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There is a dearth of human resource management (HRM) literature examining the generalizability of research employing undergraduate student participants. The purpose of this study is to conduct an experiment to compare the job applicant evaluations and hiring decisions of undergraduate student participants with those of working adults with hiring experience.

This study employed a between-person 2 × 2 × 4 experimental design: participant group (undergraduate students or working adults with hiring experience) × job gender-type (male typed or female typed) × job applicant (heterosexual female, lesbian female, heterosexual male or gay male). Participants read descriptions of a job and a job applicant and then evaluated the applicant.

The results supported a moderated mediation model where participant group moderated the interaction of applicant gender and job gender-type in predicting perceptions of competence, which in turn predicted perceptions of person-job fit, likeability and respect-worthiness, which then predicted hiring decisions. Undergraduate student participants, but not working adults with hiring experience, evaluated female applicants applying for a male-typed job in a manner consistent with gender stereotypes and were less likely to hire the female applicant than the male applicant.

To inform HRM practice, research must reflect real-world decision-making. The literature on the roles of gender stereotypes and bias in hiring, and other important HRM decisions, relies heavily on undergraduate student participants. Findings of this study suggest a need to further examine whether those studies can be generalized to working adults actually making those decisions.

This study aims to investigate the relationship between feminine gender identity and leadership intention. Based on the theory of planned behavior and social role theory, the indirect relationship between feminine gender identity and leadership intention was analyzed through affective motivation to lead and perceived leadership self-efficacy. In addition, drawing on the person–environment fit theory, feminine gender identity was examined as a moderator of the relationship between cooperative organizational culture and leadership intention.

A cross-sectional survey was administered among a sample of 183 full-time employees.

Results demonstrated that controlling for sex, perceived leadership self-efficacy mediated the relationship between feminine gender role identity and leadership intention. In addition, feminine gender role identity acted as a moderator in strengthening the relationship between cooperative organizational culture and leadership intention such that highly feminine individuals in high cooperative organizational cultures showed higher intentions to become leaders than did individuals with less feminine identities.

In research on leadership intentions, it will be important to measure both sex and gender, as gender identity explains variance in important outcomes over and above sex. In addition, beginning to include organizational characteristics (such as perception of culture) in this stream of research is important.

Organizations wishing to promote more feminine individuals to leadership roles should examine their organizational culture to determine if it is cooperative, as this type of culture allows these individuals to be more intent on seeking leadership roles.

This research adds up to the literature by looking at an organizational factor, culture, and analyzing its role in increasing leadership intention in highly feminine individuals. In addition, by studying gender while controlling for sex, this paper suggests that regardless of sex (being a female or a male), feminine individuals will benefit from a cooperative environment. This includes any individuals (females and males) that identify more with communal behaviors.

The purpose of this paper were to investigate whether gendered social media images reduce women’s leadership aspirations (via reduced leadership self-efficacy) and whether state mindfulness buffers the effect of stereotype threat on women’s leadership self-efficacy, and in turn, leadership aspirations.

Study 1 (n = 53) was a pilot study designed to test materials intended to induce stereotype threat via social media. Study 2 (n = 144) was an experimental study in which participants were randomly assigned to stereotype threat or control conditions. Stereotype threat was implicitly induced via a fictional Facebook timeline that incorporated gendered images.

Stereotype threat induced via social media predicted lower leadership aspirations for women, which was mediated by reduced leadership self-efficacy, as expected. State mindfulness moderated this mediated relationship in an unexpected way; stereotype threat effects on leadership self-efficacy and leadership aspirations were stronger for women higher in state mindfulness.

It is important to investigate stereotype threat induced via social media to understand the potential damage gendered images may have on women’s leadership aspirations in a modern advertising context. This research shows that indeed gendered images in social media advertising decrease women’s leadership self-efficacy and leadership aspirations. Interestingly, this study also found that mindfulness had a negative effect in relation to stereotype threat. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Drawing on the relational demography literature and a social identity perspective, several research propositions in which the authors postulate that demographic characteristics (e.g. gender and race) of senior leaders will influence the implementation and effectiveness of diversity management practices were presented. Specifically, the authors focus on the Chief Executive Officer/Chief Diversity Officer (CEO/CDO) dyad and explore independent and joint effects of CEO and CDO majority–minority group status on workplace diversity outcomes, outlining key identity-based and relational moderators (e.g. value threat, relational identity and leader–member exchange) of these relationships.

The literature on relational demography and leader–member exchange to develop propositions for future research was integrated.

This is a conceptual paper. There is no empirical data reported testing the propositions.

The authors extended theory and research on relational demography by focusing on senior leaders in the organization and proposing that the influence of CEO and CDO demographic characteristics on the enactment of diversity practices may be contingent on key identity-based and relational processes.

The authors are not aware of any studies investigating how personal characteristics and relational processes relating to the CEO and CDO may influence the implementation and effectiveness of workplace diversity management practices. In a similar vein, the authors contribute to the research literatures on relational demography and social identity by extending the application of these theories to senior leaders in organizations and in relation to the work of CEOs and CDOs.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the consequences of experienced workplace incivility when female employees perceive that they are different from their workgroup. The authors examine how women’s perceptions of demographic dissimilarity from their workgroup moderate the relationships between incivility and psychological wellbeing, and between incivility and turnover intentions.

A total of 125 female employees of a post-secondary institution participated in this study. Participants were recruited through an electronic mailing list over the course of one month and completed an online survey.

Experienced workplace incivility among females is related to poorer psychological wellbeing and higher turnover intentions. Controlling for actual age and gender dissimilarity at the department level, perceived gender dissimilarity from one’s workgroup moderated the workplace incivility-turnover intentions relationship, whereby the relationship was strengthened at low, but not high levels of experienced incivility. Perceived gender dissimilarity did not moderate the incivility–psychological wellbeing relationship. Perceived age dissimilarity was not a significant moderator.

The role of perceived dissimilarity and other personal contextual variables should be considered in future work on selective incivility. Perceived dissimilarity can influence some of the negative outcomes associated with incivility, particularly at low levels.

This research extends the selective incivility literature by incorporating a relational demography perspective to the study of female targets’ experience of workplace incivility. Findings suggest that perceptions of difference may affect the interpretation and outcomes associated with females’ experience of incivility.

This study aims to test how senior leaders recognize and reward the same leadership behavior in male and female managers.

A total of 120 senior government leaders evaluated simulated performance reviews wherein only manager ' s sex and engagement in individually considerate transformational leadership behavior varied.

Senior leaders (of both sexes) penalized male and female managers for failing to engage in individually considerate transformational leadership behavior (i.e. rating them as significantly less competent and civil, and recommending them for significantly fewer rewards such as salary and promotion) compared to control groups. However, only male managers benefited (in terms of competence ratings, recognition and reward) from being rated high on this behavior.

Findings support arguments in the literature for a “feminization” of leadership, whereby both male and female managers are now penalized for not engaging in individually considerate leadership behavior. However, they also question the extent to which women will get credit for engaging in some of the same transformational leadership behaviors as men.

Researchers and practitioners often collapse across components of the Multi-Factor Leadership Questionnaire (MLQ) in measuring transformational leadership behavior. This may obfuscate some of the components being aligned with sex role stereotypes, and therefore unlikely to be rewarded in certain candidates. If the present findings are confirmed by future research, there may be reason to question how the MLQ is being used in research and practice on transformational leadership behavior.

The purpose of this paper is to examine work‐related emotion as a mechanism explaining the relationship between perceived organizational support (POS) and employee physical health.

Study participants were employees at a large Canadian health care organization (n=72). A survey methodology was utilized.

POS was positively related to physical health. Negative emotion fully mediated this relationship between POS and health, and positive emotion was found to partially mediate this relationship.

Cross sectional survey data is one potential limitation. Findings suggest that further investigation of the links between POS, positive and negative job‐related emotion and physical health would be a fruitful avenue of research.

Organizations can increase POS through actions that have been investigated in past research. Increasing POS would appear to be one avenue that an organization can utilize to positively influence employee health through its effect on employee work‐related emotion.

The paper addresses previous calls to investigate mechanisms underlying the relationship between POS and physical health, and shows that job‐related emotion plays a role in explaining why POS is positively correlated with physical health.

The purpose of this paper is to explore how male and female leaders define effective leadership in an extreme context.

The authors conducted in-depth interviews with leaders working in an extreme context (a matched sample of female and male Majors and Colonels in the Canadian Armed Forces) and analysed military training materials.

In the military, male and female leadership looks much more similar than might be expected. Further, surprisingly this is not occurring because women are leading in more masculine ways, but rather the opposite; men are leading in more feminine ways.

There is a need for organizations to recognize and acknowledge the role of feminine leadership behaviours. This may also give women a better opportunity to succeed in these types of leadership roles.

This study contributes to the leadership literature by furthering our understanding of the boundary conditions for transformational leadership in relation to gender stereotypes, situational strength, and social identity.

This paper investigates the differential effects of transformational leadership and the “iron cage” on trust, commitment and team efficacy at the team level. Transformational leadership has been shown to have positive effects on trust, commitment and team efficacy. However, it could be argued that these results are not due to the leadership but to the idea that the team has developed strong norms that constrain their behavior and “force” them to perform. The rival hypothesis that the iron cage results in trust, commitment and team efficacy is tested using hierarchical regression analysis. We find that transformational leadership in teams predicts trust, commitment and team efficacy over and beyond the perceptions of the iron cage. The iron cage adds to the prediction of commitment only. Results suggest that while encouraging strong values and norms within a team will lead to increased commitment, focusing on transformational leadership in teams is a more effective way to encourage the development of trust, commitment and team efficacy.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the extent to which male and female leaders report engaging in participative versus directive intellectually stimulating transformational leadership behaviour across three different contexts (business, government and military).

Semi‐structured interviews were conducted with 64 senior leaders (29 female and 35 male) across Canada.

Leaders were more likely to describe using a participative versus directive approach to intellectual stimulation. Gender similarities and differences also appeared across contexts: government leaders reported almost twice as many directive examples as business leaders, and men and women in both of these contexts were very similar in their reports about how they enacted intellectual stimulation. In contrast, men and women in the military diverged, with male leaders reporting more participative behaviour than female leaders.

This study extends the leadership literature through an integration of participative and directive leadership theory with transformational leadership theory. Sample size and self‐report data are possible limitations.

Findings provide insight into the behaviours leaders engage in to enhance creative thinking and problem solving within organizations across different contexts and suggests that this aspect of transformational leadership is most likely to be enacted in a participative way by both male and female leaders.

This is one of the first studies to empirically investigate participative versus directive transformational leadership behaviour. Gender differences between contexts are worthy of further study, specifically regarding the implications of these findings for female leaders’ promotion and career progression.