On the way to self-employment::The dynamics of career mobility

This qualitative study offers empirically-based explanations of the dynamics of career mobility trajectories to self-employment, a popular phenomenon in real life but less so in the literature. Embedded in the career ecosystem of an emerging-economy country, we investigate the mobility dynamics of people in different stages of their self-employment career. We conducted in-depth interviews with 35 individuals who opted for entrepreneurship or self-employed careers, and deploy the interpretive phenomenology to explore the dynamics of career mobility of self-employment. The results demonstrate different patterns of mobility between self- and paid employment during individuals’ career sequences. The different push and pull forces that influence mobility are identified and explained. The study advances the theories of career and entrepreneurship literature by not only illustrating the mobility dynamics of self-employment as a stage of one’s career but by also exploring the dynamic mechanisms of the mobility, drawing on the career ecosystem framework

Factors related to knowledge creation and career outcomes in French academia: The case of the human resource management field

In response to the increasing discourse on academic careers and knowledge creation, we develop and test a model predicting research performance in the field of management outside the Anglo-Saxon countries. Based on comprehensive data of French academics, we examine various factors – career-related and demographic factors like gender – that play a role in determining academic research performance in an increasingly global academia. The role of the English language is positively related to citations but not to the volume of papers or their global/national recognition. Higher institutional reputations were positively associated to number of papers, citations, and national recognition. Strikingly, there was no relationship with global recognition, suggesting that the reputation of institutions plays a role, but only insofar as the national context and without spillover into the global academic scene. Finally, men were over-performing in both publications’ quality and quantity. Career experience had a positive effect, although this reduced gradually over time. Our findings can help individuals’ career decision-making and institutional investment in human-capital. We offer an original contribution to facilitate the understanding of factors that may influence research performance outside the Anglo-Saxon academia by opening of the black box of knowledge development, exposing the role of academic publications and recognition

Modeling team knowledge sharing and team flexibility : the role of within-team competition

This study examines the role of within-team competition (i.e. team hypercompetition and team development competition) in a team process. We developed and tested a model that associates team collectivism as the antecedent of within-team competition, and knowledge sharing and team flexibility as the outcomes. The model was empirically tested with data from 141 knowledge-intensive teams. The empirical findings showed that team collectivism had a positive relationship with team development competition and a negative relationship with team hypercompetition. Regarding the outcomes, team development competition and team hypercompetition had an indirect relationship with knowledge sharing and team flexibility through team empowerment. We offer a number of original contributions to the team effectiveness literature, especially by showing that team hypercompetition and team development competition have different impacts on team knowledge sharing and team flexibility

Team Performance in Cross Cultural Project Teams: The Moderated Mediation role of Consensus, Heterogeneity, Faultlines and Trust

Purpose To test the conditional effect of team composition on team performance, specifically, how collective team orientation, group consensus, faultline configurations and trust among team members explain team project objective performance in cross-cultural contexts. Design/methodology/approach Employing path analytical framework and bootstrap methods, we analyze data from a sample of 73 cross-cultural project teams. We assess the impact of group functioning on overall objective performance through dispersion and faultline measures aggregated at the team level. Relying on ordinary least square regression, we estimate the direct and indirect effects of the moderated mediation model. Findings This study demonstrates that the indirect effect of collective team orientation on performance through team trust is moderated by team member consensus, diversity heterogeneity, and faultlines strength. By contrast, high dispersion among members, heterogeneous team configurations and strong team faultlines lead to low levels of trust and team performance. Research limitations/implications Although we integrated the different measures of group consensus and diversity configurations to provide a more accurate picture at the team level, some other limits such as team members' countries-of-origin and the cultural effects of collective team orientation should be taken into further consideration. Moreover, the specific context of the study (MBA and upper undergraduate student work projects) may also have undermined external validity and limited the generalization of our findings. Practical implications From a practical standpoint, these results may help practitioners understand how the emergence of trust contributes to performance. It will also help them comprehend the importance of managing teams while bearing in mind the cross-cultural contexts in which they operate. Social implication In order to foster team consensus and overcome the effects of group members' cross-cultural dissimilarities as well as team faultlines, organizations should invest in improving members' dedication, cooperation, and trust before looking to achieve significant results, specially in heterogeneous teams and cross-cultural contexts. Originality/value This study advances organizational group research by showing the combined effect of team configurations and collective team orientation to overall team performance and by exploring significant constructs such as team consensus, team trust, and diversity fault line strength to examine their possible moderated mediation role in the process

Storytelling in an age of uncertainty: exploring managerial cognitive capability, expectations and sense giving in narratives post the financial crisis of 2007

Drawing on the theories of the managerial cognitive capability, sociology of expectations, and sense giving, we conducted a longitudinal study based on storytelling. We focus on how the banking and finance sectors in the UK communicated with their stakeholders in an age of high uncertainty, via annual reports during the period of 2007-2015. We investigated how organizational narratives and stories regarding the TMT’s managerial cognitive capability were changed by events which resulted in uncertainty, and how critical events could produce variations of the narratives by employing content analysis with two cycles of coding with NVivo 10. The findings significantly contribute to theory development in the areas of storytelling and sensegiving as part of TMT’s managerial cognitive capability during periods of change and uncertainty in business management, as well as to practice

Perceived organizational support and organizational identification : joint moderating effects of employee exchange ideology and employee investment

Organizational identification (OID) can be developed out of social exchange practices within an organizational setting. Drawing on social exchange theory, we propose that the effect of perceived organizational support (POS) on OID is stronger for employees with stronger exchange ideology. We further argue that employee investment in an organization may also create a social exchange process that positively influences OID. We expect that employee investment moderates not only the effect of POS on OID, but also the enhancing effect of exchange ideology on the effect of POS on OID. Specifically, POS has a stronger positive effect on OID when exchange ideology is high and when employee investment is low. When employee investment is high, POS has a weaker effect on OID regardless of employees’ exchange ideology. These effects were empirically supported by a survey. Theoretical and practical implications are also discussed

Quid pro quo? The future for graduate development programmes through the lens of talent management

The value of graduate development programmes (GDPs) from a talent management (TM) perspective is unknown. The contemporary TM literature focuses primarily on talent programmes for existing employees whereas less attention has been placed on externally recruited talent pools, in particular graduates. Attracting graduate talent is a priority for many organisations, as evidenced by the amount of investment contributed to this activity, but research on the employer’s intended outcomes and expectations of partici- pants in GDPs seems to lack coherence. To bridge this gap, this paper aims to develop a conceptual model to explicate the nature and process of GDP, using TM and the wider career literature. The model helps in our understanding of what contextual factors are important and how these factors influence policy and practice to GDPs. We also explore the value of GDPs based on the psychological contract perspec- tive in a contemporary career system. To achieve these aims, the paper investigates how the design and agenda of GDPs may be reframed by analysing several literatures including talent pool segmentation, identity, psychological contract theory and career management. We also expand the existing TM literature by exploring the factors that directly impact the outcomes of GDPs and set future research agenda

University’s shared vision for research and teaching: an international comparative study

How do universities encourage academics to buy into a shared vision while often setting punitive targets in teaching and research? This article explores possible antecedents of a university’s shared vision and its relationships with academics’ research and teaching performance in the era of managerialism. This cross-country study of two large universities in the UK and Vietnam draws on data from multiple sources to uncover the key components of a university’s shared vision. A survey strategy was adopted. Data were collected from different sources, using a stratified random sampling technique from academics of different schools at those universities. A total of 431 survey responses from academics at these universities were included for analysis, employing structure equation modelling. It provides fresh insights into whether having a shared vision can benefit academics’ research and teaching performance. The findings of this study show that while achieving a high degree of shared vision may enhance research performance, it may do little to improve teaching performance. The study provides empirical evidence indicating that a shared vision emerges as strongly rooted within individual employees rather than managers, challenging the common belief that a shared vision emanates primarily from the top down. This article advances social exchange theory (SET) by showing the interdependence of workplace antecedents, personal attributes, interpersonal connections, and performance. It introduces a framework for the relationship between universities’ shared vision with its possible antecedents and with academics’ teaching performance and research performance. The article also discusses useful implications for higher education leaders, based on the findings of the study