Staying on track: The buffering effect of culture on leadership strength and derailment potential

This paper examines the notion that derailment potential and leadership strength are complex but related to facets of leadership development and effectiveness. Using data from 766 managers from two subsidiaries in Japan and US, the authors argue that managers can develop leadership strength to guard against some aspects of derailment. Further, the paper shows that aspects of culture have a buffer effect on relationships of leadership strength and derailment. The relationship between leadership strength and derailment was found to be stronger in US than in Japan. Implications of the findings are discussed for talent management practices and cross-cultural studies

Proactivity with image in mind: How employee and manager characteristics affect evaluations of proactive behaviours

This paper investigates image cost as a potential downside of proactivity. Drawing on attribution theory, we examine how people construct subjective evaluations of one manifestation of proactivity, feedback-seeking behaviour. Using a scenario methodology, we examined how employees' performance history, their manager's implicit person theory (IPT), and the frequency of their feedback-seeking affect how managers evaluate employees' feedback seeking. Results indicate that manager attribute average performers' feedback seeking significantly less to performance-enhancement motives than superior performers' seeking. Results further show that the frequency of feedback seeking and a manager's IPT interact in influencing managers' attributions for feedback seeking, with more entity oriented managers attributing frequent feedback seeking significantly more to impression-management motives than infrequent feedback requests. These results highlight the importance of not only the instrumental benefits of employee proactivity, but also its potential costs.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/79279/1/096317909X479529.pd