Search results

The purpose of this paper is to conceptualize ex ante idiosyncratic deals (or i-deals) as a way to foster individual perceptions of a positive employer image by offering customized additional instrumental benefits.

A survey is led among 182 engineers in demand on a local labor market to test whether ex ante i-deals combine to a more global and external perception of a good employer, measured by perceived external prestige (PEP), to explain turnover intentions.

The results validate all research hypotheses, and show that the moderating effect of ex ante i-deals in the PEP-turnover intention relationship is significant during the first years spent in the company.

This research contributes to the literature on employees’ attraction and retention by building bridges between the literatures on employer image and i-deals.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the antecedents of development idiosyncratic deals (i-deals) from an organizational politics and a situationist perspective. The paper tests a moderated mediation model in which networking skills is indirectly related to development i-deal in a context of high hierarchical plateau.

The authors test the research model with a sample of 252 engineers, 88 percent male, who work in an economically wealthy region of France and who are thus well positioned to negotiate development i-deals.

The authors lead analyses with the Preacher et al.’s macros on SPSS. Results support the hypotheses. The authors find that support-seeking behaviors partially mediate the relationship between networking skills and development i-deals, and that this relationship is significant only in a context of high plateauing.

Overall, this study contributes to a deeper understanding of i-deal antecedents by bridging the literatures on i-deals and careers. It also shows that socially skilled employees are able to seek support and in turn, to proactively negotiate development i-deals. This process is a way to cope with perceptions of hierarchical plateau.

Relying on the theories of substitutes for leadership and psychological empowerment, this study aims to explore how perceptions of customer positive feedback can substitute for managers’ transformational leadership in driving frontline employees’ psychological empowerment and, in turn, task performance.

The authors tested the research hypotheses with frontline employees working in 17 equipment rental stores. Employees completed a questionnaire about customer positive feedback, transformational leadership and psychological empowerment, and supervisors completed a separate questionnaire about employees’ task performance. A total of 178 employee-supervisor dyads formed the final sample of the study.

The results provided support for our hypotheses. Psychological empowerment fully mediated the relationship between transformational leadership and task performance. Moreover, customer positive feedback moderated the indirect relationship between transformational leadership and task performance such that it was significant and positive only when customer feedback was low.

This paper contributes to the service marketing literature by showing that customer positive feedback can substitute for managers’ leadership in helping frontline employees feeling more in control of their work and psychologically empowered. Another useful contribution for practitioners is that customers may have a positive impact on frontline employees’ motivation state, which past research has little explored.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the consequences of experiencing social isolation in a context of dirty work. Relying on an integration of the job demands-resources model (Schaufeli and Bakker, 2004) with the social identity approach (Ashforth and Kreiner, 1999), the paper posits that perceived social isolation prevents the development of defense mechanisms that could counter the occupational stigma, and thus tends to increase perceptions of stigmatization, and to decrease perceptions of the prosocial impact of their work. Through these two perceptions, perceived social isolation indirectly affects emotional exhaustion and work engagement.

Research hypotheses are tested among a sample of 195 workers in the commercial cleaning industry who execute physically tainted tasks.

Results support the research model. Perceived prosocial impact mediates the negative relationship between perceived social isolation and work engagement, and perceived stigmatization mediates the positive relationship between perceived social isolation and emotional exhaustion.

This research contributes to the dirty work literature by empirically examining one of its implicit assumptions, namely, that social isolation prevents the development of coping strategies. It also contributes to the literature on well-being and work engagement by demonstrating how they are affected by the social context of work.

The present paper is the first to study the specific challenges of social isolation in dirty work occupations and its consequences.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the concept of occupational disidentification through the lens of conservation of resources (COR) theory (Hobfoll, 1989, 1998). Occupational disidentification is conceptualized as a coping strategy, or an investment of resources to cope with poor perceived prestige of the occupation, which represents a threat to an individual’s resource: one’s self-esteem. However, occupational disidentification, as an avoidance coping strategy, generates a loss of cognitive and emotional resources leading to emotional exhaustion and, in turn, departure from the organization.

The research hypotheses are tested among two samples of employees working in health and social services (Study 1, N=544), and in home care services (Study 2, N=113). Measures of employees’ attitudes were collected at the same time, and turnover was collected 18 months (Study 1) and 12 months (Study 2) later.

Research hypotheses are all supported. Occupational disidentification partially mediates the occupational prestige-emotional exhaustion relationship, and emotional exhaustion partially mediates the occupational disidentification-turnover intention relationship. Perceived organizational support moderates the negative relationship between perceived occupational prestige and occupational disidentification.

The main contribution of this study is the conceptualization of occupational disidentification within the theoretical framework of COR. In that vein, the study provides: a deeper understanding of the mechanisms explaining and buffering occupational disidentification, and empirical evidence of the key role of emotional exhaustion to explain the consequences of occupational disidentification.

The purpose of this paper is to rely on the sponsored-mobility perspective of career success (Turner, 1960) to explore the antecedents and consequences of development idiosyncratic deals (i-deals). The authors position career planning as an antecedent of development i-deals, and subjective and objective measures of career success as an outcome.

The authors led a two-wave study among a sample of 325 engineers to test the research hypotheses.

Results support the hypotheses. Development i-deals are positively related to three objective measures of career success (e.g. promotions, hierarchical level, and salary) and one subjective measure of career success (e.g. career satisfaction).

The results offer new perspectives to practitioners who want to better manage the careers of their talented employees by highlighting the positive effects of development i-deals on career success.

This paper relates i-deals to the field of careers.

The aim of this paper is to study the effects of pro‐diversity practices on perceived insider status, and explore the moderating role of leader‐member exchange in this relationship. The main and interactive effects on PIS are studied for cultural minority and majority groups.

Research hypotheses are tested with a questionnaire administered to 210 employees working in three Canadian organizations engaged in diversity management.

Results indicate that the main and interactive effects of organizational fairness and leader‐member exchange on perceived insider status are significant. The interactive effect on perceived insider status is higher for cultural minorities than for other employees.

This study shows the importance of perceived insider status in the field of diversity, identifies organizational fairness and leader‐member exchange as two significant organizational antecedents to perceived insider status, and describes the mechanisms linking these antecedents to perceived insider status (the interaction effects).

The main contribution of the research resides in the identification of perceived insider status as a variable that deserves more attention in the field of diversity. The article invites future research to explore the behavioral consequences of perceived insider status in diverse teams, and to pursue the understanding of mechanisms leading to feelings of inclusion.

The purpose of this paper is to present an empirical study of the link between psychological contract fulfilment and affective states at work. The paper argues that perceived organizational support is the key attitudinal intervening variable that arises from the cognitive assessment of the exchange relationship between employer and employee and is in turn related to the generation of affective states at work.

The paper tests this assumption using a manager sample of 249 participants and a longitudinal design.

Perceived organizational support mediates the relationship between psychological contract fulfilment and workplace affect.

Affect was not measured in real time, but through self‐reports. Future research could study how and under what conditions psychological contract fulfilment generates perceived organizational support.

One of the few studies that have sought to research the affective dimension of the psychological contract.

This paper studies the relationship between HR practices and firm performance. In that purpose, a list of high‐involvement practices – that is to say aiming to develop employees’ organizational commitment and involvement at work – is proposed. A survey among 180 French HR managers hightlights a significant link between most HR practices and firm performance. Moreover, the results show that these practices, when they are combined into bundles, have a stronger impact on performance than when they are studied individually.