How and why do social entrepreneurs experience goal conflict differently?

It is well-known that the need for both social and financial missions creates tension within social enterprises. Less well-known are the specifics around how and why social entrepreneurs themselves construct and experience their situation. Given people vary in their psychological representations of their goals from concrete (i.e., tasks) to more abstract (i.e., values), we anticipated that goal conflict with engaging in financial activities could vary along these lines, leading to potentially different solutions for support. Through collecting interviews and focus group data using goal hierarchies from 37 social entrepreneurs, we find six constructed realities with different salient goals at different levels of cognitive abstraction which either dictate, conflict with, or are dissociated from financial activities. These can explain why social entrepreneurs perceive their financial activities differently – financial activities as out of sight out of mind, aversive, a ball to juggle, a necessary evil, part and parcel, and as king - which are associated with four experiences of goal conflict (i.e., goal conflict as continual questioning, inevitable, manageable, and irrelevant).Publisher PDFPeer reviewe

Bringing Habits and Emotions into Food Waste Behaviour

This study examined consumer food waste behaviour using a comprehensive model integrating the theory of planned behaviour (TPB), the theory of interpersonal behaviour, and the comprehensive model of environmental behaviour. Using a temporally lagged design, one hundred and seventy-two respondents answered four questionnaires over a period of 14 months. Questionnaires measured emotions in relation to food waste, habits, the TPB variables, intention to reduce food waste, and self-reported food waste behaviour. Results showed that the less well-studied variables of habits and emotions were important determinants of participants’ intentions to reduce food waste and their current food waste behaviour. As expected, we found that negative emotions were associated with greater intentions to reduce food waste, but contrary to our predictions they were also associated with higher levels of food waste behaviour. In other words, participants who experienced more negative emotion when thinking about food waste intended to reduce their waste but actually ended up wasting more food. Results also show that participants with a greater sense of control, and more normative support for reducing food waste also had stronger intentions to engage in the behaviour. Our findings extend existing understanding and underscore the importance of the non-cognitive determinants of behaviour, namely emotions and habits. The implications for research and practice are discussed

It's political: How the salience of one's political identity changes climate change beliefs and policy support

Previous research has demonstrated a striking difference in climate change beliefs and policy support between people who identify with the right-wing of politics and with the left-wing of politics. But are we destined to continue with this divergence? We suggest that there is movement around these differences based on the politicization of climate change and we conducted two experimental studies with 126 and 646 people, respectively, to examine this effect. We found that those people whose political identity was made salient were less likely to believe in an anthropogenic cause of climate change and less likely to support government climate change policies than those whose identity was not made salient; particularly when those people were aligned with the right-wing of politics. The results demonstrate the importance of the salience of one's political identity in determining attitudes and beliefs even for scientific facts such as climate change. Our research also identifies some ways forward in dealing with climate change-based on depoliticizing the issue

The Role of Individualism-Collectivism Orientation in Training and Development

This study examined the relationship between employees’ individualism-collectivism (I-C) orientation and attitudes towards, and uptake of, training and development activity. A survey of 191 manufacturing employees ascertained their I-C orientation, preferences for development activity, and actual participation behaviour in development activities. The results showed that the greater the collectivistic orientation of an employee, the more they preferred activities that emphasised group skills. A preference for development activities that emphasised personal skills, however, was not related to I-C orientation. Collectivists participated more in activities that emphasised group skills than activities emphasising individual skills, while individualists showed the opposite trend. Implications, both theoretical and practical, are discussed

Developing A Team Vision

The overriding reason why people work in teams is because they share a common goal or purpose which they believe will be achieved more successfully by working together. This notion of shared purpose or shared vision is the defining element of teams at work. By taking the time to clearly define team vision, purpose and objectives, those who work within teams have a greater chance of being effective and creative in their work

Employee innovation: The roles of idea generation and idea implementation

This study tested the hypothesis that motivation, job competence and creative personality indirectly influenced innovation via idea generation. Results showed that the effects of creative personality and motivation on innovation were, indeed, mediated. It is proposed that innovation is not a unitary construct, but one that is composed of at least two stages

When does old age begin? The role of attitudes in age parameter placement

This research examined the influence of a person’s age and their attitudes towards ageing in their placement of age parameters, and in particular, their placement of the beginning of old age. Previous research has shown that as an individual’s age increases, their parameter for the beginning of old age is placed further along the lifespan. Two groups (young and middle-aged adults) were recruited to test the hypothesis that an individual’s attitude towards old age will mediate the relationship between age and the placement of this age parameter, such that the middle-aged group will hold more negative attitudes towards old age causing them to place the parameter further away. Results showed that middle-aged adults were, in fact, more optimistic towards old age than young adults. Despite this unanticipated finding, the mediation model was tested and found to be valid. Thus, middle-aged people were more optimistic towards old age and this caused them to place the age parameter further down the lifespan. Two possible explanations were suggested: an increase in contact with counterstereotypical older adults, and a possible confounding effect of optimism towards living a long life. Policy implications were discussed

Firefighting: The Effects of Time Pressure on Employee Innovation

Employees are facing greater and greater levels of time pressure, however, there is also a greater push for innovation. There is a need, therefore, to understand the effects of time pressure on employee innovation, particularly as previous research has provided conflicting results. I interviewed 65 engineers from four sites in two large organizations and found that three mechanisms underlay the relationship: prioritising, focusing, and risk aversion. When the innovation was of high priority, or a narrow focus was needed, time pressure facilitated employee innovation, however when the innovation was low priority, a broader focus was needed, or the innovation was in the evaluation or implementation stages, then time pressure impeded employee innovation