents.
Leading in in extremis situations, when lives are in peril, remains one of the least addressed areas of leadership research. Little is known about how leaders make sense in these dangerous situations and communicate these contexts to others. Because most of the literature on in extremis is theoretical, we sought empirical evidence of how sensemaking proceeds in practice. A qualitative study was conducted based on interviews with 30 Army leaders who had recently led teams in combat. Our findings suggest that during these life-threatening situations, sensemaking and sensegiving are actually occurring simultaneously, the type of training leaders receive is critical, and a sense of duty can influence a person’s role as a leader. Our findings have implications for both theory and practice since crisis leadership is now a coveted executive quality for leadership competency.
Positivity has been heralded for its individual benefits. However, how positivity dynamically unfolds within the temporal flow of team interactions remains unclear. This is an important oversight, as positivity can be key to team problem solving and performance. In this study, we examine how team micro-processes affect the likelihood of positivity occurring within dynamic team interactions. In doing so, we build on and expand previous work on individual positivity and integrate theory on temporal team processes, interaction rituals, and team problem solving. We analyze 43,139 utterances during the meetings of 43 problem-solving teams in two organizations. First, we find that the observed overall frequency of positivity behavior in a team is positively related to managerial ratings of team performance. Second, using statistical discourse analysis, we show that solution-focused behavior and previous positivity within the team interaction process increase the likelihood of subsequent positivity expressions, whereas positivity is less likely after problem-focused behavior. Dynamic speaker switches moderate these effects, such that interaction instances involving more speakers increase the facilitating effects of solutions and earlier positivity for subsequent positivity within team interactions. We discuss the theoretical and managerial implications of micro-level team positivity and its performance benefits.
Conflict is inherent whenever employees are required to work interdependently, such as within workplace teams. Yet in the face of such conflict, some teams thrive, whereas others suffer. As team-based tasks continue to increase in popularity, it is imperative that an examination of the underlying boundary conditions be undertaken to better assess under which circumstances team performance improves because of conflict, or the negative effects of conflict are minimized. Therefore, we seek to advance research and benefit practicing managers through a comprehensive review of the research that has examined contingencies in the relationship between conflict and performance in teams in order to better understand when disagreements among team members might improve, rather than harm, team performance. Specifically, we utilize a triumvirate approach to organize our review around 2 foundational theories of team conflict—complexity and information processing—as well as a more recent theoretical advance—the theory of conflict expressions. In doing so, we seek to create a deeper understanding of beneficial conflict by systematically categorizing the empirical and theoretical advances in this line of research while also identifying opportunities for future research.
This chapter explores the role context has played in leadership research over the last 100 years and offers a historical description of diverse perspectives and understandings of this interplay. To this end, we offer three approaches to studying context of leadership: (1) leadership as “nested” in hierarchy or (2) leadership as “pervasive” in social systems (e.g., organizations) and (3) leadership as a combination of (1) and (2), or “hybrid” approaches. We follow the development of each approach from the onset to today and offer alternative avenues for future research. In doing so, we hope not just to challenge some of the current assumptions, but offer a richer theoretical depiction and inspire continuous progress toward a more complete understanding of leadership and leadership effectiveness.
Proposed as a theory of motivation, the basic tenet of conservation of resources (COR) theory is that humans are motivated to protect their current resources and acquire new resources. Despite its recent popularity in the organizational behavior literature, several criticisms of the theory have emerged, primarily related to the central concept of resources. In this review, we address concerns regarding the conceptualization, conservation, acquisition, fluctuation, and measurement of resources. We highlight gaps in the COR literature that can be addressed by integrating research from other areas of psychology and management. In this manner, we hope to push the COR literature forward by resolving several concerns and providing suggestions for future research that might address other concerns.
Purpose
– The purpose of this paper was to identify examples of management lore currently in the organizational sciences.
Design/methodology/approach
– The authors deliberated and developed a series of examples of management lore in the organizational sciences and surveyed management practitioners concerning their beliefs in the lore hypothesized.
Findings
– Pervasive beliefs that conflict with academic research exist in management practices. Although many of these ideas are commonly accepted as immutable facts, they may be based upon faulty logic, insufficient understanding of academic research, anecdotal evidence and an overdependence upon common sense. Buckley and Eder (1988) called these as examples of management lore. In this conceptual paper, we identify and discuss 12 examples of management lore that persist in day-to-day management practices. Topics we explore include personality, emotional intelligence, teams, compensation, goals, performance, work ethic, creativity and organizational citizenship behaviors.
Originality/value
– A number of areas in which academic research gainsays what we believe to be an immutable fact.
Nelson Mandela and other political prisoners from South Africa were imprisoned on notorious Robben Island from the mid-1960s until the end of the apartheid regime in 1991. The stark conditions and abusive treatment of these prisoners has been widely publicized. However, upon reflection and in retrospect, over the years, a type of metamorphosis occurred. Primarily drawing from firsthand accounts of the former prisoners and guards, it seems that Robben Island morphed from the traditional oppressive prison paradigm to one where the positively oriented prisoners disrupted the institution with a resulting climate of learning and transformation that eventually led to freedom and the end of apartheid. At a macro level of analysis, we use the theoretical lens of institutional work, and, at a micro level, positive psychological capital (hope, efficacy, resiliency, and optimism) to explain what happened. This metamorphosis led to one of, if not the greatest, societal transformations in modern history. We conclude by discussing some implications and lessons learned for organizational scholars and practitioners.
A single factor, seven-level, repeated measures, unbalanced experiment was conducted with 191 college undergraduates to test Boal and Bryson's (1988) assertions that: (1) there are at least two forms of charismatic leadership under crisis conditions—visionary and crisis-responsive; and (2) once the crisis condition has abated, the effects of crisis-responsive leadership deteriorate comparatively faster than other forms of charismatic leadership. The experiment consisted of four crisis condition leadership treatments (crisis-responsive, visionary under crisis, exchange under crisis, and low expressiveness under crisis) and three no-crisis condition leadership treatments (visionary no crisis, exchange no crisis, and low expressiveness no crisis) at time one followed by low expressiveness no crisis at time two. Two graduate student “leaders” who memorized carefully prepared scripts delivered the leadership treatments. Analysis consisted of 28 a priori comparisons of cell means and repeated measures ANOVA to determine significant main effects as well as interactions. We found support for our hypothesis that there are two forms of charisma (visionary and crisis-responsive) and that, in the absence of crisis, the effects of crisis responsive charisma decay faster than do the effects of visionary charisma.
Applying individual-level constructs to higher levels of analysis can be a fruitful practice in organizational research. Although this practice is beneficial in developing and testing theory, there are measurement and validation concerns that, if improperly addressed, may threaten the validity and utility of the research. This article illustrates how computer-aided text analysis might be utilized to facilitate construct elevation while ensuring proper validation. Specifically, we apply a framework to develop organizational-level operationalizations of individual-level constructs using the psychological capital construct as an example.
Charismatic leadership has been largely overlooked by organizational theorists. In part, the problem can be attributed to the lack of a systematic conceptual framework Drawing from political science, sociology, and social psychology, this paper addresses the problem by proposing a model linking organizational contexts to charismatic leadership. A series of research hypotheses is offered.
This article reviews the leadership literature from 1990–2005 in twenty-one major journals in order to determine the nature and extent of attention to the organizational context as a factor affecting leaders' behavior and their effectiveness. Both conceptual and empirical articles were rated as having “moderate/strong,” “slight,” or “no” emphasis on the organizational context. Those articles classified in the moderate/strong category were analyzed under seven organizational context components. Suggestions are included for improving the breadth and depth of empirical knowledge about the interaction of leadership and the organizational context.
Even several years after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, many organizations are ill-prepared to deal with crises, often opting to deal with them only after the fact. InCode Red in the Boardroom, Tim Coombs argues that crisis management should be a variety of activities that the organization performs daily to prevent crises from occurring. He defines the types of crises an organization might experience (both internal and external), draws from a wide variety of case examples, and showcases cutting-edge techniques that are being tested in the public and private sectors to demonstrate how crisis management can be hardwired into the corporate DNA, so that sensing, preventing, and responding quickly to crises become everyone's responsibility. In the process, he explores evolving roles for executives, managers, and front-line employees in communicating and implementing crisis plans. Ultimately, the book shows readers how proactive crisis management makes the company stronger, more resilient, and adaptable to change. A glossary of key terms and templates for establishing a crisis management program make this book an essential resource for all organizations.
Even several years after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, many organizations delude themselves about crisis management. Some enterprises, especially smaller ones, still believe that a crisis cannot happen to them. Others have gone through the steps of creating a crisis management plan, but really pay no more than lip service to the program, and may, in fact, be creating a false sense of security that leaves the company even more vulnerable to attack, accident, crime, or other sources of crisis. Tim Coombs argues that crisis management should not just be something you do when a crisis hits. It should be a variety of activities that the organization performs daily to prevent crises from ocurring.
InCode Red in the Boardroom, Coombs defines the types of crises an organization might experience (both internal and external), draws from a wide variety of case examples, and showcases cutting-edge techniques that are being tested in the public and private sectors to demonstrate how crisis management can be hardwired into the corporate DNA—so that sensing, preventing, and responding quickly to crises become everyone's responsibility. In the process, he explores evolving roles for executives, managers, and front-line employees in communicating and implementing crisis plans. Ultimately, the book shows readers how proactive crisis management makes the company stronger, more resilient, and adaptable to change. A glossary of key terms and templates for establishing a crisis management program make this book an essential resource for all organizations.
This paper focuses on dynamic capabilities and, more generally, the resource‐based view of the firm. We argue that dynamic capabilities are a set of specific and identifiable processes such as product development, strategic decision making, and alliancing. They are neither vague nor tautological. Although dynamic capabilities are idiosyncratic in their details and path dependent in their emergence, they have significant commonalities across firms (popularly termed ‘best practice’). This suggests that they are more homogeneous, fungible, equifinal, and substitutable than is usually assumed. In moderately dynamic markets, dynamic capabilities resemble the traditional conception of routines. They are detailed, analytic, stable processes with predictable outcomes. In contrast, in high‐velocity markets, they are simple, highly experiential and fragile processes with unpredictable outcomes. Finally, well‐known learning mechanisms guide the evolution of dynamic capabilities. In moderately dynamic markets, the evolutionary emphasis is on variation. In high‐velocity markets, it is on selection. At the level of RBV, we conclude that traditional RBV misidentifies the locus of long‐term competitive advantage in dynamic markets, overemphasizes the strategic logic of leverage, and reaches a boundary condition in high‐velocity markets. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Scholars and practitioners alike have recognized that younger workers, collectively known as Millennials or GenMe, are different from workers in prior generations. Employees of this generation hold different expectations regarding the centrality of work to their lives and bring different personalities and attitudes to the workforce. As the number of Millennials in the workforce grows each year, the divide between them and their older counterparts become more salient and pose unique challenges for organizational leaders. In this paper, we explore how these changes may force the need for reconsideration of five of the most frequently used leadership theories in an effort to understand important boundary conditions and how leadership research must evolve to keep pace with a changing workforce.
This paper focuses on dynamic capabilities and, more generally, the resource-based view of the firm. We argue that dynamic capabilities are a set of specific and identifiable processes such as product development, strategic decision making, and alliancing. They are neither vague nor tautological. Although dynamic capabilities are idiosyncratic in their details and path dependent in their emergence, they have significant commonalities across firms (popularly termed 'best practice'). This suggests that they are more homogeneous, fungible, equifinal and substitutable than is usually assumed. In moderately dynamic markets, dynamic capabilities resemble the traditional conception of routines. They are detailed, analytic stable processes with predictable outcomes. In contrast, in high-velocity markets, they are simple, highly experiential and fragile processes with unpredictable outcomes. Finally, well-known learning mechanisms guide the evolution of dynamic capabilities. In moderately dynamic markets, the evolutionary emphasis is on variation. In high-velocity markets, it is on selection. At the level of REV, we conclude that traditional REV misidentifies the locus of long-term competitive advantage in dynamic markers, overemphasizes the strategic logic of leverage, and reaches a boundary condition in high-velocity markets. Copyright (C) 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Psychological capital: Investing and developing positive organizational behavior Several years ago, a growing number of psychologists became concerned that the field had overemphasized the negative at the sacrifice of the positive. In seeking the illusive solutions of healing mental illness and dysfunctional behavior, both academic and practicing psychologists had almost completely ignored strengths and developing and helping healthy, productive people reach even higher levels of functioning. The field had largely ignored the elements that contribute to flourishing, instead focusing on what made individuals fail. The jump start for a more positive psychology came in 1998 when then president of the American Psychological Association Martin Seligman challenged the field to better understand what was right with people instead of solely concentrating on what was wrong with people (Seligman and Csikszentmihalyi, 2000; Sheldon and King, 2001). Indeed, what Seligman was calling for was a more balanced approach to studying what constituted the ...
This study sought to investigate whether leaders tend to adapt their leadership style, within the full range of leadership model, between normal and extreme event firefighting contexts; as well as assess the extent these leadership styles are related to followers’ performance across both contexts. The correlational research design was coupled with a cross-sectional retrospective survey using hierarchical regression analysis. Results indicated that transactional contingent reward leadership style was the dominant predictor of followers’ performance in extreme events. Results showed that in normal contexts, transformational leadership style was the dominant predictor of followers’ performance. Leader behaviors tended to change (adapt) between normal contexts and extreme events, as the same leaders were less transformational in their behaviors in extreme events as compared with normal contexts. Theoretical and practical implications for adaptive leadership responses are discussed along with recommendations for future research.
Charismatic rhetoric represents an important tool for leaders to articulate their respective visions. However, much of the research to date on this construct has yet to consider how the eight separate dimensions of charismatic rhetoric may be used in conjunction with one another to form distinctive profiles of charismatic leadership influence. Thus, the present investigation explored the interplay of the individual dimensions using content analysis of the 1960-2012 United States presidential debates. Cluster analysis revealed the emergence of four distinctive rhetorical strategies, one of which was more strongly related to the prediction of influence success as measured by presidential election outcomes. Results suggest that conceptualizing charismatic rhetoric as a multidimensional profile construct represents a valuable area for subsequent research on charismatic rhetoric, and several possible directions are suggested.
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On many occasions, organizational science research has been referred to as fragmented and disjointed, resulting in a literature that is, in the opinion of many, difficult to navigate and comprehend. One potential explanation is that scholars have failed to comprehend that organizations are complex and intricate systems. In order to move us past this morass, we recommend that researchers extend beyond traditional rational, mechanistic, and variable-centered approaches to research and integrate a more advantageous pattern-oriented approach within their research program. Pattern-oriented methods approximate real-life phenomena by adopting a holistic, integrative approach to research wherein individual- and organizational-systems are viewed as non-decomposable organized wholes. We argue that the pattern-oriented approach has the potential to overcome a number of breakdowns faced by alternate approaches, while offering a novel and more representative lens from which to view organizational- and HRM-related issues. The proposed incorporation of the pattern-oriented approach is framed within a review and evaluation of current approaches to organizational research and is supplemented with a discussion of methodological and theoretical implications as well as
potential applications of the pattern-oriented approach.
Building on the body of positive organizational behavior research, this study examines the relationships between leader psychological capital, follower psychological capital, job engagement and job performance (task performance and contextual performance). Data were collected in three phases from multiple sources involving 60 leaders and 319 followers from a large telecom company in Taiwan. Hierarchical linear modeling results revealed that leaders' psychological capital was positively related to their job engagement through the mediation of followers' psychological capital. Furthermore, the results indicated that job engagement mediates the relationship between followers' psychological capital and their job performance (task performance and contextual performance). We discuss the implications and limitations of these findings and directions for future research.
DeRue and Ashford (2010) proposed a social process of leadership identity construction, asserting that leadership identity is co-constructed by way of claims and grants of leader and follower identities. In addition, these authors suggested that the collective endorsement of the broader social context might serve as a catalyst to initiate the leader identity construction process. As a result, they called for qualitative studies to further develop this idea. During archival research of James Meredith’s historic integration of the University of Mississippi, we discovered evidence to support and extend their theoretical arguments. Accordingly, we interpret the archival evidence of support and opposition of Meredith’s defiant integration to contrast the leader identity construction processes of Meredith with his contemporary antagonist, former Mississippi Governor Ross Barnett. We use this analysis to illustrate how the distinctive social context broadly recognized the key element of defiance and collectively endorsed Meredith as a leader, thereby initiating his leader identity construction process.
Psychological capital (PsyCap) has been conceptualized as an individual-level construct concerned with an employee’s state of positive psychological development. However, research has now started to examine PsyCap as a collective phenomenon. Although positive associations between team-level PsyCap and team-level functioning have been demonstrated empirically, there has been limited synopsis regarding the theoretical and measurement foundations of PsyCap at higher levels of analysis. This conceptual article extends collective PsyCap scholarship by applying a multilevel-multireferent framework to explore alternate conceptualizations of collective PsyCap. The framework furthers understanding of PsyCap at higher levels by exploring unique antecedents and emergent processes relating to five proposed forms of collective PsyCap. A series of testable propositions pertaining to the antecedent network of collective PsyCap are offered to guide empirical multilevel PsyCap research.
In this article, we review the history of the social scientific study of leadership and the prevailing theories of leadership that enjoy empirical support. We demonstrate that the development of knowledge concerning leadership phenomena has been truly cumulative and that much is currently known about leadership. We identify the contributions of the trait, behavioral, contingency and neocharismatic paradigms and the results of empirical research on prevailing theories. Issues that warrant research in each of the paradigms and theories are described. Ten additional topics for further investigation are discussed and specific recommendations are made with regard to future research on each of these topics.
We argue in this paper that in an age of complexity, change, large enterprises, and nation states, leaders are more important than ever. However, their effectiveness depends on their personality and charisma and not solely on their control over bureaucratic structures. We used a study of U.S. presidents to test a general model of leader effectiveness that includes leader personality characteristics, charisma, crises, age of the institution headed by the leader, and leader effectiveness. Age of the presidency accounted for approximately 20 percent of the variance in presidential needs for power, achievement, and affiliation. Presidential needs and a measure of leader self-restraint in using power, the age of the presidency, and crises accounted for 24 percent of the variance in presidential charisma. Age of the presidency, crises, needs, and charisma together predicted from 25 percent to 66 percent of the variance in five measures of presidential performance. Our study demonstrates that personality and charisma do make a difference.
The impact of organizational crises has never been stronger. Yet previous research on crisis management lacks adequate integration. In this article we attempt to integrate and build upon current knowledge to create a multidisciplinary approach to crisis management research, using psychological, social-political, and technological-structural research perspectives. We offer definitions of organizational crisis and crisis management, as well as a framework that depicts the crisis management process and researchable propositions for the integration of these perspectives. We also suggest implications for research and practice.
We propose a taxonomy of multidimensional constructs based on the relations between the construct and its dimensions. Multidimensional constructs that exist at deeper levels than their dimensions we term latent model. We call constructs formed as algebraic functions of their dimensions aggregate model, whereas constructs formed as different profiles of dimensional characteristics we term profile model. We discuss the nature of multidimensional constructs defined under these models and their operationalizations in empirical research.
In recent years there has been a marked increase in the study of the influence of leadership on creativity, and the effects of this relationship on organizational performance. While a number of explanations have been broached with regard to the positive effects of leadership on creativity, many of these studies propose different, and often contradictory, methods for leaders to achieve these positive effects on creativity within their organizations and work groups. Additionally, little work has been done examining the effects of leadership on highly creative people in fields requiring creativity. The purpose of this study is to examine two existing leadership theories with regard to their viability as models to explain creative performance of eminent scientists. Eminent scientists represent a population of leaders of highly creative individuals in a field that values the production of innovative ideas and products as a marker of performance. Ninety-three excerpts from the biographies of scientists were content coded for leader behaviors and performance criteria. The results of this analysis indicate that a model based on strategic planning and product championing may serve to explain the positive effects of leadership on creativity in a highly creative population.
Since the seminal article by Eisenhardt (1989), scholarly interest in case research has mushroomed in operations management and organization sciences. Volumes of methodological texts are matched with a massive amount of empirical research that seeks to develop case research as a scientific method. What is missing from this literature is a treatment of the methodological diversity of case research. In this paper, we seek to unveil this heterogeneity by describing three distinct methodological accounts of case study: theory generation, theory testing, and theory elaboration. Each approach has its own idiosyncrasies, in particular when it comes to the interplay between theory and empirics. A typical case research incorporates both existing theories and empirical data to varying degrees. In light of this heterogeneity, we re-interpret key aspects of extant contributions and discuss guidelines for future case research. We propose that ultimately, case research rigor is determined by attention to idiosyncrasy and transparency of reasoning. We conclude by arguing that we have witnessed in the past 25 years in organization research what amounts to the Renaissance of case research.
In the wake of increasing globalization, today's organizational leaders are faced with unprecedented complexity. To help meeting the challenge, this article proposes a new positive approach to global leadership. After first providing the background on positivity, positive global leadership is carefully defined and its similarities and differences with both the established and contemporary leadership theories are noted. The discussion then turns to how positive global leadership addresses three major challenges in the global context of distance, cultural differences and cross-cultural barriers. The article concludes that this new positive approach can help global leaders to leverage diverse strengths in themselves and their environment to more effectively meet the escalating challenges they face now and in the future.
Because of their unique relationship with followers, charismatic leaders can be powerful agents of social change. Current theories of charismatic leadership have emphasized primarily the personality and behavior of leaders and their effects on followers, organizations, and society. This emphasis fails to uncover why and how the charismatic leader/follower interaction can generate social change. Our study draws on theories of social meaning to develop a process model of charismatic leadership. Empirical exploration of our model suggests that charismatic leaders employ a set of consistent communication strategies for effecting social change.
This article develops and tests a conceptual model of followers' perceptions of transformational leadership as an antecedent to their positive psychological capital—a higher-order construct that represents an individual's motivational propensity and perseverance toward goals. Positive psychological capital, in turn, has in-role performance and organizational citizenship behavior as consequences. Structural equation modeling results support the relationship between followers' perceptions of transformational leadership and positive psychological capital, as well as the relationship between positive psychological capital and each performance outcome. Implications of these results are discussed regarding the literatures of transformational leadership and positive organizational behavior.
This paper suggests that feelings (moods and emotions) play a central role in the leadership process. More specifically, it is proposed that emotional intelligence, the ability to understand and manage moods and emotions in the self and others, contributes to effective leadership in organizations. Four major aspects of emotional intelligence, the appraisal and expression of emotion, the use of emotion to enhance cognitive processes and decision making, knowledge about emotions, and management of emotions, are described. Then, I propose how emotional intelligence contributes to effective leadership by focusing on five essential elements of leader effectiveness: development of collective goals and objectives; instilling in others an appreciation of the importance of work activities; generating and maintaining enthusiasm, confidence, optimism, cooperation, and trust; encouraging flexibility in decision making and change; and establishing and maintaining a meaningful identity for an organization.
Content analysis is a research technique used to objectively and systematically make inferences about the intentions, attitudes, and values of individuals by identifying specified characteristics in textual messages. The unobtrusive nature of content analysis makes it well suited for strategic management research. To date, the content analyses in most management studies have been performed by human coders, despite advances in computer technology that enable researchers to perform the same analyses more reliably and less expensively. In this paper, the investigator compares human-coded content analysis to computerized coding of the same text communications. The results suggest the two methods may be equally effective. Differences in results obtained using different units of analysis (such as analysis by sentence, by paragraph or by whole document) are also examined. Better reliability, improved stability, and comparability of results suggest more extensive use of computerized content analysis in future research.
We examine how the immigration of leaders possessing different skills, understandings, assumptions, and values can promote change within institutionalized organizations and fields. Our results indicate that American liberal arts colleges were more likely to adopt controversial professional programs during the 1970s and 1980s when led by presidents who had recently migrated either from colleges that had professional programs or from lower-status colleges.
The dynamic capabilities framework analyzes the sources and methods of wealth creation and capture by private enterprise firms operating in environments of rapid technological change. The competitive advantage of firms is seen as resting on distinctive processes (ways of coordinating and combining), shaped by the firm's (specific) asset positions (such as the firm's portfolio of difftcult-to- trade knowledge assets and complementary assets), and the evolution path(s) it has aflopted or inherited. The importance of path dependencies is amplified where conditions of increasing retums exist. Whether and how a firm's competitive advantage is eroded depends on the stability of market demand, and the ease of replicability (expanding intemally) and imitatability (replication by competitors). If correct, the framework suggests that private wealth creation in regimes of rapid technological change depends in large measure on honing intemal technological, organizational, and managerial processes inside the firm. In short, identifying new opportunities and organizing effectively and efficiently to embrace them are generally more fundamental to private wealth creation than is strategizing, if by strategizing one means engaging in business conduct that keeps competitors off balance, raises rival's costs, and excludes new entrants. © 1997 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
This research explores the use of impression management tactics in combination. Two studies were conducted to identify three profiles of impression management use and to examine how three individual difference variables are related to these patterns. The results suggest that women are less aggressive than men in using impression management, that high self-monitors favor positive impression management strategies, and that high Machs use impression management tactics rather indiscriminately. The findings also suggest that individuals who either avoid using impression management or who use only positive tactics are seen more favorably than those who use relatively high levels of all types of impression management. Some implications and directions for future research are discussed as well.