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The researchers at VitalSmarts have combined more than thirty years of their original research with the best social science research from the past five decades to develop a model for creating sustainable behavior change in individuals, teams, organizations, and nations. This article presents their findings which show that people who engage in a multi‐faceted change management strategy are up to ten times more successful at solving persistent and profound problems by creating rapid and sustainable behavior change.

The research presented in this article is composed of three studies. In the first study, VitalSmarts researchers interviewed 25 C‐level leaders regarding their most persistent challenges including bureaucratic infighting, silo thinking, and lack of accountability. The second study focused on the most common problems that occurred during 100 mission‐critical initiatives ‐ efforts such as internal restructurings, quality and productivity improvement initiatives, and new product launches. In the third study, researchers surveyed more than 1,000 individuals about personal habits they struggled to change ‐ habits such as unhealthy eating, insufficient exercise, smoking, and drinking.

Researchers found that influencers succeed where others fail because they know persistent problems and people's resistance to change are rarely fed by a single cause; rather, they are fed by a conspiracy of causes. Instead of looking for the minimum it will take to accomplish change, influencers combine a critical mass of different kinds of influence strategies ‐ as a result they are ten times more successful at securing sustainable behavior change.

Those who use four or more sources of influence in combination are ten times more likely to succeed in creating change than those who rely on a single source of influence.

Managerial mediocrity – that characteristic of being somewhere in the middle in terms of capability or aptitude – is an understudied phenomenon and yet has significant impact on organizational effectiveness, performance and goodwill. Organizations must therefore be able to identify mediocrity, and take prompt action to eradicate it. What are some of the symptoms of mediocrity, and what are the steps that an organization can take? These are the questions that this article attempts to answer.

This is a paper expressing viewpoint.

While the managers are not are expected to be excellent in all aspects, being consistently in the average bracket has far reaching consequences. Companies who have a sizeable number of employees in this category struggle when it comes to pursuing organizational vision and goals. Most performance management systems revolve around the top performers and the non-performers, rewarding the former and penalizing the latter. More often than not, the mediocre populace is largely untouched.

Future researchers can study the highlighted gaps in regards to commitment to change. Further it provides researchers a brief summary of 55 research studies on commitment to change.

This is an original article.

The purpose of this conceptual paper is to provide strategies on how to embed physician leadership development efforts within health organizations.

Findings from our previous research, which include an extensive literature review and analysis of 53 interviews with representatives from healthcare organizations across the globe, are integrated within the context of the Influencer© framework to provide a useful and grounded tool for physician leadership development strategies.

Physician leadership development strategies are identified for each of the six domains within the Influencer© framework.

A number of physician leadership development strategies are provided. They can be used in combination or used independently.

Integrating the knowledge gained from practices in health organizations and from the literature within the Influencer© framework is a unique approach and strengthens the usefulness of the identified physician leadership development strategies.

Scholars in the feedback seeking domain have predominantly focused on subordinate feedback seeking. The authors still know very little about feedback seeking when the leader is the “seeker” and subordinates are the “targets” of such seeking. This paper aims to develop a theoretical framework that explores the potential benefits and costs of leader feedback seeking, specifically, leader feedback inquiry for subordinates.

The authors draw upon the transactional theory of stress to propose a framework in which leader feedback inquiry influences two subordinate behaviors (in-role and proactive skill development behaviors) via appraisal processes (challenge and threat appraisals). With insights from regulatory focus theory, the authors propose that individual characteristics, namely, the regulatory focus of subordinates (promotion and prevention focus), determine the appraisals of leader feedback inquiry, subsequently influencing subordinate behavioral outcomes.

The authors contend that leader feedback inquiry can be appraised as a challenge which then produces beneficial subordinate behaviors (i.e. higher in-role and proactive skill development behaviors). However, leader feedback inquiry can also be appraised as a threat which then elicits detrimental subordinate behaviors (i.e. lower in-role and proactive skill development behaviors). The authors then argue that subordinates with a high promotion focus appraise leader feedback inquiry as challenging, thereby enabling beneficial behaviors. Subordinates with a high prevention focus, by contrast, appraise leader feedback inquiry as threatening, thereby prompting detrimental behaviors.

The authors shed light on the benefits and costs of leader feedback seeking for subordinates. The resulting framework underlines the importance of including individual characteristics and cognitive appraisal processes in research investigating the effects of leader feedback inquiry on subordinate outcomes.

Workplace voice is well-established and encompasses behaviors such as prosocial voice, informal complaints, grievance filing, and whistleblowing, and it focuses on interactions between the employee and supervisor or the employee and the organizational collective. In contrast, our chapter focuses on employee prosocial advocacy voice (PAV), which the authors define as prosocial voice behaviors aimed at preventing harm or promoting constructive changes by advocating on behalf of others. In the context of a healthcare organization, low quality and unsafe patient care are salient and objectionable states in which voice can motivate actions on behalf of the patient to improve information exchanges, governance, and outreach activities for safer outcomes. The authors draw from the theory and research on responsibility to intersect with theories on information processing, accountability, and stakeholders that operate through voice between the employee-patient, employee-coworker, and employee-profession, respectively, to propose a model of PAV in patient-centered healthcare. The authors complete the model by suggesting intervening influences and barriers to PAV that may affect patient-centered outcomes.

This paper introduces “virtual fun at the virtual workplace” and conceptualizes its impact on virtual socialization and the formation of virtual professional ties. The conceptual model also recognizes the moderation of a few variables: “awareness of being observed,” “diversity in the virtual workplace” and “virtual impression management.”

The paper takes a theoretical approach to develop a conceptual framework of virtual fun in the virtual workplace, drawing on social exchange theory (SET) and social network theory (SNT).

The study extends the tenets of the SET and extends the applicability of SNT to a virtual workplace. The study suggests that managers should introduce semi-organized virtual fun during scheduled breaks within work hours to aid in virtual socialization, which further aids in the formation and strengthening of “professional ties” in the virtual workplace.

This study is the first of its kind to conceptualize a model for virtual fun in the virtual workplace.

The current education paradigm is often criticized for fostering human dependence and failing to reduce environmental impacts. This has led researchers to propose alternative approaches. One alternative approach, place-based education, integrates a specific location’s natural and social context into learning experiences. By deepening students’ connection to their surroundings, place-based environmental education aims to enhance students’ sense of interdependence with a place and their place attachment in cognitive and affective dimensions. While widely practiced, its effectiveness remains largely unevaluated, particularly in the East Asian context. The gap hinders the development of impactful pedagogical approaches for educators.

The authors examine a river environmental education program located upstream of Taiwan’s capital, offering a valuable case study within the East Asian context. The program’s design is analyzed, and its impact on enhancing students’ place attachment is assessed through a pre- and post-survey approach.

The results indicate a substantial increase in students’ place attachment following program participation, particularly pronounced among children with limited prior experience with the river. Importantly, this increase is comparable to or exceeds those observed in similar studies from other regions.

The considerable increase in place attachment observed in this program demonstrates its effectiveness in fostering environmental connections, particularly among children with limited prior experience. The magnitude of the increase might be partially attributable to the interdependent orientation of Taiwanese culture. This suggests that place-based education might yield significant positive outcomes in other non-Western countries with strong interdependent cultural orientations.