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After completion of the case study, the students will be able to understand the importance of being culturally savvy when working in a culturally diverse environment and managing people from different cultures; critically reflect on the risks resulting from the absence of a clear direction from the company’s top management regarding unifying corporate values and a diversity policy for cooperation across cultures; be aware of best practices in implementing diversity management (DM) initiatives in the company; and learn that changes in the strategic orientation (i.e. focus on automation projects) must be cascaded down to hard elements of structures, processes and systems, as well as to soft elements of skills, staff and management style.

The Kuwaiti branch of a Japanese corporation specialising in control systems and instruments, Rising Sun IT, hired a German professional, Alex, to handle the increasing demand for automation from customers. This recruitment followed several unsuccessful attempts by the company to deliver more advanced automation solutions. Recognising the need to adapt to Kuwaiti customer requirements or risk losing market share, Japanese management understood the importance of transforming their engineering staff. Failure to achieve this next automation step would result in a steady decline in market share and ultimately impact the company’s survival. However, Alex, who was supposed to lead automation projects, was confronted with opposition from the Indian engineering staff and managers. He was not able to find common ground with the staff and perceived issues such as lack of communication, delays in work schedules, missed deadlines and high levels of absenteeism, as a sign of low work morale. Although he tried to increase the awareness of his supervisor and other managers by informing them repeatedly about the problems regarding employee behaviours, his interventions went unheard. He felt ousted by his fellow colleagues and the other employees. Besides, from Alex’s point of view, the Japanese top management did not provide clear directions to the staff and explicit support to Alex in his efforts. This case study highlights three dimensions of Alex’s problem with establishing and maintaining working relationships with other people in the company:▪ Alex’s cultural “blindness” and ignorance of differences in work behaviours that ultimately led to his inability to build solid and trustful relationships with other employees. The case study demonstrates Germany’s performance-oriented and individual-centric culture versus India’s family- and community-oriented culture and the Japanese employees’ strongly hierarchical and company loyalty-oriented culture.▪ Lack of support from the Japanese top management to Alex, which is connected with a wider problem of the lack of a systematic strategic approach to managing a culturally diverse workforce. The case study pinpoints the rhetoric–reality gap in DM in the company, where the diversity, equity and inclusion programme and corporate values were applied only formally and had little attention from the leaders as well as non-managerial employees.▪ Employee resistance to change: The lack of positive communication from the top management level in the company regarding automation projects and the lack of support for Alex’s mission in the company resulted in steady resistance to executing projects, which endangered the company’s survival in the market. Also, one part of Alex’s problem with building a working relationship with the Indian engineering staff was based on the fact that others perceived him as the automation “change agent” – an advocate and catalyst of an undesirable change connected with adverse consequences on employment in the Indian community.

This case is intended for discussion in undergraduate management and business study programmes.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 6: Human resource management.

In the first part of this article on behaviour in libraries, published in the January issue of NLW, Peter Jordan discussed librarians' approach to readers' behaviour in libraries, identifying two main ways—the instinctively correct behaviour to be expected, and the examination of the phenomenon as worthy of sociological study. Dominant and subordinate behaviour were considered, together with social reasons for them, attitudes to noise in the library, and the effects of physical contraints presented to readers by a particular library environment. In the conclusion to his article, Peter Jordan looks at the face‐to‐face contact between librarian and reader, reader service, and common regulations. The references cited are in a single numerical sequence from part one forward.

We review the literature on stress in organizational settings and, based on a model of job insecurity and emotional intelligence by Jordan, Ashkanasy and Härtel (2002), present a new model where affective responses associated with stress mediate the impact of workplace stressors on individual and organizational performance outcomes. Consistent with Jordan et al., emotional intelligence is a key moderating variable. In our model, however, the components of emotional intelligence are incorporated into the process of stress appraisal and coping. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the implications of these theoretical developments for understanding emotional and behavioral responses to workplace.

Scholars and practitioners in the OB literature nowadays appreciate that emotions and emotional regulation constitute an inseparable part of work life, but the HRM literature has lagged in addressing the emotional dimensions of life at work. In this chapter therefore, beginning with a multi-level perspective taken from the OB literature, we introduce the roles played by emotions and emotional regulation in the workplace and discuss their implications for HRM. We do so by considering five levels of analysis: (1) within-person temporal variations, (2) between persons (individual differences), (3) interpersonal processes; (4) groups and teams, and (5) the organization as a whole. We focus especially on processes of emotional regulation in both self and others, including discussion of emotional labor and emotional intelligence. In the opening sections of the chapter, we discuss the nature of emotions and emotional regulation from an OB perspective by introducing the five-level model, and explaining in particular how emotions and emotional regulation play a role at each of the levels. We then apply these ideas to four major domains of concern to HR managers: (1) recruitment, selection, and socialization; (2) performance management; (3) training and development; and (4) compensation and benefits. In concluding, we stress the interconnectedness of emotions and emotional regulation across the five levels of the model, arguing that emotions and emotional regulation at each level can influence effects at other levels, ultimately culminating in the organization’s affective climate.

This contribution argues that there is a fundamental problem for the multi-level governance (MLG) approach in that what the approach is trying to explain has never been fully agreed by the vast group of scholarship that references it. The chapter then examines and proposes that ideas and concepts from network governance, principal–agent (PA) and learning can provide the necessary micro foundations for the MLG approach.

The chapter examines and critiques the original MLG formulations and the later efforts at elaboration. It then reviews the literature and concepts for three public policy approaches that have been associated with European governance to see how core explanations can be elaborated upon in a multi-level context: network governance, principal–agent (PA) and learning.

This contribution suggests that co-ordination, and the resources that help maintain this co-ordination, is the key dependent variable that underpins the MLG approach. With multiple principals and multiple agents, operating at a number of levels of analysis, direct authority and control is harder to evoke. The key explanatory variable underpinning this MLG co-ordination is learning by the participants.

Researchers need to concentrate both their theoretical and empirical efforts in understanding the conditions that support multi-level governance and that sustain its effort.

The contribution outlines some of the key practical questions that policy-makers must face. Can they manage resources and induce learning from all the relevant public and private stakeholders to engage in the MLG effort?

Not only does an effective MLG process involve engaging a wide range of societal stakeholders, these stakeholders have to be persuaded to invest effort in learning about the nature of the governance system, the challenges of the policy problem and the implications of the efforts to resolve these problems.

This chapter isolates the fundamental lacuna at the heart of the MLG project and offers academics and practitioners a conceptual lens for building a clearer analytical structure for studying MLG.

Sustainability is an emotional issue. It is also an issue that is gaining prominence in organizational agendas. In this chapter, we outline a model to explain how employees perceive change agents working to implement sustainability initiatives in organizations. Using this model, we argue that organizational support for sustainability can influence how employees respond to sustainability messages. We further argue that the intensity of emotions that change agents display, and how appropriate those emotions are within the organizational context, will influence how employees perceive those individuals and the success of their efforts to influence green outcomes.

We extend the Dual Threshold Model of emotions (DTM: Geddes & Callister, 2007) to assess the impact of displays of emotional intensity on achieving sustainability goals. Our model links emotional propriety to change agent success. By exploring variations of the DTM in terms of contextual factors and emotional intensity, our model elaborates on the dynamic nature of emotional thresholds.

Using our framework, change agents may be able to improve their influence by matching the emotional intensity of their messages to the relevant display rules for that organization. That is, change agents who are perceived to express emotion within the thresholds of propriety can enhance their success in implementing green outcomes.

This chapter examines sustainability initiatives at the interpersonal behavior level. We combine aspects of organizational behavior, emotion in organizations, and organizations and the natural environment to create a new model for understanding change agent success in corporate sustainability.

Purpose: During turbulent social and economic times, perceptions of job insecurity can be expected to increase. In this chapter, we outline a theoretical model that links perceptions of job insecurity to lower affective commitment and high work-related stress, resulting in employees' engaging in poor decision-making behavior. We argue further that employees who possess individual skills of being aware of emotions and managing emotions are less susceptible to such behavior. Study Design/Methodology/Approach: We tested our model in two studies. The first study was conducted using an online sample of 217 respondents. The second study used a split administration design conducted in a single organization and used a sample of 579 employees. Findings: Our data revealed that job insecurity is linked to negative decision-making behaviors and that better emotional awareness and management skills may reduce negative decision-making behaviors. Originality/Value: Our findings support the notion of threat rigidity theory where we found that job insecurity affects how individuals make decisions. Our analysis suggests that the individual's level of emotional skills can act as a form of behavioral control that can ameliorate the effects of job insecurity on decision-making behavior. Research Limitations: Both studies had a female gender bias in our sampling frames. There is a possibility of common method variance affecting the results of Study 1, and both studies involved the use of a self-report measure of emotional skills.

ONE CAN BE forgiven for worrying about the ‘Peter principle’ when taking up a post on the practising side of the profession after nine years teaching librarianship.

Neal M. Ashkanasy has a Ph.D. in Social and Organizational Psychology from the University of Queensland, and has research interests in leadership, organizational culture, and business ethics. In recent years, his research has focused on the role of emotions in organizational life. He has published his work in journals such as the Academy of Management Review, the Academy of Management Executive, and the Journal of Management, and is co-editor of three books: The Handbook of Organizational Culture and Climate (Sage) and Emotions in the Workplace; Theory, Research, and Practice (Quorum); Managing Emotions in the Workplace (ME Sharpe). He is a past Chair of the Managerial and Organizational Cognition Division of the Academy of Management.Claire E. Ashton-James is completing an Honors degree in Business Management through the University of Queensland Business School. Her undergraduate degree majors were in philosophy, music, and psychology. Her present research interest is in the role of the impact of cognitive information processing capacity on emotion regulation and social functioning.Cary L. Cooper is Professor of Organizational Psychology and Health, Lancaster University Management School, Lancaster University. He is the author of over 80 books and over 300 academic journal articles. He is Founding Editor, Journal of Organizational Behavior; Co-Editor, medical journal Stress & Health; and former Co-Editor, International Journal of Management Review. He is a Fellow of the British Psychological Society, The Royal Society of Arts, The Royal Society of Medicine, The Royal Society of Health, and an Academician of the Academy for the Social Sciences. He is President of the British Academy of Management and a Companion of the (British) Institute of Management. He is a Fellow of the (American) Academy of Management and recipient of its 1998 Distinguished Service Award. Professor Cooper was awarded a CBE (Commander of the Excellent Order of the British Empire) in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List for his contribution to health.Russell Cropanzano is Professor of Organizational Behavior in the Department of Management and Policy of the University of Arizona. Dr. Cropanzano is a member of the Academy of Management, the American Psychological Society, and the Society of Organizational Behavior. He is a fellow in the Society of Industrial/Organizational Psychology. Dr. Cropanzano is also active internationally, having given talks in Australia, France, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom. His research interests include workplace emotions and organizational justice.Achim Elfering is research fellow for the psychology of work and organizations at the University of Berne, Switzerland. He graduated with a Masters degree in psychology from the University of Wuerzburg, Germany. He received his Ph.D. in general psychology at the University of Frankfurt, Germany. His research interests include job stress, physiological stress responses, and in particular associations between psychosocial work factors and low back pain. His other research interests include personality, social support, job satisfaction, socialization and selection. In 2001, he received the 3rd Annual SPINE Journal Young Investigator Research Award.Steven M. Elias is an Assistant Professor of Social Psychology at Western Carolina University. Dr. Elias is a member of both the American Psychological Association and the American Psychological Society. Currently, Dr. Elias publishes empirical research in several areas related to perceived self-efficacy and social power.Joanne H. Gavin is Assistant Professor in the School of Management, Marist College, Poughkeepsie, New York. She was the recipient of the Otto Alois Faust Doctoral Fellowship in Character and Health (2000–2002) and earned her Ph.D. in organizational behavior at the University of Texas at Arlington. Ms. Gavin earned her M.B.A. and B.S. in Business Administration at the University of New Orleans. Her research interest is in the area of personal character, decision making and executive health. She is co-author of articles appearing in the Academy of Management Executive, Applied Psychology: International Review and the Academy of Management Journal. Dr. Gavin is also co-author of several chapters in books such as International Review of Industrial and Organizational Psychology and Psychology Builds a Healthy World. In 2001, she presented a paper entitled “Transcendent decision-making: Defining the role of virtue-based character in the decision-making process” at the Society for Business Ethics.Simone Grebner is senior research fellow for the psychology of work and organizations at the University of Berne, Switzerland. She graduated with a Master’s degree in psychology from the University of Wuerzburg, Germany. She earned her Ph.D. in work psychology from the University of Berne. Her primary research interests include job stress, job analysis, emotion work, and well-being, with a particual emphasis on psychoneuroendocrine and cardiovascular stress responses.Wayne A. Hochwarter is Associate Professor of Management at Florida State University. Prior to this appointment, Dr. Hochwarter was on the faculty at Mississippi State University and the University of Alabama. He has published over 70 articles and book chapters in the areas that include organizational politics, social influence, job stress, and dispositional factors. His work has appeared in the Journal of Applied Psychology, Journal of Management, Journal of Vocational Behavior, and Research in Personnel and Human Resources Management. Dr. Hochwarter’s current research interests include social influence in organizations, accountability, and the attitudinal consequences of job insecurity of layoff survivors.Peter J. Jordan is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Management at Griffith University, Australia. He gained his Ph.D. in management at the University of Queensland. Peter’s current research interests include emotional intelligence, emotions in organizations, team performance and conflict. He has published in a range of international journals including the Academy of Management Review, Human Resource Management Review, and Advances in Developing Human Resources. He has also been invited to deliver presentations to a number of business groups across South East Asia. Prior to entering academia he worked in strategic and operational planning for the Australian Government.Michael P. Leiter is Professor of Psychology and Vice President (Academic) of Acadia University in Canada. He is Director of the Center for Organizational Research & Development that applies high quality research methods to human resource issues confronting organizations. He received degrees in Psychology from Duke University (BA), Vanderbilt University (MA), and the University of Oregon (Ph.D.). He teaches courses on organizational psychology and on stress at Acadia University. The research center provides a lively bridge between university studies and organizational consultation for himself and his students. Dr. Leiter has received ongoing research funding for 20 years from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada as well as from international foundations. He is actively involved as a consultant on occupational issues in Canada, the USA, and Europe. The primary focus of his research and consulting work is the relationships that people develop with their work. This work addresses strategies for preventing dysfunctional relationships, such as burnout, as well as for building productive engagement with work.David A. Mack is Assistant Dean for Program Development at the University of Texas at Arlington’s College of Business Administration. He received his Ph.D. from UT Arlington in May 2000. Dr. Mack earned an MBA in Entrepreneurship from DePaul University in 1993. Dr. Mack has published a number of articles and book chapters on job stress, workplace violence, and small business. His Organizational Dynamics article “EDS: An Inside View of a Corporate Life Cycle Transition” examined the spin-off of EDS from General Motors Corporation. He has had extensive management experience in the insurance industry and is co-owner, with his wife, of a financial services marketing/management business in the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex. Dr. Mack teaches undergraduate and graduate courses at UT Arlington and has taught graduate business courses at both DePaul University and Texas Wesleyan University.Christina Maslach is Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education and Professor of Psychology at the University of California at Berkeley. She received her A.B. in Social Relations from Harvard-Radcliffe College, and her Ph.D. in Psychology from Stanford University. She has conducted research in a number of areas within social and health psychology. However, she is best known as one of the pioneering researchers on job burnout, and the author of the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI), the most widely used research measure in the burnout field. In addition to numerous articles, she has written several books on this topic. She has also received numerous teaching awards, and in 1997 she received national recognition from the Carnegie Foundation as “Professor of the Year.”Debra L. Nelson, Ph.D. is The CBA Associates Professor of Business Administration and Professor of Management at Oklahoma State University. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Arlington. Dr. Nelson’s research has been published in the Academy of Management Executive, Academy of Management Journal, Academy of Management Review, MIS Quarterly, Journal of Organizational Behavior, and other journals. Her books include Stress and Challenge at the Top: The Paradox of the Successful Executive, Advancing Women in Management, Preventive Stress Management in Organizations, Gender, Work Stress and Health, and Organizational Behavior: Foundations, Realities, Challenges among others. Her primary research interests are workplace stress and gender issues at work.James Campbell (Jim) Quick is Professor of Organizational Behavior and Director, Doctoral Program in Business Administration, The University of Texas at Arlington. The American Psychological Foundation honored him with the 2002 Harry and Miriam Levinson Award as an outstanding consulting psychologist. He is a Fellow of the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology, the American Psychological Association (APA), the American Institute of Stress, and was awarded a 2001 APA Presidential Citation. He was Founding Editor of APA’s Journal of Occupational Health Psychology and was APA’s stress expert to the National Academy of Sciences (1990). He is co-author with Debra L. Nelson of Organizational Behavior: Foundations, Realities, and Challenges, 4th Edition (Thompson/Southwestern). He is listed in Who’s Who in the World (7th Edition). He was awarded The Maroon Citation by the Colgate University Alumni Corporation, and The Legion of Merit by the U.S. Air Force. He is married to the former Sheri Grimes Schember.Jonathan D. Quick is Director, Essential Drugs and Medicines Policy (EDM) for the World Health Organization, Geneva. EDM works to ensure for people everywhere access to safe, effective, good quality essential drugs that are prescribed and used rationally. He joined WHO in 1995 after 20 years in international health, serving in Pakistan, Kenya, and over 18 other countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. He has authored or edited ten books, including as senior editor of Managing Drug Supply (1997/1978), and over 40 articles and chapters on essential drugs, public health, and stress management. He is a Diplomat of the American Board of Family Practice, and a Fellow of both the Royal Society of Medicine (UK) and the American College of Preventive Medicine. He earned an A.B. degree magna cum laude from Harvard University and a M.D. degree with distinction in research and a M.P.H. from the University of Rochester.Norbert Semmer is professor for the psychology of work and organizations at the University of Berne, Switzerland. He earned his Ph.D. from the Technical University of Berlin and worked for the Technical University of Berlin, and the German Federal Health Office in Berlin before moving to Berne. He has a long standing interest in stress at work and its relationship to health, in recent years with a special emphasis on low back pain. He has also published about job satisfaction, the development of efficient strategies in groups, on human error, and on the transition of young people into work. He is a member of the editorial board of the European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, the Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, the Zeitschrift für Arbeits- und Organisationspsychologie, and the Scandinavian Journal of Work, Environment and Health, and he served as Associate Editor for Applied Psychology. An International Review from 1992 to 1998, and for the Psychologische Rundschau from 1995 to 1998.Arie Shirom is Professor of Organizational Behavior and Health Care Management at the Faculty of Management, Tel Aviv University. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin, Madison. He has published several reviews on burnout, burnout and health, organization development, and the impact of stress on employee health, each including a section describing his past research in the respective area. These reviews are downloadable from his internet site at Tel Aviv University. He is currently funded by the Israel Science Foundation to conduct a large scale, four-year study on the effects of positive emotions, including vigor, on employee health.Bret L. Simmons is Assistant Professor of Management in the College of Business at North Dakota State University. He received his Ph.D. in Management from Oklahoma State University. Dr. Simmons is a member of the Academy of Management, the American Psychological Association, and the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology. His research interests include eustress and positive psychology at work.Tores Theorell, M.D., Ph.D. is a world-renowned lecturer and widely published pioneer in psychosocial factors research. He is Director of the National Institute for Psychosocial Factors and Health and Professor of Psychosocial Medicine, Department of Public Health Sciences, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden. His research interests include psychosocial factors, health, and occupational stress.Howard M. Weiss is Professor of Psychological Sciences at Purdue University. He is also co-director of Purdue’s Military Family Research Institute, which is funded by the Department of Defense and dedicated to studying the relationships between quality of life and job satisfaction, retention and performance. He received his Ph.D. from New York University. His research interests focus on the emotions in the workplace and on job attitudes.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the mediating effect of leader member exchange (LMX) on the relationship between followers' emotional intelligence and the outcomes of turnover intention and job satisfaction.

Using a longitudinal design, survey data were collected from 579 employees within a private pathology company. Measures of emotional intelligence and LMX were collected at Time 1 and employee turnover intentions and job satisfaction were collected at Time 2.

The results show the quality of LMX mediates the relationship between follower emotional intelligence and both turnover intention and job satisfaction.

A limitation is the use of a self‐report measure of emotional intelligence. While this published measure has been shown to be valid and reliable, there are debates over the validity of self‐report measures of emotional intelligence.

The authors contend that encouraging more emotionally intelligent responses in employees may enhance the quality of LMXs and improve employee attitudes.

Although the relationship between emotional intelligence and LMX has been theorized, the study described in the paper is the first to use a workplace sample to empirically test the relationship between emotional intelligence and measures of turnover intention and job satisfaction with LMX from a follower's perspective as a mediating variable. As such, this study enables us to explore the tension between an organization's interest in the efficient use of time to focus on core activities and the followers' desire to maintain high‐quality relationships with their leaders (a time consuming process).