The strategy and change interface: Understanding 'Enabling" processes and cognitions

The aim of this special issue is to better understand the strategy and change interface, in particular, the (sub)processes and cognitions that enable strategies to be successfully implemented and organisations effectively changed. The ten papers selected for this special issue reflect a range of scholarly traditions and, thus, as our review and integration of the relevant literatures, and our introductions to the ten papers demonstrate, they shed light on the strategy and change interface in starkly different ways. Collectively, the papers give us more insight into the recursive activities, and structural, organizational learning and cognitive mechanisms that are encouraged or deliberately established at organizations to allow their people to successfully implement a strategy and effect change, including achieve greater levels of horizontal alignment. Moreover, they demonstrate the benefits associated with establishing platforms and/or routines designed to overcome decision-makers’ cognitive shortcomings while implementing a strategy or making timely adjustments to it. We conclude out editorial by identifying some yet unanswered questions

A multi-level analysis of team climate and interpersonal exchange relationships at work

This paper seeks to advance research on interpersonal exchange relationships between supervisors, subordinates, and coworkers at work by integrating social exchange, workplace friendship, and climate research to develop a multi-level model. We tested the model using hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) with data obtained from a sample of 215 manager–employee dyads working in 36 teams. At the individual level, leader–member exchange (LMX) was found to be related to workplace friendship. Further, workplace friendship was positively related to team–member exchange (TMX) and mediated the LMX–TMX relationship. At the team level, HLM results indicated that the relationship between LMX and workplace friendship was moderated by affective climate. These findings suggest that high-quality LMX relationships are associated with enhanced workplace friendship between employees, especially when the affective climate is strong

Schadenfreude: The (not so) Secret Joy of Another’s Misfortune

Despite growing interest in emotions, organizational scholars have largely ignored the moral emotion of schadenfreude, which refers to pleasure felt in response to another’s misfortune. As a socially undesirable emotion, it might be assumed that individuals would be hesitant to share their schadenfreude. In two experimental studies involving emotional responses to unethical behaviors, we find evidence to the contrary. Study 1 revealed that subjects experiencing schadenfreude were willing to share their feelings, especially if the misfortune was perceived to be deserved (i.e., resulting from unethical behaviors). Study 2 extends this work by incorporating schadenfreude targets of different status (CEO versus employee). Consistent with the “tall poppy syndrome,” subjects were more willing to share schadenfreude concerning high status targets than low status targets when the perceived severity of the target’s misconduct was low. This status effect disappeared at higher levels of perceived deservingness, however. Reported willingness to share schadenfreude was strongest at these levels but did not differ significantly between high and low status targets. These findings build on the social functional account of emotions, suggesting that sharing schadenfreude may signal normative cues to others regarding workplace behaviors that are deemed to be unethical

Talking about schadenfreude: sharing versus the social function

Talking about schadenfreude feelings can have effects that differ from the intended social functions of the emotion. In this chapter, we contend that schadenfreude is a complex emotion with both positive and negative valence. As such, socially sharing the emotion can have upsides as well as downsides, depending on how it is perceived by others. We illustrate this point by highlighting the benefits of sharing schadenfreude, as well as the negative perceptions that may form regarding the person expressing the schadenfreude. We propose that schadenfreude can play important social functional roles and that talking about it provides valuable information for observers. A number of situational and individual factors––which are not well understood––appear to help determine if the person expressing the schadenfreude is viewed positively or negatively by others. We conclude our chapter with a discussion of practical advice for individuals, as well as directions for future research