Acompanhando a inovação organizacional pela investigação: o caso da avaliação de desempenho de diretores de escola italianos

In 2015, the Italian parliament approved the law no. 107, named “La Buona Scuola” (“The Good School”), in order to boost the quality of organizational processes in schools. Among these, one of the most innovative was introducing a performance evaluation procedure for the nearly 7000 school principals of Italian public schools, from primary to college.From 2000 on, the legal status of schools principals in the public system have been set to the managerial level. However, no formal performance evaluation had been really performed before. In 2016, the INVALSI (the governmental agency for the evaluation of the national education system - http://www.invalsi.it/invalsi/index.php) was instructed to formulate a project aimed to: i) translate into concrete organizational procedures the goals dictated by the law; ii) train the evaluation teams needed; iii) monitor by an appropriate research design the outcomes of the new performance evaluation.The paper describes and discusses the training programme for assessors, the research design and some preliminary results.Em 2015, o parlamento italiano aprovou a lei nº 107, denominada “La Buona Scuola” (“A Boa Escola”), com o objetivo de impulsionar a qualidade dos processos organizacionais nas escolas. Entre eles, um dos mais inovadores foi a introdução de um procedimento de avaliação de desempenho para os quase 7 mil diretores de escolas públicas italianas, do ensino primário ao universitário.Já desde 2000 que o estatuto legal dos diretores de escolas no sistema público ficou definido para o nível de gestão. No entanto, nenhuma avaliação formal de desempenho foi antes realmente realizada.Em 2016, a INVALSI (a agência governamental para a avaliação do sistema nacional de educação - http://www.invalsi.it/invalsi/index.php) foi instruída no sentido de formular um projeto com o objetivo de: i) traduzir em procedimentos organizacionais concretos; os objetivos ditados pela lei; ii) treinar as equipes de avaliação necessárias; iii) monitorizar, por meio de um desenho de investigação apropriado, os resultados da nova avaliação de desempenho.Este artigo descreve e discute o programa de formação para avaliadores, o desenho da investigação e alguns resultados preliminares

Grundsätzliches zur Kulturtheorie der latènezeitlichen Kelten

Die Ausgangsbasis meiner Arbeit war die Annahme, dass „die Kelten“, die uns durch die antiken Quellen überliefert sind, nicht in erster Linie durch Sprache, materielle Kultur oder ihre Geschichte beschrieben werden können. Ich habe mich bemüht, den Begriff der „eisenzeitlichen Kelten“ in den Kontext ihrer Lebenswirklichkeit zu stellen. Im ersten Teil der Arbeit habe ich die Dekonstruktion des „Kelten“-Begriffes in der aktuellen Fachliteratur zusammengefasst. Durch die anschließende Fokussierung auf die archäologische Perspektive konnte aufgezeigt werden, wie antike Begriffe und Konzepte zum Umgang mit frühgeschichtlichen Quellen in der modernen Keltenforschung und Archäologie diskutiert werden. Die Problematisierung der ethnischen Deutung und der Konzeption der „archäologischen Kulturen“ führte zur Notwendigkeit, das Konzept der „materiellen Kultur“ näher zu betrachten. Im zweiten Teil habe ich deshalb verschiedene Ansätze zur Konzeption von „materieller Kultur“, sowie die Problematik der „archäologischen Kultur“ zusammenfassend vorgestellt. Das Problem der Verknüpfung der Erkenntnisse aus interdisziplinären Quellen, sowie die Beeinflussung der Ergebnisse durch die Perspektiven der jeweiligen wissenschaftlichen Zugänge, wurden auch thematisiert. Im dritten Teil der Arbeit habe ich mich schließlich um die Einbettung dieser Diskussionen in einen kulturtheoretischen Rahmen bemüht. Anhand der Zusammenfassung von wichtigen Kultur-Konzepten wurde deutlich, dass „Kultur“ ein vielfältiger Begriff ist, der unterschiedlich aufgefasst und ausgerichtet werden kann. Dadurch erhält er verschiedene Implikationen und kann auch mehrere Funktionen einnehmen. Abschließend kam ich auf die Konzeption von „Kultur“ in einem altertumswissenschaftlichen Rahmen und den „Kelten“-Begriff zurück. Mein Versuch war es, verschiedene Ansätze mit dem Leitthema „Kultur“ nebeneinander zu stellen und das Konzept der eisenzeitlichen Kelten damit in Zusammenhang zu bringen. Diese weite Perspektive ermöglicht die kritische Hinterfragung von fachspezifisch verwendeten Begriffen, die auch in anderen Kulturwissenschaften verwendet und thematisiert werden. Anstelle der leichtfertigen Verwendung von Kultur-, Ethnos- oder Identitätsbegriffen sollte nach Definitionen und Modellen gesucht werden, die geeignete Werkzeuge zur Erlangung von kontextgerechten Erkenntnissen über Lebenswirklichkeiten vergangener Gesellschaften dienen können. Wir sind über die Ansicht hinausgewachsen, dass Wissenschaft zu endgültigem Wissen beiträgt; das letzte Wort ist nie gesprochen. Wir wissen, dass wir nicht wissen, sondern in vielen Fällen nur annehmen können. Warum also nicht mehrere Lösungsmöglichkeiten akzeptieren?The starting point of my diploma thesis was the hypothesis, that „the Celts“ cannot be described or defined only by their languages, material cultures or history separately. I tried to put the term „the Iron Age Celts“ in context of their everyday life („Lebenswirklichkeit”). No matter how we define „the Celts”, they were humans interacting with the surrounding world, which includes all elements like language, material culture and so on. In the first chapter I summarized the deconstruction of the term „Celts” based on current debates. Focussing on the problems of the term „archaeological culture” and the ethnic interpretation of archaeological sources, I tried to summarize the difficulties of defining the Celts based on the constructed relation of ancient terms and other evidence like the material culture of the „Latène Culture”. In the second chapter I enlarged upon the concept of „material culture” and the associated implications for archaeology. I tried to resume the difficulties coming along with the construction of connections between interdisciplinary evidences in archaeology. The influence of the scientist’s point of view and methods used in the scientific process are important factors. In the third chapter I tried to relate the preceding issues to theoretical concepts and debates in Culture Theory. The concept of „culture” can be used and defined in many ways. The issue is to find suitable definitions of the term, which are applicable to problems in Classical Studies. I tried to connect various approaches to „culture” with the concept of the „Iron Age Celts”. A broad and interdisciplinary view can lead to a more critical usage of constitutive terms like „the Celts” or „culture”. We have got over the assumption, that science leads to final knowledge. Why not accept various conclusions

Enhancing Workers’ Well-Being. Scientific and social relevance of managing stress in the workplace

Purpose. Despite work-related stress is one of the most studied topic in organizational psychology, many aspects as for example the use of different measures (e.g. subjective and objective, qualitative and quantitative) are still under debate. According to this, in order to enhance knowledge concerning which factors and processes contribute to create healthy workplaces, this thesis is composed by four different studies aiming to understand: a) the role of relevant antecedents (e.g. leadership, job demands, work-family conflict, social support etc.) and outcomes (e.g. workplace phobia, absenteeism etc.) of work-related stress; and b) how to manage psychosocial risk factors in the workplace. The studies. The first study focused on how disagreement between supervisors and their employees on leadership style (transformational and transactional) could affect workers well-being and work team variables. The second and third study used both subjective and objective data in order to increase the quality of the reliability of the results gained. Particularly, the second study focused on job demand and its relationship with objective sickness leave. Findings showed that despite there is no direct relationship between these two variables, job demand affects work-family conflict, which in turn affect exhaustion, which leads to absenteeism. The third study analysed the role of a new concept never studied before in organizational settings (workplace phobia), as a health outcome in the JD-R model, demonstrating also its relationship with absenteeism. The last study highlighted the added value of using the mixed methods research approach in order to detect and analyse context-specific job demands which could affects workers’ health. Conclusion. The findings of this thesis answered both to open questions in the scientific literature and to the social request of managing psychosocial risk factors in the workplace in order to enhance workers well-being

A weekly diary within-individual investigation of the relationship between exposure to bullying behavior, workplace phobia, and posttraumatic stress symptomatology

Most studies on workplace bullying have adopted a between-person approach, neglecting the potential within-individual fluctuations in the experience of bullying behaviors. However, investigating such fluctuations may prove useful for uncovering processes and mechanisms associated with bullying and its antecedents and consequences as they unfold over time. In the present study, based on recent discoveries on traumatic experiences and posttraumatic stress (PTS), we hypothesized that even short-term exposure to bullying behaviors—such as the exposure that characterizes an individual when the time window considered is a working week—may already have a substantial psychological impact at the within-individual level, as indicated by the experience of PTS symptoms. Additionally, we hypothesized that the development of workplace phobia may act as a mechanism linking the exposure to bullying behaviors during the week and the reported PTS symptomatology, and that person-level vulnerability factors to PTS (e.g., a recent trauma and female gender) accentuate the within-individual relationships. We tested the proposed hypotheses on a sample of 158 workers that were followed for 6 consecutive working weeks for a total of 860 observations. In line with other recent within-individual investigations, we found that exposure to bullying behaviors shows substantial week-level fluctuations. We also found overall support for the hypotheses, including evidence of a within-level lagged impact of bullying behaviors on workplace phobia, suggesting that even nonpersistent exposure to such behaviors is related to potentially nonignorable psychological suffering and PTS symptoms

Why We Need Open Science Communication Experts

Im Kontext von Open Science entstehen neue Anforderungen und Erwartungen an die Wissenschaftscommunities, was Kommunikation und Disseminierung von Forschungsergebnissen betrifft. Mit der steigenden Bedeutung von Mikro-Blogging, Social Media und anderen interaktiven Web 2.0 Anwendungen in der Kommunikation mit Zielgruppen außerhalb des akademischen Umfeldes steigt der Druck auf WissenschaftlerInnen vermehrt Marketing-orientierte Kommunikationsstrategien und Inhalte anzuwenden. In diesem Artikel diskutieren wir, wie sich Wissenschaftskommunikation sowie die Rollen von WissenschaftlerInnen und WissenschaftskommunikatorInnen durch Open Science verändern. Wir argumentieren, dass die Schaffung neuer Wissenschaftskommunikations-Rollen und Positionen zur Überwindung aktueller Herausforderungen der Wissenschaftskommunikation nötig ist.The changing open science landscape leads to new requirements and expectations in terms of dissemination, communication and outreach. With the increasing importance of micro blogging, social media and other interactive Web 2.0 channels for communicating research outcomes to target audiences outside academia, pressure on researchers to apply more marketing-oriented communication strategies and produce related content increases. In this paper we discuss how research dissemination and communication as well as the roles of researchers and science communicators are transforming in an open science context. We argue that the introduction of new science communication roles and positions is necessary to solve current gaps in public science communication

Coping With Negative Stereotypes Toward Older Workers: Organizational and Work-Related Outcomes

The current study aims to test a moderated-mediation model in which occupational self-efficacy determines the indirect effect of negative stereotypes about older workers in the organization both on psychological engagement in the work domain and on attitudes toward development opportunities through identification with the company. The survey involved 1,501 Italian subjects aged over 50 who were employed by a major large-scale retailer. Consistently with the Social Identity Theory and the Social Exchange Theory, results showed that the perception of negative stereotypes about older workers in the organization is associated with low identification with the company and, subsequently, with poor psychological engagement in the work domain and with attitudes indicating very little interest in development opportunities. In addition, this association was found to be stronger in older workers with higher and medium levels of occupational self-efficacy. These findings suggest that organizations should discourage the dissemination of negative stereotypes about older workers in the workplace because they may lead to older workers’ disengagement from the work domain and their loss of interest in development opportunities

The Hardier You Are, the Healthier You Become. May Hardiness and Engagement Explain the Relationship Between Leadership and Employees’ Health?

The main goal of this study was to delve deeper into the relationship between transformational leadership and better general health status among employees. Based on the Job Demands-Resources model of occupational well-being, the current research investigated the role of transformational leadership, as a job resource, in fostering individual hardiness, as a personal resource, which may in turn result in higher levels of work engagement and, consequently, better general health status among employees. Data were collected from 358 white-collar employees in an Italian company. Most of them were women (52.9%) with a mean age of 44.42 years (SD = 9.22). To evaluate the hypothesis of a mediating role of employees’ hardiness and work engagement within the relationship between transformational leadership and workers’ general health, a bootstrapping approach was tested using a serial mediation model. In the current sample, enhanced levels of hardiness and work engagement among employees mediated the association between perceived levels of transformational leadership and individual general health conditions. These findings corroborated the role of transformational leadership as a strategic job resource in enhancing employees’ hardiness and engagement with their work, which may in turn protect their general health status. Organizations willing to rely on a healthy workforce should implement human resource management strategies focused on leadership training capable of boosting employees’ hardiness

Workplace Bullying as a Risk Factor for Musculoskeletal Disorders: The Mediating Role of Job-Related Psychological Strain

Workplace bullying is considered by the European Agency for Safety and Health at Work one of the emerging psychosocial risk factors that could negatively affect workers’ health. Thus, the aim of this study was to analyze the process that leads from bullying to negative health (such as musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs)), testing the mediating role of job-related strain. Data were collected on 512 workers (62.9% female; mean age = 43.6 years) of a retail chain who filled in a self-report questionnaire after a one-hour training session on work-related stress. Data analyses were performed controlling for potentially confounding variables (i.e., gender, age, organizational role, type of contract, and perceived physical job demands). Preacher and Hayes analytical approach was used to test the indirect relationship between bullying and MSDs. Results showed that work-related strain mediates the relationship between bullying and MSDs considered (low back, upper back, and neck) except for MSDs of the shoulders. Our study confirms the role played by bullying and job-related strain in determining workers’ MSDs

What Teachers Tell Us About the Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Public Education in Italy

The Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) state of emergency has brought about a radical change in the way of teaching. In a questionnaire, we asked 120 teachers from Italian Primary, Middle and High Schools about the advantages and disadvantages of online teaching, the students’ conduct during lessons and the methodologies applied to students with special educational needs. Primary School teachers most strongly reported an increase in boredom and distraction, and disagreed that online teaching helps students’ learning and that it makes them more active. The main advantage of online teaching was the technical and methodological innovations, while the main disadvantage was the lack of relationship with students. In the case of students with special educational needs, many teachers reported that they used simplified procedures and personalized meetings. Overall, teachers appear to think that online teaching has many drawbacks, though it also has some positive aspects that need to be appreciated and exploited

Defining discovery:is Google Scholar a discovery platform? An essay on the need for a new approach to scholarly discovery

This essay discusses the concept of discovery, intended as content discovery, and defines it in the new context of Open Science, with a focus on Social Sciences and Humanities (SSH). Starting from the example of Google Scholar, the authors show that this well established service does not address the current needs, practices, and variety of discovery. Alternatives in terms of technical choices, features, and governance, do however exist, offering richer and more open discovery. The paper presents in particular the implementations and research work of the H2020 project TRIPLE (Transforming Research through Innovative Practices for Linked Interdisciplinary Exploration). Dedicated to the building of a discovery platform for the SSH, the project is meant to address the specificities and evolution of discovery in this field. Prevailing scholarly resource platforms like Google Scholar limit discovery by focussing only on publications, and favouring through their algorithm well-cited papers, English content, and discipline-specific resources. A limitation in the context of cross-disciplinary and collaborative Open Science, such a service more specifically hinders discovery in the SSH. Characterized by a fragmented landscape, a variety of languages, data types, and outputs, research in the SSH requires services that fully exploit discovery potentialities. Moreover, a survey conducted within the TRIPLE project showed that most SSH researchers use Google Scholar as their starting point, and that they recognise the lack of control they have with this system. Beyond the extension of features and content, transparency is the other important criterion for the building of an Open Infrastructure actually serving the research community. In light of this, we present in some detail the GoTriple platform, which exploits today's technological potential and incorporates the best known functionalities in order to unveil more and innovative scholarly outputs and lead to international and interdisciplinary research project collaborations